49

he has charge also of the purchase of supplies, the Supply
Rooms, the Meter Bureau and the distribution of lamps, in
all of which his aggressive alertness and remarkable control of
expenditures have stood the Company in good stead. On the
technical side, Mr. John W. Lieb, Jr., whose ability as General
Manager has already been referred to, is in charge directly of the
Operating Department, and indirectly of the other technical de¬
partments. Mr. Lieb, who was the first employe of the Com¬
pany under Mr. Edison in the early days, returned from Milan
to the service of the Company in 1894, and has had as his direct
lieutenants in charge of the two operating districts Mr. H. A.
Campbell, who has been in the service of the Company since
1S87, and Mr. W. I. Donshea, who has been in its service since
1890, from both of whom the Company has had the best of ser¬
vice, increasing in value with their increase of experience. Mr.
Donshea has nominally charge of the down-town and Mr. Camp¬
bell of the up-town district, but a change in location is made
from time to time to insure unity in the management of the dis¬
tricts. Mr. John Van Vleck's services, continuous since 1888,
have already been referred to ; he has also charge of the Map
and Record Bureau, in which all the plans and records of the
Company are admirably systematized, and of the Test Room, in
which apparatus is tested and standardized. Mr. Arthur Wil¬
liams, General Inspector, who entered the Company's employ
as a boy in 1885, is head of the Inspection Department, employing
a large number of inspectors and representatives, many of them
recent graduates from the scientific schools, who handle the
technical relations of the Company with its customers, and to
his unusual ability in organizing his department, in obtaining the
best men for its purposes, and in directly representing the Com¬
pany to the consumer, the Company owes much of its success
in the increase of customers' installations. Mr. Henry Ste¬
phenson, the General Installation Superintendent, who had
charge of the original underground construction in the up-town
district as a representative of the Edison General Company,
came directly into the service in practically his present position
in 1890 and his cheerfulness in meeting obstacles, his knowl¬
edge of the Company's street system, his tact in dealing with
men, and his experience in every detail of the work done under