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Show The Billion Dollar Fortune. The Astor properties now Increase as njur before. Land values, In tho last five years, havo Jumped 60 and 100 per cent. Tho forces already described havo been especially marked since 10. The PP"IatIon grows at tho ralo ,of 100.0(0 a year. In many nectlons Now York lias been largely reconstructed: new headquarters of retail undo and business havo developed; public Improvomonls Initialed Ini-tialed slnco thou tunnel, bridges, subways, sub-ways, railroad terminals aggregate In cost not far from tf-JO.OOO.OOO. There hns been a general movement of corporations toward Now York; practically all tho newly organized combinations, -for example, ex-ample, have .located there. When John Jacob Astor died, m 3SW. his catnto. Inherited In-herited by William Waldorf, wo3 cstl- mated at 10,OCO.C".. If it wcro worth that then. It Is worth $300,000,000 now. Th estate es-tate of Wlllfcim Astor. who died In 1K3, Inherited by tho present John Jacob, was generally placed at about JO5.00O.0CO. If that wcro nn accurate figure, it must now aggregate at least $100,000,000. Tho combined com-bined Astor fortune thus Increases with accelerated momentum. In flftcon or twonty yoars, at tho present rnto of progress, pro-gress, It will have reached tho billion mark. And then It will go vcn footer, until tho ordinary mind In appalled at tho portentous flguros. Wo havo seen that the $2,000,000 Imcsted by John Jacob hnH multiplied at least (wo hundred times in ono hundred yoars. (It bos reached, at a conscrvatlvo estlmato, J-t50.0W.Oj0.) Lf tlm saino rate be maintained for another century, cen-tury, tho Astor fortune will attain tho unimaginable lotnl of eighty billions. Wo Bland aghast at such a possibility; but not more so than would havo John Jacob's Ja-cob's contemporaries had they foreseen tho present riuillty In 1S30 John Jncob Astor wan tho only man In Now York who was worth a million dollars. Burton J. Hcndrlck In McCluro's. . |