The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-04-09
In Honeymoon Time.

(N EF ERAlL m1lllOnS among this
90 country's plain people read
last week every line of newspa-
per prattle they could lay eyes on in
mention of the Vanderbilt-Fa nup-
tfals. There was abundance of this ma
terial put into type-the sober-sided as
ISOLATED press wired the dazzling list of
gifts to every corner of the country
Not to speak of the lavish handling Of
the wedding by the New York journals
OF yellow turn of mind-it was a gor
geous opportunity for them, and they
let nothing escape that would furnish
a glowing picture or a gilded para
graph.
This marriage, on the brides side at
least was a sufficiently plebean affair
and certainly there is no harm in that
The scions in the house of Fair do
not run their lineage line very far back
before they come to the jumping-off
place. In Butte, in Anaconda and in a
dozen different mining camps the list Of
this mornings readers of the Standard
will include men who, pegging along
in Nevada's famous mining camp not
many years ago, had it frequently with
in their experience to pass. unnoticeh.
the little lassie engaged at play near
the modest home of her father-James
G. Fair. He was a man of powerful
physique, an energetic and daring man,
| and thus he was believed to be the
| right man for the place. when, in
| 1866 he was made superintendent of the
| Ophir mine, in Virginia City, the once
! famous camp and now tumble down
| town whose name was bestowed, at her
birth, on the bride in last Tuesdays
| Vanderbilt marriage ceremony.
| James Fair, known as a bonanza
| king" was born in Belfast. He was
| twelve years old when his parents mi
| grated to America; he was eighteen
when he Joined in the gold stampede to
| California;: he was twenty-nine when
| he followed the rush to Nevada 1t
| was not until 1872 that, at Virginia
1 City, the true bonanza became known
| to the world and. indeed, it was not
| until 1875 that the operators at Virginia
| City began to reap their harvest James
~
era of frantic speculation ensued. Fair
| was in it. Mining experts famed
| the excitement with their assurances
| that there Were hardly less than two
| thousand millions in sight in the b.
nanza properties. Shares went OF 500
| each, and the insiders in the operations
reaped fortunes. The mines actually
produced about s15oOOO, 900: shares fell,
| in 1878, to seven dollars. At one time
| James Fair was rated to be worth $780,
| 100000. He was president of the Nevada
bank; he had one term in the United
States senate. At the time of his death,
in 1894, he was engaged in a wheat
| deal that cost his estate millions
The story of James Fairs social life
is black one. Years after he became
rich he resolved to rid himself of his
wife. the mother of his legitimate chill
dren. He succeeded. An estimable
woman Mrs. Fair was, held in highest
respect from first to last by all who
knew her. She was always regarded as
UNNECESSARILY the superior of her hus-
band, and it was public opinion that
his conduct toward her was that Of
a despicable old brute First and last
the bride of last week warmly espousad
her mothers side in this family quarrel:
and it is the settlement of his estate
that has brought to public attention the
claims of adventuresses and a mass Of
gossip that helps to make James Fairs
memory a detestable thing