Fifty years in Wall Street
there are many also who even go so far as to call him “that little
red-headed cuss.” That was the most famous boom in the history of
Pacific Mail, notwithstanding Leonard Jerome’s previous brilliant ups
and downs in that former erratic property.
Leonard and Addison Jerome had a good time with Pacific Mail for a
while. They ran it up to high figures several times; but finally meeting
with the same experience that Stockwell did. The two Jeromes from being
among the wealthiest and most dazzling operators in the Street, were in
the end practically wiped out. Leonard Jerome, who was the father of
Lady Randolph Churchill, had nothing left to bequeath his daughter
except an equity in the house now occupied by The Manhattan Club on
Madison Avenue, which yields an income of about $15,000 a year, of which
Lady Churchill gets $10,000.
These are a few of the booms that have stirred up things in Wall Street
at one time or another, as did the Keene booms, of which there were
several, the Gould booms, and the Vanderbilt booms, all of which have
been referred to in previous chapters in this book.
The question of trusts or trade combinations has, in recent years,
excited a good deal of interest. One of the most interesting figures in
this connection is John D. Rockefeller, who will undoubtedly be regarded
by the future historian as a striking character in the business history
of the nineteenth century. And be it remembered that history now
concerns itself, not so much with the doings of governments; not so much
with the personalities of emperors, kings, presidents or even with
political parties, as with the life of the people themselves. This is
clearly shown by such historians as Lord Macaulay and John Bach
McMaster. And looking at history in this way, surely John D. Rockefeller
must be regarded as one of the most interesting types of the great
commercial powers of the day. He was a pioneer, a commercial Daniel
Boone, striking out into a new and untrodden field of enterprise, taking
great risks, undergoing grave financial perils of a novel kind and at
length winning a complete and lasting success—a success which has filled
business history with his achievements and the world with his fame. It
was a great stride from the little farmhouse in Tioga County, New York,
to the place which he fills to-day. Born in 1838 he is now in the prime
of life. Reared by strict, church-going people, his word is as good as
his bond; he is the soul of business integrity, and a striking example
of what thrift, enterprise and persistency will do for a young man who
starts out in life with apparently little or no chance of success. His
old schoolmaster, it seems, was the first to get the young man to look
into the refining of petroleum. Not so many years ago, they used sperm
oil, and it cost $1.50 a gallon. How to refine the thick, ill-smelling
oil found in the water courses of Pennsylvania was a problem. It was
black slime, and John D. Rockefeller, by hitting upon a method of
refining it and introducing it in the home throughout the world has made
a fortune that recalls the fable of Midas. Before he was twenty-one he
formed a partnership with a man named Hewitt and at first engaged in the
warehouse and produce business. Then came the great oil craze in
Pennsylvania. Poor farmers suddenly became rich; thousands flocked to
the oil fields. Young Rockefeller kept his head. Asked to make
investments in oil wells for Cleveland friends he dissuaded them from
the project on the ground that the thing was being overdone, and with
Samuel Andrews, who was familiar with the general processes of
distilling, engaged in the refining branch of the petroleum trade. The
firm subsequently became Rockefeller, Flagler & Andrews, which rapidly
expanded its field of operations, and in 1870 organized the Standard Oil
Company with a capital of $1,000,000. It started pipe lines to ship the
oil to the seaports. It made millions in by-products once considered
worthless. It established markets all over the known world, cheapened
its methods of production and outstripped all competitors. Little wonder
then, that its “extra” dividend in the year 1899 amounted to $23,000,000
over and above the regular dividends on the whole capital stock. Mr.
Rockefeller attributes his success to early training and perseverance.
That is, like other men who have stamped their individuality upon the
affairs of mankind, he is what is termed a causationist; in other words,
he believes that nothing is got for nothing; that effects proceed from
causes, and the cause of success he believes to be largely perseverance.
He believes that perseverance overcomes almost everything, even nature
itself, and in that opinion this practical business man is at one with
the philosophers of antiquity.
He and his associates in the Standard Oil Company are naturally a power
in the stock market. They are, of course, very large holders of railroad
stocks and bonds and at times their influence is as irresistible as the
laws of gravitation. John D. Rockefeller’s influence alone could be so,
as he is supposed to be the richest man in America and indeed the
richest man ever known in human history. His is believed to be the
greatest fortune ever accumulated by any man within his own lifetime.
That he feels the responsibilities of his great wealth is obvious from
his munificent gifts to educational and charitable institutions, to
churches and to a hundred other praiseworthy objects. His princely
donations to schools, colleges and universities rival those of that
other public-spirited citizen, Andrew Carnegie. They are equally strong
in their belief that the greatest charity lies in helping others to help
themselves.
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CHAPTER LXIII.
A GLIMPSE INTO THE FUTURE.
I believe that it would be difficult to set bounds to the possibilities
of American development. The inventive genius of the people, their
adaptability to all circumstances, their tenacity of purpose, their
wonderful energy, and the fabulous resources of the country all make it
certain that the United States will reach a degree of power and
prosperity hitherto unexampled in human history. Carlyle’s “French
Revolution,” has been strikingly described as “history read by flashes
of lightning,” and I am tempted to use the same language in describing
the commercial revolution which has taken place in this country during
the last few years. Great as it is, however, I think it merely a prelude
to what is to come. We are destined for one thing to have a great
Pacific trade. Fifty years ago, Humboldt said that the day would come
when the trade of the Pacific Ocean would be as great as that of the
Atlantic. And the increase within a year or two in this commerce augurs
well for the ultimate fulfillment of the great scientist’s prophecy. We
readily adapt ourselves to the requirements of foreign markets and that
is a very important point. Lord Charles Beresford bears testimony to
this fact. He says with truth that Americans find out what the foreign
markets want, then they supply it. The English say in effect, “We know
what you want better than you know yourselves.” The American sends the
Chinese thirty-inch-wide calico, which is what they want; the Englishman
sticks to twenty-seven inches, with the remark expressed or implied,
“Take it or leave it.” And the Chinese will leave it rather than take it
and the American manufacturer will be the gainer thereby. Minister Wu’s
recent remarks on the necessity of finding out just what the Chinese
want and then conforming to their wants, cannot be too carefully borne
in mind. Furthermore, we are ready to adopt the newest and most highly
perfected machinery regardless of cost. Mr. Carnegie, for instance, on a
single occasion discarded machinery which had cost him $2,000,000, and
replaced it with the latest which inventive genius could supply. The
London engineering journals, on the other hand, admit that the British
manufacturers will not change their machinery no matter how apparent it
may be that they are being distanced by their more progressive rivals in
this country. They reason that they have put just so much money into the
“plant” and must get just so much out of it before they will replace it.
This seems a good deal like the ostrich which thrusts its head into the
sand and refuses to look danger in the face. In the meantime the British
are left behind in the race and Glasgow merchants have to try the
puerile and utterly futile device of getting up a boycott against
American steel and iron products. Such a device, under the
circumstances, seems a good deal like the attempt of the celebrated Dame
Partington, as the famous English wit Sidney Smith describes it, to
sweep back the Atlantic Ocean. She trundled her mop vigorously and made
a gallant onslaught, but the Atlantic was aroused and it is needless to
say who was the victor. And the American iron trade’s invasion of
English markets must result in a victory, unless there is a radical
change in conditions, which no one can now foresee. We study the
markets; we take pains to ascertain their wants, and it is an axiom of
trade that a man or nation that supplies the demand, whatever it may
happen to be, gets the trade. This is a law as inexorable, as
unchangeable as the laws of the Medes and Persians.
We are now one of the five great world powers, financial and political,
with a population second to none except Russia. That is to say, we have
a population of 76,300,000, Germany has 55,000,000, Austro-Hungary
45,000,000, the United Kingdom 41,000,000, France 39,000,000, Italy
32,000,000, Spain 20,000,000, Russia 136,000,000, Japan, 45,000,000,
India 340,000,000, China 400,000,000. The Mongolian race is numerically
powerful, but in the long run can the yellow race stand up against the
white? I doubt it. Meantime the population in this western home of the
Caucasian race is steadily increasing. In 1800 the United States had a
population of only 5,308,483. It is now 76,304,799. Then we had sixteen
states. Now we have forty-five. Then our territory consisted of 909,050
square miles. It is now 3,846,595 square miles. We have practically a
new race made up of an amalgamation of all branches of the Caucasian
race, speaking the English tongue, which in my judgment is destined to
be the one tongue spoken in the world. It is a people determined to
uphold just and equitable principles of trade and to have sound money.
The amount now in circulation is $2,074,687,871, or an increase within
three years of $400,000,000. Russia has only 26,000 miles of railroad;
we have 190,000. In the last fifteen years we have made more progress in
the things which tend to increase practically the term of human life by
annihilating time and space and supplying necessities and comforts of
one kind or another than ever before in our history. We are told that
what does not happen in a year may happen in a minute. Similarly what
might not have happened in a thousand years under adverse conditions,
has happened in fifteen.
What of the future? In the language of Daniel Webster, “the past at
least is secure.” We see that the bank exchanges which in 1888 were
$48,750,886,813, have risen in 1900 to approximately $92,000,000,000.
During four years of a sound money Republican Administration, exchanges
in our clearing houses steadily increased from $48,750,886,813 in 1888,
to the magnificent total of $60,883,572,438 in 1892. But from 1892,
during four years of Democratic rule, our clearings fell from
$60,883,572,438 to $51,935,651,733 in 1896, running as low as
$45,000,000,000 in 1894. From 1896, during Mr. McKinley’s