The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1899-07-17
IGNORANCE ABOUT OUR INDUS
TRY.

Minister Damon, in a recent inter-
view, which was published in the Star,
repeats and confirms a statement often
made that the business men of San
Francisco and the eastern cities know
little or nothing about our plantation
values, and of the prosperity of our
sugar industry Because of this ig
nOrance they are unwilling to invest
in our sugar securities. The result is
that our main industry stands on the
very narrow basis of local support.
The investing public on the Main
land does not, as a rule, place its
money ON the faith of newspaper re-
ports.
The majority of investments are
made through the personal and con-
fidential relation. A. will not invest
a dollar on the word of any journal,
because journals are notoriously in
accurate i'm statement, but he will
stake his money on what B., who is
his personal friend, tells him is a good
thing, or upon the statements Of a
banking house, because he has had
dealings with it and has confidence in
it's honesty.
The course of investments on the
Mainland has a curious and instructive
history 1t displays the effect of per-
sonal acquaintance in business.
For instance, forty years ago a few
Boston men We're induced to lend
money in the city of Chicago. 1t
proved to be profitable and safe. A
few investments were then made by
other Boston men in Chicago real
estate. These proved also to be pro-
fitable Gradually the Boston capital
ist became familiar with values in
Chicago, and the result of this gradual
process of education was that any per-
son living in Chicago, who desired the
loan of money to be secured on values
in that city, could obtain it at once in
Boston. But he could not obtain it in
New York where the reserved capital
is vastly greater than in Boston, be-
cause the New York capitalists and
bankers had little personal acquain-
tance with Chicago values. So 1T is
said that Chicago was built up on
Boston capital and the simple cause
of this fact was the personal knowl-
edge that the Boston men had of Chi
cago interests.
A young man living in one of the
mining states thirty years ago anu III
need of capital, solicited the business
men OF Providence, R. l., to invest in
his mining stocks, but he asked OF
each of these merchants subscription
of only $50 for ten shares Of the stock
of this company. These small sub
rriptions he readily obtained and in
a short time had two hundred sub
scribers to the stock. Having secured
this capital readily, he developed one
of his mines to a dividend paying
point and the honest dividends re-
mitted to the stockholders served to
educate them into "a belief that mining
did pay and that the manager OF this
mine could be implicitly trusted.
This shrewd manager continued for
several years to educate these men, by
small and honest dividends, to be-
lief that his mines were really good
investments. When he, therefore, APP
peared with projects involving several
millions of dollars, he found the money
was thrust upon him by hundreds of
people.
The great majority of the promoters
of schemes, however valuable they are,
fail i'm promoting, because they are ig-
norant of the true methods of obtain