Charles Palmer 1875 -1910

He was renowned as the person who nearly destroyed the company in the UK and indeed came very close to destroying the company in the USA as well.

Palmer was born in London in 1875 and was married in 1898 to Louise Thomas who sadly died in 1904.At the time of his marriage Charles was a printer’s ‘compositor’; his father, Henry Frederick, also being engage in the publishing world as a ‘Printers Reader’

(I have been unable to trace any army service record for him but as Eugene Sandow was a trainer for the Territorial Army this may be the connection.)

In June 1904 Patterson Left Dayton for New York City where he embarked on the SS Canopic for Europe. After visiting Italy he arrived in London on September 24 before touring the south of England coast, Bristol and Cornwall, arriving back in London on the 25^th October.

Between that date and November 16^th, when he left for Paris, he met up with Charles Palmer

Mr Charles Palmer a former British Army Gymnastic Instructor and later an assistant to the famous Eugene Sandow in his physical training school. John H in his constant search for perfect health had undergone a prolonged fasting cure. The fast may have cured his original problem but it nearly killed him. It was then that John H. went to the Sandow school and was put under the care of Palmer. He derived such benefits from his treatment that Patterson engaged as his personal attendant and took him on his round the world trip and then to Dayton Ohio, USA.

After travelling from Paris their travels took them to Africa, Malta, Egypt, the Suez canal India, Singapore, China, Japan and on to San Francisco where they then took trains to Chicago and onwards to Dayton on July 4^th 1905

In August 1905 Charles Palmer it was announced that “for the purpose of promoting the physical welfare of the NCR employees, a department of physical culture has recently been established. Mr. Charles Palmer, the health expert who was President Patterson's companion on his trip around the world, has been appointed head.

In June 1906 Patterson again took a trip to Europe arriving in Plymouth, England on the 11^th June 1906. His companions on this trip were his children, Miss Dorothy Patterson and Master Frederick Patterson, Mr. Charles Palmer, now described as his secretary, and Mr. Charles Plessinger, he made a horseback tour from Edinburgh to London.

By the 1^st January 1907 Palmer had been appointed head of the newly created Health Pyramid. Mr. Palmer for the last year has been head of the Health Department, which was under the supervision of the Welfare Department. The recent organization of a separate Health Pyramid, however, enlarges his work and shows the importance which the Company attaches to the physical well-being of N. C. R. people.
As head of the Health Pyramid, Mr Palmer will have supervision of all matters pertaining to the health of N. C. R. employees. He will direct the exercising classes and will supervise the menus served at Welfare Hall, the Women's Dining Room and the Officers' Club.
The work of preparing the food will, of course, be in charge of the Commissary Department. It will be Mr. Palmer's duty to see that the most healthful and nourishing kind of meals are served.

President Patterson, in the presence of several hundred employes
in Welfare Hall, went through a strenuous course of exercises (August 1905)

Palmers rapid rise in 18 months from “Patterson’s Companion” to Health Director caused discontent and led to the resignation of Hugh Chalmers who, at that time, was the General manager of the company. On Tuesday July 16^th the Dayton Herald announced on its front page that “Chalmers Resignation has been accepted by Cash Register Company” with the by-line “Palmer Alleged Trouble Maker – It is said Physical Director at Factory Has Caused Discontent Among Employees. ”

On Saturday August 3^rd 1907, Patterson and Charles Palmer set off on another Europe visit, returning on the SS Kaiserin Auguste Victoria from Southampton to New York.

On August 22^nd 1907 The company issued a law suit for $225,000 against the ‘Dayton Daily News’ alleging that “article published in the News held him up to Ridicule of Employees”

The reference in the paper to Palmer as his valet and his alleged influence over Patterson was complained of including that the ‘Dayton News’ had called Palmer “Patterson’s lackey, butler and Valet” The paper described him as a diminutive chap, not much over five feet tall with a countenance suggestive of the lower English classes whoa has practiced the art of hypnotism and dominated the mind of Patterson.

By 8^th January 1908 John H. Patterson had been re-elected to the Board and Charles Palmer was on the Board of the company as Health Director..

Faced with possible law suit on the 8^th February 1908 the Dayton Herald published a retraction and apology for the Attack on J.H. Patterson and Charles Palmer.

In 1908 J.H. Patterson again visited England, sailing on the Mauretania from New York to Liverpool. This time he stayed for two years. One of his first actions was to remove Mr Saxe as managing director his resignation being ‘accepted’ by J.H. Patterson at the board meeting on the 29^th June1908. He had brought with him from America, Charles Palmer.

As Theodore Armstrong said in history of NCR, ‘Our Company’(1949)

“His visits always had some of the effects of an earthquake; this time the convulsion proved chronic; he stayed for two years. He used the period for a great experiment; to prove whether sales could not be maintained or even increased by drastically reducing prices, dispensing with a well-paid sales force and relying on extensive advertising and salaried salesmen. The ideas were generally credited to the man, Charles Palmer, he brought with him as Managing Director of the British Company. Palmer had been a British Army Gymnastic Instructor and afterwards an assistant to Eugene Sandow, in that "Strong Man's" physical culture· school. Patterson, in his persistent search for health, had undergone a prolonged fasting cure. His fast may have cured the trouble, but it nearly killed him. In his subsequent weakness the President went to Sandow's school and was put under the care of Palmer.

He got such benefit from the treatment that he engaged Palmer as his personal attendant.

Patterson always believed and proclaimed that Palmer had saved his life.

This was the man who, under the direction of the President, now managed the British business; his only obvious qualifications were a magnificent physique; the knack of managing J. H. Patterson, and (on occasion) an overwhelming gift of the most forceful army vituperation.

Seven days later at the board meeting on the 6^th July 1908 Mr Veitch tendered his resignation as a Director, but retaining his position as secretary, which was accepted and his shares in the National Cash Register Company Ltd. numbered 101 to 200 were given to Charles Palmer, who was immediately made a Director.

The next month the board held a meeting on the 24^th August and appointed Charles Palmer as Managing Director giving him total power over the company. The same meeting resolved to cancel all the agents’ contracts. At a Board meeting on the 7^th November The secretary Mr Veitch resigned and Charles Palmer was made secretary in his place.

Prices of registers were reduced some 60%-the Detail Adder from $130 to $40, the 35¼ press-down key model from $235 to $65; the 422 Receipt Printer from $400 to $125. All sales

agents had their contracts cancelled. They were offered, but most refused, new terms of salary of $15 a week with expenses, but no commission. New men were engaged at this rate. The new prices were widely advertised in the Press, on theatre curtains and in doggerel verse on omnibuses with the statement: "We sell direct to the customers and pay no commission

to our employees."

1909 Prices

The reduced prices and the furore caused by customers having paid in some cases more than double the new list prices resulted in Charles Palmer having to try to placate everyone by issuing the following statement:

Their case was exploited by a weekly journal which specialised in the ventilation of grievances. Under its auspices a National Cash Register Users'

Protection Society started and week by week the journal came out with lurid articles denouncing the iniquity of this "foreign" company. The street vendors of the paper soon found that the quickest way to dispose of their wares was to shout them in front of the Company's offices, it being the duty of the Advertising Department to purchase the whole stock. Legal action was initiated by the Company, but before it came to the courts a change in the control of the journal

made recourse to law unnecessary. The final verdict on the price reduction and cheap salesman policy is given in the sales figures for those years: from 37,706 in 1907, points fell to 20,994 in 1909.”

The first reaction came from the discharged agents. They protested variously, one method being to hire and travel on a London omnibus, have it halted under Palmer's office, "boo" until the police moved it on, and then repeat the performance. Those with available funds bought the $65 machine-the most popular selling model-and canvassed until they found a merchant who had not yet heard of the reduced price, and then sold him at something under the old one. Most found other jobs. The success of the new low-salaried salesmen was immediate but brief. They started on those merchants whom the old agents had already worked-those who at the old price were already three parts sold. These exhausted, they found it as difficult to sell at $65 as their predecessors had at $235. Sales in the first few weeks were swollen by some hundreds of machines purchased by second-hand dealers, and the competition of these had also to be met. In a few months the monthly number of machines sold was about that previous to the "cut," but for one-third of the money. An unforeseen result of the drop in prices was its effect on cash register users generally and especially upon those who had bought immediately before the reduction. They felt they had had a raw deal.

Their case was exploited by a weekly journal which specialised in the ventilation of grievances. Under its auspices a National Cash Register Users'

The weekly Journal was ‘John Bull’

who in their Publication of the 2^nd April 1910 said;

Messrs. PATTERSON AND PALMER

Before we go further, we should explain that whereas Mr. John H. Patterson is the head of. the Cash Register organisation being President of the American and Governing-Director of the English Companies. His right-band man and inseparable companion is Mr. Charles Palmer-under whose influence there is no doubt. that Mr. Patterson has completely fallen. It may, therefore, be interesting to record the fact that Mr. Palmer was employed from June, 1902, till October, 1903, as second porter for Messrs. Hewitt and Schwerzl furriers, of 15, New Burlington Street, London. His salary was 22s. per- week, which was subsequently increased to 24s., and his duties were to beat furs and deliver parcels. He was subsequently employed as temporary odd man at the Sandow Institute, at salary of 27s 6d. per-week, and from this place he was engaged by Mr. Patterson’s medical man to take charge of· the physical welfare of Mr Patterson whose hotel he has lived ever since and from whom he is scarcely ever separated. We mention these facts to enable our readers better to appreciate the remarkable documents which we are· able to set forth, ·and from which it will appear that in a relatively short space of time Mr Palmer, the furrier's ex-porter and Sandow's ex-temporary assistant, had apparently accumulated a sufficient sum to be able to lend the company £6,,500; and that he has further developed marvellous genius as an inventor and patentee of cash register improvements, receiving& a huge sum from the American Company in respect of them.

By January 1909 the company had lost £20,000 and at the board meeting the 19th January the board decided to cancel the commission salesmen in London and make them salaried.

A Board meeting was held on March 8th 1909 when Mr Palmer was present but he missed the meeting of 5th April he was missing and at the board meeting on the 14th April 1910 Palmer was not present but sent a letter suggesting that Mr H.C. Banwell be appointed Manager of the company.

This meeting then resolved that a letter be sent to Mr Charles Palmer sending their sympathy in his illness and a wish for his speedy recovery. The board believed that his illness had been brought on by the time and though he had given to the business and resolved to bear the cost of his illness. The meeting discussed the question of the John Bull articles and requested that the company lawyer Mr Beardall, be requested to take out a writ for libel

On Thursday the 12^th May it was resolved that Mr Palmer was not fit to continue in the position of Managing Director and any authorities invested in him by the company were cancelled.

The board also resolved that the resolution to pay Mr Palmers while he was ill was cancelled.

The Board meeting of the 15^th May heard that Charles Palmer was being held at the Flower House, Catford under an order granted by a Justice of the Peace as he was of unsound mind and therefore the board removed him as a Director.

A meeting of the Board on the 18^th May 1910 confirmed that Henry C. Banwell be made a Director in Charles palmer’s place.

On the 8^th June Mr Banwell to the meeting his line-engaging ex NCR commission agents and Salesmen and placing them in territories thereby reversing Charles Palmer’s disastrous policies.

Charles Palmer died on the 5^th November 1910 at Flower House Southend; he was 35 years old and his death certificate records his profession as General Manager, Cash Register Company and his death resulting from Tubercular Phthisis and Tubercular Meningitis.

His Estate amounted to £13387 0s 8d. In his will dated 4^th April 1910 when he was staying at Claridge’s, he left bequests to his family and to Bernardo’s Children’s homes

In a codicil to his will he said that no friend or relation should be present at his funeral except his executor and that no-one should wear mourning on account of his death.

In today’s money his estate would be worth £1,680,172.47 in 2022

Although we will never know what Palmer’s true relationship was with J.H. Patterson he certainly left his mark on the National Cash Register Company in both the USA and Great Britain.