St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1891-06-14
MODERN CITY BUILDING.
How One Town Came to be OIL
Puget Sound The Story of
Fairhaven's Birth and Growth
EntertaininglyT Told.

Fairhaven's Birth and Growth
Entertainingly Told.
speaking of the way some townsite
schemes are backed" said Charley
Reed, last night, "the great Northern's
western terminus, Falrhaven, is the
best example of a scheme i'll which big
money is judiciously put in sight of any
l have ever seen, and L have been fol-
lowing up the booms pretty well.
Charley Larrabee. for years a poor
miner at Butte, struck it rich one day
and made cleanup of about 81, 600, 600
by selling for that much cold cash and
some stock in the Boston Mining Com
pany besides. This stock pays him
dividends of about 100000 year. He
went down to Portland and made
good real estate deal, buying the old
Ben Holiday estate and some other
property and soon running his cash &C
count UP to about $5,000,000. Then he
and Nelson Bennett. the great Northern
Pacific railway contractor, got together
and it was found that Bennett had
million or more to put into
found a third man well known
in this city who could command about
as much money as the others put to-
gether. Thus the now famous Fairhaven
Land Company was OrgoniZed, as well
as three or four railroad companies, sew
eral steamship lines and number of
other good, solid, permanent enterprises.
But l am little fast. Before organizing
all these schemes they employed the
very best engineering talent Obtainable.
They spent whole year examining the
east coast of Puget sound north of
Seattle, as we'll as the country for a
hum ir.fn 4
The harbOrS were carefully sounded,
the mountain passes leading from the
East critically examined, the mining,
timber and other resources all looked
into by experienced men. The pool was
heavy enough financially to buy up any
location 1t Wanted-even an established
tOwnsite if it wished-for such men
always have plenty others behind them.
After all this information was gained
they one fine morning bought
few thousand acres Oh Belling
ham bay, surrounding what is now
known as Fairhaven. For their bust
ness center they wonted certain quar-
ter section, for which they paid ex-
actly 100000, and little later they
paid $1,000 per acre for nearly half a
section. Plenty of other alleged sites
for city are still going begging all
around Fairhaven at from S25 to 500 per
acre, but these men knew what they
were about. They then organized all
these other schemes. They built two
railroads, which the Great Northern has
since purchased, built big lumber mills,
opened great coal and iron mines, built
steamboats,, went into legitimate manu-
featuring enterprises, ETC., and soon got
around them lots of other bright, push
ing fellows. They must have put
100000 into the scheme. They are at
it yet, and have never floated dollars
worth of bonds. They pay as they go.
They sold several million dollars worth
of property last year as a natural result
of all this"
"But how are they coming out ?''
asked cautious listener.
''They have the best of their property
left. They are making but little effort
to sell during these close times, but they
20 right along developing new re-
sources. as well as enlarging old enter
prises. They insist that they have the
future great city of the Pacific coast,
and guess they are right. Booms may
come and booms may go, but they
won't bother about booms. They will
simply help Fairhaven on in a steady,
solid way. They not only have the
property, but they have the cash to
keep 1t improving in value, and believe
i'll using it freely"