This was said as a matter of sincere congratulation, but I thought to myself: "This concern will never stand the strain of competition; it is bound to fail when hard times come." The result proved the correctness of my belief.

The surest foundation of a manufacturing concern is quality.

After that, and a long way after, comes cost.
I gave a great deal of personal attention for some years to the affairs of the Keystone Bridge Works, and when important contracts were involved often went myself to meet the parties.

On one such occasion in 1868, I visited Dubuque, Iowa, with our engineer, Walter Katte.

We were competing for the building of the most important railway bridge that had been built up to that time, a bridge across the wide Mississippi at Dubuque, to span which was considered a great undertaking.