A lady in a faded gingham dress and her husband, dressed in
a homespun threadbare suit, stepped off the train in Boston , and walked
timidly without an appointment in to the Harvard University President's outer
office.
The secretary could
tell in a moment that such backwoods, country hicks had no business at Harvard
and probably didn't even deserve to be in Cambridge .
'We'd like to see the
pres...ident,' the man said softly. 'He'll be busy all day,' the secretary snapped.
'We'll wait,' the lady replied.
For hours the
secretary ignored them, hoping that the couple would finally become discouraged
and go away.. They didn't, and the secretary grew frustrated and finally
decided to disturb the president, even though it was a chore she always
regretted.
'Maybe if you see
them for a few minutes, they'll leave,' she said to him!
He sighed in
exasperation and nodded. Someone of his importance obviously didn't have the
time to spend with them, and he detested Gingham dresses and Homespun suits
cluttering up his outer office.
The president, stern
faced and with dignity, strutted to ward the couple. The lady told him, 'We had
a son who attended Harvard for one year.
He loved Harvard.. He
was happy here. But about a year ago, he was accidentally killed. My husband
and I would like to erect a memorial to him, somewhere on campus.'
The president wasn't
touched.. He was shocked.
'Madam,' he said,
gruffly, 'we can't put up a statue for every person who attended Harvard and died.
If we did, this place would look like a cemetery.'
'Oh, no,' the lady
explained quickly. 'We don't want to erect a statue. We thought we would like
to give a building to Harvard.'
The president rolled
his eyes. He glanced at the gingham dress and homespun suit, then exclaimed,
'A building! Do you
have any earthly
idea how much a
building costs? We have over seven and a half million dollars in the physical
buildings here at Harvard.'
For a moment the lady
was silent.
The president was
pleased. Maybe he could get rid of them now.
The lady turned to
her husband and said quietly, 'Is that all it costs to start a university? Why
don't we just start our own?'
Her husband nodded.
The president's face
wilted in confusion and bewilderment.
Mr. and Mrs. Leland
Stanford got up and walked away,traveling to Palo Alto , California where they
established the university that bears their name, Stanford University , a
memorial to a son that Harvard no longer cared about.
You can easily judge
the character of others by how they treat those who they think can do nothing
for them.
THIS IS A TRUE STORY
By Malcolm Forbes about the founders of the now world renowned STANFORD
UNIVERSITY !!
People will forget
what you said,
People will forget
what you did.
But people will never
forget how you made them feel.
Life is too short for
drama & petty things, Love truly and forgive quickly.
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