Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hide: A tale of two brothers.

Robert Louis Stevenson wrote the fascinating Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde to examine the theory that man has a dual nature. In the book Dr. Jekyll was successful in separating the good and evil sides of himself via the use of a drug he created. The good doctor had created a drug which turned him into the evil Mr. Hyde. As Hyde, Dr. Jekyll lived the free and fleshly life of his evil side. However, the effects of the drug became unpredictable. Discovering that he cannot get hold of a crucial type of salt, Dr. Jekyll realized that he could no longer continue in this double life. In the laboratory, unsuccessful at recreating the drug, Dr. Jekyll killed himself before two of his concerned friends could break in. Dr. Jekyll wrote a confession to his strange experiment, with the knowledge that if the Hyde character won over his nature, there would be no turning back from his evil nature.

If the Goodyear Family were to be described by the Jekyll and Hyde characters: Frank Goodyear would definitely be a great Mr. Hyde and Charles would be a great personification of Doctor Jekyll. Frank being the dark side of the family traits and Charles possessing almost ever good trait of the family. Charles was charming and charismatic to say the least. Frank was overbearing, demanding, manipulative and abusive to those he felt he could abuse. Frank sucked up to the powerful and rich. Charles helped those who had little in life as well as those who were rich. You could almost say they were complete opposites which might explain their many conflicts.

Charles held great social skills which resulted in his achieving unparalleled political power in his rise to the top of the American elite of his day. Frank had great business and marrying skills which resulted in his rising to the top of the American elite of his day. However, the two operated as a conflicted pair in their life's work. Each benefited from the others skills and as a pair they were a very powerful team. Sadly Charles must accept responsibility for using Frank's twisted business plans and skills to amass a huge fortune for his own family. More than the money Frank was able to provide Charles and his children with a lifestyle that approached that of a modern day lord or prince at least in the Bogalusa community. Frank did suffer greatly in his life and probably had what is known as bi-polar disorder in this authors opinion. Couple this bipolar disorder with anti-social personality traits and you have a formula for a person who brings much misery into the lives of everyone he meets.

Charles side of the family were in fact benevolent lords who ruled with a velvet hand. Sadly many of the supervisors of the Great Southern Lumber Company were picked by Frank and held his hard nosed view of the world. So the face of the company was one of hard nosed capitalism couple with a very paternalistic polished social heart. One cannot help but like Charles Goodyear when reading about him or when reading congressional testimony he gave during his life. I can only conclude that the family operated much like the novel by Stevenson. They personified good and evil all in one package. The same could be said for their creation the Great Southern Lumber Company. Much good was achieved by the company but so was much evil.

Last, it must be understood that the very social, economic, racial, religious etc structure of Bogalusa was planned out by Frank Goodyear and his "friends" such as JP Morgan on Jekyll Isand. Charles had important management duties but the actual structure of the company and thus the community was Franks mindchild. One can only thank God for taking Frank when he did before he could have created even more damage to South Louisiana and Mississippi. We were fortunate to have Charles and his children remain to lesson the harm which was created.

Don't get me wrong Charles believed himself to be a Good Sheppard who was benefiting the community while making a huge fortune himself. But the facts are Frank's brainchild was implemented by Franks key employees who were themselves brutal men just like Frank. Had they been more like Charles they would have been viewed as weak by Frank and abused to the point of being fired. I believe there was a good amount of denial by Charles Goodyear about what was going on in Bogalusa and this is evident in the History written by his son. I can only hope the family re-examines their role in the creation of many social problems which exist in Bogalusa to this day. This is more a plea for help than an indictment of the Goodyear Family.

Some of what I post is hard on the Goodyear Family. I do hope these harsh words can be softened by corrections of any mistakes or inaccuracies I may have made. Better would be assistance in helping correct the current problems in Bogalusa by those living members of the family and living corporate charities birthed from the profits of the Great Southern Lumber Company. It is hardly fair for anyone to benefit from murder, race baiting, and other evil practises, while those who are negatively impacted by such behavior are left to suffer in obscurity.

This in large part is why I write about these matters. So that those who suffer can know exactly why they have the issues which lesson their spiritual and economic growth. What is needed is healing and help for those suffering from this terrible past. This is why I believe those who are still benefiting from the transgressions should come forward to help. I will continue to write about these matters but I felt compelled to give my opinion at this point out of respect for the readers right to know my own biases in the matter.