Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 27.djvu/804

782 less difficulty and loss. It is the bond of closer friendly relationship between employer and employé, and has fostered a feeling that the interests of both are identical. It has done away with all pretext for joining organizations inimical to labor, as well as with all justification for seeking charitable assistance from the company or from fellow employés.

It is the almost unanimous testimony of the railroad company's officials that it would now be most difficult, if not impossible, to inaugurate a general strike among the members of this association.

Personal appeals to the managers of the company for pecuniary assistance on behalf of unfortunate employés are now unknown in this service, and this relief from solicitation has reacted favorably upon the morale of the force by inducing independence and contentment. Besides the many patent advantages accruing to the company from the savings fund and building features, is the important one of converting a proverbially migratory force into a permanent one, which is gradually locating itself at points where the company's interests will best be subserved and protected.

Under the pension feature the provision made for the support during life of its aged and permanently disabled employés enables the company to dispense at will with many old servants, who. though incapacitated by mental or bodily infirmity, often the effect of injuries received in the service, must, under ordinary conditions, through sheer humanity, be borne on the rolls, though, as all administrative officers know, to the disadvantage and frequently to the endangering of the company's interests.

In brief, the best possible testimony of the good results attained lies in the fact that, as the result of two years' trial of the plan, such a conservative corporation as the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company undertook further obligations on its behalf which, if capitalized, would amount to over a half a million dollars, and is contemplating still further donations to the same cause.

Railroading is rapidly advancing beyond the boundaries of a mere business, and into the dignity of a profession requiring extensive knowledge of many branches of science, technical training of a high order, and already requires a devotion to corporate interests from its staff-officers and many subordinates that necessitates the sacrifice of their independence, and all opportunity of securing competence in other channels, while it has not branches or departments in which intelligence, energy, and scrupulous honesty are not required. And, as of the great armies of railroad operatives only a few, comparatively, can gain wealth or competence, the great majority who give to their work equal devotion and their full measure of ability yearn for recognition m their sphere, and in no more effective or acceptable way can they be rewarded than that in which the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad has recognized the self-abnegation and faithfulness of its servants.