Meade County news. [volume] (Meade, Kan.) 1900-1918, 1907-09-12

4 will surely give the tenth to thee
Let not thy left hand know what thy
right hand doeth.-Matthew SO.
John ID. Rockefeller, upon whose
oil monopoly the United States gov
eminent has laid a penalty of over
$29,000,000 for alleged violations of
the law against rebates, has given
away, up to the present time, more
than s100,O00,0O for public good
to churches, schools, hospitals,
asylums and missions.
In an address some years ago be-
fore Cleveland religious gathering of
his own Baptist faith Mr.. Rockefeller
told the story of his early struggles.
He said he had always followed the
| Scripture rule adopted by him when a
poor clerk, which provides for giving
one-tenth of his earnings to charity.
Accepting this statement as true, it
follows, from simple mathematical
calculation that the oil king has made
during his business career at least
billion dollars, in order to have given
away a hundred millions, unless per-
chance in an excess of zeal for the
public veal he has trespassed on his
capital.
1t is the general testimony of those
who have been brought IN close con-
tact with Mr.. Rockefeller that he has
| likewise followed, more closely than
the ordinary public benefactor, that
other Scripture maxim in regard to
the right and the left hand in the act
| of giving. He has never, so far as
known, handed out a list of his dona-
lions, although it is said that such a
list has been compiled by one of his
secretaries and is now in the inner
archives of the general education
board. Personal gifts and annuities
and strictly private charities do not
| appear on this, list, notwithstandir.
they are said to have absorbed in the
aggregate about $10,000,000 of the
Rockefeller accumulations.
Said to Be an easy Mark"
Mr.. Rockefeller's reputation among
professional gift hunters is that of an
easy mark" that is, if approached
cautiously and yet frankly and plaus-
IDLY through properly accredited chan
nels he gives up generously and much
more easily than the great steel king
whose benefactions rival those of the
founder. and preserver of the Standard
Oil company. Mr.. Rockefeller, say
his friends, is rot man of the world
in the ordinary sense of the term. I'm
til ten or dozen years ago he was
CO n, 80
the oil business that he knew little of
what was going on. He attended
church and devoted himself to bust
ness, ar d that was about as far as he
went.
Although he has been compelled to
take more leisure in the last ten
years, on account of his health, and
consequently has been drawn into
other spheres of experience and obser
walton whereby he has grown interest
ed in the general subject of secular
as well as religious education, he has
never crossed the threshold of art, of
| literature or of science. Hence the
limited primary scope of his colossal
gifts. From this is to be excepted his
| interest in the Rockefeller Institute
for Medical Research, which was
originally aroused, however. by mis-
| fortune in his own immediate family,
and not, it is said, by any general con-
siderations for humanity at large.
John D. Rockefeller's charity has as
sumed four great forms of expression:
Church and mission work 800 SIS, OOO, 900
The general and southern educa-
The h University of Chicago ...... 1000
| The Rockefeller institute.......... 1000 900
Private gifts to schools, individuals,
churches, parks, hospitals, societies
and reformatory and benevolent insti-
tutions have absorbed the rest of the
500, 1000, 900
Started with Church Work.
During the first quarter century of
his business career Mr.. Rockefeller's
charities did not extend beyond church
and missionary work. He began his
activity in that direction in Cleveland.
where he gradually built up, in con-
| junction with other rich Baptists, q
splendidly equipped church and parish.
He has always considered Cleveland
his home city, and has given large
amounts to nearly every one of the
publicly supported institutions there,
including the parks in his donations
AS the oil king grew in fortune he
gradually became dominant figure in
the Baptist denomination throughout
the United States and gave, systemat-
ically to the foundation and main
tenance of Baptist churches through
out the length and breadth of the
country. He early became interested
in the working church" scheme, and
under the guidance of DR.. Judson and
others invested" largely in the new
idea. The working church, 1t was ex-
planned to him, would solve the indif-
| ference of the masses in the great
cities toward the cause of religion.
Mr.. Rockefeller accordingly estab-
lished, with Rev. DR.. Judson, the fine
religious institution of that kind on