Doctor Grenfell then suggested his plan.  It was this.  They would form a company.  They would open a store for themselves.  Through the store their furs and fish would be sent to market and they would get just as big a price for their products as the traders got.  They would buy the store supplies at wholesale just as cheaply as the traders could buy them.  They would elect one of their number, who could keep accounts, to be storekeeper.  They would buy the things they needed from the store at a reasonable price, and at the end of the year each would be credited with his share of the profits.  In other words, they would organize a co-operative store and trading system and be their own traders and storekeepers.

This meant breaking off from the traders with whom they had always dealt and all hope of ever securing advance of supplies from them again.  It was a hazardous venture for the fishermen to make.  They did not understand business, but they were desperate and ready for any chance that offered relief, and in the end they decided to do as Doctor Grenfell suggested.

Each man was to have a certain number of shares of stock in the new enterprise.  The store would be supplied at once, and each family would be able to get from it what was needed to live upon during the winter.  Any fish they might have on hand would be turned over to the store, credited as cash, and sent to market at once, in a schooner to be chartered for the purpose and this schooner would bring back to Red Bay the winter’s supplies.

A canvass then was made with the result that among the seventeen families the entire assets available for purchasing supplies amounted to but eighty-five dollars.  This was little better than nothing.

Doctor Grenfell had faith in Skipper Tom and the others.  They were honest and hard-working folk.  He knew that all they required was an opportunity to make good.  He was determined to give them the opportunity, and he announced, without hesitation, that he would personally lend them enough to pay for the first cargo and establish the enterprise.  Can any one wonder that the people love Grenfell?  He was the one man in the whole world that would have done this, or who had the courage to do it.  He knew well enough that he was calling down upon his own head the wrath of the traders.

The schooner was chartered, the store was stocked and opened, and there was enough to keep the people well-fed, well-clothed, happy and comfortable through the first year.

In the beginning there were some of the men who were actually afraid to have it known they were interested in the store, such was the fear with which the traders had ruled them.  They were so timid, indeed, about the whole matter that they requested no sign designating the building as a store be placed upon it.  That, they declared, would make the traders angry, and no one knew to what lengths these former slaveholders might go to have revenge upon them.  It is no easy matter to shake oneself free from the traditions of generations and it was hard for these trappers and fishermen to realize that they were freed from their ancient bondage.  But Doctor Grenfell fears no man, and, with his usual aggressiveness, he nailed upon the front of the store a big sign, reading: