1.I recently met a business man in Texas who was burned up with indignation. I was warned that he would tell me about it within fifteen minutes after I met him. He did. The incident he was angry about had occurred eleven months previously, but he was still burned up about it. He couldn't speak of anything else. He had given his thirtyfour employees ten thousand dollars in Christmas bonuses—approximately three hundred dollars each—and no one had thanked him.“I am sorry, ”he complained bitterly, “that I ever gave them a penny!”

50. So he struggles to get a foothold in the civilian work force. Hlis brother in Boston lost his roommate,and early last month Scott moved into the empty bedroom,with hisparents paying Scott's share of the $ 2 ,000-a-month rent until the lease expires onAug. 31.

49. It was not to be. In early January,a Marine Corps doctor noticed that he had suffered from childhood asthma. He was washed out. “They finally told me I couldreapply if I wanted to , " Scott said.“ But the sheen was gone."

48.If all had gone well,he would have emerged in 10 weeks as a second lieutenant,committed to a four-year enlistment. “ I could have made a career out of theMarines,"Scott said , " and if I had come out in four years,I would have been incredibly prepared for the workplace.

47. Scott Nicholson almost sidestepped the recession. His plan was to become a Marine Corps second lieutenant. He had spent the summer after his freshman year in“platoon leader"training.Last fall he passed the physical for officer training,andwas told to report on Jan. 16.

46.“If you talk to 20 people,"Scott said, " you'll find only one in manufacturing and everyone else in finance or something else.”The Plan

45. In better times,Scott's father might have given his son work at Endeavor,but the father is laying off workers, and a job in manufacturing , in Scott's eyes, would be adefeat.

44. David Nicholson's longest was at the Stanley Works,and when he left,seeking promotion,a friend at the Endeavor Tool Company hired him as thatcompany's general manager,his present job.

43. He joined one of those companies -- owned by the family of his friend — and he has stayed in manufacturing,particularly at companies that make hand tools. Early on,he and his wife bought the home in which they raised their sons,a white colonialdating from the early 1800s,like many houses on North Street,where thegrandparents also live , a few doors away.

42. When his son David graduated from Babson College in 1976,manufacturing in America was in an early phase of its long decline,and Worcester was still a centerfor the production of sandpaper,emery stones and other abrasives.

41. He spent most of his career in a rising market,putting customers into stocks that paid good dividends,and growing wealthy on real estate investments made yearsago,when Grafton was still semi-rural. The brokerage firm that employed himchanged hands more than once,but he continued to work out of the same office inWorcester.