News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1890-01-23
RICH BLOODS OF FRISCO
Condition of the Bonanza Heirs and
Their Follies.
Only Few Of tae Young Men of San Fran
cisco Who Inherited Millions of Value
Either to themselves or to the World

What Is going to be the future of
San Francisco is problem that few
care to discuss lest further unwelcome
intelligence be the outcome, says a
correspondent writing from that city.
San Francisco has lost most of her
wholesale trade. That vast commerce
which used to come around Cape Horn
and across the Isthmus of Panama and
had the splendid city of the Golden
Gate as its distributing point has ceased
to exist. San Francisco no longer sup
plies the other cites of the coast. All
are independent of her. Oregon,
Washington and northern Idaho, which
once depended upon the wholesale
merchants of San Francisco, long ago
transferred their trade to st. Paul and
Chicago. Los Angeles, Arizona, all
that southern portion of the western
slope, draw their supplies directly
from st. Louis and Kansas City. The
wholesale trade of San Francisco is
gone, and no better proof of it can be
found than the fact that most of the
wholesale houses here are going out of
business, voluntarily or involuntarily.
One discouraging feature is that so
much of the brain and wealth of Cali
fornia-the sons of pioneers who once
made the state famous-are seeking
homes and opportunities elsewhere.
There is nothing to tempt the rich
young men of this decade to business
enterprise of any kind. Most of those
who have inherited the wealth of their
fathers are either idle dawdlers or
wasteful spendthrifts. Some are lack
ing in either mental or pysical capaci-
ty to perpetuate the usefulness or fame
of their sires. Scores of young men
who have inherited the wealth of bo-
nanZa days have left the state for 9TH
er fields-some for Europe, others for
New York-all with intent never to
return to the land in which their faith
ers toiled for their wealth and their
children's independence. In this way
millions have been carried away from
California, which in justice should
have remained here to assist in the
states development and prosperity.
The young men who remain are not
all of benefit to the community. With
the single exception of the Croclzer
family, the younger members of which
are now in full possession of their
fathers, immenee fortune, there is
scarcely millionaire's son who has
shown any business ability, public en-
terprise, or any other tendancy than
selfish enjoyment of suddenly acquired
riches. There are a dozen more of
these young Croesi in San Francisco,
and the city would be better off if
there were none. An exception might
be made in the cases of Colonel Mer-
vyn Donahue, who as the heir to his
father. Peter Donahue, came into a
piece of railway property worth sew
eral millions. The colonel has shown
in such shape that it is available for
sale to some eastern company who may
want terminal facilities in San Fran
cisco, but further than that his genius
has not wandered. The colonel like
many of the other young miIlionaires,
wants to sell out and take up his abode
in New York, where indeed he now
spends most of his time.
By reason of their vast railway and |
real estate interests the Crocker boys |
are probably anchored to the coast
They are worth from $1,000, 900 to !
$40, 000, 900 each, and it may in truth |
be said they are pretty good boys.
The three Crocker boys have been
happily free from scandals-their
names have never been associated with
any but reputable women, which is SO
unusual in California that it is worthy
of remark. Rich young men here,care
little for the proprieties in their rela-
tons with the other sex. They seem, as
a rule, to have no respect for mothers
and sisters. They will set up siren
in a gilded cage right in the shadow
of the parental roof, and think they
are doing something manly and cred
liable.