[Ot] If you want to see a chart of APPLE or or INTEL a click of a key on the keyboard and up pops the chart.
You want volume? Click.
You want 10, 20, 50 day moving averages? Click. Click. Click.
A 5 minute chart? Click.
A 5 year chart? Click.
Magic.
But it wasn't always this easy.
In the mid '60's I read "Technical Analysis of Stock Trends" by Edwards and Magee. It grabbed me.
I read it again.
'Stocks tend to move in observable patterns, repeatedly, over time.'
'A company and the stock of a company are two very different things. Always trade the stock, never the company.'
Ten years later I was the editor of a business newspaper.
While business and finance were our major thrust I often strayed, eclectically:
A story about the economics of cocaine told by a major cocaine dealer.
A story about an attorney who one day received two gentlemen who dumped $100,000 in cash on his desk. "What's this for?" he asked.
"A retainer," he was told. "For a murder. "
"When did the murder happen?" he asked.
"Tomorrow," he was told.
It was a great story, a grabber, a nice read.
Another story was about Jerry Williams, an acerbic, sharp and funny guy who did a late night radio talk show in a small studio a few hundred feet from Fenway Park.
Another featured an arsonist who, for a fee, would torch a building for the insurance money.
In some papers the editor had a lot of clout. I was lucky, I was one.
Then I thought about John Magee and the book I'd read a decade ago.
John lived in Springfield Mass. about a 90 minute drive.
I called him, told him I was an editor and an occasional stock trader. Would it be possible to meet, talk for a while?
John was most gracious. Sometimes you can tell a lot by the sound of a man's voice on the phone. John invited me out.
He met me at the door, we shook hands.
He was tall, grey hair, maybe in his 70's.
But there was something gentle, gentlemanly, about him that touched me. I liked John immediately.
He led me to his office: it was a large room with down slanting tables along the walls. Tables everywhere. Just enough room to walk among them.
And on the tables were charts, stock charts.
I'd never seen such chart paper. John explained that he devised it, called it "Tekniplat."
A stock that moved from say 10 to 20 looked similar, in size, to a stock that moved from 50 to 100.
I don't know how many charts were on those slightly down slanting tables; I'd guess 100 or more.
We walked around. I saw AT&T, IBM, TXT [Textron] AVCO, Western Union. I knew most of them.
And the story is true: there was a sheet of plywood nailed to cover a window.
I asked him about this. He told me that he did it to symbolically shut out all the noise and nonsense that flowed always from Wall St.
We went out for lunch and for maybe a couple of hours talked stocks and the market and how folks viewed life. He did most of the talking, I did a lot of listening. I was entranced, impressed. John clearly loved what he was doing.
John gave me a stack of his Tekniplat charts.
That day I became a technical analyst.
It was a great day for me.
Thank you John.
