“PROGRESS AND POVERTY” CHANGED HIS WHOLE LIFE.
One day, while traveling, Mr. Johnson came across a book which was destined to influence his career vitally. This book was Henry George’s “Progress and Poverty.” There, he thought, was the solution of the great social questions of the age, and from that moment he was an ardent “single-taxer.” Indeed, the desire to benefit his fellowmen by opening their eyes to what he considered the truth, had become his first consideration in life, more important even than his business. Forthwith he set about to convert his father and partner, and when, soon thereafter, the chance for action on a larger stage presented itself, he was himself irresistibly impelled to seize it, despite distrust in his own ability. Owing to his uniform plan of considering the comfort of the public in the operation of his railway lines, he had earned for himself unsought popularity in the city of Cleveland, where rival companies had practiced a reactionary system of niggardliness and indifference. The reward came not only in financial prosperity, but also in the form of an unexpected nomination to congress.