The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1900-10-14
"JULE' CARR===THE MAN.
A PEN PICTURE.
BY ROBERT LILLY GRAY. RALEIGH.

| city that came in time to be the very
nerve center of all that was progressive
/ and daringly successful in the spirit OF
| the State owes it's chief impetus to his
enthusiasm and example. The three miles
! of factories and business houses and
churches and colleges and happy homes
that comprise the Durham of today form
| with their history an apotheosis of Carr
| Durham twenty years ago became the
Mecca of 1.-THE man with an idea He
was sure of Carr's interest. If his idea
was good one he was sure of his help.
And Carr himself became the apostle ana
sponsor of the States material progress.
He is that now. He is building and pro-
noting and encouraging constantly all
manner of business undertakings. Scarce
ly has there been factory that has been
built or business venture launched in
North Carolina during twenty years that
seeking aid out of its immediate vicin-
ity, has not had Carr's name at the head
Of its stock subscription list. He has
set more things to going and more
wheels to turning than any other ten
mon in the State He has put more peo-
pie to work, and thereby furnished more
homes and more of sustenance than the
combined charities Of a generation. The
number of the people who make their
livings directly by reason of his indus
trial offspring would fill the ranks of an
army
The diversity of the mans undertakings
is almost incalculable. He has found the
time to give his attention to myriad of
interests, any one OF which would en-
gross the ordinary man. He has the
genius of management, which is the
genius of concentration. He can deter
mine what to do, pick the man to do it
and put the thing in operation in a
breath. He can pigeon-hole it in his
brain and turn instantly with unim-
paired vigor to the doing of something
else His energy is unlimited, but con-
served.
These are some OF the phases of Carr
the Capitalist. Carr the Man is even
more interesting. His success and his
money have served simply to enable him
to more adequately express the interest
in the people that is in him and to intro
duce him to their regard. The Boy, the
eternal Boy that has lived and will die
in Julie" Carr has found unfeigned ex-
preston of delight in the money that
Carr the Business Man has made. His
joy in giving it away is so we'll known
that he has constantly to be on his
guard against imposition. He takes the
same active personal interest in his char
titles that he gives to his business. He
investigates and then acts. 1t is rarely
that he is deceived into giving inju-
diciously
How he saved the old Trinity College,
paying the third part of its running ex-
penses and finally how it was estab-
lished in the magnificent campus that is
his gift; how he saved Greensboro Fee
male College; how he has, more than any
other man. contributed in every way to
the support of the State University ard
dotted it's campus with the architectural
monuments of his love; how he has not
confined his interests to the welfare of
his church or his alma mater, but HIS
contributed literally to the endowmens
of Wake Forest, Elon and st. Marys col
leges, and has built and supported
churches and school houses of all sects
and denominations until you can scarcely
encounter an educational or benevolent
institution in the State that has been in
straits that has not profted largely by
his aid-all these things are known of
all men. But the individual distress that
he has dissipated, the mouths he has
filed, the opportunities that he has fur
nished and the singing hope that he has
planted in many discouraged breast
these are the daily and unheralded in
cidents in the life of this multifoldly busy
man that. written out, would make the
lengthiest scroll of his works, and that
most clearly point his character and his
mission in the world.
The writer knows of one poor widow of
a Confederate soldier, of whom he had
never heard. who wrote and asked his
aid in the education of her daughter. ''If
my old friend Blank" he wrote on the
back of the letter, will endorse this, you
may send your daughter to any college in
North Carolina and send the bills to
me-"
lawyer who has since taken promi-
Rent place in the organization of the State
Democracy went to Carr fifteen years
ago, a poverty stricken youth and asked
his endorsement of a note for $500 with
which to complete his education He was
stranger and it was at a time when
Carr was facing a business crisis. 81
cannot endorse anything" he said, "but
take this stock and borrow on it what
you need
1t is things like these, and the feeling
LndC cacn OF the thousands or individuals
he has helped has from the manner of
their doing that they are acts of fellow
ship rather than the colder charity. that
make the appearance of the man among
the people the lighted fuse to their en-
thusiasm. They know him for a man
who, when he speaks, speaks with sense
and force ard often with eloquence But
did he speak as a Demosthencs the
cheers would be more for the man than
for the orator. For the people know
him; and he knows pretty nearly every
mothers son of them. He knows more
men with that peculiar intimacy that
comes up from behind and says Hello
Bill,' than any man living in the State
And each man knows that there is moth
ing of affectation in the greeting. He
knows that if it pleased Julie" Carr to
drive over the country roads in a coach
and four he would be as glad of the
chance to give the humblest farmer
lift and be as genuinely interested in the
state of his crops as he would be of the
society of the merriest party of "blue
bloods" in the land
Some years ago l walked through the
halls of Somerset Villa at Durham on
the occasion of a magnificent reception.
The house was like scene from fairy