Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1881-05-15
MILLIONAIRE MACKAV.
One Of the Wealthfest Men I'm the
World Who Once Worked for Sd a

One OF the Wealthfest Men I'm the
World Who Once Worked for SD a
Day.
[From the Washington capital.l
Here" said the speaker, as he stood
with friend near windlass by which
ore was hauled out of mine on the
Comstock here I used to stand and
turn for So a day. Seth Cook was my
partner, and he was paid SO day. Seth
Cook is now large owner in the Stand
ard mine and one Of the rich men Of the
Pacific coast" The speaker was John
w. Mackay, the bonanza king, one of
the richest men in the world. He is a
slender, tallish, well-knit man Of AZ,
with clean, well-marked face, showing
decision and frankness. His hair and
mustache are brown, tinged with gray.
His eye is keen and penetrating, his skin
is ruddy, wholesome and vascular,
tanned with Nevada sunshine and
steamed in the Turkish bath tempera-
ture OF the lower level of the Comstock
lode. What impresses one about the
man is that there is nothing wasted in
him he is all muscle and nerve, and
shows temperate and careful habits.
When he walks it is with the sure, agile
tread Of the leopard or the lynx-like
one who might spring at any moment.
There is joyous element in the man,
which would be winning were its owner
only cab-driver instead of the master
Of millions. He speaks with half
stammer. which at first impresses one as
being the slowness Of a man who DELHI
crates while hespeaks. This is the bonan-
"a king as he stands at your side, look
ing out over the brown Nevada hills.
The miners come UP and speak to him
and call him John, and there is between
them sense Of command, blended with
comradeship, which appears odd to
metropolitan eyes.
Forty-seyen years ago, or thereabouts,
John W. Mackay was born in Dublin.
He came to New York in his youth, and
gamboled around the City Hall Park in
its pastoral days, end was not unhappy
when a blase theater- goer gave him q
check for the Park Theater. Among
other sights, he used to look with won
der upon a famous man striding up Mas
sau street from the old postofice with a
bundle Of newspapers under his arm.
This was James Gordon Bennett, then a
curiosity even to boys, and the work
which he was doing was building up the
/ New York Herald. California came in
/ enticing golden spiendor out of the
/ sluices Of Swiss Suffers mill, and young
( Mackay went with all the world to Ell
dorado. About this time there went two
I others on the same errand. One was an
Irishman named O'Brien-'.s Billy y
O'Brien, as all California came to call
him. Billy had partner-a strong
headed, resolute New York lad, who
cane from the Broderick section of New
York, and had in him all that immense
capacity of doing and daring which gave
Broderick national fame. Billy's part
ner is now known as j ames G. Flood, of
the "Flood 6 O'Brien firm" whose phe-
nomenal success was to make all the
world wonder.
Mackay went his way, as everybody
did in those feverish days. He lived in
mining camps, he slept on the ground,
he picked and scratched and washed the
gravel in running streams he had his
ups and downs; he had ali that was
gay, all that was golden in Eldorado
life, and then he came with his pick and
his blanket to the Nevada mountains.
In the meantime Billy O'Brien and his
partner had tired Of the sage-brush
Giving up mining, they went to San
Francisco and into business. The young
Irishman made their acquaintance. He
had found some good prospects and they
had some money. A hard-headed,
smooth, discreet engineer became known
to them, by name Fair, He was a man I,
to be considered, and the resultwas that
four -Mackay, Flood, O'Brien and
Fair-made that business compact
known as the Bonanza firm, which is
now a ruling power in our Pacific en-
pire. In the firm Mackay owns two
tifths, and, as the head Of the Bonanza
firm, is known as the Bonanza king.