3: Promising Student

Perversely spurred on by his embittered uncle, Albert moved ahead with his plans to go to college. But it was not going to be easy. Scholarships were not (readily?) available for foreign students. Many years later when Albert gave money to USC, he arranged that the gift go towards a scholarship fund for foreign students--not necessarily, but preferably, from China or other Asian countries.

At one time, Albert said he started to save up for a college endowment policy offered by New York Life from the $35 he earned each month at the store and the quarters he got in tips from the Chinese he helped. The store acted as a sort of social service center. Since Albert spoke English, he was often sent on errands with Chinese who needed an interpreter--to the doctor's or wherever. There were about 250 Chinese living in San Diego back then.

Albert finally took out a policy, but also started selling them. He thought other Chinese would be interested and struck a deal that he would earn commissions to be used toward purchasing his own policy. It was about $15 for a $1,000-policy. He brought in seven clients the first week, soon had himself two $1000-policies and about $1000 cash, which he had set as a goal for himself to guarantee he could work his way through school. While working for New York Life, Albert also worked toward his agent's certification. Supposedly he took the books home for one night and the next day insisted he could pass. There were some skeptics, but Boillat (?), the man who hired him, had confidence in him and sure enough he passed with a score of 97%. When he left his uncle's shop, he was told he would never be welcome back.

Before leaving San Diego, Albert also invested in 10 shares of San Diego Electric. He was told he could pick up the certificates himself if he was headed for Los Angeles in any case.

At one point, Albert told how his mother had sent him some money and he decided to invest it to earn some money to pay for college. He went for something sure and bought preferred shares in San Diego Gas & Electric. The brokerage house of "Stephens" that he was dealing with suggested that since he was planning a trip to Los Angeles, he pick up his stock certificates in person at their offices.

At the Stephens office in L.A., they got the mistaken impression--from all his questions--that he was there to spend more money and ushered him in to the office of a Mr. McEwan/McKuen. Albert hurried to explain the error, that all the money he had had already been invested in the San Diego preferred. They got to talking and it came out that the young statistician was already taking or about to take a correspondence course from a Mr. ??? in exactly the same subjects that Albert was already studying or about to study. Mr. McEwan was just a few years older than Albert (who was then 24) and they agreed to keep in touch and meet from time to time to discuss their ideas about business. Albert and "Mac" did indeed remain friends for many years to come.

Mac with wife Augusta and son Bob in a family photo album

Albert chose USC because it had a new downtown campus and he thought that it would offer him the best combination of a formal education and a chance to rub shoulders with real businessmen. He lived in a kind of boarding house run by a Japanese. In his junior year, he talked his way into a class with A.M. Clifford, who was known as the best investment advisor west of Chicago. The class was only open to seniors, but Gung Gung's good grades, plus a bit of persuasion won him a place. (A.M. Clifford later offered him a job?)

Note: The website of Clifford Swan of Pasadena says, "A.M. Clifford founded his firm in Los Angeles and Pasadena in 1915, and was one of the first to coin the term 'Investment Counselor.'...Many of the principles of conduct first prescribed by A.M. Clifford in his treatise, The Investment Counselor (1925), and later adopted by the Investment Advisor Association (IAA), have been used by Congress, the Securities Exchange Commission, and the U.S. Supreme Court in defining the standards of fiduciary conduct that are applicable to all investment advisors. Clifford's principles also helped define the first non-profit association to represent this new profession, the Investment Counsel Association of America (ICAA), formed in 1937."

4: Marrying Material