FROM FUGITIVE TO MAYOR

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 25, 30 January 1932, Page 23

FROM FUGITIVE TO MAYOR

It is a-rare distinction for an Englishman to t ,b,e.C9ins. Ddayor of a foreign, town. It' is an >'even "more rare,- >if not 'a u unique distinction' for a man to becomo Mayor of a town where he was once stoned (says the "Daily Express"):

Mr. Thopas E. Payne, a native of Worleyi n'eaf Birmingham, has both these achievements to hia'credit. Thirty yeais ago he and three companions went to Peiu to begin a mission station at Calca, a small town on a plateau '9000 ft "above sea level.

No sooner had the quartet set foot in the town than the native Incas and other Peruvians chased them out and stonedthem. Mr. Payne bears to, this day 'the marks of. :the injuries .he received then.

: Undaunted, the four missionaries returned, to the ■ town as business men, and as, such ,they Trere allowed to remain. .They introduced the; first steam engine Peruvians ever saw. They built sawmills, wool mills, spinning factories, and then they tested an agricultural policy of.their own, , , .• . .--..-..;.-'■

. The nchemo was successful, and the Peruvians shoved their gratitude by

recognising the men as ■ missionaries, building a church, on the Payhej-and.sleeting>him,;May.ojy; ~ ~ • ;;':■ "We needed roads, but we had no money," Mr. Payne saM, when on a visit to England. "I taxed alcohol, cocoa and tobacco, and put a special two-cent stamp on letters. Peruvians object to hard work, so 1,-passed ia" law; making it imperative for every. ablebodied man to spend twelve days per year road-making—without pay. "When I went to Calca first we had periodic famines. I experimented for fifteen years, before I managed to cultivate wheat which would grow at our altitude. It has now been adopted as the universal seed for the Andes | range. ' : : •

"The local t sheep, about the size of terrier dogs, gave ljlb bi! wool: each. It was .not enough. I crossed them with an English breed,' and now we •have thousands of sheep giving an average of. 81b of wool each. "In eight months' time," Mr; Payne added, "I am going back to Calca : —the only white man in the province—to. further the work of the Gospel among my people."