Title
Red Flag Out. Sidetracks All Callers. Harriman's Desperate Fight for Day of Rest. . . .John Muir Says Financier Is Lover of Nature.
Files
Kimes Entry Number
A20-b
Original Date
3-17-1909
Publication
Los Angeles Daily Times
Size/Description
Clipping
Location
CStoC
Recommended Citation
Muir, John, "Red Flag Out. Sidetracks All Callers. Harriman's Desperate Fight for Day of Rest. . . .John Muir Says Financier Is Lover of Nature." (1909). John Muir: A Reading Bibliography by Kimes, 1986 (Muir articles 1866-1986). 618.
https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/jmb/618
William and Maymie Kimes Annotation
Mr. Edward H. Harriman, who had just arrived with his family at the Raymond Hotel in Pasadena, ""refused audience to all representatives of the press . . . hoping to have a day of perfect repose."" Further wishing to avoid publicity, he ordered the chef and waiters from his train to the ""cottage."" Apparently Muir had been a luncheon guest of the Harrimans and when he emerged from the ""cottage,"" the waiting reporters peppered him with questions. One asked, ""How do you, a nature lover, happen to be visiting a cold-blooded financier?"" ""Why, Mr. Harriman has a heart,"" Muir replied. ""People may not know it, but he loves the flowers and the trees. He loves nature and human nature. I have been with him among the glaciers of Alaska; on the waters of Pelican Bay . . . and I have seen him in the privacy of his own family. He is just a plain, great-hearted man, endowed with a wonderful brain that unceasingly drives him . . . to the great responsibility which he never consciously sought."" ""What is the secret of his power?"" another asked. Muir answered, ""He has an acute conscience and abides by it. This has given him the confidence of men. The scope of his power is wide. . . . Mr. Harriman knows the needs of the country before him, seeing the spots where the corn grows highest, where mineral is hidden and where the flower of the future may flourish. Mr. Harriman once told me that he had always been lucky . . . . But such great success as his is not mere luck, it is the result of genius.""