The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-04-05


cial world to be seen on the Fifth avenue of
ginning life as Staten Island boatman. laid the
broad, firm foundations of one of the most
colossal fortunes ever amassed by private citi-
zen in any age.
William H. Vanderbilt is the oldest of the
thirteen children of Cornelius Vanderbilt better
known as the Commodore" He was born in
New Brunswick, N. j., May s, 1921 He is con-
sequently. in his sixty-fourth year, though his
appearance would indicate that he was at least
ten years younger. He received only common
school education, and has frequently expressed
his regret that he was not in his youth allowed
better educational advantages When eighteen
years of age he became clerk in the financial
firm of Drew, Robinson & Co., and in his TWEEN
tieth year he was offered partnership in the
business.
City life, and especially the close application
to business, telling his health, he started
little later as farmer Staten Island, where
his father gave him farm of seventy five acres
He had in the meantime married Miss Nissan,
the daughter of New York clergyman, cul-
tured lady of many sterling traits of character.
Later when the Staten Island railroad became
embarrassed he and his uncle, Jacob Wander
bilt, extricated it from its difficulties. This was
his first experience in railroad affairs. He dis
played certain aptitude for business of that
sort, and, in 1864, he was elected vice president
of the New York & Harlem railroad, and soon
after he was chosen to fill the same office in the
New York Central & Hudson River road. When
his father died, in 1877, he inherited the bulk of
the Commodores immense property. Of the
nine children born to him eight are living
III.
In personal appearance he is tall, nearly six
feet in height of burly build, ruddy complexion,
with coarse, heavy features, gray eyes. sandy
side whiskers in the English style and yet only
slightly fringed with gray. He is somewhat bald;
the hair is rather inclined to curl. His roughly
chiseled upper lip is not concealed by mus
tache.
His appearance rathersuggests that of the typ
ical English capitalist, but his features are
without the stupid stolidity that not seldom dis
tinguishes the large putty faces Of his brother
millionaire across the water. His manners have
little or none of the solemn, fat-witted attenua-
ton of many of the moneyed Englishmen Still,
at times he comes altogether too near to that
sort of pomposity usually observable in compar-
atively illiterate men of great wealth, of what
ever nationality and then the less ingratiating
side of his character is disclosed.
1t is said that on one occasion he was riding
down town in a Fourth-avenue car and the con-
ductor not knowing him asked for his fare. The
unctuous- looking man slowly turned his weight
of $50 pounds and with an impressive nod of
the head uttered the word:
s'Vanderbiltr
The conductor retired abashed. 1t was doubt
less as stakeholder in the company that he
thought the mention of his name was enough.
though. Mr. Gould, for instance, would most
likely have paid and said nothing But Mr..
Vanderbilt seldom gives any such foolish exhi-
bition of his consciousness of a plethoric ex-
chequer.
He has not the resources in ready money of
Russell Sage, and sometimes will remark to a
friend, IF had five million dollars at hand /
would buy so and So naming some stock or
bond, and speaking of the matter. and such a
vast sum, as most persons would speak of few
hundred dollars. AS to Wall-street affairs he
sometimes processes complete Ignorance he has,
he says. retired from any active participation in
Wall street matters he is not even watching
the market. But such a statement is often
times quite as inexact, for example, as that of
a well-known political leader of Brooklyn,
who occasionally is kind enough to cheer
the public by the assurance that he has retired
from the dictatorship of Brooklyn politics. Mr.
Vanderbilts reputation for veracity on business
subjects, in other words, it is charged, leaves
much to be desired He has been subjected to
considerable censure on this account, and even
to downright abuse, with epithets which need
not be repeated. He has been accused of secretly
going ''short" of his own stocks though he spoke
well of them in public, and it is claimed that he
has met with considerable success at times in
mystifying investors and spectators. A keen OBJ
server of financial affairs who knows him well
in business way, in speaking of him recently,
sad "He is not always truthful about business
matters But then he can't be. No man can
succeed in Wall street and always speak the
truth People are constantly trying to pry into
his affairs. To misead them is often matter
of self defense"
This is Wall-street cynicism. 1t would, of
course. be more commendable for Mr.. Vanderbilt
to observe the strict silence, the immovable reti-
cence, in regard to his financial campaigns that
General Grant for example, would observe in a
military campaign. He lowers himself to the
| level of thimble rigger of the markets when he
adopts any other course. Putting the most le-
nient construction possible on some of his utter
| ances on financial matters, more particularly
| with reference to certain railroads, they have
| been sngularly calculated to create mistaken
| impressions. OF course, any business engage
| ments which he makes are carried ont faithful
| ly with the pron'ptness of thorough business
man.
| At times he exhibits an almost boyish enjoy
ment of his wealth and leisure. Some time after
he retired from the presidency of the New York
Central railroad he said, with laugh, to an ac-
qualntance, VINO met MIN walking down Futn
avenues Il am doing nothing now. l am loafng
l think l rather enjoy being loafer."
".
He is sensitive to newspaper criticism and not
insensible to public opinion He is in fact far
more sensitive to criticism in the public journals
than he himself would admit more SO than some
have supposed. He manifests no such bitter
hostility to newspaper men, it is true as Russell
Sage, for example, who, when he finds reporter
holf hale
growl, in the rural accent which he has never
wholly rid himself of: swell, how did you get
inr But Mr.. Vanderbilt, while not ordinarily so
brusque as the great jobber in puts and calls,
avoids journalists. especially those who are not
particularly well versed in railroad matters. He
has little respect for any who does not readi-
ly comprehend railroad inanciering in all its in
tricacies He Is even sometimes weak enough to