The great financial success Edward Bok achieved as the editor of Ladies' Home Journal-his long and popular tenure lasted from 1889 to 1919-naturally prompted some ire from readers, particularly when he preached economy.

So in this 1915 essay, he discusses his own youth in city tenements, scrounging for food and coal, working ceaselessly while other children played... and why he still considered poverty "the richest experience than can come to a boy."

Also in this volume is "Two Persons," Bok's tribute to his grandparents, who transformed a barren island in the North Sea into a lovely place to raise their thirteen children and, in the process, charged their heirs with a duty to beautify the world. This little pearl of love and wisdom remains an inspiration to us all to leave the planet a better place than we found it.

EDWARD W. BOK (1863-1930) was born in the Netherlands and emigrated to the United States as a child. A champion of progressive issues, he created The American Peace Award in 1923.

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ALSO FROM COSIMO: Bok's The Americanization of Edward Bok, Dollars Only, and Successward: A Young Man's Book for Young Men