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BRUTUS SPEECH
Fred Jefferson went up to the lectern and gave a fiery speech about the past and future of the Yacht Club, the difficult situation on the Market, and the reduction of Market capacity, which would play into the hands of the Yacht Club. That was the premise for the future; the premiums would rise and the members were ready to take on higher self-retentions on the insured risks, as shown by a recently carried out Market survey.
Everything he said was projected onto the screen with statistical models and in the same way the new tightened insuring conditions. He harshly criticized underwriting‘ as practiced in the USA, and he announced consequences, for staff too if necessary. He coined on this occasion the saying that his underwriters are „seamless“; which nobody understood. The lecture was rounded off by a presentation of the progressive data processing system (with online screen input and automatic rating, a sensation at that time) and with a new advertisement for the Yacht Club. During the whole presentation his gaze was fixed on the Lloyd’s underwriters. He spoke to them and disarmed their power of criticism, winning them for himself word by word. He answered questions competently and with good preparation, even when his answers could not be submitted to exact examination. His voice kept calm and he radiated competence and serenity, he positively sprayed positive energy. He was a brilliant speaker. I was reminded of the famous speech of Brutus from The Life and Death of Julius Caesar by Shakespeare:
“Romans, countrymen, and lovers! Hear me for my Cause, and be silent, that you may hear: believe me for mine honor,
and have respect to mine honor, that you may believe”.
Yes, that was his method. Whoever questioned his statements was directly attacking his honor. He was a tough nut to crack. At the end of his speech his daughter broke out in tears.
„You were wonderful, Dad,“
She said with an emotional voice, and John and I looked at each other in bafflement. Fred took no notice of that. Obviously he was used to such displays of emotion. All in all the insurers felt encouraged and in a positive mood, and a decision was taken to spend the afternoon at a pool of the hotel. Then John Hughes said:
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