Silent, courteous, proper, and dignified. These were the adjectives contemporaries used in describing the first Marshall Field. You could add: measured, emotionally self-sufficient and inscrutable. He was discreetly elegant in hand-tailored suits with immaculate linen and no matter what the season he wore white gloves.
But it was his eyes that were the most striking feature of his appearance. Variously described as steel gray or bright blue, they were eyes that could shatter the composure of the most self-assured men. Two of the most consistent characteristics of the inner man were a Yankee frugality and his sense of honor in commercial dealings; never at any time in his career did he engage in sharp business practices.
John D. His only amusement was playing low stakes poker in the evening at the Chicago Club, mainly for the rather stilted companionship it providedβalthough he did occasionally host Sunday morning breakfast gatherings in his Prairie Avenue dining room for a few male friends.
Although Marshall Field would become the richest and most influential man in late 19th century Chicago, he was born in the son of a hill farmer and his wife outside Conway, Massachusetts.
By working in a Pittsfield, Massachusetts dry goods establishment as a young man, he proved that he was a gifted retailer and, at the suggestion of his older brother, Joseph, he decided to leave Pittsfield in to venture out to the mushrooming economy of Chicago.
