Word: canton
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...prosperous farmers of Illinois' rural Fulton County, it sounded like a gilt-edged business opportunity: Henry Ford was planning to build a huge soybean processing plant at nearby Canton if local people exhibited their faith in the enterprise by buying a factory site. Many a farmer shelled out forthwith, and the investors were soon rewarded for their faith. Ford, they were told, had simply been testing them. To escape inheritance taxes, he had decided to divide his vast fortune among poor and worthy people-if they now wanted to invest further, he would issue certificates which would repay them...
...Grandmother Is Sick." The fact that Henry Ford died in 1947, and that two of the original sponsors of the enterprise were sent to prison last year for mail fraud in connection with the swindle, only speeded up collections. Mrs. Marie Fuller, grandmotherly operator of a Canton beauty parlor, had been, a sort of silent partner in the conspiracy. She began operating more openly, and at the same time the investors began getting letters, telegrams and telephone calls from someone who announced himself as "Benson Ford...
...used as a political bribe. "Kids," his letter began, "this [man] says he will lay off for the sum of $2,000, so I know it is lots of guts to ask you, but. . ." The money was raised. At another point "Benson" asked a 53-year-old Canton plumber to get his blood tested. "Grandmother is sick," said Benson over the telephone, "and William and I have given our blood and are about done . . ." He also promised one Sally Onken (a $12,000 investor) a yellow convertible with "foldaway steps just like Margaret Truman...
...subsequently found that Canton Island was nine miles long and 500 yards at the widest. Its population was 40. Enderbury Island was three miles long and one mile wide, and had a population of four persons! Manchuria, of course, has a population of 33 million and an area of about 413,000 square miles...
...sure that at Yalta in 1945 President Roosevelt had in mind his favorite case of the Canton and Enderbury Islands which were placed under a U.S.British condominium for 50 years. History will not forgive the man [Stalin] who played such deliberate tricks on the generous idealism of a great humanitarian...