My Adventures with Your Money

the Great Go

the district were being gutted of their treasures at the rate of $1,000,000 a month. Under the high pressure of the short-term leasing system new high records of production were be

lusty trail-blazers, who had braved the perils of the desert to locate the district, had become a towering reality. The camp, which two years before was dubbed by financial writers of the press as a "raw prospect" and a

camps had increased in market value $50,000,000 more. The camp rode complacently on the crest of the big boom, tha

st be reached in climbing values at some

f the company. You could have bought all of the properties of this company for less than $150,000 when the camp was first located. A score of leases were operat

tional prices and enjoyed a swimming market. The successful merging by Wingfield and Nixon of the principal producing properti

re capitalization, and stood firm in the market regardless of the fact that it was still only an unpromising "prospect." The issued stock of a dozen other companies in control of the promoters of the merger was selling at an agg

, had scored an uninterrupted advance from 15 to $2.65 a share without a

of 2,250 per cent. over the promotion price. Kewanas's gain was also made despite the fact that mine developments had failed to open u

ooned from 15 cents to $6 a share on a capitalization of 1,500,000 shares. It had never earned a dollar for stockhol

n a capitalization of 1,000,000 shares, had risen rapidly, because of ore discoveries and co

from the productive zone, had been carried up from 10 cents a share to $2.50 without

ted, are now selling for a few pennies per share each, the average not being so much as ten cents. There were over a hundred

F WINGFIEL

reason felt that there must be concrete value behind nearly all of them. Brokers in Eastern cities reported that few of their customers were willing to take profits even at the prices to which stocks had been skyrocketed. Most mining-stock brokers of the cities had "knocked" the stocks of the ca

t kept carrying the market up at each session could be heard half a block away. Later, did you find your way into the crowded board-room, the half-crazed manner in which note

Born in the backwoods of Arkansas, and later of Oregon, he hailed from Golconda, Nevada. Mr. Nixon, at the time he staked Mr. Wingfield and until his election as a United States Senator in 1904, was known as the "State Agent" of the Southern Pacific Company for Nevada, having succeeded on t

er of the Tonopah Club, the biggest gambling house in Tonopah, and later "parleying" the money for himself and part

r. Wingfield was a conspicuous figure at nearly all the sessions of the Goldfield Stock Exchange, of which he was a member. In the early

he possessor of abilities of a superior order. In and around the camp he was noted for secretiveness. He was rated a cool, calculating, selfish, surething gambler-man-of-affairs-the kind who uses the backstairs, never trusts anybody, is willing to wait a long time to accomplish a set purpose, keeps his mouth closed, and does not allo

and above middle girth at that part of his anatomy which a political enemy once described as seat of his thoughts and the tabernacle of his aspirations. His steel-gray eyes were absolutely without expression. Newly-rich, h

d would on occasion ostentatiously offer to wager that Goldfield Consolidated "would sell at $15 before $9," etc. Men with money who had flocked to the camp from every direction listened in rapt attention. At a later hour they secretly wired the new

NGS OF A

as not the fact that the mergerers and waterers of Goldfield Consolidated were in command of the mine, market and bank situation sufficient to make me suspect that possibly the cards might be stacked and that maybe cards were

only item in my conception of the worth of a Goldfield mining issue. The millionaires of the camp were not miners by profession and their judgment of the value of any mining property would not have influenced a Guggenheim, a Ryan or a Rothschild to exte

hours a day, including Sunday, and I never relaxed. Although I had arrived in the camp broke, had I been of

nd in the early period of the camp's days of "trial and tribulation." They had triumphed like their forebears on the Comstock, just as did the hardy pioneers of Leadville and Cripple Creek and as their brethren of Tonopah di

ted at 25 cents, was selling freely at $1.30. Jumping Jack, for which subscriptions were originally accepted at 25 cents, was in hot demand at 62 cents. Stray Dog, sold to the public originally at 45 cents, was active around 85 cents. Lou Dillon, put out less than a month before at 25 cents, had worked its way up to 64 cents. Silver Pick Extension, which was

was now president of

e market. With the exception of Bullfrog Rush, for which the Sullivan Trust Company had refunded the money to subscribers when the mine under development proved to be a "lemon," every promotion of the trust company showed investors a h

by the American National Bank of San Francisco to examine the books of the trust company, had reported that our assets were $3,000,000 in excess of liabilities, all of which had been gathered in

its $8,000,000 more, but I felicitated myself that I had done very well by pyramiding $2,500 into a half interest in a flourishing $3,000,000 trust company. I was vain enough to believe that my achievement was as unique as that of Mr. Wingfield, because he had had the influence of a United States Senator and the money deposited in a chain of newly established banks in Goldfield, Tonopah and other points to aid him in his operations. Against this I had not only bee

DED HIGH

Denver S. Dickerson for Lieutenant-Governor, was victorious. The Republican ticket, headed by J. F. Mitchell, a mining

ent intervened to quell the labor riots there. Goldfield miners to a man very naturally voted for him. Governor Sparks had accepted the renomination at the urgent reque

he financing of mining enterprises, loomed large on the political and business horizon because of its increasing financial and political power. The trust compan

John S. Cook & Company's bank in Goldfield, which was credited with deposits aggregating $8,000,000; into a new bank in Tonopah, known as the Tonopah Banking Corporation, and into a newly formed ba

racy was re

e camp at a time when this class of securities was not so readily accepted by the other banks as good collateral. In Tonopah the newly-established Nixon bank, known as the Tonopah Banking Corporation, was making gradual headway against both the Nye & Ormsby and the State Bank & Trust Company, which still carried about 75 p

grasp on the throat of the mining and financial business of the camp, and through the out-of-town draft collect

r companies not included in the merger, and had raked in not less than $10,000,000 during the boom as the result of this selling. The disposal of huge blocks of stock by Wingfield and Nixon, however, was not interpreted as meaning that stocks we

promoters began to complain that they were compelled to lend strong support to the market because of selling from many quarters that could not be explained.

ack in all markets. Salt Lake and San Francisco were report

upport i

as no s

o throw all of a million dolla

tock certificates for the money, and

to determine wha

NNING OF

s who held Sullivan stocks, or knew of anybody who held them, to unload. From

Exchange opened strong and buoyant, and it looked for a mome

ck broker of Tonopah calle

Dillon at 48," he sa

t had been promoted at 25; 48 was n

," I said. "Wha

tment. You have had five new men on your books for the past few weeks, and som

t up from San Francisco by the firm of accountants recommended to us by the Americ

all of the big blocks of Sullivan stocks owned in the camps of Tonopah and Manhattan. Before our denials could reach the s

er Mining Record in Goldfield. As its agent I had secured advertising contracts for it which netted my agency in the neighborhood of $10,000 a year in commissions. The owners of the newspaper conceived the idea that I was making too much money on a commission basis and sent Wing B. Allen, formerly of Salt Lake, to the scene to take my place.

ver to the Grand Jury. At the hearing before Judge Bell the Sullivan Trust Company submitted evidence that Mr. Allen had threatened, if we did not give his paper a slice of the promotion adverti

eed with the attack, because neither Mr. Sullivan nor myself gave indication of yielding. At the hearing, under oath and in a crowded courtroom, I openly denounced Mr. Allen and his newspaper a

would not have compromised. The stuff printed by the Denver Mining Record, which has been rehashed by every blackmailer who ever attempted to levy on me, was about two-tenths true and eight-tenths false. It was a literal copy of an anonymous publication put out by a set of blackmailers who had tried to circulate it years before in New York when I was head of the Maxim & Gay Company. I had spent thousands of dollars to run down t

INENT PER

roceedings, and in a Reno evening paper which is controlled by Senator Nixon, who owns a large slice of the paper's mortgage. It has also appeared in other

f I should undertake to tabulate the cases where men and interests, ranging from impecunious newspaper reporters to financial-newspaper publishers and mining-stock brokers and market operators who, from the background, p

al career has been that I had a youthful Past-a Past which during the last decade has never been taken into serious consideration by men who ha

r, but have never taken any. I have been honest. Were I really dishonest, I could have prevented every publication of an attack of consequence on me by lending myself in advance to the base purposes of my traducers, and I would have millions now for having compromised with them.

t the Denver Mining Record was getting ready for another attack and that tens of thousands of copies of that newspaper were to be circulated. But you can't stop a rumor by the declaration of the truth, and the Sullivan Trust

leared through the Wingfield-Nixon bank. It was reported to me that Senator Nixon was openly discussing the enormous volume of stocks coming in on us and was questioning our ability to stem the tide. As a strategic measure, the Sullivan Trust Company decided to "cross" sales on the San Francisco Stock Exchange so that it might ship out o

WHEN MO

e Bank & Trust Company telegraphed them formally that it would honor our paper to the extent of $20,000 or $30,000 in every case. To protect the bank and in order to be able to borrow a large sum of money, should we need it in the event of another selling move

e money, but I realized the desirability of assembling cash in an exigency such as that. Nor was this an unusual proceeding. There was a time during the Manhattan boom when the overdraft of the Sullivan T

he Sullivan Trust Company showed a big profit to stockholders. I considered the greatest asset of the trust company to be, not its money, but its prestige, and I entertained big ideas as to a future I had mapped out for the corporation. I did not suspect that an organized campaign wa

how the trust company a big profit, as they had. We could have cleaned up $3,000,000 in cash, but we had not done so. Now, within a month, all of our available cash had been put into fresh lines of our own securities, we had been compelled to sell other lines out, and the corpora

down the truth, that a lie can't live, and that justice will be finally done. Had I always put the accent on the "finally" and mixed with my philosop

dangerous thing" and that this "little knowledge" leads astray this particular kind of sucker. In "falling" in Goldfield for the philosophy that "justice is always triumphant in the end," by swallowing it whole, and in making no allowance for the fact

wait only for a general turn in the market to relieve itself of money-pressure by disposing o

N THE WE

ion of the people of Goldfield that he was trying to precipitate trouble. The miners had asked for higher wages. The Sullivan Trust Company, which was operating seven properties with a monthly pay-roll of $50,000, was t

on every side that Wingfield and Nixon were dumping overboard big blocks of stock. Could it be

Company was called upon t

evealed the fact that all Goldfield and Tonopah banks were overloaded. This condition had been brought about by the liberal terms which had been granted by the Wingfield-Nixon banks during the "ballooning" of Goldfield Consolidated, when t

itical machine, I now suspected was part of a general scheme to get hold of anything and everything that was valuable in the camp. By smashing the Sullivan Trust Company they could hurt the Democratic party of the State, with which we were affiliated, and for which it was currently believed we were supplying the sinews of war

all of the banks. John S. Cook & Company were calling for more collateral from their customers, and real estate was being added to the pledges of mining securities. What more easy, even though diabolical, than to "bear" the market, shake out t

and Nixon, what transpired could not

s to "get him." He threatened another shut-down, a reduction of wages, the installation of change-roo

sty and did things with which the community was not in

e, arguing that the prices of stocks should be allowed to recede in sympathy with the labor troubles. No thought was his for the men of the camp who were committed to the long side of the market at b

e next day gloom would pervade the camp because of the unfavorable action by the union on the peace plans. Nightly conferences were held. It was impossible to get an accurate line on the situation. Crowds gathered about Miners' Union Hall, where the meet

The drift, however, was unmistakably downward.

a mining-camp boom of such proportions, and I failed to recognize that a reaction must ensue, whether it was forced by Wingfield and Nixon or not. Tens of thousands of shares of Sulliv

REDIT

-wire system from coast to coast at a cost of $300,000 per annum, and who have over 100 correspondents in nearly as many cities, all of high standing as stock brokers, made a tentative offer to the Sullivan Trust Company early in December to connect their wire system with our office in Goldfield and to giv

d at the time. He asked as to our finances. There was pres

Trust Company on its unindorsed paper and

llion or more," an

tly satisfie

00 and we claimed a capital and surplus of only $1,000,000 at the time the rating was given, it was believed in Goldfield that we were worth much

of the Sullivan Trust Company

pt intact our reduced cash balance. We figured that a fresh loan of $300,000, additional to the $300,000 already obtained from the State Bank & Trust Company, would enable us to take up all of our paper and to discontinue the "cross" trades. We promptly arranged for the loan, which Cashier Lindsey of the State Bank & Trust Company informed us would be immediately credited to our account whenever we r

back in the open market fully 50 per cent. of all the stocks promoted by the trust company. Distribution of the stocks of our early promotions had originally taken pl

E SULLIVAN T

ust company was secure, I made preparations to go. Before leaving I busied myself with the preparation of a dozen full-page reading-matter advertisements on Sullivan properties, which the Salt Lake Tribune and Salt Lake Herald had contracted to publish in their New Year's Day editions. These are an annual feature of those newspapers. I decided to "make" Salt Lake on my ret

d Mr. Grant, who had remained at the helm with Mr. Sullivan while I was away from Goldfield, about business. He assured me that the loan from the State Bank & Trust Company would not only be forthcoming, as needed,

t Lake correspondents, I was astounded to learn that rumors had been telegra

hy, Lindsey has given me his word, an

own' on us," I said,

must wire $150,000 to our credit in San Francisco, and you and I can jump on the train to-day and go to San Francisco and support the market r

gre

s that we gave and they accepted a big supporting order to be used on the San Francisco Stock E

State Bank & Trust Company had "laid down" on us. In the meantime despatches to us from the cashier

before New Year's. The next day was Sunday. Monday was New Year's Day, a legal holiday. Thus f

, was in Tonopah, where he was reported to be in imminent danger of arrest on the charge th

eople beca

d so was Mr. Sullivan. Employees were running the business. Cashier Lindsey concluded that we were "overboard." On top of it all, Donald Mackenzie, the heaviest depositor of the State Bank & Trust Company, had that very morning drawn out a larg

r beginning into a $3,000,000 trust company crumbled in a heap and le

GHT THAT CA

ost of these stocks in large blocks during the exciting boom days through brokers to speculators instead of disposing of them in small lots direct to investors; (4) my lack of knowle

ere selected with great care. They were very much higher in quality than the average. Those at Manhattan are yielding treasure to this very day, and may make good yet in a handsome way from a mining standpoint. Those at Fairview bid fair to duplicate the performance.

in buying back the Sullivan stocks at advanced figures over the promotion prices. I didn't know then, as I know now, that the accepted practice of the successful market operators is to go with the crowd-to help along an advance when the publ

ard to construct came as an overwhelming blow to the camp and marke

better for Goldfield and Nevada had Wingfield and Nixon possessed sufficient foresight to go to our rescue instead of facilitating our

hung in the balance, and had it not been for a quick transaction by which the United States Mint at San Francisco forwarded by express to Reno and Goldfield $500,00

ankers, and that only by virtue of Mr. Nixon's position as Chairman of the Committee on National Banks of the United States Senate was he able to get the Sub-Treasury in New York to instruct

he responsibility to me for the destruction of the great mining camp of

and Nixon succeeded in annexing the remnants of the Goldfield banking business, along with the control of nearly all of the Goldfield properties for which they had been seemingly gunning. Wingfield and Nixon are, in fact, to-day in control of the political as well as the banking and precious-metal mining industry of the State. They h

re $1,200,000. The assets, calculated at the low market price of the securities that was reached after the embarrassment was publicly announced, were still in excess of the liabilities. The creditors agr

of the value of the securities than we had, and he refused to sell any of them at the prices which then prevailed. He held on. During the bankers' panic of 1907 the State Bank & Trust Company failed for about $3,000,000. The Sullivan mines w

sment, the trust company would have paid dollar for dollar. Those of the public who did not sell their holdings in the Sullivan companies when we were supporting the market to the extent of more than $3,000,000, lost most of their investm

om the business during the life of the trust company was about $5,000, just sufficient to pay living expenses. My expenses to New York, where I went to have my head operated on-are you surprised?-were supplied by th

esert was a big fund of Experience. Believe me, I t