Letter from John Oliver Replying to Mr. G.R. Parks

June 2, 1924

Mr. G. R. Parks
Guaranty Trust Co.
Guaranty Bldg. 84 Sixth St.
Portland, Ore.

Dear Sir:-

Replying to yours of the 27th. ult. with reference to the Christian Community of Universal Brotherhood. I would say that these people are somewhat peculiar in their religious beliefs, and are rather difficult to deal with. One of their peculiarities is to perform work such as building roads, trails and bridges without authority from the Government and then afterwards making a claim against the Government for the cost of construction of before mentioned works, and claiming such costs as an offset against taxes due to the Government. Of course they are not alone in this method of making claims against the Government, but perhaps they are a little more crude in their methods than some others.

They are, however, a very industrious people taken in the aggregate. They have secured large areas of land, some of which is of very excellent quality and other which is very poor and difficult and expensive to bring under cultivation. There is no doubt that they succeed in improving their lands and bringing them under cultivation and making them productive, where few native Canadians or other classes of people would have made the same improvements. I have no reason to believe that in carrying out there financial obligations they are not equally as trustworthy as the average of other classes of people in the country. Briefly put, if I were asked to finance them I would consider them as good a risk as the average of other classes.