-From: credmond@watmath.waterloo.edu (Chris Redmond)

In article <1882@disuns2.epfl.ch> riese@litsuns1.epfl.ch (Marc Riese) writes:

I agree that The Bay is a very special company for Canada for its long and
colourful history, but I think its a youngster in comparison to certain
European companies (although I couldnt name one). I remember hearing a story
of an American company negotiating a business deal with a Swedish steel
company. In the proposition sent to Europe, the American company mentioned
some reliability concerns and asked for proof that they could count on
the Swedish company still being there in a year. In a terse letter, the
Swedish firm replied that since they had existed more than four times the
age of the USA, they didnt see why they would not be there the next year…

Comparable anecdote #1: At the 350th anniversary celebrations of
Harvard University, one speaker said, Harvard is intimately bound
up with the history and culture of the United States–an innovation
in which we have taken considerable interest.

Comparable anecdote #2: Someone has calculated that there are in Europe
26 (this number is my best recollection of what was said) organizations
that have been in continuous existence for at least five hundred years:
the Parliament at Westminster, the Althing (parliament) of Iceland, the
Roman Catholic Church, and 23 universities.

-From: brad@looking.on.ca (Your Editor)

Anecdote #3, told by Greg Benford: At an Oxford college, they were
debating what to do with all their money. The consensus was to buy land,
since for the past thousand years, land has proven to be a very wise
investment for the college.

The crusty old patriarch piped in, True, but the past thousand years have
been atypical.