This reminded me of a joke. I will shorten it up a bit for a comment post.

Back in the late 1890 a young Italian man immigrated to the United States. His first job when he got off Ellis Island was working for a former prostitute who had saved up money to open her own brothel. He was hired as muscle for dealing with troublesome customers, and he also earned extra money with his skills as a carpenter, and with landscaping, things he learned growing up on a farm back home. After five years her business had been so successful she needed to hire a book keeper. Since this young amn had been so helpful taking care of the women in her employee, and helping make her building look presentable inside and out she offered the job to him, but he could not read, or write, and his math skills were very baisc.

Since he had been so helpful through her first years in business she allowed him to stay in his room out back rent free for six months, but was not able to pay him for any work because she needed that money to pay the bookkeeper. He tried finding a job without success. One night he came up with an idea to have an income. When he did construction work around the place he never threw away any of the left over lumber as he would always find a use for it. He went out to his pile of lumber and fashioned a simple push cart. The next day he took some of the money he had saved up to buy the best fruits and vegetables he could find in the wholesale shops. That day he pushed his cart through town until he had sold everything on his cart. He repeated this work for three months until he had saved up enough money to buy a wagon and an old horse so he could carry more product and make more money each day. After his six months were up he paid his former boss a small rent for his room, and continued working with his wagon. After a year he had enough money saved up he could afford to open up his own store front, and not have to ride around town finding customers, he could have them coming to him. During this year he met a young lady of Italaian decent at one of the wholesalers he did business with and began courting her. When he came to the point he could open his own store he asked her to marry him, a proposal she enthusiastically accepted. In addition to having a wodnerful wife he loved dearly he also had a woman who could read, write, and whose math skills were more than adequate for doing the bookkeeping for his new business.

They had three sons one after the other the first four years of their marriage. By the time all 3 sons were grown men he and his wife had saved enough money to not only open a bigger store, but to open a second store which the oldest son ran, having learned the business as he grew up. By the time he and his wife had reached retirement age they had four very successful grocery stores in the New York area with he and his wife running one, and each son running one fo the others.

The stores were so successful they caught the interest of a large grocery store chain that wanted to buy them out. The chain sent the man a letter to his office with a request for a meeting, and a very nice offer. When he saw the logo of the competition on the envelope he just threw the letter away. The chain sent 3 more letters all of which got put in the garbage. Rather than send a fifth letter they sent two representatives with a final offer. When they met with the old Italian man he had his oldest son with him.

One of the reps handed the old man the last offer to buy his stores. The old man opened the envelope, removed tha papers then handed them to his son without looking at them. The chain rep asked him why he did not read the offer himself, to which the old man informed the rep he had never learned to read and write. This bit of information amazed the chain rep. This old man had built this incredibly successful, albeit modest, empite and he could not even read or write.

In his amazement the reap asked the old man, "Do you have any idea where you would be if you had just learned to read and write?"

Without hesitation the old man replied, "Sure I know. I would be keeping the books at a whore house over on 132nd Street."