Following Donald Trump's victory last week, I was reminded of a conversation I had with one of his closest friends, the late Home Depot co-founder Bernie Marcus.
That was exactly one year ago, the day of his death. Barney, who is frail and struggling, told me he was “particularly frustrated.” Capitalism was under attack from the left wing forces of the Biden-Harris administration.
Marcus believed (based on ample evidence) that they were trying to dismantle the free market, which was what made this country great. Bernie intended to focus his remaining energy on making sure that didn't happen, including helping elect President Trump.
Bernie's health continued to deteriorate, and this was his last extended interview. Last week, he passed away peacefully, surrounded by family and friends, knowing he had lived a life worth living. He rose from poverty, fought against the anti-Semitism of the time, and became a millionaire and major philanthropist.
He founded one of the great American companies. This is a shining example of how capitalism actually works for average Americans.
Of course, he didn't do it alone, he got help from friends like his old friend Ken Langone. Long before the name “Langone” became synonymous with a world-class medical system (full disclosure: I'm a prostate cancer survivor, thanks to the excellent care at NYU Langone Medical Center), Bernie named him “Kenny,” as I called him, is a Wall Street legend.
Barney leaves the tenement house to live the American dream. Ken was the son of a Long Island plumber who was struggling to make a living. Like many ambitious men of his time, Ken set his sights on the big city to make his mark.
cut teeth
After graduating from college, Langone took a job at a rural company called RW Presprich. The larger WASPy corporations of the early 1960s wanted nothing to do with outspoken working-class Italian kids. (For the full story of Langone's amazing life and career, pick up his great autobiography, I Love Capitalism!: An American Story.)
But Langone was also a great stock analyst and banker. Let's say you couldn't hold him back. He persuaded another upstart, Ross Perot, to hire him as lead banker for the IPO of Perot's fast-growing computer company, Electronic Data Systems. The excitement surrounding the deal cemented Perot's status as a business leader and billionaire. It also cemented Langone's status as one of the world's great investors.
Knowing all this, we can see how Bernie and Ken became friends and eventually business partners when Marcus hit rock bottom in his life. Due to a corporate restructuring, Barney was fired as CEO of Handy Dan, a highly profitable publicly traded hardware store chain. He immediately asked “Kenny” for advice.
“When Bernie came to see me, he got shot…He said he was on the verge of bankruptcy,” Langone said in an interview with the Post last week.
Mr. Langone recalled that Barney often had big dreams of how to revolutionize household goods retailing, creating a new company that would be a one-stop shop for things like tools, cement and paint. Langone was impressed.
“Okay, you're fired,” Langone recalled telling his friend. “But I think you got hit in the ass with a golden horseshoe.”
Langone used all his connections on Wall Street to raise money for his dream. Home Depot started small. There was very little in stock. The company is now a $400 billion company that employs approximately 500,000 people across the United States.
One big reason, Langone said, was that Bernie wanted to distribute wealth to the average home improvement store worker through the free market.
“We called our business model the 'inverted triangle,'” Langone said. “Most companies had key people at the top: the CEO and his subordinates. Not us.”
Langone said he was adamant that Barney “didn't even have a headquarters,” which he believed would create distance from store employees. People were paid decent wages and given the opportunity to become owners. Workers were given the opportunity to buy stock, including “kids who collected shopping carts in the parking lot,” Langone said.
Aim to become a millionaire
“I know at least 3,000 of these employees, many of whom started out earning minimum wage and became millionaires,” Langone said proudly during our conversation.
Bernie was on his deathbed last Monday, quietly convinced that another friend, Donald Trump, would be elected president within hours, and that he had a hand in it. A friend who was there said this. Trump's victory will help expose the left's lies about the foundations of our great country, including false claims about the evils of capitalism.
Yes, it's a great sight to see a home improvement store fill its huge store with shoppers and hard-working employees milling around knowing that the government didn't build it. Instead, it was a poor kid from Newark and his friend, the son of a plumber from Roslyn, Louisiana.
As “Kenny” says, you have to love capitalism. And you gotta love Bernie Marcus.
