A PRECIOUS BABY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVII, Issue 14507, 22 October 1910, Page 2 (Supplement)

A PRECIOUS BABY.

HEIR TO 000,000.

GOLD TOYS AND CRADLE. ix - months -old baby McLean, of NewYork, arrived at Plymouth on a recent Monday with his suite by the liner Kronprinz Wllhelm. If his nurse drops baby McLean on tho hard London flagstones she will achieve a nursing record by dropping something worth more than any nurse has dropped before. For the infant has something like £30,000,000 to his credit in the bank at this day. He has a bodyguard of nurses, and it is said that two hold on to him night and day. In full his name is Vinson Walsh McLean. He is the grandson of two fabulously wealthy men," the late Mr. Thomas F. Walsh, who owned the Camp Bird gold mine in Colorado, the veins of which show a richer yield every year, and Mr. John R. McLean, proprietor of the Washington Post and Cincinnati Enquirer, and owner of the lighting and traction systems of the city. With a part of this mighty wealth Vinson Walsh is already endowed ; the rest will be his with time through his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Edward Bealo McLean, for he is the only baby in the Walsh and Mclean families. He crossed the Atlantic in the liner's most luxurious saloon, in a golden cradle given him by the late King Leopold of the Belgians, who was a friend of grandfather Walsh. Baby McLean travels with a. retinue, which includes private detectives and his parents. Attempts have been made to kidnap him. Once a burglar entered the nursery window of one of his several American residences, the one at Bar Harbour, hut the baby gave the alarm, and the burglar escaped alone, and in a hurry. In consequence of such incidents a strong kidnapper-proof cage of steel bars was made to cover his rosewood-and-gold perambulator, and in this he created the sensation of the day when he was wheeled out daily, with his nurses round him, detectives at the bow and stern, and lusty servants walking within easy hail. FATIIKIt HAD TO WOSX. Sitting in the interior, fitted up with the height of luxury, the baby, as he played with golden toys, looked upon the world through his cage of steel bars. The American press revelled in wild imaginings as to the ransom the successful kidnapper of this world's wealthiest baby might demand. • Baby McLean enjoys the reputation of being the richest infant in America, and, judging by the space devoted to him in the magazines, he is about the best advertised baby in the" world. It is estimated that. Baby John 1). Rockefeller 111. is heir to about £12,000,000, but Babv Vinson Walsh McLean has £30.000,000 to his account already, according to the New York World, and that sum is steadily increasing. Baby McLean's mother before her marriage was Miss Evelyn Walsh, known in Washington society as " the girl who has everything she wants." The father, Mr. Edward Beale McLean, before he met Miss Walsh, had everything he wanted,, also, except one thing, which it is said his'then fiancee pointed out. The missing want was work. Accordingly, at the lady's behest, Mr. McLean began working on . his father's newspaper as a reporter until he was promoted to attend the conventions before the last Presidential election. Miss Walsh used to watch the young millionaire reporter from the gallery of the house. Just before the election of President Taft they were married secretly iu Denver, thus avoiding an elaborate wedding in Washington. X. AHOTJR F.R TO M U LTt - MII.U O N"A I RE. Grandfather Thomas F. Walsh made the huge fortune -which._tchild, owns as the business partner of the late King Leopold of Belgium. An Irishman by birth,-Mr. Walsh was working at the age of nineteen as a day labourer in the stretts of Boston in 1870. He later followed the trade of a millwright and carpenter, and went to Colorado, where he became a contractor. First he built hotels, and then managed one for himself. In seven years from his arrival in America he had made enough money to retire, but an unfortunate investment compelled him to start his financial career over again. His second venture was in mines. He had firm belief in the Camp Bird gold mine, situated 12,00 ft above sea level, though experts asserted that it was worthless. 11l three years he produced £60,000 worth of gold from the. mine, and the syndicate offered him £7,000,000 for it, only to be refused. He sold part, however for £3,000.000. In 1900 King Leopold asked Mr. Walsh to manage his Congo property, but he declined the offer. Five years later, however, they became associated in: gold mines in Colorado, and continued to be so until Kins Leopold's death. Mr. Walsh's only son was killed in a motorcar accident at Newport, and his only daughter is the mother of baby McLean. Grandfather Walsh died in April of this year, leaving his colossal fortune to his grandson.