A
Message to Garcia - Forward
by Elbert Hubbard
December
1, 1901
This literary trifle,
A Message To Garcia, was written one evening after dinner, in a single hour.
It was on the 22nd of February, 1899, Washington's Birthday: we were just
going to press with the March Philistine.
The thing leaped hot from
my heart, written after a trying day, when I had been endeavoring to train
some rather delinquent villagers to abjure the comatose state and get radioactive.
The immediate suggestion,
though, came from a little argument over the teacups, when my boy Bert suggested
that Rowan was the real hero of the Cuban War. Rowan had gone alone and done
the thing - carried the message to Garcia.
It came to me like a flash!
Yes, the boy is right, the hero is the man who does his work - who carries
the message to Garcia. I got up from the table, and wrote A Message To Garcia.
I thought so little of it that we ran it in the Magazine without a heading.
The edition went out, and soon orders began to come for extra copies of the
March Philistine, a dozen, fifty, a hundred, and when the American News Company
ordered a thousand, I asked one of my helpers which article it was that stirred
up the cosmic dust. "It's the stuff about Garcia," he said.
The next day a telegram
came from George H. Daniels, of the New York Central Railroad thus, "Give
price on one hundred thousand Rowan article in pamphlet form - Empire State
Express advertisement on back - also how soon can ship."
I replied giving price,
and stated we could supply the pamphlets in two years. Our facilities were
small and a hundred thousand booklets looked like an awful undertaking.
The result was that I
gave Mr. Daniels permission to reprint the article in his own way. He issued
it in booklet form in editions of half a million. Two or three of these half-million
lots were sent out by Mr. Daniels, and in addition the article was reprinted
in over two hundred magazines and newspapers. It has been translated into
all written languages.
At the time Mr. Daniels
was distributing A Message To Garcia, Prince Hilakoff, Director of Russian
Railways, was in this country. He was the guest of the New York Central, and
made a tour of the country under the personal direction of Mr. Daniels. The
Prince saw the little book and was interested in it, more because Mr. Daniels
was putting it out in big numbers, probably, than otherwise. In any event,
when he got home he had the matter translated into Russian, and a copy of
the booklet given to every railroad employee in Russia.
Other countries then took
it up, and from Russia it passed into Germany, France, Spain, Turkey, Hindustan
and China. During the war between Russia and Japan, every Russian soldier
who went to the front was given a copy of A Message To Garcia. The Japanese,
finding the booklets in possession of the Russian prisoners, concluded it
must be a good thing, and accordingly translated it into Japanese.
And on an order of the
Mikado, a copy was given to every man in the employ of the Japanese Government,
soldier or civilian. Over forty million copies of A Message To Garcia have
been printed. This is said to be a larger circulation than any other literary
venture has ever attained during the lifetime of an author, in all history
- thanks to a series of lucky accidents.
Elbert Hubbard - December
1, 1901
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