1/milton petrie
the most generous man in the world
every morning, billionaire milton petrie
walked from his new york apartment
and bought a newspaper from the
ragged old man on the street corner,
one morning the man wasn't there.
petrie learned that he was very ill in the city
hospital. immediately he paid his hospital bill and
later, when the man died, paid for his funeral.
the old man was just one of
many people that milton petrie
helped with his money.
whenever he read about personal
disasters in his newspaper petrie
sent generous cheques, especially
to the families of policemen or
firemen injured at work. he also
sent cheques to a mother who
lost five children in a fire, and a
beautiful model, whose face was
cut in a knife attack. it cost him
millions of dollars, but he still
had millions left. he said that he
was lucky in business and he
wanted to help those less
fortunate than himself. the nice
thing is, the harder i work, the
more money i make, and the
more people i can help.'
milton petrie died in 1994,
when he was 92. his will was 120
pages long because he left $150
million to 383 people. his widow,
carroll, his fourth and last wife,
said his generosity was a result of
the poverty of his early years. his
family were poor but kindhearted. his father was a russian
immigrant who became a
policeman, but he never arrested
anyone, he was too kind. he
couldn't even give a parking
ticket.
2/hetty green
the richest, meanest woman
in the world
h
enrietta (hetty) green
was a very spoilt, only
child. she was born in
massachusetts, usa, in
1835. her father was a
millionaire businessman. her mother
was often ill, and so from the age of
two her father took her with him to
work and taught her about stocks and
shares. at the age of six she started
reading the daily financial newspapers
and she opened her own bank account.
her father died when she was 21 and
she inherited $7.5 million. she went to
new york and invested on wall street.
hetty saved every penny, eating in the
cheapest restaurants for 15 cents. she
became one of the richest and most
hated women in the world. she was
called 'the witch of wall street'. at 33
she married edward green, a multimillionaire, and had two children, ned
and sylvia.
hetty's meanness was legendary. she
always argued about prices in shops.
she walked to the local grocery store to
buy broken cookies (biscuits) which
were much cheaper, and to get a free
bone for her much-loved dog, dewey.
once she lost a two-cent stamp and
spent the night looking for it. she
never bought clothes and always wore
the same long, ragged black skirt. worst
of all, when her son ned fell and
injured his knee, she refused to pay for
a doctor and spent hours looking for
free medical help. in the end ned's leg
was amputated.
when she died in 1916 she left her
children $100 million (worth $9.3
billion today). her daughter built a
hospital with her money.
ответить на вопросы:
how were milton and hetty's childhoods different?
• how did their childhoods affect them later?
• why was milton especially generous to policemen?
• why did hetty's daughter build a hospital?
• what was the kindest thing milton did?
• who had the happier life? milton or hetty?