My Father and Me

My father passed away last week. Walter taught me many things. I developed a great love of numbers, finance and the world of business and economics from him. In the 1967 I started to read his copy of the Wall Street Journal (I am 9 years old at the time). I learned about a big world out there, I tried to figure out how to get there at my age but was not able to. I always remember going to the stock brokers office one summer day with him. He had $1000 that he wanted to buy one share of Berkshire Hathaway stock. The broker laughed at him and used all types of reasons why it was a bad investment. Thus my father taking the advise of this expert went to his Plan B and bought Xerox stock instead. My father took a quick profit in it over the next few months and we shared this story many times over the years. What if he had bought it? His life and wealth would have been dramatically different.
The world of finance and business still amazes me today. To make something successful out of a concept is a great accomplishment which is rewarded by profit. There is nothing wrong with profit going to the risk taker. Our economy is based upon it something that is lost in our political system.
I still read the Wall Street Journal daily. And I miss my father and thank him for his teaching this lesson and many others to me at a young age.