There is a story in industry circles about the time former Milwaukee Valve owner Johnny Seder had dinner with a contractor customer and that individual’s family. During the meal, it was revealed one of the contractor’s children was interested in attending Johns Hopkins University, but had not heard anything back from the elite institution.
As the story is told, Seder quietly excused himself, went to a back room in the contractor’s home and made a phone call (Seder’s late father, Herschel, was on the school’s board of trustees at the time) and then returned to dinner without saying a word.