| Show written for this paper BIG FORTUNES AND HOW THEY ARE MADE copyrighted copyrighted by frank G Ca carpenter menter 1896 washington febuary 12 1896 i 01 HILE IN NEW Q 0 C 0 ea 0 0 york the other Q 0 Q C C day I 1 dropped 00 0 Q 0 0 in for a few moments at the 0 office ol of henry clews and ha had d 00 v a characteristic chat with him about money matters M r C clews is t he h e oldest broker in wall street he H e began to t 0 speculate at twenty jimr two and he is still in ia the swim at sixty he has known intimate intimately lv all the great operators and fortune makers for the past thirty five years and has had bad his tussles with most of them he has made and lost millions and be is said to be worth millions today he is still one of the most energetic men on the street and you would never suppose that he has reached t threescore he is as bright as a silver dollar fresh from the mint and talks in the gaiek quick jerky wiy way ot of the business man hie is time I 1 asked him first as to the times he told me that prosperity bad tonic come to stay and that we were on the upgrade up grade of lancial financial good times said he 1 I expect to see the times improve steadily from now on we are going to have a period d of gold inflation and the golden era is is about to come we will produce more than two hundred million dollars worth of gold in the world this year and he greater part of this will go into circulation there are new gold fields being discovered in all parts of the world and the probability is thattie that the output will increase rather than dim now the big countries of europe have been hoarding gold for sone time they have their strong boxes practically lull full in preparation for possible wars in the future they will hoard no more and the surplus from now on will go into circulation there will be a billion dollars worth af pf gold thrown into the worlds circulation during the next five years and this will create at least a billion dollars of credit money the result wili be a gold inflation and the prices of everything will rise will there be a panic at the eod end of it H hyes yes the panic will come sooner or later imer prosperity and the reverse move inove in waves and we are bound to have our ups and downs just about every so often f how about interest rates have th they n not 0 t got to the bottom zer no 0 I 1 1 I think not 1 replied mr clews interest est is falling and will probably fall all the low rate ot of interest depends upon credit our government has such good credit that it can get money very cheaply it is so with our business men L they are known to be good and every one wants to lend to them how about wall street Is there thereas as much chance to make money as there has been in the past yes every bit men are making M money oney he here renow now successful wall street speculators are born not made they come into the street and by industry e energy and practical common sense make fortunes what are the elements of a successful duwall ful wall Wall street speculator the chief thing is to know a good thing when you see it it and to act upon it the moment you know it A successful man here has to know the country he has to study the markets and to be able to reason and think for himself he has to be careful in his habits and see that his brain is in good condition if his vital force goes out in dissipation of any kind he cant can it use it here and I 1 can tell you he needs vital force here 1 1 I in monte carlo mr clews where real gambling goes on there are numerous men who have systems which they think will beat the game Is there any system by which a wall street stock gambler can beat the game no I 1 think not replied the old broker men with systems come here by the scores they invariably fail in the end you cant play wall street on system I 1 how does a presidential campaign affect wall stee et it is bad replied mr clews bad for the speculators bad tor for the brokers bad all around people get interested in the different candidates the bankers and brokers are appointed on committees mit tees and they devote time to politics which they ordinarily use in the street both wall street and the people lose a great a campaign who is the richest man in the united states mr clews 1 I believe cornelius vanderbilt stands at the head was the reply he has at least one hundred million dollars who are the five richest men let me gee see was the reply of the broker as he held up a delicate white hand and began to count on his fing rs beginning at the little one there is cornelius vanderbilt first wi liam H vanderbilt second william waldorf astor the fortune of jay gould and lastly that of john rockefeller each of these is worth from fifty millions to a hundred million dollars and together they represent an enormous amount of money are not these large fortunes dangerous to the united states I 1 asked dont you think that we are liable to have a society of the rich and one of the poor if u we are not careful no I 1 think not replied mr clews the aply way these fortunes have been kept together is by a system of entail the Vander bilts have given the bulk to the eldest son and the astor millions are kept together the rule is that rich families seldom hold their estates more than four generations that may be called the lile life of a fortune we have no law of entail and the sharp young fellows from the outside manage to get away with the fortunes of the effete rich 1 I how about the honor of wall wallai ss some people think that the broke dangerous men to deal with 1 I 1 dont believe that there is a p pi i in the world where honor is worth and held at a higher rate than here millions are made and lost every day without a scrap of connected with the contract A ot of the hand will often announce cep tance of a bid which makes or a fortune other professions have idea of such methods and the avei ave broker has as high a sense of hone hon the trien men of any other class in the wot you were worth five million d doll mr clews in 1873 when you s u SP it must be awaul 1 to lose millions ns does it leel it feels so bad replied mr cl with a shudder that I 1 dont ii 1 talk rf of it I 1 dont want to thinka thial it why I 1 lost two millions and a 4 in one clip at that time it D georgia bonds you know the repudiated and I 1 could do holhi got up however but I 1 dont want it I 1 through such an experience again t speaking of mr clews belief ot boff being a good era at hand I 1 had it the other day with senator hen hei teller about the rich cripple creek mine of colorado cripple cre just back of pikes peak it isper the best gold region in the U 1 states today senator teller h ha come from the mines when I 1 saw said baid he A wonderful gold develop mei 9 going on in colorado and this practically changed the condition dv state we seemed to be on them the of ruin in 1893 through the fall J iff price of silver now the financial sl have changed and all the clouds golden linings new mines haver havel discovered at cripple creek 4 and have some rich gold mines at f creek and fulford the cripple mines are turning out gold at the i from eight to ten million dollars a I 1 visited two of the greatest mines d during aring my stay in the portland nd I 1 found millions in sight and I 1 am ain that the independence mine is eq ettic T good the portland mine is turning wy about worth ot of gold a dai day W more than half a million dol domars arr month it costs very little t to 0 get g gold out the average is less wa twenty five cents an ounce arid and A w ounce of gold is you know worth al nw than 20 20 nineteen dollars and twenty five cents cent s is a good profit oft off of tw twenty five cents it yes it is said 1 I but I 1 1 I sup suppo the most ot this mone money y goes to ar east no it does not replied senator T ler 1 I thank fortune it does not the has had little confidence in color colorado late years it would not lor for a long tin take any stock in the gold dincov and colorado men had bad to develop da mines themselves this is what I 1 I 1 want to see the state develop itself get the profit we dont want a tot fot N fellows living in the east and fatten oft off the body of colorado we are p 1 independent colorado hash ha sorts of resources and if the people not want our silver we can give ive f th gold if they dont want gold we give them coal and if they dont coal we have got enough the state to float many ot of the c cities the gold discoveries have banks I 1 heard not long lorado springs my letter there was more than a mil bof of cripple creek gold de tt rits bank vaults I 1 have a re from one of our banks mr it had a half million dollars 1 and its deposits now amount to seven millions millio ns of dollars you think this gold output will WN SW abbe to increase increased haloo Hf loo know why it should not f re pae senator teller some of the aich I 1 saw had enough gold in bottea them busy for years and es as I 1 said are being dis bied there is a great increase in ehte worlds gold product it usually Maio 1 mite to about annually or adiv going on at such a rate that it vre bamat to more than a aar ao and I 1 will not be surprised to see r itak to a year such E 20 will surely raise prices and go up I 1 do not however thieve that this will make immediate add jmes capital i is timid there Mr t gew fiew factories being started and asit I 1 think several years before W ate a L substantial change chang e in the finan will ing of the cripple creek mines Sto tor ator who are the men who are maks bg the most money out of thern them aher thee v are a number of men who are ali w ittig ng for fortunes tunes replied senator TWO among other persons who ha tee ib e property is a man named stam he owns the independence chich is now turning out our a half buoo dollars every month I 1 venture pahe can clear that much a month ore is so rich that it can be I 1 tm taken out at an expense ol of io 10 cents an ww and I 1 dont suppose that it costs UK amre than monthly to oper MOM mine aune 1 awas was told when I 1 was 10 Deriver that he had then 40 awit t in a denver bank as a s stratton S a man to start atti asked no mt I 1 believe not replied senator TOW teller he came west poor and struck itta lic at cripple creek it was the baith with one of the owners of the portland mine which I 1 told you was also turning OU out t a half million dollars a month tie he was a plumber a few years ago bof sad and was working for a lew few dollar a day f i HO abw w about david H moffatt senator lofv I 1 asked he is also a sell self made ire is he not yes J replied senator teller aten I 1 first knew david H moffatt ws running a little book and station acty Y store in denver he came west 1100 omaha I 1 think he left the book tore SOM to be cashier of a bank and his A fibey making ability was such that he W toon soft able to buy a majority of th the e i 6 of the ban and became its J dont mean that he did anything otly icay honest but he is a natural edilo r maker and he has always been saul s is MT mr moffatt worth now pa he be is worth anywhere be ifft tn wand and fifteen million d ollars dollars yx he is so rich no now W that 0 P m making aking money he may lose i a little here and there but he is bound baw to come out on top why not ole had bad to take a mine for a df toi he put mone money yinto into it developed ped it and out ot of that mine 4 alone he has I 1 venture taken taken a million he i is now interested in mines all over colorado he owns railroad and other stocks and he is one of the boldest operators of the west he has large interests at cripple creek what kind of a man is moffatt senator said I 1 you remember how a tramp scared him into a present of 20 with a little bottle of water it was not water replied senator teller it was a bottle of sweet oil I 1 have talked with mr about it he was sitting in the back room of his bank in denver one day when a wild eyed looking fellow entered he seemed to be desperate and he said he was so after a few moments talk he pulled a little bottle out of his pocket held it up before moffatt and told him that it contained t nitroglycerine nitro glycerine he said he was bound to have some money and that moffatt could choose between giving it to him and being blown into atoms 11 he told moffatt that he was bound to have 20 that he must write out a check tor this amount and go with him to the counter in the outer office get it cashed and give him the money it he did not he would drop the bottle on the floor and blow himself moffatt and the bank into eternity mr moffatt looked at the man he did not know whether he was war telling the truth or not but he decided that the risk was too great and that he would oblige the man he told me that he thought the man could be caught after he had gotten the money and started out of t the he bank well wel he walked to the cashiers desk asked for the i got it and handed banded it to the man who took it and ran out moffatt at once sounded the alarm but it was then too late and he was never caught the incident was rather a humiliating one to mr moffatt but the money lost was nothing to him any sensible man would have done the same you see you cant calculate very closely as to whether a mans pistol is loaded when the cock is raised and the man has his finger on the trigger it dont pay to risk the pressure of that finger this was the situation of moffatt the bottle might have contained dynamite and might have been as dangerous in its explosive power as the bomb which was thrown at russell sage he was wise in not risking it 1 I suppose big fortunes are often made in colorado by chance are they not senator mining is to a large extent a matter of luck yes said the senator luck has a great deal to do with it it takes luck brains and nerve I 1 bought a mine once lor for about 12 and I 1 made out of it I 1 had a chance to go into another for 1 I would have had to borrow money to do so and I 1 was afraid of it this was for a third interest and within a short time the mine was sold tor for about 1 I would have made nearly out of my but I 1 had not at that time the nerve to risk it the same fellows who asked me to go in with them to buy that mine have lately made a big strike at cripple creek they bought a mine and stocked it on the basis of five cents a share to raise the 3 oooo which they needed to develop it the face value ol of the stock was at the start and it cost those who went in only 5 cents on the dollar I 1 it is now worth more than and every 5 cents put into it has risen to a value of irom from 2 to 3 1 I asked one of the owners why wh Y he did not take me in when the stock was down at 5 and lo 10 cents he replied that he did not know that it would amount to anything and he feared to offer it to his friends one ot of the present congressmen from new york got a block of stock in it for 11 cents a share yes 1 continued senator teller this matter ot of fortune making is to a large extent a matter of luck I 1 know for instance ol of a mine which was sold a few months ago and which is now paying a big dividend it was discovered in idaho and the prospectors capitalized it at they wanted cash to open it up so they took ot of the stock for themselves and sold sod the remaining at io 10 cents a share to get the t to 0 open the mines they came to 10 denver to get the money one of the prospectors knew gov grant and one other of our capitalists both of these men were but of the city and not knowing where to turn the prospector went on to ohio where he finally succeeded in placing the mine at youngstown he brought back his bis 35 and began to work the mine paid at once and it is now giving lo 10 per cent dividends on the face value of the stock realizing in fact more than a month had grant been in denver he would have bought the mine and luck in this case diverted a fortune to ohio take my own case I 1 am not a rich man and still I 1 have lost a couple of hundred thousand d ollars dollars by |
