I found John Ruskin with the assistance of an American, George F. Baker; he was asked to participate in a $5 million Harvard Business School construction program in the mid 1920s. When George F. Baker asked whether he could fund the entire amount and add another $1 million, Harvard Business School’s Baker Library and Baker Scholarships emerged. Beginning his career as a young farmer, a working man of New England, the aging and generous tycoon said that, “I should like to give a new start to better business standards.” George F. Baker is “the other George Baker.”
The Guild companion’s George Baker, the second master of The Guild of St. George, was the grandson of a button maker and the son of a grocer. A contemporary of his American namesake, this diligent George Baker helped to build Birmingham and Bewdley while securing the beauty and the mission of The Wyre Forest’s socially responsible enterprise with John Ruskin.
Rather than constantly visiting the George F. Baker Library during my student years, I preferred studying some of my Harvard Business School cases in Harvard’s Widener Library, named after the young book collector who perished with the Titanic. I left the strenuous business atmosphere of the George F. Baker Library to contemplate business management, ethics, and controls amongst the shelves of fine bindings in Widener’s Byron Room. My own time management in the Byron Room allowed me to make sporadic 30 minute visits to a nearby coffee shop and a second-hand book store.
One afternoon from the bargain table at the Pangloss Book Store, I purchased a copy of Ruskin’s Sesame and Lilies, which was so inspiring that I returned to find and purchase a complete edition of Ruskin’s works. I had met one of my own earthly masters. While the rigors of HBS prevented me from reading Ruskin within or without the George F. Baker Library, I was able to find time during my subsequent US National Guard basic training to read such treasures as Modern Painters and Stones of Venice. When an Army inspector questioned the purpose of Mornings in Florence in my military trunk, I answered that the volume was a field manual. In fact, I had led a group of students through Florence with Mornings in Florence as our guide.
Both the American George Baker and the English George Baker were descendants of working people in their countries. I admire the self-reliance, ingenuity, morality, and philanthropy demonstrated by the two George Bakers. During my recent Companion’s Day walk along the Wyre’s path through “the shadow of the ferns,” I gave silent thanks to the first and second masters of The Guild of St. George and to George F. Baker who has also helped to stimulate the notion of “business for good” in planned and in unexpected ways.
Last modified 10 May 2019