It has been built up without the backing of any great bank or multi-millionaire.

There have been no Vanderbilts in it, no Astors, Rockefellers, Rothschilds, Harrimans.

There are even now only four men who own as many as ten thousand shares of the stock of the central company.

This Bell System stands as the life-work of unprivileged men, who are for the most part still alive and busy.

With very few and trivial exceptions, every part of it was made in the United States.