His father, Captain Thaddeus, died when Jed was fifteen, just
through the grammar school and ready to enter the high. He did not
enter; instead, the need of money being pressing, he went to work
in one of the local stores, selling behind the counter. If his
father had lived he would, probably, have gone away after finishing
high school and perhaps, if by that time the mechanical ability
which he possessed had shown itself, he might even have gone to
some technical school or college. In that case Jed Winslow's
career might have been very, very different. But instead he went
to selling groceries, boots, shoes, dry goods and notions for Mr.
Seth Wingate, old Jedidah's younger brother.

As a grocery clerk Jed was not a success, neither did he shine as a
clerk in the post office, nor as an assistant to the local
expressman. In desperation he began to learn the carpenter's trade
and, because he liked to handle tools, did pretty well at it. But
he continued to be "queer" and his absent-minded dreaminess was in
evidence even then.

"I snum I don't know what to make of him," declared Mr. Abijah
Mullett, who was the youth's "boss." "Never know just what he's
goin' to do or just what he's goin' to say. I says to him
yesterday: 'Jed,' says I, 'you do pretty well with tools and wood,
considerin' what little experience you've had. Did Cap'n Thad
teach you some or did you pick it up yourself?' He never answered
for a minute or so, seemed to be way off dreamin' in the next
county somewheres. Then he looked at me with them big eyes of his
and he drawled out: 'Comes natural to me, Mr. Mullett, I guess,' he
says. 'There seems to be a sort of family feelin' between my head