Famous Givers and Their Gifts

by Sarah Knowles Bolton

John D. Rockefeller, Jr., is at Brown University, and will probably be associated with his father in business, for which he has shown much aptitude.

The children have all been reared with the good sense and Christian teaching that are the foundations of the best homes. They have dressed simply, lived without display, been active in hospital, Sunday-school, and other good works, and found their pleasures in music, in which all the family are especially skilled, and in reading. They enjoy out-door life, skating in winter, and rowing, walking, and riding in the summer; but there is no lavish use of money for their pleasures.

The daughters know how to sew, and have made many garments for poor children. They have been taught the useful things of home-life, and often cook delicacies for the sick. They have found out in their youth that the highest living is not for self. A recent gift from Miss Alta Rockefeller is $1,200 annually to sustain an Italian day-nursery in the eastern part of Cleveland. This summer, 1896, about fifty little people, two years old and upwards, enjoyed a picnic in the grounds of their benefactor. Mrs. Rockefeller's mother and sister, Miss Lucy M. Spelman, a cultivated and philanthropic woman, are the other members of the Rockefeller family.

Besides Mr. Rockefeller's summer home in Cleveland, he has another with about one thousand acres of land at Pocantico Hills, near Tarrytown on the Hudson. The place is picturesque and historic, made doubly interesting through the legends of Washington Irving. From the summit of Kaakoote Mountain the views are of rare beauty. Sleepy Hollow and the grave of Irving are not far distant. The winter home in New York City is a large brick house, with brown-stone front, near Fifth Avenue, furnished richly but not showily, containing some choice paintings and a fine library.

Mr. Rockefeller will be long remembered as a remarkable financier and the founder of a great organization, but he will be remembered longest and honored most as a remarkable giver. We have many rich men in America, but not all are great givers; not all have learned that it is really more blessed to give than to receive; not all remember that we go through life but once, with its opportunities to brighten the lives about us, and to help to bear the burdens of others.

Mr. Rockefeller began to give very early in life, and for the last forty years has steadily increased his giving as his wealth has increased. Always reticent about his gifts, it is impossible to learn how much he has given or for what purposes. Of necessity some gifts become public, such as his latest to Vassar College of $100,000, a like amount to Rochester University and Theological Seminary, and the same, it is believed, to Spelman Seminary, at Atlanta, Ga., named as a memorial to his father-in-law.

This is a school for colored women and girls, with preparatory, normal, musical, and industrial departments. The institute opened with eleven pupils in 1881, and now has 744, with nine buildings on fourteen acres of land. Dr. J. L. M. Curry said in his report for 1893, "In process of erection is the finest school building for normal purposes in the South, planned and constructed expressly with reference to the work of training teachers, which will cost over $50,000." In the industrial department, dress-cutting, sewing, cooking, and laundry work are taught. There is also a training-school for nurses.

In a list of gifts for 1892, in the New York Tribune, Mr. Rockefeller's name appears in connection with Des Moines College, Ia., $25,000; Bucknell College, $10,000; Shurtleff College $10,000; the Memorial Baptist Church in New York, erected through the efforts of Dr. Edward Judson in memory of his father, Dr. Adoniram Judson, $40,000; besides large amounts to Chicago University. It is probable that, aside from Chicago University, these were only a small proportion of his gifts during that year.

An article in the press states that the recent anonymous gift of $25,000 to help purchase the land for the site of Barnard College of Columbia University was from Mr. Rockefeller. He has also pledged $100,000 towards a million dollars, which are to be used for the construction of model tenement houses for the poor in New York City.