Adventure, June 1911 — page 9: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

My Adventures: with -Yotr Money . Camp promotion campaign was only half successful at the outset. About 650,000 shares of Stray Dog and 350,000 shares of Indian Camp had been disposed of when the Manhattan boom be- gan to lose its intensity. Promotions had been made a little too rapidly for public digestion. There qere more miners at work than ever in the Manhattan camp, but the demand for securities was not keep- ing pace with the supply. Manhattan’s initial boom appeared to be flattening out just as Goldfield’s first boom had. We met with a setback from another di- rection. Henry McCornick’s banking con- nections in Salt Lake objected to the use of his name as president of the Stray Dog. At the very height of our advertising cam- paign Mr. McCornick resigned. We elected our engineer, ‘‘ Jack’? Campbell, president, but the damage was done. — YES, ‘‘BUSINESS IS BUSINESS ”’ HE offices of the trust company were furnished on an elaborate scale, resem- bling the interior of a banking institution of a large city. The offices became the head- quarters of Eastern mining-stock brokers whenever they arrived in camp. “~ One morning J. C. Weir, a New York mining-stock broker, whose firm held an option from the trust company on 100,000 shares of Stray Dog stock, was ensconced in one of the two luxuriously furnished rooms used as executive offices. Mr. Weir’s firm was one of our selling agents in-New” York. He was the dean of mining-stock brokers in New York City. In those early days the telephone service of Goldfield was not yet’perfected, and it was only necessary for a person; in order to overhear any talk over the telephone, to lift the receiver from the nearest hook and listen. It was re- ported to me that Mr. Weir had been avail- _ ing himself of this method of learning things at first hand. “Say, Rice,” said Mr. Sullivan one morn- ing, ‘‘Weir hears your messages every time you are called on the ’phone. He takes advantage of you. me fix him.” “All right; what do you want to do?’ I answered, . . Say,” said Mr. Sullivan, “Campbell, our engineer, is in Manhattan. T’ll call THE initial Stray Dog and Indian - It’s a whale! I wish you would let- 195 him up from the public station and tell him to ’phone you some red-hot news about mine developments on Stray Dog, and T’ll see to it that Weir is in his office at the time you get the message. If Weir don’t grab a big block of Stray Dog. on the strength os it, I’m a poor guesser.’ "All of our options to brokers were to ex- pire on the 15th of March and this was the 13th. At four o’clock in the afternoon I was in my room. Mr. Weir was at the desk in the room opposite. The ’phone bell rang. “Hello,” I said, ‘who is this?”’ “Campbell, at Manhattan,” was the re- sponse. ‘““What’s the news, Jack?” I asked. ‘“We’ve just struck six feet of $2,000 ore! Never saw a mine as big as this one in my life! Don’t sell any more Stray Dog under $5 a share!” shouted Mr. Campbell. “Bully, Jack,” I said, “but keep that information to yourself. Don’t tell your, mother, and dori’t let any more miners go down the shaft. Close it up until I am abley to buy’ back some of the stock I sold so cheap.”’ Fifteen nie later Mr. Sullivan and I met Mr. Weir leaving the room. “Weir,” said I, “your option on Stray Dog expires on the r5th at noon. So far, your New York office has ordered only 85,000 shares of the 100,000 that were allotted to you. We have decided to close subscriptions on the moment and wish you would wire your New York office not to sell any more.’ “You are wrong,” said Mr. Weir; “why, when I left New York we had oversold our entire allotment! If the office has not notified you of this, it has been a slip. We will, in fact, need at.least 25,000 shares more than have been ordered.”’ “You can’t have them,” said I. “Not. in a thousand years!” put = Mr. Sullivan. Mr. Weir sent a bunch of code miosasgen: to New York. All the next day Mr. Sulli- van spent with Mr. Weir. He allowed Mr. Weir to cajole him into letting him have the entire block of stock. Finally, it was agreed between Mr. Weir and Mr. Stillivan that Mr. Sullivan would give him the addi- tional stock whether I consénted or not. Surreptitiously, according to Mr. Weit’s idea, Mr. Sullivan was yielding to him, (C@ S AMC co 9)(0)(6)