The Fountainhead Chapters 3-5

In these chapters the role models of Howard Roark and Peter Keating. They introduce the large architect firm, Francon & Heyer, who is a big name in the architect business, and employs many up and coming architects, including Peter Keating. The other is Henry Cameron, a washed up drunk, who has very few commissions and even less that Security Trust Company will approve for construction.
Peter begins to work in a room filled with many other architects who quickly like and trust him. He quickly becomes friends with the owner Guy Francon, after he takes the bold step of critiquing the works of one of his superiors directly with him. “Keating knew that he had taken a terrible chance and won; he became frightened by the chance after he knew he had won” (Rand 42). By playing off of the flaws of his peers he advanced himself over the two years that these chapters depict, and tossed out the others who stood in his way. He took the other designer with Tim Davis, and took over his work in the premise of giving him time to spend with his new wife, when in reality he blames him whenever something is late because of him being a newly wed, or him not being on task. This ended with him being fired and Keating getting the position. He then did the same for the head of the architect department Stengel, landing him a commission to start his own firm, clearing the spot for Keating to fill. The key this shows is that the people in Francon & Heyer don’t advance by demonstration of skill, as another designer pointed out Keating’s first day, “Francon hell…he hasn’t designed a doghouse in eights…Stengel. He does all the work” (Rand39). It shows the talent less and the undeserving advancement of people playing by the mainstream rules of society. They also regard the opinions of others very highly, taking the words of the architect critic, Ellsworth M. Toohey. They show the necessity of the gratitude of others, probably from the fact that they do not progress from their talent, but their ability to suppress others who surpass them.
Howard Roark under Henry Cameron, on the other hand, had a workroom with two drawers working under Henry Cameron. Cameron chooses to hire Roark not based on the recommendation of others, or the fact he was expelled form Stanton, or that he had only been in New York for a day, but that he had work to show for it in his sketches to show his work. Roark didn’t take the job to get paid, because there wasn’t much to get from a firm not doing a lot of work, but that he knew he could learn from Cameron and that he had once been like him, resenting society. They both think, “Men hate passion, any great passion… [Henry Cameron] had nothing but a faith he held merely because it was his own” (Rand 45). Roark also expresses a dislike with the way things are, “I love this earth. That’s all I love. I don’t like the shape of things on earth. I want to change them” (Rand 49). He learns how so better create things his own way, refining the designing methods he created out of raw necessity of a building and with the help of Henry Cameron, made them even more efficient. This work shows a desire for a purpose higher than material gain, an actual love of their work and a desire to work just to express it that way.