Viewing page 81 of 99

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

22 

Michigan Central but he sold them everything from wire and cable to transformers and switchgear. 

I already knew Charlie and Tal because they came to Erie ocassionally. Otherwise, the Detroit Office was a blank when I started the Ford proposition. The man who handled the Ford account was a small, middle -aged, well-dressed individual named Dyke Harvey. Dyke didn't know beans about locomotives but he knew the Ford Motor Company from a salesman's viewpoint, from A to Izzard. He was fussy. He was a worrier. Everything had to be just so. Nothing was too good for Ford, who gave him several millions of business every year. At first, Dyke was a pain to work with. I doubt if he was overly impressed with me as a worthy emissary to Ford; my youthful appearance indicated I couldn't have had much experience and this was a handicap I usually had to spend many months overcoming when I walked in to a set-up like this who knew nothing about me. So I had to sell myself to Dyke as well as to Ford and I'm sure the latter was considerable easier. In fact, I vaguely recall being tempted to tell Dyke a few times where to shove the job. But gradually Dyke and I established a better relationship and before it was over, we were good friends. In fact, he had me out to his house for dinner one night and I met his wife. I don't remember but two things about this affair: first, I'm quite sure they were childless, which may have explained why Dyke was such a fussy old crab some of the time, and second, Mrs. Harvey served liver and bacon for dinner and it was all I could do to choke down the mealy stuff. But the point was that Dyke had apparently finally accepted me. And I should point out an evident thing, I suppose: you weren't assigned the Ford apparatus account if you didn't have a good deal on the ball--so I had to conclude that Dyke was well-liked at Ford and brought home the bacon to GE. 

The manager of the GE Apparatus Sales Office was Bill Cameron. He was an urbane, handsome, beautifully-groomed man of maybe fifty. He looked the part of someone who could mix easily with the titans of Detroit industry from Henry Ford I down the line. And I guess he possessed this ability. He had one unforgivable flaw. He was a first-class son of a bitch. I doubt if there was one employee of his office who didn't hate him with a cold and implacable intensity. As far as his employees were concerned, he had absolutely no taste whatever--no feel for them as human beings. He would chew out a man unmercifully in front of his peers. He would bawl people out with insufficient justification. He didn't handle his payroll right and had nothing but dissatisfaction on that score. Praise was absent, caustic criticism rampant, in Cameron's relations with his group. Cameron's people didn't talk about this situation with strangers and I was unaware of it when I began to go up there. As far as I was concerned, Mr. Cameron was the soul of charm and hospitality. He invited me into his luxurious, pine-paneled office and treated me like a king and asked me all about the job, cordiality itself. 

Transcription Notes:
Reviewed