Famous Givers and Their GiftsBolton, Sarah Knowles
History
Famous Givers and Their Gifts
Bolton, Sarah Knowles
Philanthropists
The Milton collection in the library contains about 250 volumes, nearly
every variety of the early editions. Several volumes have Milton's
autograph and annotations. There are about 500 volumes of Bunyan's
"Pilgrim's Progress," and books relating to the writer, containing
nearly 350 editions in many languages. There are also about 200 volumes
of Spanish manuscripts relating to America. The set of "Jesuit
Relations," the journals of the early Jesuit missionaries in this
country, is the most complete in existence.
Many thousands of persons come each year to see the books and pictures,
as well as to read, and all are aided by the courteous librarian, Mr.
Wilberforce Eames, who loves his work, and has the scholarship necessary
for it.
MARY MACRAE STUART.
At her death in New York City, Dec. 30, 1891, gave the Robert L. Stuart
fine-art collections valued at $500,000, her shells, minerals, and
library, to the Lenox Library, on condition that they should never be
exhibited on Sunday. To nine charitable institutions in New York she
gave $5,000 each; to Cooper Union, $10,000; to the Cancer Hospital,
$25,000; and about $5,000,000 to home and foreign missions of the
Presbyterian Church, hospitals, disabled ministers, freedmen, Church
Extension Society, aged women, etc., of the same church, and also the
Young Men's Christian Association, Woman's Hospital, Society for
Prevention of Cruelty to Children, Society for Relief of Poor Widows
with Small Children, City Mission and Tract Society, Bible Society,
Colored Orphans, Juvenile Asylum, and other institutions in New York.
Mrs. Stuart was the daughter of a wealthy New York merchant, Robert
Macrae, and married Robert L. Stuart, the head of the firm of
sugar-refiners, R. L. & A. Stuart. Both brothers were rich, and gave
away before Alexander's death a million and a half. Robert left an
estate valued at $6,000,000 to his wife, as they had no children; and
she, in his behalf, gave away his fortune and also her own. She would
have given largely to the Museum of Natural History and Museum of Art in
New York, but from a fear that they would be opened to the public on
Sundays.
WALTER L. NEWBERRY.
Chicago has been recently enriched by two great gifts, the Newberry and
Crerar Libraries. Walter Loomis Newberry was born at East Windsor,
Conn., Sept. 18, 1804. He was educated at Clinton, N.Y., and fitted for
the United States Military Academy, but could not pass the physical
examination. After a time spent with his brother in commercial life in
Buffalo, N.Y., he removed to Detroit in 1828, and engaged in the
dry-goods business. He went to Chicago in 1834, when that city had but
three thousand inhabitants, and became first a commission merchant, and
later a banker. He invested some money which he brought with him in
forty acres on the "North Side," which is now among the best residence
property in the city, and of course very valuable.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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