GIVING AWAY MILLIONS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20372, 28 September 1929, Page 2 (Supplement)

GIVING AWAY MILLIONS.

PHILANTHROPIC WORK. CARNEGIE AND ROCKEFELLER SLUM CHILDREN'S SAVIOUR. MITIGATION OF SUFFERING. The richest man in the world, Mr. John D. Rockefeller, has just passed his 90th birthday. Ho spends his days in playing a littlo golf and in thinking of new ways to givo away his money. One of the ways is through the Rockefeller Foundation, which he endowed 16 years ago to fight unceasing war against disease. Is a new hospital with a medical school for research or for training doctors wanted anywhere from London to Peking! Application is made to the Rockefeller Foundation, and never i? vain.

Somo bclicvo that charity begins at homo, and that China is such a long way off that it can wait its turn. Not so the Rockefeller Foundation, which since 1913 has spent more than £6,000,000 in medical colleges, in aid to hospitals, and on the training of doctors in China.

Other countries are not forgotten. Nearly another £6,000,000 was spent in (hern, in every country—from England, Belgium, and France, through Canada and the United States to Hong Kong, Melbourne, and Singapore—in setting up schools for medical education. When somo of these countries were at their worst during the war over £4,000,000 was offered up by the Rockefeller Foundation for the aid of tho wounded, tho sick and the starving. In 16 years the Foundation lias spent £30,000,000 in trying to banish disease and sickness and suffering from the whole world, without regard to nationality. Health o 1 the Nations.

It has its generous and benevolent eye oil everything that can help, from childwelfare to campaigns against the mosquito that spreads malaria. The wise doctors who control and administer its gifts know the immeasurable importance of good nursing in sickness or ill-health. They spend money, therefore, on setting up or aiding schools for training nurses. Fifteen schools in ten countries were helped last year. The sarno men recognise to the full the importance of improving the health of nations as a whole. The Rockefeller League of Nations enjoying the Fund's help numbered 23 last year, without counting the United States. The open hand of its generosity is stretched out to tlio whole world. Toronto, London, Prague, Warsaw, Budapest, Belgrade, Zagreb, Sao Paulo, Brazil, all have Rocke-feller-supported Institutes of Public Health. If any scientific man or body of men wants to undertake expensive researches into Iho causes of disease their thoughts lead first to the. Rockefeller Foundation, and never in vain. Jhe principal investigations have been in malaria, tuberculosis, hookworm disease, and yellow fever—which has been driven from Mexico, Central America, and Northern South America. Its last refuges in Brazil and West Africa. It was in West Africa that Dr. Noguchi, sent out under tho auspices of tlio Foundation to study yellow lever, met his death. Prevention Better than Cure. The motto inscribed on the banners of tho Foundation is " Prevention is Better than Cure." Last year it provided Fellowships for 800 men and women from 46 different countries who' aro inquiring into tho causes of disease so as better to prevent it. At tho same time 60 doctors and professors and 127 nurses were sent to various countries to study the conditions and tho way tho work is being done. Long and far were tho journeys of some of them, for there aro medical schools coming under tho survey in Beirut, in Haiti, in Syria, in Siam, in Suva, Fiji. Tho benefits that men of charity and goodwill bring live long after them, notwithstanding what Mark Antony said in his famous funeral oration over Julius Caesar.

Tho United Kingdom still has reason to remember and p"aise the name of Andrew Carnegie, who left a great part of his fortune to tho establishment, the maintenance, and tho expansion of public libraries for the people of Great Britain and Ireland.

In his will Mr, Carnegie laid down the wise, far-sighted instruction that tho trustees appointed to spend tho fund he left should apply it to the well-being of tho masses of the people of Britain and Ireland, but that they should remember that new ways would arise for securing this from time to time, because new needs would arise constantly as "the masses advance. Carnegio Library Fund. Consequently, in addition to the libraries and to the aid of existing libraries of every hind by furnishing money for buying books, other aims aro kept beforo the Carnegio Trust. Thero is, for example, the life of tho country village. The Trust helps tho Rural Community Councils which encourage village hafis, young farmers' clubs and village baths. Thirteen counties were helped last year by grants amounting to ovor £SOOO. The work includes young people's clubs and organisations. It encourages nursing and health-planning.

In regard to music and tlio drama the fund makes grants to festivals; it. publishes fino old English music; it has made grants to the Old Vic and to Sadler's Wells

East End hostels, infant and child Welfare, children's arts and crafts, infants' play centres—on all fall the beneficent rain of the Carnegie grants; and tho playing fields arc receiving it in abundant measure.

Playing field grants have been made out of Andrew Carnegie's fortune to more than 120 places in England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales. Millions of boys and girls when they go out. to plav will have cause to remember tho fine Scotsman Andrew Carnegie, whoso last thought was that tho generations of children to come should receive a better education and live in happier and healthier surroundings than ho knew as a boy.