The Errand Boy

by Horatio Alger Jr.

It is rather amusing to see how soon the cheapest clerk talks of "us," quietly identifying himself with the firm that employs him. Not that I object to it. Often it implies a personal interest in the success and prosperity of the firm, which makes a clerk more valuable. This was not, however, the case with G. Washington Wilbur, the young man who was now conversing with Phil, as will presently appear.

Paperback

First published January 1, 1888

About the author

Horatio Alger, Jr. (January 13, 1832 – July 18, 1899) was a prolific 19th-century American author, most famous for his novels following the adventures of bootblacks, newsboys, peddlers, buskers, and other impoverished children in their rise from humble backgrounds to lives of respectable middle-class security and comfort. His novels about boys who succeed under the tutelage of older mentors were hugely popular in their day.

Born in Chelsea, Massachusetts, the son of a Unitarian minister, Alger entered Harvard University at the age of sixteen. Following graduation, he briefly worked in education before touring Europe for almost a year. He then entered the Harvard Divinity School, and, in 1864, took a position at a Unitarian church in Brewster, Massachusetts. Two years later, he resigned following allegations he had sexual relations with two teenage boys.[1] He retired from the ministry and moved to New York City where he formed an association with the Newsboys Lodging House and other agencies offering aid to impoverished children. His sympathy for the working boys of the city, coupled with the moral values learned at home, were the basis of his many juvenile rags to riches novels illustrating how down-and-out boys might be able to achieve the American Dream of wealth and success through hard work, courage, determination, and concern for others. This widely held view involves Alger's characters achieving extreme wealth and the subsequent remediation of their "old ghosts." Alger is noted as a significant figure in the history of American cultural and social ideals. He died in 1899.

The first full-length Alger biography was commissioned in 1927 and published in 1928, and along with many others that borrowed from it later proved to be heavily fictionalized parodies perpetuating hoaxes and made up anecdotes that "would resemble the tell-all scandal biographies of the time."[2] Other biographies followed, sometimes citing the 1928 hoax as fact. In the last decades of the twentieth century a few more reliable biographies were published that attempt to correct the errors and fictionalizations of the past.

Reviews

[Kathryn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Most of what I said in my review of Joe the Hotel Boy also applies here. In this case, Philip lives with his stepmother and presumed half-brother. In a non-stunning twist, it turns out that Philip was left at his presumed father's inn years ago, and the man he has thought was his father all his life wasn't. Philip doesn't care to be beholden to his father figure's second wife, who has always disliked him, so he strikes out on his own. Meanwhile, Philip's...well, she's not his stepmother, but it's easier to call her that...discovers that Philip's father is still living and is fabulously wealthy and decides to have her own son impersonate Philip so that they, too, can be wealthy.

Philip, naturally, finds success in New York by helping a wealthy old man (hilariously, the first wealthy old man Philip encounters, who gives Philip his card and tells him to call on him, is never seen again. I guess Alger just forgot about him), whose greedy relatives don't care for Philip's encroachment. Philip's landlady turns out to also be related to Wealthy Old Man #2, and between the two of them, they manage to expose the greedy relatives for what they are and win WOM#2's affection.

Meanwhile, Philip's stepmother's imposture is beginning to wear thin. Through a series of lampshaded coincidences, Philip learns that his father figure actually left him part of his estate, and that his stepmother has kept the money to herself. He also learns that his stepmother and stepbrother have traveled to Chicago, so he and WOM#2 head over there. They all happen to go to the same theater one evening, and Philip's father, who already had his suspicions, quickly figures out that Philip is his own son.

Everyone lives happily ever after, and Philip is totes going to marry WOM#2's great-niece.

[Hal Johnson · Rating 3 out of 5]

By the 1880s, Alger’s plots had become a series of fetishistic turns to be dutifully ticked off. In his haste to get through all the ticking, Alger presumably carelessly fell into a series of doubles. Philip Brent, it goes without saying, becomes wealthy both by hard work and by claiming an inheritance he had been defrauded out of. But here he has been defrauded out of not one but two inheritances!—a modest one from his stepfather and a vast one from his estranged real father. (The fraudster in both cases is the same woman.)

“Hard work” is here (as is often the case in Alger) a euphemism for befriending a tycoon. Brent is pampered enough that he recoils from selling newspapers or blacking boots, and when he briefly considers a career (never consummated!) smashing baggage, he is filled with shame. But even the relatively cushy job of errand boy he only needs to suffer for a hot second before graduating to private secretary of the tycoon he does a good turn for.

The good turn in this case is a mild “don’t-slip-on-the-ice”—but the tycoon involved is of course doubled, or is himself the second tycoon. On his way to NYC, Brent befriends a bank president who gives him ten dollars, his card, and instructions to call upon him in three days. Brent never does, and through all the vicissitudes of his fortunes the bank president’s card burning a hole in his pocket never comes up again.

There are two mother–son pairs of enemies, two local “colorful” friends, two boarding houses, two private detectives (only one of whom actually gets to do anything), two mislaid missives full of cash, and two surrogate mothers (one (future mother-in-law) good, one (step-mother) evil—not to mention the adoptive mother who predeceases the book’s opening). The book ends with two tycoons (neither one the bank president) agreeing to live together with Brent as their real/surrogate son making a third.

What’s most unusual about the book, though, is that fact that Philip Brent goes to a fortune-teller, and no authorial voice leaps in to explain that such charlatans are a waste of time and money. Instead, the medium is 100% genuine and capable of actual supernatural power. The book also features an accurate prophetic dream and an accurate troubled feeling.

A young Ragged Dick makes a cameo to remind us that not all Alger heroes are priggish snobs so lucky that when they go to Chicago in search of a party, that party is not only staying in the same hotel as they (!) but also goes to the same theatrical show (!!).

[Christy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The hero loses his identity and his inheritance, but hard work and scrupulous honesty save the day for him. Typical for a Horatio Alger story, and lots of fun.

[Lori · Rating 3 out of 5]

Typical boy against the world story... I enjoyed it thoroughly in the context in which it was written.