JOHN O. PACKARD.

 

            WHEN I knew him first Mr. Packard was a merchant in Marysville, Cal., in 1852. He was born in New York City, was trained and educated there in the circle which later blossomed into "the Four Hundred." Before I knew him personally I had seen him and noticed that he was the best dressed man in the little city. His measure was doubtless in New York, and he was not only dressed in perfect taste, but in perfect taste every hour of the day. But the rains fell and the floods came, and on Christmas clay a part of the city was under water, the other part deep in mud.

            Still Christmas had to be celebrated, so a band of young men there were no old men there gathered together and engaged Seymour Pixley, who was six feet three in height and slim, to play the fife, and little Grubb--! cannot recall his given name, who was about five feet four in height, but tall east and west, to play a bass drum ; the whole company wore high miners' rubber boots, and some other clothing. They formed a procession, the fife and drum leading, and marched from one saloon to another. When a saloon would treat the whole bunch, they would give it three resounding cheers. When a saloon declined to be generous it received three sepulchral groans, and this continued from 10 a. m. to 4 p. m.

            And Packard was the grand marshal of the procession.

            The next morning he was clothed in his habitual perfect attire, and was in his right mind. Moreover he looked fresh and ruddy as a bridegroom.

            Later I got to know him intimately and early formed an idea that he was a man who went into confessional with his conscience every day, and balanced his books by it every night. But he never stopped to question his conscience as to its own status ; never took time to remember that the compass of a ship may seem to be perfectly adjusted, and still something in the ship itself may cause it to vary, so when the

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ship's course is set by it, all unexpectedly it goes smashing into the breakers.

            There was a little variation of this kind in the compass of Mr. Packard's soul, so he was at times a trifle eccentric, and had collisions which were a surprise to himself.

            He was wonderfully wrought up when the Coxie army started on its march. He had never relied upon anyone save himself and could not comprehend how any healthy man should directly or indirectly beg in a land like ours.

            For a long time he had been noiselessly contributing to maintain a certain church in Salt Lake City. No one knew it but the pastor of the church. As the army neared Salt Lake, just as Packard was most furious about it, he met this pastor on the street, who greeted him with, "Oh, Mr. Packard, what can we do for these poor men ? Where can they go ?"

            At the top of his voice Packard shouted : "Let them go to h--l!" And strode on leaving the good pastor paralyzed with astonishment.

            Mr. Packard made a fortune in Marysville and removed to the east.

            At the close of the war he went South and bought two plantations, one in Mississippi, the other just over the line in Louisiana, and started to raise cotton.

            Soon after his going there news came that the cholera had reached America and was devastating the eastern cities. Packard took the first boat for New Orleans, consulted an eminent physician as to the most approved treatment then known for cholera, bought a great chest of medicines, and with it returned home. It was not long until the disease began its march through the south, and one afternoon a man came by Packard's house and said a negro on a neighboring plantation had been stricken. Mr. Packard, with holsters filled with medicine, mounted a horse and hurried to the sick man's side. For several days he was physician to all who were seized by the pestilence until he finally came down with it himself. He went through all its stages until he lost consciousness in a collapse. He came to himself the next morning and asked his foreman what had been done to pull him through. The honest

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man replied : 'The case was desperate, Mr. Packard, so I doubled the doses on you."

            But cotton was low, and the atmosphere of Mississippi and Louisiana just after the war was not congenial toward northern men, even northern Democrats like Packard. So Mr. Packard sold out, or more correctly, abandoned his home there, and started for California.

            But reaching Salt Lake he was attracted by the reports of the Eureka mine in Tintic district, and bought the control of it. He had practically no knowledge of quartz mining, but he had exhaustless pluck and industry; he made a great mine of his purchase, and a great deal of money; later opened the Gemini and made more until his fortune mounted up into the millions.

            He built the fine school building at Eureka, the beautiful library in Salt Lake and another in Marysville. where he made his first fortune. His home for twenty years was in Salt Lake. In all that time he sought no honors for himself ; comparatively few people knew him ; he never had any family, but during the last ten years of his residence there, with the beginning of every month more than one family received a check from him which was equal to the family's needs. He removed to Santa Cruz, California, about 1900, and engaged in business there, pursuing it with all his old-time energy until at about eighty- five years of age his summons came. He was one of the very strong men of the West.