MILLIONAIRES AND CHARITY

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 1008, 17 February 1912, Page 4

MILLIONAIRES AND CHARITY

A YEAR’S GIFT IN AMERICA

It is estimated that wealthy Americans living iu the United States gave over this year in philauturopy, the list being headed by the following : Andrew Carnegie, chiefly education and research, ,£8,000,000 ; Frederick Hewitt, hospitals, ,£BOO- - ; Joseph Pulitzer, journalism, music and art, ,£600,000 ; J. D. Rockefeller, education and medical research, ,£600,000 ; James Patten, Chicago, towards lighting tuberculosis, ,£400,000 ; Michael Valentine, to Hospitals, ,£400,000 ; John Buike, for relieving distress, ,£4OO- - ; Henry Braker, asylums aud colleges, ,£300,000 ; aud Mrs Rhinelander King, to charities, ,£300,000. The following each gave £20,000, chiefly lor education, hospitals aud art ; —Jacob Schiff, R. A. Doug, Edwin A. Abbey, Armour aud Co., Ernest Deusmore, Gustave Mebriuger, Mrs M. C. C. Wilsou and Morton Plant.

In the decade since xqoo (adds the Daily Telegraph's New York correspondent) there is a record of wealthy Americans giving over ,£200,00.0,000, in philauthropic works. One-fifth of this sum was contributed by Mr Carnegie, who still retains a comfortable iucome. While it is the custom iu America for the wealthy few to give generously —no country can produce such a splendid record — the average American gives far less than the average Britisher, Freuchmau or German. Phis is not because the average American is stingy, but because lor years he has looked to the millionaires to act as the uation’s almoners, aud so tar they have proved satisfactory. All Americans in the millionaire class have a charity bureau, and no application tor help has a chance ol success unless it is approved by hardened scrutineers. This tact is so well known that millionaires in the United States are far less pestered by begging letters than wealthy Europeans.

Special legislation has been asked lor constituting trustees for Messrs Rockefeller aud Caruegie, so that their wives, if the husbands predecease them, will not be burdened with the task of distributing big legacies aud administering those already created. Mrs Russell Sage still acts personally as almoner for her husband, but she was so worried by applicants that she has left New York, and now lives in the country.