Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 240, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 October 1914 — GOLDEN WEDDING IS CELEBRATED BY THE ROCKEFELLERS [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

GOLDEN WEDDING IS CELEBRATED BY THE ROCKEFELLERS

Wife of Oil King, at Seventy-Five, Realizes Life’s Ambition. SOME GLIMPSES OF HER LIFE Point* in.the Career of a Woman Never Before Given to the Public -—Family Waa Alwaye Her First Consideration. New York.—ln a secluded corner of the state of New York, a quiet little old woman of seventy-flve years enjoyed the realization of her her life’s ambition on Tuesday, September 8. On that morning she attained her golden wedding anniversary—the goal of her existence. Surrounded by all the luxuries that belong to the wife of the richest man in the world, she cares only for the pleasures of the thrifty housewife and the bestowing of little charities that might be the pride of a prosperous business man. Mrs. John D. Rockefeller, one of the principals in a golden wedding anniversary that is golden in every sense, Is the personification of simplicity in dress thought and manner. Thete are plenty of 50-year wedding anniversaries in these days. But seldom do the very rich and less often do the very richest dwell together in peace and companionship through half a century of nuptial experience, resisting the onslaught of time and the wear and tear incident to the amass-

Ing of fortune and all the burdens that money brings until they reach an age sufficiently ripe to plan for golden weddings. So the Rockefeller anniversary, which fell on September 8, was unique in many ways. It was in Cleveland, 0., on a bright autumn day In 1864 that Laura Celestla Spelman and John D. Rockefeller took their nuptial vows. The bridegroom was twenty-five and the bride was almost the same age; her birthday succeding her wedding day. Their romance had its foundation in an acquaintanceship when both were in grammar school at and ripened after Miss Spelman had finished her education at a boarding school in Worcester, Mass., and returned in 1859 to Cleveland to teach. Mr. Rockefeller had been a clerk in a Cleveland commission house, but about this time he entered Into the partnership of Clark & Rockefeller In the commission business, and laid the foundation for hfs fortune in furnishing food supplies to the Union army at the outset of the Civil war. His sweetheart agreed to wait for him until he had firmly established himself, and their wedding was deferred until John, with the fruits of his commission business invested, launched into the oil industry with Andrews, Clark & Co., in 1862. The story of how Rockefeller rose to fortune subsequently by the formation of the successive concerns of William Rockefeller & Co., and the various Standard Oil companies, culminating in the Standard trust, is familiar to almost every schoolboy. But what of his wife, this little woman of today? Never a strong girl and of less than average physical size, she was always of the sweetest disposition and most kindly thought. She was the daughter of Harvey Buel Spelman, who emigrated from his native Massachusetts to Akron, 0., where he became a successful dry, goods merchant. He was an educator and' a member of the Ohio legislature, an ardent Congregationalist and aboli-

tionist. He removed to Cleveland when Laura was a child. In Cleveland she attended grammar school, and after a course In the East taught In Cleveland for five years, giving up pedagogy for matrimony. Her mother was an active W. C. T. U. worker, and the daughter followed in her footsteps. She was Indefatigable In her work for temperance, for the poor, for those ill. She “went about doing good." > Despite her long residence in New York city and her immense wealth, she never figured in the society of the metropolis. She sought, rather,, the hospitals to visit, comfort and give financial help to those ill. And when her children were large enough they made tieir regular visits to the sick,

carrylng flowers. She has taken a deep interest in the welfare of colored girls in the South, in which work her father was interested before her. In fact, Spelman pater established the Spelman seminary at Atlanta, Ga., for negro girls, and since his death this institution has been supported by Mrs. Rockefeller. Mrs. Rockefeller’s chief occupation in life has been the rearing of her four children. Another child died in infancy. Society never claimed her from her children and she never has had any interest that was considered as approaching her family in importance. Mrs. Rockefeller trained her children in the ways of thrift just as she might have done if she bad expected that they would be compelled to make their own way in life. She set them an example in this respect in her manner of dress and in the direction of her household, even when this involved the great home and grounds at Pocantico Hills, Tarrytown, N. Y. Her social circles always included only the old friends of the family—friends made during the early days when nobody suspected that John Rockefeller, commission merchant,ever would be the richest man in the world. Even this limited number of friends often was neglected in order that the mother might devote all of her time to her children. During recent years when Mrs. Rockefeller appeared in public she always was clad in the same simple style. She wore a black silk gown with white lace trimmings at the throat and cuffs, with a neat black coat to match. # a . Nobody ever discovered that Mrs. Rockefeller was greatly interested in the wealth that her husband spent his life in amassing. She suffered much because of it. She suffered when her husband faced numerous attacks in newspapers and magazines that had to do with his methods of making money and she suffered when he was the defendant in several government prosecutions that were brought on for the same reason. But that practically was the only interest she had in the money credited to her husband’s account at the bank —or his numerous banks, to be exact. Any business man with an income of $5,000 a year could have provided his wife with the same luxuries that Mrs. Rockefeller enjoyed. Most of the charities of the Rockefeller family were left to the husband or his aids to handle. Mrs. Rockefeller, however, enjoyed bestowing funds in certain directions herself. A needy distant relative was incapacitated! A home was built And given -to him free of aH cost by Mrs. Rockefeller. The church interests of this richest wife have always been important in her eyes. She was originally a Congregationalism but upon her marriage transferred her allegiance to the Baptist denomination of her husband, and is now a member of the Euclid Avenue Baptist church in Cleveland. As long as her health permitted, she was never absent from her pew on Sunday. But it is in her home that she shows to her best advantage. To her guests she is a hostess royal. Always she talks of those subjects which are closest to the hearts of those she entertains —YEfe rare secret of a successful hostess. She makes all feel at ease at once. There is nothing of the snob in her. Lovable and companionable at all times, jshe is a woman to whom wealth has brought no change of character save to emphasize its highest qualities. In recent years she has been in very inflrm health. But for the tender and persistent care which she has received at the hands of her husband she would probably not have lived until now. The best of everything has been given her. She never sought to buy titles for her children, though she might easily have done so. And she never aspires to the title of “oil queen" or any other queen, though she has some excuse, for the blood of royalty actually flows in the veins of her “oil king” husband. Such is the fact, for though not many know of it, John D. Rockefeller is a direct descendant of the reigning house of England, a'lineal heir of Edward Ironsides, once king, and of all the succeeding rulers down to Edward 111. Through the third Edward’s son, the earl of Leicester, he traces

his ancestry rto the daughter of the third earl of Lincoln, who married John Humphrey, early magistrate of Massachusetts Bay colony. And whose granddaughter, Susanna Palmes, wed Samuel Avery, progenitor of Lucy Avery, who married Godfrey Rockefeller, the grandsire of John D.

John D. Rockefeller.