CROFTER TO MILLIONAIRE.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 138, 28 January 1916, Page 2 (Supplement)

CROFTER TO MILLIONAIRE.

There lately arrived in London a man whose career provides yet another amazing Illustration of the energy, perseverance, and shrewdness of the modern Scot. His name is Mr John William Stewart, known in Canada as "Jack" Stewart, the millionaire railway contractor.

Four years ago he bought from the Duke of Sutherland 50,000 acres of the Sutherland estates, with an annual rent-roll of £2,500, which among other tilings included Mr. Stewart's birthplace, a tiny cottage at Dnini'utg. ia the parish of Assynt. A few months later Mr. Stewart bought from i<:o Duke for £OO,OOO a further large tract of land in the parish of Assynt, which included house property, a deer forest, a sheep farm, and small holding-, with a rental of £2,700. Yet it is not so many years ago since Mr. Stewart landed in Quebec with lust IDs. ill his pocket. This was after lie had tried farming and engineering •n Scotland, and decided that the Colonies offered him more scope for the realisation of hi- ambitions. Obtaining work as ;; farm hand on a French Canadian farm, he ultimately settled down in Britsh Columbia with the money he had saved, where he found work on the railway. Afterwards he drifted to Montana, in th<> States, and made such good use of his opportunities that he was able to enter into partnership with two well-known IrishAmerican contractors, Foley and Walsh, which ha.s since become one of the foremost firms of it; kind i:i the West.

A patrot to the backbone, Mr. Stewart has utilised sonic of his wealth to equip a Highland regiment in British Co!umb : a. where lie is opening up n great now railroad, and lias furthermore contributed L'l'fl.niHJ to tlie war funds.

•• Rather than n.y country -honld hj" beaten in tlii- great war." he s;iys. "i will go hack again to day lalimir and small wages where I hegan." And there are thousand-, of wea'thy Scot-men in :;!1 part-- of the world who would do the