Early Career

• As per his mother’s diary, Jerome K Jerome began his career at the London and North Western Railway on 12 January 1874, at the age fourteen. Being posted at Euston Station, his first job was to collect coals that fell along the railway, but very soon, he was promoted to the post of a clerk.
• His mother died sometime in the middle of 1875. By then his sisters had left home and living alone in dingy lodgings in London and working as a clerk, Jerome entered the bleakest period of his life. In spite of that, he did not give up hope.
• Sometime now, he joined an amateur theatre group, acting in small roles in his spare time. Finally in 1877, he left his job to join a repertory troupe, which produced plays on a shoestring budget, with actors buying the costumes and props with their own resources.
• He remained with the troupe for three years, may be for the excitement of traveling around. Sleeping in the dressing rooms or church porches he played various parts, doubling or even trebling roles. Sometime he had to look at his costumes to remind himself which part he was playing.
• Finally at the age of 21, he had enough of acting and returned to London, literally penniless. Subsequently, sleeping in dosshouses, he was discovered by an old friend, who managed to get him a short-lived job of a journalist, requiring him to cover police stations and coroners.
• He next became a school master in Clapham; but this job too did not last long. Thereafter, he took up an array of menial jobs, working for an illiterate builder, as a packer for a commission agent and also for a parliamentary agent. Finally, he became a solicitor’s clerk.
• While joining the solicitor’s office, he had a vague intention of being trained for a career in law. Simultaneously, he started writing essays, short stories and satires, sending them to different magazines. Although initially most of his works were rejected, he never gave up.