“Why, the Super.”

“Yes, the Super hands the plans down to you, but who plans the work for him?”

“Why, the Chief.”

“Now, look here; the Chief comes to his office at ten o’clock in the morning.  He uses his head until noon.  He leaves at noon, and perhaps he doesn’t come back until two or three o’clock.  He uses his head then until five or, sometimes, until four; then he goes off to play golf.  But as the result of those few hours’ use of the Chief’s head, the Superintendent, and you six or eight foremen, and all the two hundred men under your direction work a whole day or a week, or even a month, as you know.  You are merely carrying out in a mechanical, routine kind of a way the thoughts and ideas that another man thinks.  Now, you have the ability to think for yourself.”

“I could think for myself,” said he, “but I can’t do all the figuring that is necessary in order to decide just what size wire should go here, and what kind of equipment should go there, and all the different things.  That’s beyond me.”

“Yes, it is beyond you now, but it doesn’t need to be beyond you.  You have the mental ability to learn to use those formulae just as well as the Chief does.  The thing necessary is for you to learn how to do it, to get needful education.  Now, you are young, and you’re strong, and you’ve got lots of time before you.  If you want to make more money, the way to do it is to learn to use your head and save weeks, months of time, as well as the labor of your hands.”

“If I went off to college or university for two or three years, I don’t think Bessie would wait for me,” said he.  “She wants to get married.  I want to, too, and I think we ought to do it.”

AN EDUCATION BY CORRESPONDENCE

“Well,” said his counselor, “you don’t need to go off to school.  You can take electrical engineering in a correspondence course, even after you are married.  You’re making good wages now as a foreman.  Your hours of work are only eight a day, and you have plenty of time in the evenings and on holidays and other times to study this subject.  Besides, you will probably make better progress studying it while you work at the trade than you would in school and withdrawn from the practical applications of the principles that you are learning.”

The result of all this was that D.B. did take a correspondence course in electrical engineering.  It was pretty tough work.  He had not studied for years.  One of the first things he had to learn was how to study; how to concentrate; how to learn the things he had to know without tremendous waste of energy.  After a little while he learned how to study.  Then he progressed, a little at a time, with the intricate and complicated mathematics of the profession he had determined to make his own.  Again and again he was puzzled, perplexed, and almost defeated.  But his young wife encouraged him, and when things got so bad that he thought he would have to give it all up, he would go and talk with his counselor, who would inspire him with new ambition, so that he would go to work again.  So, month after month, year after year, he struggled away with his correspondence course in electrical engineering.  Little by little, he got hold of the technical knowledge necessary for professional engineering work.