CROFTER TO MILLIONAIRE

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2681, 29 January 1916, Page 7

CROFTER TO MILLIONAIRE

There lately arrived in London a man whose career privides yet another amazing illustration of the energy, perseverance, and shrewdness of the modern Scot. His name is Mr. John AVilliam Stewart, known in Canada us Jack Stewart, the millionaire railway contractor. Four years ago lie bought from the Duke of Sutherland 50,0(10 acres o£ the Sutherland estates, .wit'bi an annual rentroll of JT2500, which, among other things, included Mr. Stewart's birthplace, a tiny; cotlago at Drumbeg, in the parish of Assynt. A few months later Mr. Stewart b6ught from the l)ukq for-.£66,000 a fnrtlior large tract of land in the parish of Assynt, which included house property, a deer forest, a sheep farm, and small holdings, with a rental of d^fOO. i'et it is not so many years ago since Mr, Stewart landed in Quebec with just 10s. in his pocket This was after he had tried farming and engineering in Scotland, and decided that the colonics offered him more scope for tho realisation of his ambitions. Obtaining work as a fnrnt hand on a French-Canadian farm, ho ultimately settled down in British Columbia with the money ho liad saved, where ho found work on Che railway. Afterwards he drifted to Montana, in the Stales, and made such, good use of his opportunities that he was able to enter into partnership with two well-known Irish-American contractors, Foley and Walsh, which has eiitce become, ono of tho foremost firms of its kind in the West. A patriot to tho backbone, Mr. Stewart lias utilised some of his wealth to equip a Highland regiment in British Columbia, whero ho is opening up a great new railroad. and has furthermore contributed .£20,000 to tho war funds. "Pather than my country should bo beaten in this great war," ho says, "1 will go hack again to day labour and small, wages where I "began."