The Daily Alaska empire., 1935-09-09


 N In the heat of the oil litigation Ia' his only son, E. l. Doheriy, Jr., was A murdered by a servant. He saw his | old friend, Albert B Fall, Harding $ M Secretary of. the Interior, declared " guilty of .hribe taking, Back through K the spans of the years. he and Fall, M many times, as prospectors, had A tramped together behind the flap Al ping ears of a pack mule.
 In the. ramifications of litiga- H ton, civil and criminal that fol- h lowed leasing Of Government oil M lands by Fall, an alleged $100,000 H. bribe given Fall by Doheny occu- \ pied a key position. It was for that N act Fall was convicted. But Do- E heny was acquitted.
 K s ssNot Guilty h,a The Government charged that N Secretary Fall leased to Doheny Athei Elks Hills naval oil reserve in E California because of the alleged brlhe Twice, the level eyes of the N gray haired oil millionaire stared Es at a jury deciding whether he was
 criminally culpable Both times he heard the words mot guilty First he was tried for conspiracy
 to defraud the Government He was gin. his seventy fourth year when he was acquitted of the bribery count in 1880, six years after indictment. D. In the years of civil litigation \ over the oil leases, all had been cancelled by court order. Doheny N Sonce made the statement that these cancellations cost him $21 100000 He never wavered from his as seration that the $100,000 was ad- vanced to Fall as loan to an old K friend-a mortgage loan on Falls western ranch properties. Likewise, he insisted at all times he was motivated by patriotism, F hot chance of possible profit, in
 taking over the naval reserves He asserted he had been led to believe
 Pacific war was imminent and
 that it was necessary to concen-
 trate oil in Honolulu for American vessels. Here was an opportunity,
 he said he had been told, for a
 man of wealth to perform an act
 which would irnmeasurably aid his \ Government.
 Swears in Court
 When Fall. his friend of the days Of mule -skinningg table waiting, and odd jobs, was convicted. Do- heny was in court, militantly com .forting the weak and faltering Fall The oil millionaire sprang to his feet and blazed. "It's that damn
 court" when the verdict was re-
 turned.
 Doheny.s life was one of adven- .ture, of picturesque ups and downs. He was born August 10, 1856. Gold was his goal when he started from his birthplce, Fond du Lac, Wis., 4 sat the age of Is, to seek his for tune. He had just graduated from 1 Ahigh school. <
 Here was a Dick Wilmington,
 with his belongings on his back.
 At the end of his journey he was
 reckoned a man of princely pos essions. The road to that objective seeas studded with menial jobs and
 many failures.
 His first idea of the straight
 road to wealth was in prospecting. vBut he lost his accumulated capital
 in an expedition into the Black Hills of South Dakota.
 End of Rainbow
 For 20 years he travelled through
 the West when that region was in
 the turmoil of adolescence, In 1892 siie reached the end Of the rainbow in a vacant lot in Los Angeles.
 Tic drilled for oil there-and found
 it.
 Four years later, he was broke
 again. But he recouped, and de- weloped his California oil interests
 to an established position.
 He turned to Mexico in 1900, and
 spent 20 years building up bis ip-
 terests. which bioneered the oil
 industry in that country.
 N"Never look back" was the DO.
 peny formula for success, That
 Philosophy he followed until he
 became head of a. great combina-, Vtion of oil and subsidiary corpora .tions in Mexico. California and Louisiana Pan American Petroleum
 and Transportation Company. of
 which he was President, was his
 principal interest aside from Mexi-
 can Petroleum, Company. He re- .u-ed as president of the latter
 concern in June, 1922.
 A MT. Doheny married Carrie Es-
 telle Betzold of Marshalltown, Iowa