The Tycoon and the Do-Gooder
Last week I wrote about the Polish physician, Ludwik Rajchman, who played a pivotal role in the creation of WHO and UNICEF. This week let’s turn to two Americans who at first glance could be described as near polar opposites. Yet later in life they became close allies. For now I’ll just call them: the ‘Tycoon’ and the ‘Do-gooder’. As in the previous episode, two countries - Poland and China - play outsize roles in our story.
The Tycoon from Iowa
The Tycoon grew up the son of Quaker parents in the small town of West Branch, Iowa. His father was a blacksmith. By the time the boy reached age 11 both of his parents had died and he was sent off to live with an uncle in Oregon. Although he attended schools both in Iowa and Oregon, he showed little interest, and he dropped out at age 13 to work for an uncle. Against all odds and despite failing all but one of his entrance exams, he was admitted to Stanford University in what the university called its ‘pioneer class' - its first full four year programme. At Stanford he studied geology and decided to become a mining geologist.
He was eventually hired by a London-based gold mining company to work in western Australia. While there he quickly developed a reputation as a ruthless cost-cutter, ignoring deplorable living conditions for workers, importing Italian workers to undercut wages and opposing workers’ compensation for injuries. Through his aggressive management his company soon controlled fifty percent of the gold production in western Australia.
The Boxer Rebellion against foreign domination and Christian missionary work broke out shortly after he arrived in China. Like the other 700 foreigners in Tientsin in 1900 he survived the resulting siege and final fierce battle between the Boxers and China's Imperial Army on one side and a force of Russian, American, British and Japanese troops on the other.
When the foreign forces eventually captured Beijing and the Imperial Government collapsed, he maneuvered the take-over of a major British-Chinese mining company. With this success, he moved up still further in the company and traveled the world overseeing British mining operations in many countries. By 1908 he had formed his own company in London, consulting on restructuring and buy-outs of mining companies. He had also become a major investor in mines around the world.
By the time World War I broke in 1914, he was a very wealthy American living in London. His company had branch offices in San Francisco, London, New York, Paris, Petrograd and Mandalay. Like other Americans, he was deeply worried by the onset of the war. In response he created a committee of other wealthy Americans in London to help repatriate Americans stranded by the war in Europe.
Following the German invasion of Belgium in August 1914, the committee turned its attention to the plight of Europe’s civilian population, and in particular the situation of civilians in Belgium and northern France. The new organization was called the Commission for Relief in Belgium (CRB).
Food was in desperately short supply, as the German army had taken whatever food it could find for its own needs. For its part Britain had cut off all food shipments to Belgium and opposed any food aid from the US, partly in the hope of sparking a rebellion against the Germans. CRB with full support of the US government argued that the US was at that point still a neutral party. Therefore any food aid they sent would be under the control of the US Ambassador to Belgium and thus not subject to seizure by either side.
No one would have accused the hard-bitten mining tycoon of being a humanitarian. Yet something from his time in China had clicked there and clicked again when faced with war in Europe. In China he had moved quietly from calling the Chinese people an inferior race to giving the country and its people great respect. Although he failed in his attempts to learn the language, he developed a deep interest in Chinese history. He even established an 8 hour workday and allowed union organizers in his Chinese mines. Judging by his times, he had quietly become a 'progressive'.
With the war in Europe now raging, the CRB started shipping American grain and other foodstuffs to Belgian ports. This was a start, but the tycoon knew that the operation would go wrong quickly without ‘feet on the ground’ to ensure that the food went to civilians. He asked his offices to look for suitable candidates willing to work as ‘CRB delegates’.
The Do-gooder from Denver
He was born the son of Nebraska farmers, but when he was only three years old the family gave up farming and moved to Denver. He grew up there, as the eldest of seven children. Three of those born after him died - one of polio, one of diphtheria and the third from unpasteurized milk.
He proved to be a bright pupil and soon skipped a grade. allowing him to finish high school at age 16. He was accepted immediately at Princeton and graduated from the university with high honors in 1915.
After graduation he worked briefly for his uncle at a bank in Iowa, but kept his eye on the war which had been raging in Europe since 1914. Like many young men of those years, he looked for some way to help in Europe. The US was not a party to the war, so military service was not yet an option. On a visit home to his family in Denver, he came across an article in the Saturday Evening Post about the Commission for Relief in Belgium (CRB) and its founder, a rich American living in London.
As soon as he put down the magazine, he knew what he wanted to do next in life. He headed off to New York to sign up. CRB promptly hired the young Princeton graduate and sent him to oversee aid distribution in and around the city of Tournai Belgium, near the French border city of Lille and just behind the front lines of the war. Tensions were high in the area, as the Germans suspected that the US might soon enter the war.
Yet as the US was not yet a party to the war, he and other representatives of the Commission were free to travel - and so he did. One day he and his Belgian driver covered over 600 miles, visiting towns, ensuring that flour mills could operate, arguing with German officials over food seizures and abuses.
The winter of 1916 / 1917 was the worst on record with floods closing roads and railways and ice closing the canals. Food distribution became impossible. By March 1917 he reported that the average Belgian family of seven was surviving on less than one pound of food per day.
Just a few weeks later in April 1917 the US entered World War I, and CRB had no choice but to withdraw its delegates, lest they be imprisoned as enemy agents. Much work was left undone, yet without the Commission’s aid, later estimates suggested that 7 to 8 million could have starved that year.
The Tycoon
While the war dragged on, the tycoon’s work with CRB had developed his reputation for managing food supplies. He was tapped to head a newly created US Food Agency, intended on one hand to ensure food supplies for allied armies in Europe and on the other hand to control food stocks and prices in the US. He became known as ‘America’s food czar’. When the war ended, the businessman was appointed to head another agency, this time called the American Relief Administration (ARA) which delivered food aid to Europe and came to focus on Poland, Russia and Czechoslovakia.
When US funding of the ARA ceased in 1919, the tycoon turned ARA into a private foundation and raised millions of dollars in private donations. He ensured that ARA’s assistance was not simply the supply of food but also rebuilding of basic infrastructure needed for commerce..
 |
| 1921 Austrian stamp celebrates European Childrem's Fund |
One notable success of the programme was the development and application of the ‘Pelidisi formula’ for measuring child malnutrition as a ratio between sitting height and weight. The formula was developed by Dr. Clemens von Pirquet of Vienna University and applied throughout the network of aid agencies. Von Pirquet established a set of normal child ratios expressed as 100. Children with a ratio below 93 were considered underfed and admitted to a special feeding programme.
The tycoon’s experience in heading the CRB, ARA and ECF gave him a high profile in the US Administration. As a result, he was invited to join President Wilson as an advisor at the Paris Peace Conference where he strongly supported aid to the defeated nations and the creation of the League of Nations. By 1921 his reputation led to an appointment as the US Secretary of Commerce. He served in that role until 1928.
The Do-gooder
As soon as he was out of uniform, the young man from Denver returned to work again again for the tycoon and the ARA. He was assigned initially to manage child feeding projects in Czechoslovakia. After aiding Russia during its great famine of 1921, Poland became the main focus of ARA. When ARA wrapped up its operations in 1923, the young do-gooder decided to stay on in Poland. He met and married a Polish socialite. They came back to the US in 1935. War broke four years later when Poland was invaded by Germany.
The tycoon’s experience in heading the CRB, ARA and ECF gave him a high profile in the US Administration. As a result, he was invited to join President Wilson as an advisor at the Paris Peace Conference where he strongly supported aid to the defeated nations and the creation of the League of Nations. By 1921 his reputation led to an appointment as the US Secretary of Commerce. He served in that role until 1928.
The Do-gooder
As soon as he was out of uniform, the young man from Denver returned to work again again for the tycoon and the ARA. He was assigned initially to manage child feeding projects in Czechoslovakia. After aiding Russia during its great famine of 1921, Poland became the main focus of ARA. When ARA wrapped up its operations in 1923, the young do-gooder decided to stay on in Poland. He met and married a Polish socialite. They came back to the US in 1935. War broke four years later when Poland was invaded by Germany.
World War II had begun.
Now for the names
By now you have likely guessed the names of the tycoon and the do-gooder :The 'Tycoon from Iowa' who built his fortune from mines in Australia and China was Herbert Hoover. He later elected as President of the United States in 1928 and served until 1933.
The 'Do-gooder from Denver' was Maurice Pate who later became UNICEF’s first Executive Director.
Pate and Hoover stayed in close touch throughout the tour and devoted much of their discussion to the possibility of forming a new UN agency for children crafted around the structure of the former ECF - a UN agency coordinating assistance with various NGOs and other agencies already established in the region.
The 'Do-gooder from Denver' was Maurice Pate who later became UNICEF’s first Executive Director.
So then what happened?
When World War II broke out in Europe in 1939, Maurice Pate, with the strong support of his former boss, Herbert Hoover, was selected as President of the Commission for Polish Relief (CPR). Hoover later described Pate as “The most efficient human angel I have ever known.”
The CPR was built along the lines of the former Commission for Relief to Belgium, aiming to provide relief where and when possible behind lines or in liberated areas. Pate later left CPR on to head operations of the American Red Cross to aid prisoners of war and distribute aid to refugees in both Europe and Asia.
In May 1945, the then US President Harry Truman asked Herbert Hoover to undertake an extensive tour to determine how famine could be avoided when the war ended. Hoover undertook the 'World Food Survey' in 1946 along with several former colleagues from ARA. Chief among them was Hoover’s ‘efficient human angel’, Maurice Pate. Pate was critical of much of what he saw of American efforts in the immediate postwar period.
When World War II broke out in Europe in 1939, Maurice Pate, with the strong support of his former boss, Herbert Hoover, was selected as President of the Commission for Polish Relief (CPR). Hoover later described Pate as “The most efficient human angel I have ever known.”
The CPR was built along the lines of the former Commission for Relief to Belgium, aiming to provide relief where and when possible behind lines or in liberated areas. Pate later left CPR on to head operations of the American Red Cross to aid prisoners of war and distribute aid to refugees in both Europe and Asia.
In May 1945, the then US President Harry Truman asked Herbert Hoover to undertake an extensive tour to determine how famine could be avoided when the war ended. Hoover undertook the 'World Food Survey' in 1946 along with several former colleagues from ARA. Chief among them was Hoover’s ‘efficient human angel’, Maurice Pate. Pate was critical of much of what he saw of American efforts in the immediate postwar period.
Reaching Cairo in April 1946, Pate sent Hoover summaries of the situation in 12 countries, concluding that the child malnutrition situation was far worse than Hoover had imagined. Instead of estimates that 40 million children needed supplementary feeding, actual needs were likely three times higher. He also estimated that there were 11 million orphans and half orphans needing assistance.
Pate and Hoover stayed in close touch throughout the tour and devoted much of their discussion to the possibility of forming a new UN agency for children crafted around the structure of the former ECF - a UN agency coordinating assistance with various NGOs and other agencies already established in the region.
When Hoover presented his final report to Truman, prominent among the recommendations was a call for strong support by the US in the formation of UNICEF.
There is much left to tell in this story, but let's leave it here for now.
Hoover meets Truman at the end of
his World Food Tour
At the urging of Hoover and Truman
the US calls for Americans to eat
one-fourth less in order to feed
the world's hungry
(try to imagine such a call today)
A fascinating encounter with history. Thanks for writing and sharing with us. Doreen Lobo
ReplyDeleteThanks Tom for this piece of interesting history. Austrian postage stamp is great.
ReplyDelete