unday Bee
No Filthy Sensation
THE OMAHA BEE
Best .IT. West
PART III.
HALF-TONE SECTION
PACES 1 TO A.
The Omaha
VOL. XXXVIII NO. 5.
OMAHA, SUNDAY MORNING, JULY 1, 1908.
SINGLE COPY FIVE CENTS.
LEVI CARTER PIONEER CAPITALIST AND PHILANTHROPIST
Character and Achievements of the Man Whose Interest in Omaha Bears Fruit Even After His Death and Whose Memory Will Be Perpetuated Through a Beautiful Public Park
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along the
shore:
SHORE AT LARSEN'S ON THE NORTHWEST
A TALL MAN with long gTy beard used to ride out on th
street car dally in the early '90a from an office In the Mo
Cague building to Sixteenth and Locust street and walk
thence to the white lead works in East Omaha. The
man seemed a personification of benevolence. His eyes
were kindly and his mouth firm though easily breaking Into a smile.
He walked down across the bottom land where the wind blew among
the sunflowers and brush that fringed the margin of the lake.
Barefoot boys and laboring men were fishing there sometimes. It
wasn't very exciting sport, but it was the best they had. Often the
big man would stop and watch the boys and often be would talk
to them about themselves and their families. Boon they all came to
know him and to know him very favorably, ladeed, for he quickly
became famous as an inexhaustible storehouse f nickels and dimes.
Not only was he a storehouse, but also a liberal and free dispensary
of these little nickel and silver pills so efficacious as a cure (or
Juvealle ills.
The boys fishing by the lake knew the pleasant man personally,
bnt they little thought he was the president of the big white lead
works in East Omaha. They little thought that the man who found
time to stop and talk to them about fishing, who became enthusiastic
when a small boy pulled up a line with fish on the hook, was the
head of a great industry in which many thousands of dollars were
invested and which depended upon himself for its prosperity and its
very existence.' They certainly did not think that through the
munificence of this man the dingy, dirty lake, bordered with weeds
and rusty railroad tracks would be converted into a beautiful park,
a continuous green sward, dotted with flower beds and shade trees
narked with winding driveways.
His Generosity Bears Fruit
That great man, simple and unpretending, as all great men are,
who used .to take dally walks down across the bottom land to the
white lead works was Levi Carter. In his mind even at that early
day had budded the plan for making a beautiful park at Cut-Off lake.
Last Tuesday his widow, Mrs. Sallna C. Carter, offered to the city
$50,000 for buying the land on the edge of the lake and Improving
it The city accepted the money together with the conditions at
tached thereto and the result will be that within the space of a few
years a beautiful metamorphosis will be wrought. Cut-OfT lake, dia
mond in the rough, as it Is and as it was seen long ago by Levi Carter
to be, will be cut and polished until it sparkles with a dacsllng
beauty, until it is the largest as well as by all odds the most attrac
tive park in the city. Indeed if the plans now being perfected are
realised there will be no park west of Chicago to compare with it
Levi Carter tu a pioneer of Nebraska and of Omaha. He was
one of those sturdy, broad-tnln4ed, courageous, indefatigable and
philosophical men who braved all manner of dangers and endured
all manner of hardships in the dual task of building a great com
monwealth aad earring out their own fortunes. Much of his life is
faithfully typical of the lives of aU the pioneer, but he had many
qualities) which were sot common and which are rare among men.
He came of a hardy and independent race, a race of freed om
i loving men. a race which left its peaceful and secure firesides ia
England and ventured upon unknown seas ia search of a land where
God could be worshiped freely. Both his grandfathers fought for
freedom in the continental army. One of them was with the "em
battled farmers" at Bunker Hill and helped fire the "shot that was
heard around the world." His paternal grandfather was Moses
Carter, a native of, Massachusetts, who removed to New Hampshire
when he was 2S years of age, and lived there until bis death. One
of his sons, Levi, married Miss Polly Piper in 1805. She was the
daughter of Stephen Piper, a revolutionary soldier, and had had ex
traordinary educational advantages.
Levi Carter, Nebraska and Omaha pioneer, was the son of these
two. He was the seventh of their ten children and was promptly
christened by his devout Baptist parents with the Biblical name
long honored in the Carter family. He was born in 1830, on his
father's fjrm in Belknap county. New Hampshire. He died in Omaha
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ROAD THROUGH THE JUNGLE THAT WILL BECOME ONE OF
THE POPULAR DRIVES.
years. "I found that remarkable man in his shirtsleeves in his
library sitting before a table with a pencil and sheet of paper draw
ing plans for a new factory."
Before the ruins of the old one had ceased to smoulder these
plans were completed. Less than cne month after the fire the new
works were begun and by the following December a new plant, cost
ing $200,000, had been constructed In East Omaha and was in op
eration. This is typical example of the energy and the courage of
the man. Achllles-like, he was proof against the arrows of mis
fortune. Once while he was engaged In freighting, his wagons were
besieged by Indians for a number of days. Every day of delay meant
a loss of about $1,000 to Mr. Carter. Yet he slept every night at
soundly, ate his meals as heartily and was a cheery as though he
was having the most prodigious good luck.
The history of the Carter White Lead Works following their re
organization by Mr. Carter is well known. No enterprise has been
more successful. It is now the largest independent manufactory of
white lead In the United States, having a capital of $750,000 and a
yearly capacity of 30,000 tons. The branch In Chicago makes about
20,000 tons a year and the house in East Omaha about 10,000 tons.
Through the astonishing process discovered by Mr. Carter there is a
vast saving in time and labor.
LEVI CARTER.
November 7, 1808. He attended the district school near his rural
home during his early boyhood, and then went to an academy in
New Hampton, where he pursued his studies until his twentieth year.
Upon leaving school he learned the trade of carpenter. Then, with
his life before him, with his school education completed and his trade
learned, he looked about the quiet village among the New Hamp
shire hills, and that something which seems instinctive in the human
makeap bade him go west. He next appears on the frontier in Illi
nois and Wisconsin, working at his trade. Industry and frugality in
two years gave him a little hoard of savings. With this he appeared
in 1867 in Nebraska City. He quickly decided that freighting over
the plains to Denver and Salt Lake City would be profitable. He in
vested his money and entered that hazardous undertaking. He con
tinued in this work ten years. The last seven of these he was in
partnership with General Isaac Coe. General Coe was a native of New
England also. The two met in Nebraska City and though Coe was
fifteen years older than Carter they found much in common. Coe
had come to Nebraska City in 1858, and had invested his savings in
government lands, which bad Increased rapidly in value. The part
nership of these two men continued until General Coe's death in
1899. Together they made money in the freighting business, in de
veloping Rocky mountain mines, in cutting ties for the Union Pacific
railroad and in government contracting.
Carter White Lead Works
From 1867 to the time of his death Mr. Carter lived continu
ously in Omaha and be was closely and very actively identified with
the upbuilding of the city. He was best known as the man who
built the great Carter White Lead works. These were established
in August, 1878, with a capacity of 600 tons a year and a capital of
$60,000. The plant was built at Twentieth street and the Union
Pacific tracks. The incorporators were W. A. Paxton, Levi Carter,
C. Hartman, W. B. Royal, C. W. Mead, N. Shelton, D. O. Clarke and
S. E. Lock. It was the largest white lead works at that time west
of Chicago and St. Louis. In 1881 the capacity was increased to
1,200 tons a year and the capital to $90,000. In 1885 the very low
price of white lead resulted In the shutting down of the plant.
Probably It would have remained shut down had it not been for
Levi Carter. He had been doing more than visiting the office of the
company occasionally. He had laid aside his long black coat and his
white shirt and collar occasionally and had donned overalls and gone
down into the works and studied the method of manufacture. He
had utilized his time and opportunities to get an intimate knowl
edge of the process. Now, the process of making white lead used for
several hundred years was that known as the "Dutch process."
Sheets of lead were placed in vats where they underwent an exten
sive corroding process, which took a long time. Levi Carter had
studied the problem and he had decided that if the lead were re
duced to atoms instead of being allowed to remain in large sheets
the corroding would take but a comparatively short time. He ex
perimented and found that his theory was correct
Courage Saved the Day
Then he proposed to buy the defunct works. The stockholders
were glad to have him make a reorganization, which he did in Janu
ary, 1889, under the name, Carter White Lead Works. The capital
was fixed at $150,000. Levi Carter was president, Henry W. Yates
vice president, and S. B. Hayden, secretary. In 1889 the capital was
increased to $500,000 and Mr. Yates sold his stock to the other two.
In the latter part of 1S89 improvements costing $60,000 were made
and the yearly capacity was increased to 4,000 tons. The skill of
Mr. Carter bad been proven, for his new atomizing process was a
grand success. White lead could be made at a much smaller cost
than by the old process and it was better white lead. The firm was
making money literally "hand over fist." Then, on the morning of
June 14, 1890, Mr. Carter woke up to find that luring the night the
plant had been entirely destroyed by fire. How did he take this
crushing blow?
"I went to his home the morning after the fire to condole with
him," says E. J. Cornish, who was his intimate friend for many
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One of Many Enterprises
This was but one of the many big enterprises in which Mr.
Carter engaged. He and General Coe operated extensively in cutting
ties in the mountains for the Union Pacific and Oregon Short Lino
railroads. They had tie camps in many parts of the mountains. Mr.
Carter sold his interest in this enterprise to Frauk Coe, son of Gen
eral Coe. They also owned over 200,000 acres of land in Wyoming
which were disposed of to the Colorado Fuel and iron company.
With General Coe and B. B. Crary he was Engaged In furnishing hay
to the government It seemed a kindred fate must have brought
these three together. They were all big men in body and broad In
mind; they all had long white beards; they all had faces cast in the
same mould of benevolence and good will. Often they used to sit to
gether in their office discussing business, looking like three good
natured giant Druids.
"Fortune favors the bold," or, as Disraeli says, "success is the
child of audacity." It is notlcable in all Mr. Carter's operations that
he struck quickly and boldly. He "did not fear his fate too much"
to "put it to the touch to win or lose it all." And when he lost ha
never stopped to mourn the past. When he was sure he was right ha
went ahead. Therefore at the time of his death he was a very wealth
man. Besides being president of the Carter White Lead company ho
was president of the Equitable Farm and Stock Improvement com
pany, which had over 200,000 acres of land in Keith, McPherson,
Deuel and Lincoln counties, Nebraska, and great herds of fine cat
tle and horses. These holdings were traded for for more than 2,000
acres of very valuable coal land and other property In Vinton county,
Ohio.
A man who was very intimately associated with Mr. Carter was
asked about his character. "Why, his character wan Just perfect,"
be exclaimed. At any rate, it was ideal and lovable. Pliny, the
Younger, said "The most perfect and best of all characters is hit
who is as ready to pardon the moral errors of mankind as if he
were every day guilty of some himself, and at the lami time as cau
tious of committing a fault as If he never forgave one." This is pe
culiarly apt in expressing the character of Levi Carter. Though his
actions were always above reproach, he was not self-righteous; ha
did not parade his virtues and be had the charity which could for
give an erring brother. One of his employes in the Chicago house
wrote him once stating that his wife was sick so that it would be
necessary to perform an operation. He asked his employer for the
loan of $600. Mr. Carter sent the money. Before the check reached
Chicago it was found that the young man had defaulted to the ex
tent of more than $1,000. The officers held the check and wrote tha
particulars of the case to Mr. Carter, returning the check. Mr. Carter
wrote to the employe a letter mildly reproving him for the default,
talking to him like a father and enclosing the check again. This
treatment touched the young man. He subsequently paid all the
money back voluntarily.
His Daily Walk
GENERAL VI1CW Of THB 8ITB OV CARTER PARK FUOM THIS 60UlUWGdT BHORB OM ifTi?
Mr. Carter married Miss Sallna C. Bliss of Chicago, daughter of
George Bliss and niece of General Isaac Coe. He was a man of very
domestic tastes and though he was a member of the Omaha club and
the Commercial club he preferred his home always and was always
to be found there outside of business hours exoept when he and hit
wife went to social affairs, and they entertained also considerably in
their home at Nineteenth and Chicago streets.
He was naturally a quiet man and extremely courteous. Ha
never entered his office without passing the time of day with his
employes. He took life seriously, however, and was not a man of much
humor. This mildness of manner and speech caused some people
who were poor readers of human nature to misjudge him. But they
soon learned their error, for when firmness or drastic action were re
quired none had more than he. Entirely without conceit, he treated
all men alike. It made no difference in the cordiality of his greet
ing whether the visitor to his office was a collector for the Salvation
Army or the millionaire president of some eastern bank. Levi Car
ter made no distinction between the two. System and thoroughness
were a part of blm. The latter quality is illustrated by the manner
In which he studied the white lead manufacturing industry. The
former is Illustrated by his habits. He came and went with the reg
ularity of clockwork. Every evening after dinner he smoked one
cigar; every Sunday he smoked two cigars. He never drank liquor
at a bar. He was never known to swear.
His big heart was deprived of the privilege of lavishing Its af
fection on children of his own. His only daughter died at the age
of 4 years. Many a child was made happy by him, though, and
many a man raised up to a place of eminence through the aid of Levi
Carter. "He was a great man to pick up babies on a car " said a man
(Continued on Page Two.).
