Repaying the Rent

Evan Edward Worthing told the Negroes who rented his property in Houston: "You let me have what belongs to me. and I'll give you what belongs to you." A fair man who sometimes seemed hard, he had captained the first Texas A. & M. football team to beat the University of Texas (12-0. in 1902), and he sternly threw out tenants who had no good reason for defaulting on their rent. But he lent money freely when times were hard, would let a family fall behind on the rent if there were good reasons for it. Quietly he made no-interest loans to his tenants to help put their children through high school. By 1951 he was a millionaire.

At 68, ill of diabetes, Landlord Worthing was taken to a hospital, told that one of his legs must be amputated. As he lay waiting for the operation, he looked back over a life that had led from college to a job as signal design engineer for the Southern Pacific Railroad, then to real estate dealings in white-tenanted property, and finally, after a severe Depression loss, into Negro rentals. Then Evan Edward Worthing called his lawyer to the hospital, explained the terms of a will he wanted drawn. Eleven months later, in December 1951. he died. In his principal bequest, he gave his Negro tenants what he felt belonged to them: $1,350,000 of his $1,600,000 gross estate, to be placed in a trust fund for Negro college scholarships.

Last week 20 college-bound Negroes from Houston (where a junior-senior high school was named for Worthing this year) got $4,000 scholarships in colleges of their choice. Total given so far by Worthing's trust, which will continue indefinitely: 130 scholarships worth $520,000.

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