Many people keep a relentless pace in their pursuit of financial success, barely stopping for a breath even after they hit it big.

For Bernard Mannes Baruch, his downtime was priceless. "All of us need to pause every now and then to examine where the rush of the world and our own activities is taking us," Baruch wrote in his autobiography, "Baruch: My Own Story."

So when Baruch sealed a deal, made or lost money, or just needed some quality think time, he headed for a park bench near his offices in New York City or Washington, D.C.

He'd review the entire day and plan for the next, and talk about business and politics with passers-by.

"If I had lost money, I wanted to make sure that I would not repeat the same mistake," he wrote. "If it had been a successful operation, getting away from the clattering tickers helped me clear my mind and refreshed me physically for any future action."

That approach proved a boon for Baruch (1870-1965), who became one of the top investors of all time. He also became a noted statesman, serving as chairman of the War Industries Board in World War I and in Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal brain trust. Altogether, he advised seven presidents.

A native of Camden, S.C., Baruch moved with his family to New York when he was 11, according to James Grant's "Bernard M. Baruch: The Adventures of a Wall Street Legend." Until the end of his life, Baruch often mentioned the influence his father, Simon, a dedicated doctor, and mother, Isabelle, had on his personal and business conduct. Their morality, kindness and generosity inspired him.

See The Right Way

Baruch liked visual cues. To remind him to stick to the high road, Baruch had a photo of his father in his office with the inscription "Let unswerving integrity always be your watchword."

Baruch also kept a black notebook with him at all times to jot down ideas and thoughts about securities he believed were sound investments. He'd return to the notebook frequently to check his expectations against a stock's performance.

Baruch analyzed his steps each time. If it turned out he picked a dog, he tried to figure out what he missed. "The more we know of our own failings, the easier it becomes to understand other people and why they act as they do," he wrote.

If he was right and a stock's value climbed, he made sure he covered the same bases with the next stock.

Every time an investment — or any other situation — turned out badly, Baruch said, it was because he hadn't done enough research. "Before you (act), find out everything you can," he wrote.

He learned from direct experience. Just weeks after his first big success, Baruch put everything he had into American Spirits Manufacturing because he'd heard from a secondhand source that renowned investor Thomas Fortune Ryan liked the stock. When American Spirits — then the country's largest liquor manufacturer and distributor — lost its sparkle and the stock tanked, Baruch had to sell other holdings and his carriage to cover his losses. Later, Baruch told Ryan about the incident.

"Did I tell you to buy that whiskey stock?" Ryan asked.

No, Baruch said, he hadn't.

"Never pay any attention to what I am reported to have said to anyone else," Ryan told him.

Point taken. For the rest of his career, Baruch avoided stock tips; he neither gave nor accepted them.

"There is no more dangerous illusion than the belief that one can get something for nothing," he wrote.

While on a fact-finding mission, Baruch tried to remain as emotion-free as possible and let the data do the talking. Once, Baruch ran into banker Otto Kahn, who started to talk about some heavy activity in Union Pacific stock. Baruch stopped Kahn cold. "Please don't tell me anything that is happening to Union Pacific," he told Kahn. "I don't want my judgment affected by anything you might say."

Yet Baruch was a tireless gatherer of information. He was shy, so he spoke little and listened much. He often eavesdropped on brokers' conversations. He pored over the Financial Chronicle and devoured information from Poor's Manual. He studied train routes to figure out the effect transportation had on different companies. He arrived at work two hours early so he could check out the stock activity on the London exchange before anyone else.

His thoroughness extended to his sales techniques as a young broker at A.A. Housman. To sell some railroad securities, Baruch went through business directories and picked out names of possible investors. He wrote dozens of letters asking the men to consider the stock. The response was complete silence.

Not one to get discouraged, Baruch went to the men's offices after the stock exchange closed to make his pitch. He finally made his first sale by waiting at the end of the day for James Talcott, a merchant, and following the man up the street talking as fast as he could about the stock. Talcott bought one share, and Baruch was on his way.

Education was critical to Baruch. He believed that much of his success came from the classical liberal arts education he received at City College of New York. He maintained that having to take classes in a wide variety of subjects, and learning Latin and Greek — he could converse in either — taught him how to think and apply himself later in life.

As his father advised, Baruch made integrity one of his biggest priorities — even at great personal cost. For instance, when he accepted President Wilson's offer of the War Industries Board chairmanship, Baruch sold all of his holdings that he legally could to avoid any appearance of favoritism to companies in which he owned a stake.

When a problem reared its head, Baruch liked to confront it head-on. Take the time whispers on Wall Street said he'd raided American Smelter's stock by shorting it just to best the company's owners, the Guggenheim family.

In fact, Baruch had advised others — including the Guggenheims — that he thought the stock was overpriced and that he'd therefore sell his holdings. But the sale made people doubt the company's stability.

When he heard the whispers, Baruch went right to the Guggen- heims and reminded them of his earlier advice and assured them he hadn't intended it to create a problem. He also bought $500,000 of the stock to let others know he believed in the company's strength — and the company rebounded.

Solid Handle

Known as the "Lone Wolf of Wall Street," Baruch was no follower. He invested only in companies that produced tangible objects because he thought that helped the U.S. economy. According to Grant, Baruch's financial assets hit $22 million to $25 million before the crash of 1929, and by 1931 settled at $16 million, or $205 million in today's dollars.

Baruch wasn't seen as a hero by all; he occasionally faced vicious taunts because he was Jewish.

Rather than get angry, Baruch treated the prejudice as motivation. He told his children to "take these discriminations as spurs to more strenuous achievement. . . . Do not be blinded to the greatness of America by the pettiness of some of the people in it."

BY JOANNE VON ALROTH