The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-06-23
JOHN |. BLAIR DYING.
Famous Old Multi-MiIliOnaire Nearing
Life's End i'm New Jersey.

BLAIRSTOWN, N. J.. June 22.-John l.
Blair, New Jerseys greatest and most gen.
erous millionaire, is dying. For months he
has been in delicate health, and the end is
not far Off 1t may come at any moment.
Starting in as a clerk in a country store
without dollar, he is now worth $50, 900 0O0.
For long time Mr.. Blair has been prepar-
ing for the end. He scarcely needed the
warnings which he has received, for he is
within five years of the century mark OF
life
Mr.. Blair comes of Scotch stock His
father, at the beginning of the century, was
superintendent of a foundry at Belvidere,
n. J., and owned farm. The boy had to
work hard on the farm and he did not take
to it. When he was eleven years old a
cousin who had a village store in Hope.
sent for him to come and be his clerk.
Blair went, and for seven years he clerked
with eminent success. Then his cousin and
himself opened a store at Budd's Bridge.
That is the Blairstown of to-day, the town
that John I. Blair owns in fee simple. Then
he became postmaster and opened branch
stores all over the country. He succeeded
everywhere. He saw money in banking,
and established the Belvidere Bank, of
which he has been president or vice presi-
dent for sixty years. He bought a cotton
mill at a low figure and turned a financial
failure into success. He bought cargo of
damaged cotton that was in the hold of
steamship and made $1,000 by the opera
ton. He had examined the cotton secretly
and found it was not so badly damaged as
was thought. Then he went into the pro-
duce business. He obtained control of
nearly all the produce raised in the coun-
try where he lived and sent il to market at
q handsome profit. He ran four flour mills.
de bought and sold real estate. He dropped
the retail business and went into the whole
sale. He sent wagons into the sparSely set
tied country, where they exchanged manu-
factured goods for rich produce money.
BY this time he was rich. but his instincts
Kept him moving. He had business enough
on his hands to send ordinary man to
an insane asylum, but it did not worry him
IN the least. He bought shares in the
Scranton Coal and Iron Company and paid
FOR experiments for making iron with an
thracite coal They were successful and
before long the company could not begin
to supply the demand for rails from the
railroads This turned his attention to rail-
roads He went to work to secure a char
Bend. He got it and the road was built. 1t
was called Leggett's Railroad But from
that infant sprang the giant of to-day, the
great Delaware, Lackawanna & Western
ger business. From Lackawanna to Iowa
from Iowa to OakeS Ames and the Union
Pacific. Those We're the strides he made
The Omaha extension, the Sioux City and
Pacihc and dozen other roads he built
and helped to manage. AT one time he was
president of twenty railroads and improve
ment companies in the West
1t was not until Mr.. Blair went into poll
ties that he tasted the bitterness of failure
In 1856 his friends persuaded him to run
the campaign and was defeated. After that
he SWore off from politics.