THE ROCKEFELLER MILLIONS.

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 110, 26 May 1937, Page 4

THE ROCKEFELLER MILLIONS.

The, death of John- D. Eockefeller iu the ociour of sauctity will no doubt recall to the older amongst us the time when, perhaps along with Andrew Carnegie, he Was about the beist hated man in tM United States. Wfibn Ee: set about creating th&.viftfcal mofiO|»'tfly ifl- "oil" wliieB he eventualiy estabiished, not only in that countiy But afmost throtrghout the WorM, fie ninde' himself notorious for the rhtfilesS1 wSy lii WKieh, once he acquired the power, he erushed oiit all compefition and oppositidn. Yet, despite the feeling that was tiius Uroused, there can be no doubt that his mafvellous genius fdr organisation, aud tho energy and entexprise he displayed in using if had the' effect of providing that world with the then almost univerSal illuminant at a price and of a quality that eould not otherWise have been xeached. It was "oil" ia the form of kerosene that laid the fdundation tnf th# vatt forttule whifeh Eockefeiler eventualiy accumulatedj and at the base 6f that foundation were to be found not & few lives xuined by the mdthods which. h6 adopte'd in laying it. , All that, however, has during his long life fallen into oblivion and is now veiled off from the sfght of the present genenation by the benefioent uses to whieh ho has pdt so many of the millions of dollars thus gathered togpther for his own personal disposal. Judged only by the money so lavishly pottr ed into thamy there have been no individtaal benefaetions in any way comparable With those establishM by this 6ne many so long regarded as of the flinty heart. As With his feerosene, too, they have been spread all over the world, and in this way the dollars have in a very great measure been returned to those whose forebeara originally supplied thehi.' "Whether Eo'dkefeHer hdd any Such purpose actually in view when he started out tO amaSfl his grdfit fdrtune eannot, of cour'se, be said, but it may very well be doufctei However, in the hands of an over-ruling Providence Ee was cdnverted from the seemingly heartless ' ' eapitaliat ' ' into one of the greatest benefaetors the wrrld has known. Beyond this, of cdttfse,- Out Of the iMustry Which he created humberless Others have developed, and '' dil,' * itt the iii&uf shapes into which- it is now tranaformed,- hai become an easential of 6ur daily life and, directly and indire'ctly ,helps to proVide rfemunerativO Omployment for countless thousands. SucE- is the Whirligig Of tiine.