BEFORE STUDYING the preface and The Bigness of the Fellow Within which follows, it is proper you should know three men — the father of him who writes this prologue, the writer of the prologue, and the man about whom he writes in the preface.  All this should be read as preliminary to the body of the book.  To know me and my background is to know how well I know the one about whom I write.  To know B.J. as I know him, is to better appreciate what he writes in his article.
    My father, A. B. Hender, M.D., D.C., was a close, intimate and personal friend of D. D. Palmer, in his early struggling years, having associated with him at the time of his discovery of Chiropractic.  When D. D. Palmer left Davenport, my father linked interests with the son about whom I write.  My father became an instructor in The Palmer School of Chiropractic until his death — 48 years of service to Chiropractic.  He was Dean when he passed away in 1943.
    I was born “to the faith.”  I grew, surrounded with Chiropractic atmosphere; I breathed it, lived it, heard it talked about, pro and con, on all sides at all times.  I grew up saturated with discussions of the trials, troubles, and tribulations of D. D. Palmer’s son, B.J.
    For twenty-seven rich and happy years, I’ve worked at B.J.’s side — first, as a student in his school; later as a member of his faculty family; finally, now, as Dean of his beloved P.S.C.  I am therefore competent to discuss and tell about him and say what I please.
    As a member of his official family, I’ve held almost daily conferences with him.  I’ve participated in numberless faculty and staff meetings with him.  Hours beyond number, I’ve listened to him lecture, dictate, or make recordings.  And, no matter how often all this has been, he has always held my devout attention.  I’ve sat with him in fishing boats, on the side of trailers when we traveled on vacations.  His every waking moment was always thinking, studying, reading, or discussing multitudinous phases of our Chiropractic, radio, or what-have-you problems — too many times giving up restful trips to stay and work.  He almost always carries his faithful Corona with him.  When in a train bedroom or drawing room, out comes the note pad, jotting down notes.  Later, out comes his typewriter, when he fills in the notes.
    When he begins to look out a window or grows quiet, he wants to be let alone until he has studied what he is going to say and write.  I have known him to write and rewrite a particular sentence or paragraph as many as twenty times, until it was whipped into language which expressed his idea.  I have heard him say: “Give us thirty days and we’ll write a book.  Give us three months, and we’ll write a paragraph.  Give us a year, and we’ll write an epigram.”
    Once finished, he would read it to me or some other critic, get reactions to see if we grasped what he was trying to say.  If we did, he was finished.  If we did not, he started over again.
    I once asked B.J. how he wrote his lectures.  His answer was characteristic.  “We don’t write them, we build them.”  I asked him to describe the process from time he began a lecture until finished, thinking that might be of interest and help others to duplicate his method.  Here is his description:
    “We deliberate and mentally carve out our fundamental theme around which we desire to build the talk.  It might be a new thought, or it could be a symposium of preceding ideas.  We then mentally test it for logic and reason to see if it will stand up under the test of time.  If it does, we go ahead.  If it does not, we whip it until it does.  Having given an idea birth, we then begin to shape our approach.  Conception of a theme is the hardest part we have to go through.”
    (Let me here interject a description of his typewriter which, like most other things this man works with, is radically different.  Years ago, he became disgusted with constantly taking out and putting in ordinary sheets of paper, because it broke his continuity of thought when writing.  He suggested to the Remington Company that they build him a special typewriter with a continuous roll of paper five hundred feet long, on a spool on top, automatically fed.  He also asked for an electric automatic shift of the carriage, by pressing one key on the keyboard which, at the same time, would shift the paper so he could write by the yard on paper eighteen inches wide.  I have seen a continuous writing twelve feet long, eighteen inches wide, single spaced, when he was writing.  To his knowledge, this was the first electrically-operated typewriter built, and that was at least twenty years ago.  He uses the “hunt and peck” system of two fingers and can type as fast or faster than many stenographers using ten fingers.  This unusual and different typewriter is an object of curiosity to visitors and is usually demonstrated by the guide who conducts the daily noon tours through The B.J. Palmer Chiropractic Clinic.)
    “We then write whatever comes, as it comes, be it good or bad.  We keep writing as long as thoughts flow, and they always flow without effort.  We may knock out some, much, or all of it later.  Much of this may be out of sequence.  We keep on until the present line of thinking is exhausted.  Then we let it simmer and settle for an hour, hours, days, or weeks.  Usually, when building a lecture, it is more or less steadily on our minds, and we are constantly harassed by Innate to keep on keeping on whipping it into shape.  Usually, in a few days or a week or two, it is finished for the time being.
    “Soon a new line of thinking may begin to flow, and away goes the typewriter again.  We frequently rewrite our copy the second or third time before we get it to say exactly what we mean, before turning it over to our lecture secretary.  When the subject has seemingly been completed, we turn it over to the secretary who types it on regular size sheets, double spaced, each paragraph on a separate sheet, each page numbered separately.  We then take these and rearrange them for sequence of thought.  Page 1 may be moved to page 6; or page 9 may be page 1, etc.
    “We continue the study of our subject from time to time, adding copy, marking it ‘Insert 1, page ?’  Our secretary then rewrites those pages with inserts.  We then go over the copy once more, transpose one sentence from here to there, constantly briefing, cutting out superfluous words or duplicate thoughts, possibly eliminating entire sentences or paragraphs foreign to the central theme.
    “From time to time, during intervals between working on a certain lecture, we might be found reading, or checking on gold fish in pools of Clinic Gardens or aquaria in Clinic, or doing any one of a hundred other things here, there, or everywhere, during which one or a series of new ideas may flash.  We hesitate, then and there, and make notes.  This is kept up for days or weeks, at times getting so many inserts that it looks like a crazy-quilt patch job.  We then have the lecture completely rewritten, inserting at proper places all late inserts; then by reading it entire we can see how it sounds or listens.  Additional inserts continue until we feel the subject has been fully covered.  We then lay it away to settle.
    “When it is finished, we have the secretary copy it once more, double-spaced, on loose leaf form for filing in one of the 150 volumes of lecture outlines, each of which is numbered.  This lecture, under its title, is indexed in the Index Volume for quick selection at any time.  Every lecture we have ever given, from away back when, is builded around an outline and is filed as mentioned for future reference.  This makes it possible to repeat most any lecture on most every subject on short notice.  Instead of beginning a new outline, we have one ready builded.
    “Even then, days or weeks later, a new train of contributory thought may come.  When it does, we write them in notes, be it at night in bed or at some other activity, then fill them in on typewriter, revise and rewrite until they represent new thoughts, rewriting pages into which they fit or overlap.  If these inserts are of sufficient number to justify, we have all pages of the lecture outline renumbered so they follow each other.  This prevents any getting out of order or misplaced.  Often this process of renumbering pages may be done three or four times.
    “Keeping in mind the various topics we have lectured on and have outlines for, we often go back to one of years ago and add something.  The listener hears in one hour the labor of possibly hundreds of hours.
    “Often the comment has been made, ‘What a brilliant man.  His talks are marvelous.  I could listen to him all day.’  Little does the listener realize that the talk he listens to is not the product of the hour during its deliverance.  It is the product of weeks, months, years in advance, even though he hears it all within one hour.
    “Every time a lecture is delivered, we see a part or parts which can be strengthened, others may be deleted.  No lecture is ever finished.  One talk (Selling Yourself ) has been delivered more than 5,000 times over the world before all kinds of audiences, cutting and fitting it to suit.  It isn’t finished yet!
    “We have funeral orations, sermons from pulpits of churches.  We have conducted schools on radio, Chiropractic, legislation, salesmanship, caves, migrations of races, national and international conventions in many foreign countries.  In fact, the list is endless.
    “Criticism has been directed to the voluminousness of our talks.  In writing, we endeavor to present a complete presentation, leaving no loop-holes.  By presenting every fact, it cannot successfully be attacked.
    “Altogether, one lecture may represent scores or hundreds of hours from time of conception to laying it away to rest.  That’s the process we use in building a lecture.”

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    I’ve traveled planes, ships and sleepers with him, to and from endless conventions of various kinds when he was to speak.  I’ve read, corrected proof, or discussed most every book, magazine article, or lecture to come from his prolific and versatile mind.  He has written on most every subject one can conceive.  He has 150 big volumes of lecture outlines — a lifetime’s work if nothing else were ever done — yet it was but one item amongst many in his life.  He has written and printed an entire library and thousands of booklets and pamphlets.  One wonders where he gets time for it all.
    He asks for criticism.  He wants truth, and I always give it.  He is not adverse to people who disagree with him.  But he wants those differences to be based on logic and reason and to be sincere.  I know the reasons “why he does what he does in the way he does it.”
    B.J. is an early riser.  Outside of the night shift around The P.S.C., he is always the first on the job.  He has his breakfast at 6:00 A.M., lunch at 10:30, dinner at 4:30 P.M.  And he goes to bed at 9:00 P.M., regardless.  If there is company at home, he will often say, “Let’s go to bed, our company wants to go home.”
    He gets his first mail at 6:00 A.M., and it is answered at once.  He then usually makes the rounds of inspection of his buildings, checking, seeing if all is right.  He makes notes on what needs be corrected or changed.  As soon as the department head arrives, he calls him and reports what is to be done, and how.  He knows his buildings, their equipment, their uses, intimately; and astounds his people with his understanding of what it is, what it does, and how.  It has been frequently said: “If everything is running according to Hoyle, he is never around or makes comment; but let anything go wrong, he is on the job instantly.”  He is called “Eagle Eye” by many because he sees details which frequently escape the eyes of the head of the department.
    I’ve seen this man completely reverse himself several times, evolutionize and revolutionize his processes of thinking, speaking, writing, and printing, as well as teaching, as he has climbed in the development of himself.  Often this has been costly in friends and finances.  He is always fearless, never afraid of consequences in so doing.  He has often said, “The only excuse for any person to live is the development of self.”  I have seen him change from a dogmatist, teaching a dogma in a dogmatic manner, in the days when such was necessary, to that of a scientist, teaching a science in a scientific manner.  Such changes were brought about by the logic and reason of his indefatigable researches for better ways of doing better things, to accomplish more, with less effort, to save time, that he might take worse cases and get them well quicker at cheaper cost to patient.
    I’ve heard this man cussed and discussed, damned and praised, by friends and enemies.  He has often said, “We have no lukewarm friends.  They are either red-hot for us or ice-cold against us, depending upon whether or not they know what we are trying to accomplish.”
    His mind does not deal with fol-de-rols or knick-knacks, fringes or useless details.  He has a very analytical mind, what he calls “straight-line-thinking.”  I know his faults — and he has them — as well as his virtues.  He is a very human being, common, easy to approach if you have something worth while to say.  He is sensitive to unjust, untrue, injustices.  He does not deliberately hurt anyone, although often his pungent and terse answers are so construed.  He will quickly brush aside anybody who pesters him with nonsense.
    B.J. is kind, thoughtful, considerate, never deliberately hurting feelings, trying to avoid doing so.  He is constructive, building for tomorrow.  His early and comparatively recent life has been one of battling his home town, many of his own profession, legislatures, to save his heritage.  He has had to fight for the preservation, development, and defense of Chiropractic to preserve it in its purity for posterity; often against some in his profession who would drag Chiropractic in the mud for selfish purposes of mercenary greed, regardless of how it ruined Chiropractic and was of no value in getting sick people well.  All this has made him callused, tough, bitter towards many and much.  He has been deceived so often by so many that he places trust in few.  In last ten years, much of this has changed.  Being elastic and plastic, he has mellowed, softened, forgiven many of the heartaches and sufferings forced upon him.  His work is now coming into its own.  The City of Davenport is now his friend.  The Chiropractic profession is divided into two camps — those strongly for, and those bitterly against.  He ties fast to the group for, and now ignores the group against.  Many students of The P.S.C., upon graduating, tell him how they are going to carry on his principles and practices.  His answer is born of his struggles.  “Tell me that ten years from now, after you have been tried and not found wanting, and I’ll believe you.”
    It has been vicariously bruited around by some near and dear to B.J., and through them to others not so close, and the talk has been kicked about like a football, that he is in business and, being in business, his opinions and actions are unduly influenced by his business advisors of the necessity of yielding to financial income rather than meeting the ends of scientific progress and the development of his profession.
    As one writer put it:
    "Being the head of a business, you are more or less the victim of your customer’s wants and desires if you wish to keep his business.  You cannot promote a radical idea any more because it will affect your business.  Those who receive the salaries who run the business and who advise you in such matters must always be cautious to protect the business and their salaries.”
    After reading this preface and studying the ways and means used by this man and what he has gone through, the reader must come to the unalterable conclusion that nothing and nobody has stopped or can stop B.J. from doing what he interprets as the right thing to do, when the right time comes to do it.  That has been his history and that is still his straight-line thinking and acting.
    He has an organization and as such is an organization man.  He is not a one-man rule or ruin director of his enterprises.  No organization can long run without successful team work.  He counsels with his counselors, he listens to their suggestions and weighs them carefully; but when he feels he is right and the time has arrived for any new innovation, he is fearless in taking the step regardless of how it effects his income.  He long ago realized that permanent growth comes from growth that is permanent and that always follows the pioneer who moves into newer and better fields who keeps up with progress.  “Go West young man and grow up with the country” is still true in fields of philosophies, sciences, and arts.
    He knows no expediency nor does he appease anybody on a step forward and upward when necessary.  When his Innate directs him an issue is right, he moves regardless of any and all educated sophistries to the contrary.
    I always end up saying, “If you knew this man as I do, you would be the friend to him that I am.”
    As a close personal friend, as a professional advisor, and as companion, I’ve traveled thousands of miles with him and it is under such off-guard moments that you really get to know the real inside of any person.  I’ve fished the gulf stream and Atlantic ocean, and walked over glaciers with him.  I’ve walked the streets of New York, Miami, Los Angeles, Toronto, and many other cities with him and, sooner or later, his mind reverts to his loved subject of Chiropractic.  I’ve even bunked with him in trailers on vacations in the South and West.
    I’ve heard many intimacies from his own lips during his relaxed hours when his guard is down — bits here and fragments there — the story of his heartaches and triumphs; and, believe you me, there have been many of both.  It is as he has said, “The higher you go, the fewer.  The more achievements, the more and harder bumps.”  But wherever he went, his mind was seeking information on so many topics it bewildered some of us trying to keep up with his pace.  Without warning, he might discuss mummies, caves, geology strata, customs of people here or there — seemingly endless topics are stored away in his consciousness.
    As busy as “The Chief” is, with all his properties, businesses, professional work, he still finds time to ride his hobbies which are varied and many.  They are found scattered throughout all buildings, A Little Bit O’ Heaven in his back yard, Clinic Gardens, Rose Gardens, in the Clinic, on the walls of the various buildings, his Circus Museum, all of which are open to the public.  How he keeps up with all is a mystery to all of us.  But, best of all and not open to the public is his unique home.  He used to open it to the public Easter and Labor Day.  As many as 8,000 have passed through it in one day.  But a home is not a home when everybody can knock on the door and be invited to see it.  Today, the home is closed except to close friends.  Veritably it is a museum — a treasure house — with all its choice and valuable arts.  What a pity it must be buried from public gaze!
    I have said “The Chief” is busy.  There was one period in his life when younger, when he worked 18 hours a day, 365 days in the year, for 18 years, without a single vacation.  He allotted 6 hours to sleep, per day, during all that time.  Then he had a break.  He went to Pass Christian, Mississippi.  Each day he was wheeled out on a cot on the long pier that runs into the Gulf, where he dictated 100,000 words per day to a reporter.  Since then, he has eased up because of the insistence of some of us near and dear to him.
    I’ve seen his institution grow from a “hole in the wall” to that of many buildings, to the mammoth organization it is now in all its ramifications.  I’ve seen it grow in numbers from a mere faithful handful until its loyal employees now number hundreds.  I’ve seen him count pennies and skimp and scrape the bottom of the financial barrel many times until now he is a tower of financial strength.  Too many, seeing his success now, overlook the struggle of those early years.  They little realize the heartaches that he had to go through to get where it is now.  He paid the price many times.
    His people who work with him work for him.  They love him, admire him, even to some considering him a genius in every endeavor he espouses, whose work and works will live long after him.  He wants to be called “B.J.” which he says means Big Job.
    He thinks, speaks, writes, and prints without inhibitions, be they philosophical, scientific, religious, financial, commercial, radio, or travelogues.  He speaks fearlessly, regardless of the group to whom he talks.  He has builded that kind of a reputation and if they don’t want to hear what he has to say, they shouldn’t invite him.  He pulls no punches when he knows he is on firm ground and believes he is right.  He has often said “If what we say proves right, then none can break it down, therefore discussion will help it.  If it proves wrong, then discussion brings out errors and it should be corrected.”  Once he believes an issue sound and right, nothing can swerve him except reason and logic.  He is not moved into action by emotion, passion, or prejudice.  He is not an appeaser or strategist on vital problems.  He cuts quick to the core of an issue, knows it backwards and forwards, top to bottom, inside and out; gets his facts, and acts promptly.  He uses language to reveal thought, not to conceal it.
    On matters which are non-essential, which do not affect anything seriously, he will listen and yield.  On issues which are vital, fundamental, and basic, he has not been known to yield to anybody.
    B.J. lives what he calls “the crowded hour.”  He squeezes in many things.  His life has been full and running over.  His mind goes into many avenues.  Any of his many lines of thinking would fill any one man’s life; but somehow he does that, adding many more.  When I think of all the different lines of activity this man has gone through, I marvel at his ability.
    As a further example: In his travels, he always seeks caves.  It has been said: “B.J. can smell a hole in the ground like a tombstone man smells a newly made grave.”  B.J. has visited and studied all the great caves of the world, hundreds of them, including such as Mammoth, White’s, Luray, Carlsbad, Jenolan, salt caves in Australia, etc.  He has even discovered some never known before, such as Olive’s Bower in Mammoth.  He has solved the “Mysteries” of the Jenolan caves in Australia where it is now believed only two people know how they were caused.  Yes, B.J. not only has seen them, but can talk intelligently about them, how they came into being, what caused them, how long it took to grow them.  He has a most interesting talk on Caves and Where They Lead Us.  Occasionally, he gives this talk to his class assembly.
    I know whereof he writes in the article which follows — all being true — as to how he builded and the source of his inspirations.  His mind is keen, alert, always ready to listen to criticisms, suggestions, or advice from those in whom he has confidence.  He will not waste time on flattery, insincerity, or defeatist ideas.  He is a builder, always constructive.  When he makes an appointment for a certain time, you’d better be there!  Whenever you are granted an interview with B.J., make it brief.  He rarely grants more than five minutes even to us who know him well.  He will be equally brief.  He has no desire to “brush you off” but he does believe in eliminating what he calls “goat feathers.”  If he wishes to extend the interview beyond that time, he will let you know.  When he appears before his classes, and the time is 8:00 o’clock, he starts on the second.  I’ve known him to speak to a convention of hundreds when there wasn’t a baker’s dozen in the room at the appointed hour.  And I’ve known him to “bawl out” those who come late.  As he says, “The time you lose has the same value as the time you use.”
    The more I study this man and his processes of thinking, the more fundamentally right I think he is, and I believe time will so prove.  Peculiarly, you have to know the sincerity of the man to know that he is not egotistic in making statements he does.  He says them in a calm, deliberate, research sense, scientifically reasoning them out as a nodal point on which to base his thinking.
    The more I watch the methods and processes used by this man, of recognizing the supremacy of the Innate within him, the more I see that that is the road to success.  I would not call him genius, neither would I say he is possessed of supernatural ability.  I would say, though, that because of his taking adjustments since a boy, he is more in tune with the Infinite within him than are most of us mortals who came later into the picture and, because thereof, suffered more from subluxations than he did.  He has lived a more normal and natural life than the most of us.  Because of that, he is more natural in his method of living, suffering less with educated inhibitions than most of us.  Perhaps that accounts for why he thinks issues differently, acts differently, and is more like what all of us would like to think and do, but fear criticism that arises when we do.
    B.J. does not believe in predestination or foreordination — that certain people are born to do certain things.  He believes that any man has the Innate potentials to do the same work in the same way he has done it.  Circumstances of birth and environment had something to do with his success; but more than all that is the freedom of flow of Innate from within to the Educated without that was more natural in him than in most others.
    Through all these past fifty-four years of being attacked on all sides on many and varied issues, he has remained the outstanding authority and recognized leader of Chiropractic.  Many have tried to usurp his position on false premises and misrepresentations, but he always maintained that right would prevail in the long run and lies would defeat themselves, given time.  He has never been known to swerve from being true to the fundamental Chiropractic principle and practice and it was this which richly brought him the sincere respect even of his worst enemies.