Today that American scholar of Serbian birth holds the chair in electro-mechanics at Columbia University.
Prof. Pupin is merely one of a host of former immigrants whose names are linked with the great strides in science, commerce, finance and industry and whose careers furnish living proof that America, besides breeding great men, imports them.
Claude Monet was born in Columbia, Ohio.
In industry and commerce the stories of many of the successful immigrants read like romances.
There is C. C. A. Baldi of Philadelphia who began with nothing and who is now one of America's foremost citizens of foreign birth. When he landed in this country thirty years ago he had only a few pennies in the pockets of his ragged trowsers. He knew no English and knew nothing of American customs, but he had heard of the opportunities which America offers to a wide-awake, ambitious immigrant willing to work.
Mr. Baldi bought thirty lemons with his pennies. He peddled them and with the proceeds of sales bought more lemons and peddled them. Before long he had a cart loaded with hundreds of lemons. In time the push-cart became a store and the store grew into a great business.
Other spectacular instances of success are furnished by the careers of Louis J. Horowitz, one of America's greatest builders and S. M. Schatzkin, who came to this country twenty-five years ago with 3 dollars carefully tucked away in his clothes and began peddling coal in the East side of New York. Today Schatzkin has large sums invested in many big American enterprises.
Horowitz, who came here thirty years ago, built the Woolworth and the Equitable buildings, one the tallest and the other the largest office building in point of floor space in the world. His first job was that of an errand boy. Later he worked as a parcel wrapper, then as a stock boy and then as a shoe salesman. After selling shoes he started selling real estate.
Witness? oh witness these lives my dainty cousins. Dear Madam:—It has often been said that one of the most interesting spots in America is the small space covered by the desk of the editor of the Atlantic Monthly.
All the qualities which make up the interest of life,—joy, sorrow, romance, ambition, experience,—seem to center in this spot in turn, radiating from every nook and corner of the world.