The Gingham
Dress
BE
As received in an e-mail…
THE GINGHAM DRESS BY MALCOLM FORBES
A lady
in a faded gingham dress and her husband, dressed in a homespun threadbare
suit, stepped off the train in
The
secretary could tell in a moment that such backwoods, country hicks had no
business at Harvard & probably didn't even deserve to be in
"We'd
like to see the president," 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 toward 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 cost 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.
----
A TRUE STORY . . . By Malcolm Forbes
###########################
Note: What a great article and a super moral,
huh? It’s especially thoughtful of
Malcolm Forbes to make the effort to give us all an insight into the true story
of the founding of
The
main problems with this wonderful article are – Malcolm Forbes had nothing to
do with it, it offers no insights and it is strictly a work of fiction. No
matter how much we would like for this to be a true story, it is not.
Our
life paths are frequently charted and our destinies determined by “stories”
which, like the one above, may not be completely true. It’s not that anyone is intentionally trying
to mislead us through their poor information, perceptions or interpretations of
events or situations. They are just
providing us with their opinions and perceptions which at the time, they are
likely convinced are true.
Each
one of us then, takes the information we are given and stores it away as “fact”
for future reference. Over time we
hardwire our brains to accept only the information that confirms or reinforces
these “facts” and reject that which contradicts everything we are absolutely,
positively sure is true. And, as the
article about the gingham dress illustrates, there are times when the
information we receive is just so appealing that we’ll tend to accept it
immediately as fact without taking the time to check out its authenticity.
If your
life is not everything you would like it to be – if you’re stuck in life’s rut
– I would recommend that you take the time to question those “facts” that
you’ve filed away over the past years.
What information have you received that is prompting you to think and
subsequently act as you do? What is holding
you on your present life path? What
fears, doubts, worries, insecurities or misconceptions are you keeping in your
“fact” file that are preventing you from moving on to the person you could
be? Don’t you think it’s time to find
out?
For the
full story on “The Gingham Dress”, go to
http://www.snopes.com/glurge/stanford.asp
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