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By Root 3438 0

books—Where Are the Customers’ Yachts? and Security Analysis. Ruane loved telling tales about his stockbroking job, though he swore that his first choice of career was working as an elevator boy at the Plaza Hotel, a future derailed by a lengthy wait for a uniform.19 He and Warren had connected immediately. But neither Ruane, nor any other of Graham’s students, nor Warren himself, ever had the temerity to try to see Graham outside the seminar room. Warren did manage to find reasons, however, to drop in on his new acquaintance, Walter Schloss, down at the Graham-Newman Corporation.20 He got to know Schloss better and learned he was caring for a wife who had been suffering from depression throughout most of their marriage.21 Schloss, like David Dodd, appeared to be remarkably loyal and steadfast, qualities that Buffett sought out in people. He also envied Schloss his job; he would have cleaned the washrooms for free in exchange for one of those gray laboratory-style jackets, made of thin cotton, that everyone at Graham-Newman wore to keep from dirtying their shirtsleeves while they filled out the forms that Graham used to test stocks against his investing criteria.22 Above all, Warren wanted to work for Graham.

As the semester neared an end, the rest of the class was busy finding their futures. Bob Dunn would be heading off to U.S. Steel, possibly the most prestigious corporate job in the United States. Almost every young businessman saw the route to success as working his way up the ladder in a great industrial corporation. In Eisenhower’s postwar, post-Depression America, job security was all-important, and Americans believed that institutions—from the government to large corporations—were essentially benevolent. Finding one’s cell inside the institutional beehive and learning how to fit in was the normal and expected thing to do.

“I don’t think there was one guy in the class that thought about whether U.S. Steel was a good business. I mean, it was a big business, but they weren’t thinking about what kind of train they were getting on.”

Warren had one goal in mind. He knew he would excel if Graham would hire him. While lacking self-confidence in many things, he had always felt sure-footed in the specialized area of stocks. He proposed himself to Graham for a job at Graham-Newman Corporation. It took audacity to even dream of working for the great man himself, but Warren was audacious. He was, after all, Ben Graham’s star student, the only one to earn an A+ in his class. If Walter Schloss could work there, why couldn’t he? To clinch the deal, he offered to work for free. He went in and asked for the job with far more confidence than he had felt riding up to Chicago for his interview with the Harvard Business School.

Graham turned him down.

“He was terrific. He just said, ‘Lookit, Warren. In Wall Street still, the “white-shoe” firms, the big investment banks, they don’t hire Jews. We only have the ability to hire a very few people here. And, therefore, we only hire Jews.’ That was true of the two gals in the office and everybody. It was sort of like his version of affirmative action. And the truth is, there was a lot of prejudice against Jews in the fifties. I understood.”

Buffett found it impossible to say anything that could be interpreted as critical of Graham, even decades later. Of course, it must have been incredibly disappointing. Couldn’t Graham have made an exception for his star student? Someone it wouldn’t cost him anything to employ?

Warren, who idolized his teacher, had to accept that Graham viewed him impersonally, so much so that he would not overrule a principle even for the best student who had ever taken his class. There was no appeal—at least for now. Chagrined, he stayed through graduation, then once again he pulled himself together and stepped aboard a train.

He had two consolations. He would be back in Omaha, where he felt he belonged. And it would be much easier to pursue his love life there, for he had met an Omaha girl and was now smitten. As usual, the girl he wanted was not smitten with him.