Description
The Napoleon Hill Letter
In 1919, future author of probably the best-known personal development book Think & Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill, penned a letter to Charles F. Haanel about the influence The Master Key System had on him.
In the letter Hill wrote “I believe in giving credit where it is due, therefore I believe I ought to inform you that my present success and the success which has followed my work as President of the Napoleon Hill Institute is due largely to the principles laid down in The Master-Key System.” The letter Napoleon Hill wrote to Haanel about The Master Key System.
The letter in its entirety reads:
“April 21, 1919. “Mr. Charles F. Haanel, “St. Louis, Mo.
“My dear Mr. Haanel:
“You probably know, from the editorial in the January issue of the Golden Rule, copy of which my Secretary sent to you, that I began twenty-two years ago as a coal miner at a dollar a day.
“I have just been retained by a ten million dollar corporation at a salary of $105,200.00 a year, for a portion of my time only, it having been agreed that I shall continue as editor of the Hill’s Golden Rule.
“I believe in giving credit where it is due, therefore I believe I ought to inform you that my present success and the success which has followed my work as President of the Napoleon Hill Institute is due largely to the principles laid down in The Master-Key System.
“You are doing a good work by helping people to realize that nothing is impossible of accomplishment which a man can create in his imagination. Surely my own experience proves this.
“I shall cooperate with you in getting your course into the hands of the many who so greatly need your message.
“Cordially and sincerely, “Napoleon Hill, “Editor, The Golden Rule “Chicago, Illinois”
The fact that Hill entitled one of his later books The Master-Key to Riches reinforces the fact that Haanel was a direct influence on Napoleon Hill.