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Show ji P. J. Mo ran and His Work I Bj 1 1' ' ! This isn't a story of whore Pat Moran was Hl i born, where he.Jwent to school, or when he ate Bffl j ' ',' his first flapjack. There are about eight people Bj. 1 j in town, possibly, who care whether or not "Pat" Hti Ml ' ever went to school, and they care less about Hp '; what he eats or when he eats it. - ; j Furthermore, the contractor has had so much Bf l pf that "dope," as he terms it, printed about him- Kfj ; Jj self in the last few years tlwit he ducks for cover B H ; i! every time anyone who looks like a newspaper B II vj f man -gets in sight of his office. B jf 1 There are about thirty thousand taxpayers in B lv i If Salt Lake, however, to whom it makes consider- H H ' j able difference where P. J. Spends his time be- BB 4 i .tween meals, for these taxpayers have paid him B II j a few hundred thousand dollars in the last few B j : fa years for about thirteen and a half miles of pave- B II ( ; 1 1 , ment, several miles of water mains, sewers and B ji ' lj a conduit or two. B f J ' ! Pat Moran has developed from a private con-Hlljj con-Hlljj ' l i . tractor into a municipal figure. He doesn't pose HK I ' r ' as the city's benefactor in any sense of the word. B Iff' He lins tlone practically all the municipal im-Bi im-Bi 1 ! ji i provement work Salt Lake has known for years, Bj I Mi'; and he has been fairly well paid for it. He has I V: profited by his work and not a taxpayer in the Hj i city will dispute his right to profit by the work Bj J he ban accomplished. He doesn't work for glory, B : j j: ,' and Salt Lake doesn't ask him to. Nevertheless, Bfj : Mr. Moran has undertaken and completed work ff , jj here in a manner that has made him the most H j " i j interesting figure in municipal construction work gj ; ' B' In the intermountain country. HI! About fifteen miles of asphalt and five miles Hill .11 of macadam paving have been put in by the con-Hi con-Hi j ij tractor. The biggest job he ever tackled was the H ; Big Coltonwood conduit, and it stands today as H '' a monument to his engineering and contracting Hit) A' genius. He has put in sewers, water mains and H HI f sidewalks all over the city and is now putting in HI ' the big water main on Fifth East street. For Efjl the pipe alone used in this main the city paid a H$ . J 'freight bill of $60,000. He has just completed Hiy ij the macadamizing of Second avenue and has Hjni ' f practically made a ' oulevard of the street, so Hjjjl i thoroughly has the work been done. It would be Hfil lj useless to enumerate the different pieces of work Hfji , 1 handled by Mr. Moran in the last four years in Hijlj 4 Salt Lake. There isn't a taxpayer in town who Hjfl $ doesn't know what he has done and what he .is Hjjjl -j. iloing, and the newcomers are rapidly learning. Hjjjj ,ij Something that about one in five citizens Him ii know, however, is the fact that the contractor Hjjjl j, has a fortune or so invested in machinery and H !y : 1 stone quarries in Salt Lake to enable him to H1 ! handle the big contracts he secures. P ; j Heowns the rights to the Pascoe limestone Bl Vj quarries, north of the Warm Springs, and he has Hit l j invested $12,000 in a rock crusher and electric Hj ; !; j motor there that has a capacity of about 600 tons Bl ill of crushed rock a day for use in asphalt and ma-Hi ma-Hi ) cadam work. He owns two groat trench-digging B I j machines and a steam shovel of standard size. B i On an average he employs about 1200 men and Bi i owns some 200 horses, to say nothing of wagons, B 1 ' ( j dump carts, elevated electric dump tracks and B I j several thousand dollars' worth of other tools. HTj Moran has about $200,000 tied up in his plant B ! There are two mighty good reasons why Pat H li i Moran has the local municipal improvement work Hjj 1 1 J field to himself. In the first place he has proven B ! j , , , the worth of what he does. When he puts down Hk ! . ! a pavement, taxpayers who dig up for it know Rlj : h that that pavement will stand a year or so longer Rjjj 1 1 than an ordinary pavement, and the same thing j i J ', holds gor l in everything else he does. There is Hjtf I ! V . yet to ' und in Salt Lake a piece of work con- tracted for and put in by Pat Moran that is faulty in itself. The other reason is .that the contractor has the capital to go in after the big contracts, and when he gets them to put them through on his A 1 Salt Lake can stand a goodly nu'mber of Mr. I Moran's "street closed" signs during the next I few years, for when those signs come down, the I ,ity is always another step nearer the goal of I "The City Beautiful." I mHIb P. J. MORAN own financial resources; in other words, carry the work to completion in the face of deferred payments when such an arrangement is made. He has the money and the nerve to go in deep. The city council knows this and the taxpayers know it. That's why Moran gets the big contracts. con-tracts. It has never been proven that Moran asked and received more money than his work was fairly worth. Bonis (struggling author) You bock reviewers review-ers were unnecessarily severe on that last novel of mine. Naggus Why, yqu ungrateful hound, with one accord Ave pronounced it one of the cleanest and most uplifting works of fiction that had appeared this season. Bonis That's what I mean, I haven't sold a single copy. Chicago Tribune. |
