4pQonT

II
EZRA POUND was born on October 30, 1885, in Hailey, Idaho.
He was the son of Homer Loomis Pound and Isabel Weston
Pound. In later years, the sculptor Lekakis humourously referred to
Ezra as "Homer's son", a mot that was repeated among the Greeks.
Hailey was a frontier town, such as those that can be seen today
on any American television screen. Homer Pound was employed in
the government land office. Ezra recalls seeing some burly gentlemen
striding about with large six shooters strapped to their waists.
In 1888, Homer Pound was appointed assayer to the United States
Mint in Philadelphia. The family was caught in the famed "Blizzard
of '88" during their return to the East. They settled in Wyncote,
Pennsylvania, a prosperous suburb, with such neighbors as a certain
Mr. Curtis, who published a well-known periodical of that era.
Ezra's interest in money as a phenomenon, in contrast to the
usual attitude toward money as something to get, is a legitimate
one. His paternal grandfather, Thaddeus Coleman Pound, had been
a pioneer railroad-builder and lumberman in Wisconsin. He served
several terms as a Congressman and became an ardent advocate of
monetary reform. While he was in Washington, his lumber interests
were wiped out by the rapid expansion of the Weyerhaeuser firm.
He returned home to salvage what he could, and for a time, he
paid his workers in scrip money. Ezra inherited a few bills of
30