Lower coast gazette., 1909-11-06
pockefe,ler's Unsolicited Gift.

Pockefeller's Unsolicited Gift.
The daily press brings the news OF a GIT
from Mr.. Rockefeller Of a million dollars Tor 1he
nurpose of investigating and suppresslns on-
cin2riasis. or hook worm disease, thought by nm
and said by some to be prevalent IN the oou'f-
ern states of the federal union. II MI. kocKe-
Teller has really done this, it would Indicate a
lack of knowledge Of true conditions that we
should hardly think possible. He is SAID to De
an able man and intellectual and that Wlth ms
miserlv and brutally oppressive instincts nave
made the extraordinarily rich man that ne IS
His gifts of much money to the Chicago Uni
versjty are above criticism, unless they carry
with them some element of his own personal
control. But when he comes to accuse any con-
siderable number Of people OF chrome or pa1ho-
logical ~laziness, he ought to be sure OF ms 1acls'
We believe that the people of the South gener-
ally will resent this gift Of Rockeiellers WIN d
hook and line attached to 1t.
The hook worm disease is said to prevail IN
some parts of the United States, where the peo-
ple. and particularly the children live much out
of doors and in some way become dirt or mud
eaters and thus develop the hook worm. That
i should be characteristic of the southern
country as a whole is simply absurd. From the
beginning of the government OF this country
the South was the controlling element ana
showed no laziness therein. Virginia was noted
as the mother of the presidents, it beng the
native state of so many of the presidents VINO
served previously to the civil wal. Since the
civil war, the abolition of slavery and the enor-
nous development Of the agricultural West ana
of manufactures in the middle states, tens OF
thousands of southerners have gone up into
those sections of the federal union and so many
of them have become foremost in their respec-
tive vacations that it has excited much com
ment, Wherever southern and northern men
have been evenly pitted, side by side, no DIS
%tinction as to sectional origin became possible
The southern people were always prominent IN
the political life of the country and since the
civil war as lawyers, doctors, educators, bank:
ers and general merchants they have held the1
own by the side of all competitors.
The advantages Of soil and climate that at
tach to the South and especially to our
state of Louisiana remove the urgent n%ecesslt!
for that intense and untIring effort that |
requisite to produce given results in the state
further north. When our people go there the
indulge in intense and untiring efforts and, a
we have said hereinbefore, they hold their ow
} against all competition. When the men OF tn
= North come to US, under our genial skies, brlgf
Z sunshine and semi-tropical luxuriance general!
thew are lust as apt to indulge in less energet
3 methods of life than formerly and to become {
u lazy" as any of those here long resident an
e this without the intervention Of the hook Wor
~ and the development of the disease uncinariasl
" with which Mr.. Rockefeller now so serious
81 concerns himself. The Porto Rico immigran
,, ~ that We had here a few years back ard quite
VI number of whom went to the Sandwich Island
W are said to be afflicted more or less with tt
disease, the result of their very unsanitary ST
a roundings in their native land. There are Sc
II, to be mud eaters and clay eaters in the southe
'e' mountains of the Appalachian range, but as
Wy uncinariasis, or the hook worm disease bel
VI epidemic, or even epidemic in the Southe
III States of the federal union, it is simply absu
and if Mr.. Rockefeller desires to be enterpl
ing with his i'll gotten gains, the most sale
lty object for him to attack at the present II
lat would be the typhoid fly, the musca domestl
les or common house or typhoid t1y. A million {
~ lars given to the Chicago University or to
al John HOPKINS for the means Of educating
nd people up to the necessity of suppresslng
pie present most active enemy Of the human 7
would seem to be a laudable gift,