Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1895-07-03

region Will move Slowly edStWdFu dHu lidt
the storm in the northwest will advance
toward the great lakes. The rain area VIII
growing demands of the business. The
stock in this company was nearly all taken
in the District of Columbia.
Bell Company Licenses.
Right here it may be we'll to state that
the Bell Telephone Company (Which had
in the meantime been organized. and which
was inlustriously promoting the establish
ment of exchanges over the country and
representing that an exchange sufficient to
serve several hundred subscribers could
be established for $1,000 issued licenses TO
agents which extended seven years. The
two earliest agencies, however, were in
Detroit and Washington, and in these two
cities the license was made perpetual ex-
tending it to the term of the patents.
a Star reporter. fortified with these facts.
called today upon a gentleman we'll VerScd
in telephone matters since the formation OF
the present local telephone company. After
recitirg to him the foregoing statements
and being assured of their correctness, the
chapter to the present Tine and this re-
quest was acceded to.
Fell Company Makes Purchases.
when the Bell company realized that the
telephone system had gone far beyond its
most ardent expectations" he began, lit
wanted the Washington license back. In
the meanwhile the Maryland Telephone
Company had been established with a sew
en-year license, and this term had nearly
expired. The Bell company, therefore,
bought up a large portion of the stock of
the National Capital Telephone Company,
did the same thing with the Maryland
Telephone Company and merged the two
into one, under the style and title of the
Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Com
pany. To the holders of the securities of
the two companies the Bell Telephone
Company paid the market value of the
stock, and when it put out the new stock.
it made it largely in excess of the capital of
the two original companies combined.
Royalty on Telephones.
1.-The original rental charged for tele-
phones by the Bell company TO agencies in
various cities was fixed at So per year
for a set of Instruments he continued.
"Since then many of the patents upon
which they based this rental have eX-
pred. notably the patent on the Bell re-
ceiver. and consequently If the Bell COM
pany charges much royalty now as it
did then, the rates are not, l believe, alto
gether fair. Since the Bell Telephone Com
pany gained control OF the Chesapeake and
Potomac corporation the stock has de-
clined from par to 81 or GO, and an crgan-
ization composed of high-salaried officials
has grown into existence. There is d pres
ident at princely salary. board Of di-
whom are high-salared officials in the Bell
Telephone Company, and all this. taken
in connection with other expenditures, have
had the effect of reducing dividends. In
reply to structures upon the eNorbltant
rates charged telephone users III Washing
ION II has been the custom of the officials
of the local company to reclte the enorm-
Gus expense it is under for its apparatus
and plant 1t is said that the conduit sys-
TEN, whose use was imposed upon 1t 10y an
act of Congress. was merely III an expert
mental stage when the system was put
down, and that 100000 was virtually lost
in that manner. If such an amount was
expended and lost it was only another evil
dence of careless and eXtravagant business
| methods. for which telephone users should
not be held responsible
Switch Board Secrets.
Another thing that great stress is laid
upon in the matter of mechanical expense
is the central office switchboard" contin-
ued the gentleman. THE local company
had such a switch put in several years ago
at cost of $4,000, and more recently had
another placed in position at even greater
expense These switches, as well as large
| number of the cables and apparatus used In
the telephone systems in operation here
and elsewhere, are manufactured 10y the
Western Electric Company of Chicago, and
the Western Electric Company of Chicago
is owned by the Bell Telephone Company
of Boston. AS the Chesapeake and Poto-
mac Telephone Company is owned by the
same corporation it will be seen that in all
this extfavagant expenditure for switches
it merely takes the money out of one OF Its
pockets and puts it in The other. The fact
is that the Bell Telephone Company owns,
with few exceptions, all the local telephone
companies now doing business IN TINS coun-
| try, and the general tendency now is 1or
| the general consolidation OF all these com
panies There is at present movement on
| foot for the consolidation of the Chesa-
| peake and Potomac Telephone Company
| and the Pennsylvania company, which prac-
| tically exists now, but * is expected that
| 1t will be made more binding in short
while.
Careless About Dividends.
81 have heard men in position well
qualified to speak with definite knowledge
| on the subject state that the question of
| dividend on the stock Of The Chesapeake
and Potomac Telephone Company is mat
ter of very small iterest 10 the Bell COM
parry, because the local organization is re-
gardeI by the parent corporation as very
small portion of its great system, and 1t
does not make any difference to II whether
it pays per cent to it's stockholders or
four-tenths of l per cent, SO long as all the
money actually expended for the use Of
telephones outside of the few thousand
dollars paid out in salaries comes into the
Golfers of the Bell company anyhow, IN one
way or another.
Rates Throughout the Country.
There will be found considerable amount
of instruction in the paragraphs following.
| which give the rates charged by telephone
companies in various cities.
The figures quoted have been secured
from the mayors, or others in municipal
authority, In the several cities and towns
by some of the business men Of Washing
| ton who are vitality interested in the ques-
| ton and have been investigating It,
In this city business places on a metallic
circuit are charged s125. and on a ground
| circuit 500 per year. while residences pay
500 and $72 on the respective circuits.