A Saga of Courage by Seabury Stanton (PDF)

[TREVNI]

Wish I'd found this sooner. Tracked it down in a library and scanned it for anyone that's interested. It's the speech Seabury Stanton gave to the Newcomon Society in 1961 which gives a detailed account of Berkshire Hathaway's early days. 

A Saga of Courage_Seabury Stanton.pdf

[hellowod]

Thanks Trevni, I took a quick look. Is the lesson that Stanton invested too much into a dying industry, while Buffett took capital out of BRK? The profile seem to indicate Stanton, due to history and family loyalty, basically went all in to invest into BRK, sound like a hero, but in the end it was all for nought?

[Ballinvarosig Investors]

15 hours ago, hellowod said:

The profile seem to indicate Stanton, due to history and family loyalty, basically went all in to invest into BRK, sound like a hero, but in the end it was all for nought?

It's not quite as black and white as that. Berkshire had a long history of share buy backs and dividends before Buffett arrived, so while Stanton was committed to the textile business, capital was being returned to shareholders throughout. 

[TREVNI]

I enjoyed reading the account of building Berkshire and all the predecessor companies. I come down on the side of admiring the work Stanton et al did but also faulting him for not changing course. And I'm not sure I could do it differently in his shoes. He grew up in the business and had his identity tied to it, his legacy and his father's legacy. Buffett had none of this and could view the capital as fungible. 

[John Hjorth]

Thank you for sharing, @TREVNI

There is really no way here on CoBF to express the gratitude I posses for sharing your work on Berkshire Hathaway with others.

Simply put: An absolutely awesome performance! - based on persistence [stubbornness [<- ? [ : - )] ], "never yield", "never give up" et. al.].

- - - o 0 o - - -

Again, thank you.

[TREVNI]

21 hours ago, John Hjorth said:

Thank you for sharing, @TREVNI

There is really no way here on CoBF to express the gratitude I posses for sharing your work on Berkshire Hathaway with others.

Simply put: An absolutely awesome performance! - based on persistence [stubbornness [<- ? [ : - )] ], "never yield", "never give up" et. al.].

- - - o 0 o - - -

Again, thank you.

You're very welcome, @John Hjorth. Thank you for the kind words about the book and the material I've compiled elsewhere, such as theoraclesclassroom.com. I've benefitted so much from the value investing community and hope to continue to give back and continue to learn.