In the prospering prairie town of St. Charles, Ill. (pop. 7,700), 35 miles west of Chicago, Leading Citizen E. J. (for Edward John) Baker last week handed out three sizable checks. To the town's E. J. Baker Working Fund went a no-strings-attached $100,000, bringing the total that parchment-fragile Colonel Baker, 90, has given the town so far this year to $300,000. To the St. Charles school district went $75.000. Father Walter Ryan accepted a $25.000 check for St. Patrick's parochial school, gasped: "Is it real? Never do that again; I'll have a heart attack." When the news got out, St. Charles was hardly surprised. In 40 years, Millionaire Baker has given the town and its enterprises a staggering $5,000,000. Says Mayor Ralph Richmond: "There isn't another city like St. Charles and there isn't another Colonel Baker."
The colonel, whose rank rests in Kentucky rather than the Army, inherited the bulk of his fortune in 1918 from his sister, widow of fabulous John W. ("Bet a Million") Gates, who made money on barbed wire and risked as much as $150,000 a night at the faro table. Some of the inheritance Baker invested in profitable local real estate, e.g., a bank, the Baker Hotel. The bulk he put to work helping his home town. Samples of his largess:
¶ The Henry Rockwell Baker Memorial Community Center, built in 1925 for $175,000 and named for a son who died of tuberculosis.
¶ St. Charles' Municipal Building, which includes a museum and rifle range, toward which Baker gave $200,000.
¶ The imposing $1,400,000 First Methodist Church, erected in 1955.
¶ Fox River Dam, rebuilt by the colonel after he found it crumbling 30 years ago, and Pottawatomie Park, on which Baker and the Public Works Administration matched funds to provide tennis courts, two swimming pools and a golf course designed by Robert Trent Jones.
In addition to public munificence, Colonel Baker carries on quiet good works; e.g., when he hears of deserving citizens whose taxes are in arrears he wipes out their delinquency. Between times, the fragile (135 Ibs.) philanthropist holds court in the coffee shop of the Baker Hotel, where he has lived since his wife died in 1939. Fellow townsmen are allowed to stop and chat if a hovering nurse nods to them, are offered Robert Burns Panatelas at audience's end. The cigars must be smoked immediately; E. J. Baker likes his gifts to be used.
After 40 years of using the big gifts, St. Charles understands two dangers: 1) the town has become spoiled, 2) aged Colonel Baker won't live forever. St. Charles is already steeling itself against the day he disappears. Says Mayor Richmond: "We're trying to get on our own feet so we can carry on by ourselves."