HOBBY OF GIVING

Greymouth Evening Star, 28 December 1934, Page 2

HOBBY OF GIVING

THOUSANDS TO CHARITY The inner story of Mr. Edward Meyerstein, the man who lives in retirement in a little country house, and gives away hundreds of thousands of pounds to charity, is of absorbing interest. Within the short space of three or four months he has given no less than £185,000 to one hospital. Yet that is only a part of the hundreds of gifts which Mr. Meyerstein is making almost daily . the gifts of which nobody hears. “Every day a shoal of begging letters arrive for him,’’ a member of his household told an interviewer, “and every one of them is opened personally by Mr. Meyerstein. “His great joy is giving; that is why ho deals with all this correspondence himself. He likes to make sure that he is giving to a worthy cause.” The spectacular donations he cannot keep secret, but about all his smaller charitable works he maintains the strictest silence, except in his own home. “When he has made a really big donation, Mr Meyerstein cannot conceal the pleasure it has given him. He comes home more cheerful even than usual, and tells us about the gift he has made and how hundreds of people may bo’made happier by it. “Children are his particular joy He has two grandchildren of his own, both little girls, and nothing pleases him better than to have them here at his house' and buy things for them. It is an open secret, too, that he has given thousands of pounds to children’s hospitals in various parts of the country. “Frequently during the summer he invites as many children as he possibly can to play in his grounds, and to bathe in the swimming pool he has made.”

. Neither from the outside nor the inside does Mr. Meycrstein’s home give the slightest indication of the enormous wealth of its owner. Its unpretentious exterior is in keeping with the small, simply furnished rooms within. His household staff is small. So close a secret did Mr. Meyerstein make of his wealth that when the news of his first £lOO,OOO donation leaked out, his closest friends, and even members of his household were astonished. Apart from charitable work Mr. Meyerstein has only half-hearted hobbies. He plays bridge at a penny a hundred, but he is far from being a bridge “fan.” So shy and elusive is Mr. Meyerstein that ho resisted efforts to interview him to the last ditch ... to his bath in fact. The last attempt to persuade him to answer questions occurred when queries were written on a paper and slipped under the door of the bathroom. But the noise of a hearty chuckle half-drowned in the noise of running taps was the only reward.