The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1898-01-03
BRAVE STRUGGLE A VICTORY.
A FORMER NEWARK MERCHANT
GAINS AtBIGBFORTUNE
AT OF.
MADE
DE REPEATED FAILURES,
But They Did Not Discourage Hugh
e. WiIItams-Other In
stances.

III ooSloH VINO committed suicide the
other day leaving farewell letter in
which he said that he had lost his for
tune, and his age, fifty years, 1t was
absurd for any one to think of achieV-
Ing financial success from nothing in
these days Of hot competition, ought to
nave heard about the men out in this
country who have won new success
after they had become gray-haired
| grandparents and had had all their saw
1ngs OF years swept away. There are
several men in California who had
passed their sixtieth birthday when
financial disaster overlook them and
!. left them without means, and, never
: theless, were able to restablish them
| selves.
Joseph Mason, who died in Coronado,
Cal, last October at the age of seventy
zine years, was a single instance Of
what a determined man may do to
achieve success in the face Of what
ninety-ntne out of a hundred persons
would consider insurmountable obsta-
cles. In the summer of 1885, when he
was sixty seven years old, he failed in
| the furniture business at Newark n. ].
He had been i'll for months and his bus
mess had been managed so badly that
when the sheriff seized the property
MIR. Mason was left with only his dwell
Ing and its contents. few weeks la
ter his house was burned, and, the in
surance policy having expired a few
days before, he was left with less than
a hundred dollars worth of property.
His wife was helpless invilid, he was
supporting several grand children, and
he had, besides, a partially invilid
daughter. None of his near relatives
had any means to help him. Mr.. Ma
son declined a number of offers of char
ity from his oldtime business friends,
and declared that he would make
money enough for his family's support
scmeway. For weeks he tramped about
Newark and Jersey City seeking
employment in furniture stores. His
white hair and old-fashioned clothes
were against him in places where
young men are employed No one
wanted him, and he tried to get en-
ployment at bookkeeping This plan
also failed. One day while he sat wait
Ing to ask busy merchant for some
SORT OF work, he read an article in a
New York newspaper about the immi-
grafton that was setting in toward
Prescott, Ariz., since the building of
the Atlantic and Pacific railroad
through that region
He read the article over again and
abandoned his effort to seek work in
that store. He went straight home to
the two little rooms his family occu-
pied, and said he had decided to go
to Arizona to try his luck His wife
was too Ill to argue the matter and
things We're too desperate with the in
valid daughter for her to offer an OBJ
lection. When Mr.. Mason told his &C
quaintances that he was going to Ari-
iona to make fortune he was regard
ed with suspicion, as If he was enter
ing an early stage of insanity. When
1t was seen later that Mr.. Mason was
dead in earnest, and that he had the
utmost faith that he could find some
way of making a success in a new
country, he was begged to stop and
consider what a rash step he was TAX
ing. But, in spiteiiof all arguments,
Mr.. Mason borrowed S150 from a friend,
and putting his family in the best
shape possible for a long winter, start
ed for Prescott 2, 700 miles from home,
without knowing what he would do
when he got there. 81
good sized volume might be filed
with the extraordinary career of this
courageous, gray haired man in his eff
forts to make another fortune for him.
self and familyy. 1t is quite as pathetic
as great many chapters in fiction.
He was the only white-haired man in
Prescott for the first two years, and
| that fact and This geeaseless industry
made him a prominent figure In the
busting town. The cowboys knew him
as "Old Pop Mason" and the miners
as white Top He got a job as book
keeper for cattle company the second
| day he was in the place, and by the
| most eXactfng economy he managed to
| save most of his salary to send to his
family in Newark. He had as much
enthusiasm for the new country as any
of the young men about him. That
made him particularly well liked All
his holidays he spent in climbing over
the mountains and studying the gold
and silver veins that were then being
opened in that part of Arizona. He
spent his leisure hours each night In
reading about assays, mining reports
and all the literature he could find re-
lating to the geology Of the gold and
| silver regions. The miners and cow
! boys became fond of the old man, and
not only gave him thousand and one
| tips about mining and the location of
unclaimed rich ore deposits but also
made him their banker and trustee. He
| had at one time deposited in his name
| in Prescott bank some $4,000 belong
ing to cowboys and miners who could
not read or write and trusted Mr.
| Mason
He kept incessantly studying, observ-
ing and talking about mining condi-
| tons until, when he had been in Pres
| colt two years, he had become an au-
| thority on many points. He was an
pointed by the court manager of a par
TALLY abandoned copper mine In Yava-
PAL county a year before he was seven
ty years old, and he entered upon the
task of turning thej enterprise into a
moneymaker. Thatdwas the beginning
Of his march toward financial success
He often said IN later years that he had
never in all his long life worked as he
did when he was seventy years old. He
was putting the copper mine on its A.
nancial legs then. she went into the
mines scores Of times day, shared
| the miners fare and, beds. studied out
the dips, and ssweryes of the copper
ore Lodges and projected new shafts
where other rninersqhad not dreamed
| there was ore land where some of the
richest coppero ore Yet found in the
Southwest was mined. Many a time
| he was on duty twelve hours at
| stretch. 1t is wonderful that his health
endured the strain, but Mr.. Mason said
| that he could not afford to be i'll with
| his load of responsibility, and it does
seem as if that were so. On Jan. l.
| 1890. Mr. Mason made his final report
| to the copper company. 1t had paid
IL per cent dividends in the previous
| wear and had made more than SA5 nm