One Thing Has Led to Another

In my last post, I explained how I jump-started Memoirs Unlimited with networking and how I soon realized that I had found my “sweet spot.” This time, I'd like to recall how that first memoir, for “Mr. Carter,” led to more than sixty projects over the past twenty years.

The simple explanation is, One thing led to another.
Mr. Carter was dying of cancer even before I began working with him, and he did not live to see his book published. I had it completed and printed with the help of his widow. Eighteen years later, I would work with his widow to write and publish her memoir—but not before I had worked with cousins and friends of Mr. Carter.

It turned out (I had no idea going in) that Mr. Carter was the grandson of a fabulously wealthy man, who had made two fortunes before and after the turn of the twentieth century and whose family had proved remarkably adept at preserving and enhancing that fortune. Once Mr. Carter became confident with my work for him and could see that it was leading to a satisfactory result, I began to develop a client base among his cousins. For example, his father's youngest sister had three children, and by the mid-1990s I had worked with all of them, plus two of their spouses.

Mr. Carter had been a prominent figure in the community where I live north of Boston: president of a leading hospital, a high mucky-muck (he would have used that term!) in one of the most venerable country clubs, and so on. In my early years, I worked with several people who knew him socially and respected his contributions to the community.

“Mrs. Campbell” was another early client, who hired me to edit and publish a memoir started for her mother-in-law but never completed. I met Mrs. Campbell through a short chain of contacts: Speaking with my insurance agent, I asked him for references to acquaintances who might be interested in my services. He referred me to “Mrs. Gamble,” who said, No thank you, but Mrs. Campbell might be interested. Mrs. Campbell was interested.

Once I had completed the project for Mrs. Campbell’s mother-in-law, and after the mother-in-law had died, Mrs. Campbell asked me to work on a retrospective volume about her father-in-law. That in turn led to my first major organizational history, about the family company behind one of today’s Fortune 500 corporations. Since that project, I have been involved with over a dozen organizational histories, all of which have led, in some way, to the book that has consumed me since the fall of 2007, the history of Massachusetts General Hospital. If you’re not from the Boston area, you may not realize that many of the leading families of Boston, including the “Campbells,” helped found the MGH and still support it. So, in a sense, that first job I did for Mrs. Campbell was the cornerstone of the MGH book.

It’s fair to say that, by chancing upon Mr. Carter and Mrs. Campbell, I had not only found my sweet spot personally (doing something I feel uniquely qualified to do), but I had also found a sweet spot in greater Boston, developing my client base from two influential people.

Of course, I had to do the work, and well, for “one thing to lead to another.” Next time, I’ll talk about my approach to memoirs and family/business histories.