The Portland daily press., 1882-02-24
About Shipherd.

Jacob r. Shipherd, whom the Peruvian COM
pany scandal has brought into uneviable noto-
fiety. has a rather remarkable history. He is
45, and is a graduate of Oberlin college and d.
vinity school, where he was known as bright
and energetic youth, though a great castle
builder. After leaving the seminary he was
made western secretary Of the sanitary COM
mission, and plunged into the work with an
enthusiasm which resulted in great work,
though even then he was planning various en-
terprises. One of them now iourishes at Chi
cago in the religious paper, the Advance,
which would never have been started but for
him. At the same time he became pastor of the
Plymouth Congregational church at Chicago,
and was popni preacher. After the war he
became general secretary of the Freedmens
Union Aid commission, and did effective SER
vice while continuing his preaching. But he
began to weary of the duties of the pulpit and
was constantly planning financial schemes of
enormous magnitude, and in 1869 he left the
ministry and opened real estate and loan Of
Zee in Chicago with partner. But it was not
long before suit was brought against the firm
for some questionable transaction, and the
courts in deciding against them severely CEN
demned their conduct. Still Shipherd flour
ished and did so good a trade in eastern ex-
change town and county bonds that in 1870 he
started bank and the firm began as bankers
and brokers. Shipherd became trustee of one
of the corporations engaged in building up the
suburbs of Chicago, and negotiated the bonds,
bat the bubble burst, the bonds were cancelled,
and Snipherd was involved in some trouble
some litigation. Meanwhile the bank became
the sole property of Shpherd and drew to it
the savings of many laboring men and women,
while the banking firm proper thrived, and es-
t2blished at intervals branches at New York.
Boston, and Frankfort Germany, though all
the time careful business men mistrusted Ship
herd. One of his private schemes at this time
was the buying of $50 acres of land at Elm
hurst, Is miles from Chicago, and the laying
eut of streets and avenues, to form beautiful
town out to which Chicago was expected to
grow. For a time there was boom, and Ship
herd could have realized 100000 or $780, 900;
but he believed there was millions in it and
held on till the whole thing collapsed. A little
later, in 1872, he conceived another grand
scheme-the possession of all the railroads on
Long Island. He did secure the South Side
road, or contracted for it, and though the stock
was not all paid for, his banking business was
50 good that the road was turned over to him.
He organized company of powerful names,
but took the entire control himself, under the
name of managing director. Shipherd was in
his glory, but suddenly the panic of 1873 came
upon the country, the contracts for the stock of
thr railroad were not met, and it went back to
it's original owners the bank collapsed, and the
various branches were closed. Shipherd gave
certificates of indebtedness to his poor deposit
srs, but when they came due he could not be
found, and the Chicago papers were for a time
filled with denunciations of Shipherd. For a
time he disappeared; but in 1876 he again came
70 notice as a real estate broker in Chicago, and
claimed to be also settling up the old business.
The next year he appeared as a student in the
law school of the university of New York, and
In 1878 he was admitted to the bar, and opened
a law office in in New York, where he has
since remained-in quiet except for his Peru
viaR scheme begun last summer, and his claim
in October to be president of the Michigan
Northern railroad company, which has a char
ter but no road.