The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-07-02
The Market-Street Railway
Company to Pierce to
the Ocean.
THE STORY OF A FRANCHISE
How a Gun Burst in the Trenches
Just Prior to the Last
Struggle.

cisco and San Mateo Railway Company
for an extension of their franchise out
Sunnyside avenue and to the ocean.
There has been nothing before this COM
mittee or the board for many, many days
that has developed anything like the con-
tention that this matter has. 1t was one
of the holdovers from the old board, which
had wrestled with the question in commit
tee, the committee reported it to the board,
the board back to the committee and, when
the tenure of their Office expired, it was
still there.
Then the new board took it up and sent
it to the committee and there, week after
week, the friends and enemies of Behrend
Joost and the San Mateo Railroad have
gathered and battled until this bit of fran
chlse has become as famous in the Councils
of the City and County as those old grades
on Battle Mountain.
Some very ugly things have been said in
the course of the repeated skirmishing,
and it has been matter of wonder to those
who have watched and listened to it from
a disinterested standpoint to note all the
bitterness of opposition that was developed
by the property-owners along the line who
might have been expected to favor it, be-
ing the people to be benefited.
through III Ill JOOSL mas kept al even
course, showing up regularly, and smiling
at every call of the case, supported by the
bland, unruffled tenacious eloquence of
Mullaney, his attorney, as well as the rep
resentatives of the receiver, all of whom
never grew weary in answering the most
excited and fire-eating attacks OF the oppo-
siton.
At the last meeting of the committee II.
M. Clement by way of argument against
Z h0 M mo q
Joost, offering him and the record which
he declared he had made for not keeping
obligations, as the best reason for not grant
ing him further fayors
Joost, in a speech Immediately follow
ing, kept to his text the benefit his road
would be to the people in the region
traversed-and completely ignored the per-
remark at the close that MIR. Clemant was
the paid attorney of the Market-street Rail
way Company; that he would have been
his (Joost's) attorney, perhaps, if he
(Joost1 had had money enough and had
thought fit to engage him,
Mr.. Clemant declared he was not the
attorney of the Market-street Railway Com
pany.
Some days ago a man who is friend of
Joost-so it is related-and who is also on
familiar terms with the Market-street Rail-
way people-the Southern Pacific Com
pany-desirous of learning just how the
wind was blowing in this matter, called
upon H. E. Huntington and said to him:
"lf you have any notion OF extending your
lines out that way pretty soon will get in
and oppose the Joost petition
Mr.. Huntington looked at the gentleman
with smiling urbanity and answered, "Oh,
don't bother about that. my. dear sir; we
are going to get that franchise"
This little story is run in by way of
parenthesis.
Just before the vote was taken in COM
mittee. that last day, Chris bunker, whom
Joost had confidently counted upon be-
cause of assurances in private converse
tons, left the room. Only four, therefore,
remained to vote. OF these Supervisors
Spreckels and Morgenstern voted in favor
and Hughes and Benjamin voted against
This left the matter tie. There could
be no report, for there was no majority.
Joost afterward expressed himself as very
much surprised at Hughes voting against
him, for, to use his own language: "At
the meeting preceding Hughes declared
himself emphatically in my favor, saying,
.Joost is all right, and then turning and
nudging me in the ribs he said, Send me
some printing'-he is in the printing bust
ness, you know. Well, haven't had any
printing to send him since then; but 1
shouldn't think that would cause him to
change completely round against me--for,
of course, / will send him some printing"
That was all matter of a few days ago.
Yesterday two petitions were presented
before the Board of Supervisors by the
Market-street Railway Company asking
for an extension of their franchise over ex-
actly these lines-Sunnyside avenue and
the ocean road to the ocean-for which
Joost and the San Mateo Railway Com
pany have been arguing and pleading for
these many months. They were supported
by petitions of property-owners.
Joost, with notion that something
might appear in the report OF the Street
Committee concerning the split on the
subject, was present yesterday, this time
REINFORCED by new lawyer, Van Duzen.
Mullaney had been discarded, not for lack
of appreciation of his ability and the mel
liffuous shading of his wonderful periods,
but because he was Democrat, and moth
ing more.
In the depths of his wonder at his own
poor progress and the constant casting
about for some reason for it--or rather in
an effort to grasp all the reasons-it had
occurred to Joost that perhaps Mulaney's
politics had something to do with it. So
he went and hired Republican-Van
Duzen-apd with HIM and his old line OF
supporters and opposite to them the
little army OF the opposition, all the we'll
known faces, sat throughout the entire
afternoons session.
1 But no reference was made to his petit
ton in the Street Committees report for
the reason stated, and no opportunity,
therefore, was given them to be heard
But when the petition of the Market
street Railway Company was read it
struck the Joost camp like the sudden
bursting of one of their big guns in their
own trenches. While it did not actually
create panic, they realized that the fight
which they thought was almost at an end
had only now begun. The petitions were
referred to the Street Committee.
A resolution providing for new official
map of the City and $4,000 to pay for it,
according to the desire expressed by petit
tions of many organizations of influential
citizens, was introduced by Supervisor
Hughes and was passed to print.
A resolution also permitting the Preside
and Ferries Railroad Company to abandon
their franchise on Greenwich street. be-
tween Baker and Steiner, was passed.
Durkee's resolution to organize and put
in active service two new engine COM
panies, to be known as Nos. q and 20, was
passed through the regular course
A new resolution increasing the police
force and the number of officers as pre-
viously published-this despite the fact
that Auditor Broderick did not provide for
the expense of the same in his estimate
was introduced by Benjamin, chairman of
the Health and Police Committee, and