Clinch Valley news. [volume] (Jeffersonville, Va.) 18??-2019, 1916-07-28
GEORGE WILLIAM LITZ.

SAN. but al
distinct loss 10 the business and
social community in which he lived
and moved. His rise i'll the business
world. ana the position he occupied
therein. WAS almost phenomenal.
Starting = Jew years AEo. boy
with li,-le o. 10 money. ne acrunu-
iS:si fortune vAriou$ly estimated ri
between 700 ani 500 thousand dol
lars. with seal ana timber holdings
which promise 70 De exceedingly
valuable within few years True.
he had special opportunities in his
favor. but so had scores and scores of
other young men, who failed to take
advantage of them or who had not the
ability to grapple with them. When
OPPORTUNITY knocked he was in,
and seized upon her offering and
climbed to a height in the financial
world seldom attained by one of his
years.
At the time of his death he was
assistant to the President of the
iNllSCl LulilDCl w., anu ICIclul Mill
ager, Vice President of Il big Cyp-
ress Lumber Company and assistant
president of the Raleigh Lumber Co,
and vice president of railroad in
West Virginia. He began work with
the Ritter Lumber Company at Welch,
on the yard at $1.35 per day. Upon
the death of the manager Of the
stables he was promoted to the posi-
ton made vacant. Afterwards he
bought horses and mules for the
Company, afterwards he was promot.
cd to the position of supply agent,
and then to superintendent, and so
on, until at the time of his death he
was practically the head of the Comp
any, with large mills in several
states. Instead of the $l.35 per day
seventeen years ago, his salary is said
to have been between $50 and 10
thousand dollars per year, besides
owning large stock in the
company, and an interest in large
boundaries of valuable undevclopeL
coal and timber lands in Kentucky
These facts are rccitcd, not to laud
Mr. Litz, but us an example to other
young men, on the one hand, and
testimony to the worth of integrity
industry and sobriety 80 factors in
business success
This sketch would be incomplete
if ended here. The money making
capacity is not regarded as one of
the highcst,-not how much man
makes, but how he makes it, and what
he does with it after he makes it,
-proclaims the real man.
For years he had been scattering
his money in benevolent deeds, 20 the
exact and entire extent, may never Do
known. Only since his death, upon
close inquiry, have many OF his ben
efactions come to light, all of which
cannot be recited here. In different
lumber camps of the company hun
dreds of poor people shared his benc-
faction. In one of these he paid Il
large part of the salary of woman
missionary to work among the fami-
lies of the lumbermen. He sent men
and women to sanitariums for costly
surgical operations and treatment,
paying their bills and saving lives.
He remembered hundreds of children
at Christmas times, and in numer-
Gus ways and instances proved thai
money was not all he loved, nor the
chief end of his life.
Makes His Will.
1t is a peculiar and striking Incl
cent, that short time before he
started on his fateful trip from Col
umbus to North Carolina and other
points at which he had engagement; ),
he made his will, giving requests to
his brothers or their wives, the child.
rem of an uncle, amounting to some
thing like $4,000, providing literally
for his family. Two of his brothers,
alread rich men, mot needing his
help, were not named in the will,
but six Of the eight brothers and
their families, were each bequeathcl
as much as $4,000 or more. Did he
have premonition that perhaps he
would never return from this trip?
Another fact bearing upon the ques-
ton of the accumulation Of his wealth
stands GU. prominently. "Gcneral!y
the man with the most money has the
fewest friends" has often been said
the reason perhaps, that in the max
ing of a fortune the maker has beer
oppressive, inconsiderate to every
body but himself, Indifferent to the
needs of the poor around him, alb
sorbing everything like a great biz
sponge, and giving out nothing. Suc}
men are popular with men like them
selves, but this popularity is purel,
of selfish nature. George w. Lit;
was widely known among large elias
Of big men, as we say, and among
much larger class of the rank an,