DISSIPATED FORTUNES

Otago Witness, Issue 3594, 30 January 1923, Page 21

DISSIPATED FORTUNES

SOME GREAT SPENDTHRIFTS. £2,000,000 SPENT IN FOUR YEARS. Handsome Jack ’ Cudahy, who brought his life to an untimely end at Los Angeles some time ago, deserves a place among the world’s greatest spendthrifts. His father was one of the original Cudahys who were poor Irish butchers half a century ago. They joined the Armours in the tinned meat business in Chicago and made millions. When Jack’s father died he left £12,400,000. Out of this, by his will, the millionaire left to Handsome Jack only £2OOO, but as the result of a lawsuit he succeeded in securing a one-seventh interest in the estate. One hundred thousand pounds were paid outright, and the rest held in trust for his children. In ten years every penny of this fortune had been squandered, and he shot himself after failing to negotiate a loan of £2500. . n known for many years as “Coal Oil Johnny,” was another notorious spendthrift. In early life he was a poor farmer in Pennsylvania, but one day an oil gusher was discovered on his farm and he found himself with £2OO a day from his oil wells. When he got over the shock of having such wealth he proceeded to get rid of it ill a way that dazzled all beholders. He went to Pittsburg, bought saloons, threw open the dors to the public, and chartered theatres for days at a time, his greatest enjoyment being the sight of others enjoying what his morrey would do for them. NOTES TO LIGHT CIGARS. Attending one theatre in Pittsburg, he stepped out of his box when a black-faced comedian finished his song and handed the man a £2OO note, asking at the same time that the song should be repeated. In Philadelphia he used ten-dollar notes for lighting his cigars, insisted upon the driver of his carriage wearing livery designed- by himself, and would not associate with any of his hangers-on unless they wore silk hats, for which he paid. In New York he threw bank notes to the crowd as he walked down Broadway. When his oil wells dried up after several years. Steele found himself as poor as before, and was glad to get a job as station agent on the Burlington Railway Companv He died at the age of 77. DASHING YOUNG COUNT. Some years ago the world was ringing with the doings of that monumental spendthrift and dashing young sprig of the old French nobility, the Count Boni de Castellano. The daughter of the late Jay Gould brought him, on their marriage, somewhere about £2,000,000. This vast sum of money, and an almost equal sum represented by un-

paid tradesmen’s bills, were squandered in fewer than four years. During the week that he gave a bear hunt in honour of the Grand Duke Boris of Russia, de Castellane gave close upon £4OOO for a fur coat and between £70,000 and £BO,OOO (or a wardrobe in which to hang it and his other garments. Once when sorely pressed to find new forms of extravagance he paid £12,000 for a few paintings worth about £lO. This appealed to him as such a successful method of reducing his income that he immediately bought a pair of candlesticks for £SOOO. Not all of the £2,000,000 through which Boni went in four years came from tha Goulds. After Boni had spent £600,000, his wife’s total dower, for building the Little Trianon de Castellane, George Gould did relax to the extent of another £250,000. No less a sum than £2,000,000 Count Boni owed to tradesmen.