My Experiences in War and Business

To describe Earl Hawkins as a self-made millionaire is about as incomplete a formulation as describing a Stradivarius as a wooden box with strings. His autobiography is an American story. It is about a poor, half-blind, young boy from the back woods of West Virginia, overcoming all adversity through simple, quiet, and honest determination and making himself wealthy, to be sure, but above all, a man. It is about his experiences in a war that shaped the world in which we now live: how he joined a most unlikely outfit of the National Guard; how he fooled the medical examiner to get into the Army: how he fought for several years in the Pacific--winning the Silver Star, Bronze Star and Purple Heart. It is about a man building his own American dream, piece by piece, with honesty and integrity. It is about the habits and virtues of successful people--described in an intelligent, witty and engaging way. Foreward by Dan Quayle