STOREKEEPER WHO DID NOT.

Hawera Star, Volume XLV, 30 January 1926, Page 14

STOREKEEPER WHO DID NOT.

PRESS HI'S DEBTORS. Treasured in many a humble adobe house in the mountains, or Rio Arriba County, New Mexico, is- a little soiled and wrinkled slip of paper. On it appeals in. -Spanish: ‘ Juan Sanchez (or whatever the name may he), to Felix Garcia, Dr. “Garcia, Dr.” Then an itemised list of purchases of chili, coffee, sugar, flour, beans, and- at the bottom the endorsement: “Paid, an full by God. ’ ’ It is the tale of the country merchant .who died a rich man despite the fact that he never pressed, a ,debtor for payment, crossed the obligations' of poor people off his -books, and left among his papers bills receivable and promissory notes amounting to more than £20,000. jGareiu, once a nominee of the. Democratic Party for Governor of New Mexico, died from a bullet accidentally discharged. Few men in New Mexico were more widely or sincerely mourned. The esteem in which he was held was based entirely oil his honesty and humanity. He was- not a briliant mail, but was gifted with sound- business. judgment. A typical small Spanish-American merchandise store was established by Garcia. He. made a little money and aeuired a number of small ranch properties. But the poor people, did not contribute to his increasing fortune. If a customer fell sick or had bad luck on his little mountain farm, or was out of work, Garcia promptly hunted up his account and sent him the hill marked “paid in full by God.” Garcia ran two stores in the little village of Lmnberton; one a i-asli store, the other a “ credit store’ where he let his needy patrons run accounts as long as they wished. It- is. not on record that his generosity was often taken advantage, of by those able to pay, and the bulk of the. £20.000 101 l unpaid on his books really represented charitv to tho poor. v