Alpena weekly argus. [volume] (Alpena, Mich.) 1871-1893, 1891-10-21
A Bankrupt Trust.


brings to the surface number of
very significant hints of what has
been going on below the surface since
the Mckinley bill was introduced.
The american Wheel Company" as
it was called, was organized as trust
corporation in December. 1889. Its
purpose was to get ready for the Nc
Klnley bill and increase the prices on
all the wagon, carriage and other
wheels used in the country, as far as
it could control the market. 1t made
extensive preparations for complete
monopoly and entire control. Among
the minor corporations and plants
embraced in it and now listed in its
bill asking for a receiver were estab-
lishments at indianapolis, Fort Wayne
Terre Haute and st. Mary's, Ind. !;
Miamisburg, Sidney, Gallon, San
dusky and Ottawa, O.; Jackson and
Kalamazoo, Mich. Westchester, Pa,
and Syracuse and Shortsville, N. Y.
The plants at all these points are in
operation except at Westchester, Pa.
A large amount of property is also
owned in Huntington, Mount Vernon,
Osgood, Titusville, Auburn and SAL
mon. Ind. in Lansing, Mich. and
Van Vert and Scott, o.
Taking in these corporations, the
trust corporation prepared to realize
an immediate profit of a million or so
by floating watered stock.
The usual method in such cases is
to issue to the separate corporations
stock in the trust corporation double
or more than double their capital in
vested, and in addition to print ere
serve stock" to be sold to outside PRO
ducers." If it can find outside pro-
ducers enough the trust corporation
can realize very large sums in this
way from the sale of wind. The
Sugar Trust, the Lead Trust and all
others whose history is known have
operated on this principle-a principle
which, of course, charges the public
with responsibility for making good
annual dividends calculated on the
entire amount of the capitalization,
including wind and water.
But in the case of the American
Wheel Trust there was hitch, and it
is now explained that "the company
was unable to issue any part of its un-
used capital stock, on which it had de-
pended for funds"
In other words, it was unable to
find outside producers to pay cash for
its surplus of wind and water.
This is easily explainable in the
light of the history of the past two
years. The trust got whatever they
wanted in the way of increased taxes
against competition in the Mckinley
bill. Consequently they looked for
ward to 1891 as year of immense
profits. But they overreached them
selves.
1t is so we'll understood that they
had everything their own way in the
Reed Congress that the introduction
of the Mckinley bill caused immense
importations to anticipate its passage.
The American market was consequent
ly overloaded, and when, after the
passage of the bill, the trusts began
operations under it they found i'm
mense stocks of imported manufacture
es on hand to break their attempted
corners.
In addition to this our foreign trade
was violently dislocated by the pass
age of the bill, and all last year our
agricultural surplus of cotton, wheat,
corn and provisions could only move
abroad under the greatest difficulties.
All these causes combined to postpone
the triumph Of the trust. They had
overreached themselves least for
the present. The general increase in
the price of manufactured goods they
expected came with the Mckinley
bill, but in few months the weight
of foreign goods forced into this mark
ct in advance of the bill, and the
weight of our own surplus kept from
moving out by the bill, broke pieces,
60 that the market became altogether
unmanageable. The resultant string
ency made producers" on whom
watered stock of trust corporations
could be unloaded very scarce. The
Wheel Trust fails accordingly, and
but for the scarcity of breadstuffs in
Europe, which will result in moving
our wheat surplus in spite of the Nc
Kinley bill, a very considerable
number of the other trust corporations
might be expected to follow It into