MANY TONS OF MONEY.

Taranaki Daily News, 2 January 1926, Page 7

MANY TONS OF MONEY.

WEALTH FROM CIGARETTES. A GKNIoROL'-S Mil iLIGNAIi: the pj_easuke w gi\ ixg. KXrMTING TO DIE POOR. When you are young it's fun to make money. When you are old it a fun to give it away. When you are young- you think of pleasure that you ran buy for yourself. When you are old you think of the pleasure you ean buy for others.” That is the philosophy of Mr. Bernhard Baron, of the watering-place of Hove, who, in London, is the millionaire head of a cigarette concern. His career in some ways ran parallel to that of the late Mr. Samuel Gompers. Mr. Gompers, born in England, and Mr. Baron, born in Russia, went to America to carve their fortunes. They did not find the streets paved with gold at, the start. Mr. Gompers became a cigarmaker. Mr. Baron got his first job in a tobacconist’s shop. He earned four dollars a week and saved one and a half dollars. Later he, too, became a cigar-maker and worked at the bench alongside Mr. Gompers. Then he invented a cigarette-making machine, took it to England, and became head of a great business.

Mr. Gompers lived and died comparatively poor. Mr. Baron, also, will probably die a poor man as he is giving his riches away as fast as he can. His fortune has never alienated him from the working class. Messrs. Ramsay MacDonald and Arthur Henderson, leaders of the British Labour Party, are his intimate friends. And at the last election, when the Labour party made ready, to appeal to workingmen for their pennies. Mr. Baron started things going by a gift of £s'ooo. Mr. Baron is a widower, 74 years old, and, before starting on his campaign of giving, bestowed £300.000 upon his relatives. M have made, tons of money in my time,” -says Mr. Baron. “I am still making money. But money as such gets me very little. I am not a sporting man. I never cared a rap for high society. I have no desire for honours and titles.

“I am finding out that one of the supreme joys of life is giving. And especially to charity. Charity has no religion, no nationality, no race. It springs from something higher than ourselves. For instance, when I sec a sick man in a hospital getting well again, and know that I have enabled that hospital to serve him well, that gives me a glow. I feel a personal interest in that man. He is my brother. So I intend to go on giving until I die.” Mr. Baron’s gifts have Included the following:—For the building of the Middlesex Hospital, London, £lO,OOO. For a new wing to the Hove Hospital, £BOOO. To clear the debt of the Hutchison House Club for working lads in Aidgate, London, £BOO. To the Leman Street, Girls’ Club, of Aidgate, £6OO. For the new Jewish University in Jerusalem, £lO,OOO. For the Liberal Jewish Synagogue Building Fund. £ll,OOO. For the London Jewish Maternity Home, £2500. To the London Jewish Hospital, £lO,OOO.