Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1890-05-16
THE HOLMES SYNDICATE.
Yesterdays Inspection of Tri-City
Lines.
A Trip Over the Milan Line--.Ideas Of
Director walker MS to Motive Pow

| DIRECTOR walker ms TO MOTIVE row
/ er.
After their tour of inspection of the
various lines of their own system last
evening, President Holmes and Directors
Walker. Mitchell and Buckingham. of the
Chicago street railway syndicate. at Supt
Schniteer's suggestion, took trip over
the Rock Island s. Milan road to the
watch tower and the Milan terminus
President Hass, of the Citizens Improve
ment association, and an ARGUS repre-.
sentative accompanied the party. While
| waiting. at the corner of Seventeenth
street and Second avenue for the car,
Mayor McConochie and number of al
dermen and other representative citizens
were introduced by the officials. and sevs
eral minutes of pleasant conversation in
sued. Mr.. Holmes also examined the ar.
teslsn well on Mitchell s. Lynde's prem
ises and took much interest in the pro-
cess of drilling, which proved to be of
the nature of revelation to him.
On tie trip to the tower the reporter
had pleasant informal interview with
Mr.. W. B. Walker. who is one OF the di>
rectors as we'll as one of the heaviest
stockholders in the syndicate He ex-
pressed great satisfaction with the syndi-
Gates tii-city plant and its prospects as a
financial venture. I'VE are not deriving
any revenue from it yet, he said. "The
returns are all on the other side of the
scale. We are constantly at an expense
such, however. as we expected in pur>
chasing the lines hereabouts for in truth
we got nothing but the franchises
we hope to have everything completed
within the present year. Our output here
so far has been close to $500, 900. and we
are not through vet. but we feel confident
that the future will bring good and sat-
isfactory return. We ere very much
pleased with your cities here. Rock Island
is an especially promising place. have
noticed that most of your buildings in the
business part of town are of brick. l
have observed too, the Improvements that
are being made here on your streets and
your park up on Second avenue. These
are things that express the stranger in a
city at first glance. They give him a
favorable idea of the city at once, and he
has confidence in it from the first
think Rock Island has most encourag-
ing future indeed and you can be assured
that it is to our interests that it should
be So
Returning to the subject of the com
pany's system here. the reporter inquired
as to the Investigations of the syndicate
as to power, on which Mr.. Holmes had
briefly expressed himself in the afternoon
1--WE realize" replied Mr. Walker,
that the last day for horses for street
cars is soon to be reached, and we
are equally satisfied that the future
power for lines such as we have here, has
not yet been fully developed, though we
steam motors which we are constantly
working on. In a city like Chicago the Ca
BILE is the motive power, but it is too ex
pensive for smaller places"
How about electricity" inquired the
reporter
"E leCtricity is not in my opinion
success. That is not yet. It's
possibilities have yet to be re-
vesled The overhead wire sys>
TEN, which is the most popular and the
only economical way of using it. is in my
opinion far from perfection, while the
storage battery has not reached that stage
of advancement to warrant its adoption
as an economical substitute for horses
These are the reasons why we have done
nothing yet as to power. We don't want
to adopt anything until We are satisfied
that il u permanent. But we are going
to make a change as soon as we can de-
termine the nature of the power aud are
putting down the best quality Of iron we
can get-52 pound rail with that end in
view. As far as we go we propose to
have everything firstclass. and | think
your observing citizens will bear US out
in that sssertion.
On reaching the tower MIR. Holmes
and his associates were struck with the
beauty of the scene, which they unhesi'
tatingly pronounced the most lovely they
had ever seen. They also seemed to be
surprised that the Milan road had proved
an Improbable investment. As to their
views of the propriety of making prop-
osition for the purchase of the line, how
ever, they were non committal. This
much they did say; that the roads sole
value lay in its approach to the tower. and
that the motive power, car equipment and
road bed would all have to be entirely re-
placed if any money was to be made out
of it.
The directors afterwaTd visited Milan
and returned to Rock Island at o'clock
They returned to Rock Island after re-
| ception at the rooms of the Davenport
| Business Mems association last evening.
| Briefly stated, the views of the Chicago
capitalists seems to he that the Milan
road ru ming az it does TO the tower,
could he made source of profit, while as
to the nature of power on all the lines,
the belief is tina! the overhead wire cleo
trio system might be adopted if nothing
| better could be secured.