El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1900-12-20
WHAT ONE CHAMBER
of COMMERCE DID.
It is Only Year Old, but its Record of Good
Work Accomplished Makes Suggestive
Reading for Some of Our People.
From the Albany Argus.


Reports of the officers and nine
committees of the chamber of COM
merce, presented at the annual meet
ing in the common council chamber
last night, showed that the organiza-
ton has accomplished a great work
for Albany during the first year Of
it's existence.
Committee on Trade Promotion.
Some of the most tangible results
achieved by the organization were
shown by the following report OF the
committee on manufacturers and pro-
motion of trade:
They have had fifteen meetings
during the year and at every meeting
all the members were present, except
in two or three cases. where some OF
them were out of town or too ill to be
present Very early in the history of
our work we came to two conclusions:
First, that as the world was not made
in a day, SO a movement of this kind
could not show great results at once,
no matter what efforts were put forth.
We are satisfied that the only way to
help Albany in this direction is by "a
long pull, a strong pull and a pull all
together" We have through our eff
cient secretary corresponded with more
than 600 different firms with the view
of getting them to locate in Albany.
While the immediate results have not
ben great. at the same time it has adj
vertised Albany in a way that we feel
it was never advertised before, and a
good many firms who are not ready to
move their works are now looking to-
ward Albany, and the seed which is
being sown now may be gathered at
some time in the future. So far as i'm
mediate and tangible results are con-
cerned, we should say that one out-of-
town concern has located in Albany.
This is piano factory, employing now
about 40 hands, and these will be in
creased to not less than $50 in the near
future. We are very strongly in hopes
that two more concerns may decide to
locate here in the near future. one of
them being a large one and employing
thousands of hands.
AT the beginning of our career as a
committee we were told that the people
of Albany were conservative and that
the wealthy people here especially
would not be willing to engage in a
work of this kind in such a way as to
build up Albany as other cities have
been built up. The committee decided
very early, without any reference to
this claim. and after investigating a
number of firms who spoke of coming
here, that it would not be wise for the
committee or for the chamber of COM
merce either to financially help con-
Germ which wanted to locate here or to
contribute in the way of buildings, land
or money unless we were absolutely
our city. We therefore have really only
very few propositions of that kind, and
after a thorough investigation of all
these cases, it has really simmered
down to only one; and in connection
with that one we wish to state as to
the position of men of influence and
means in this city: We were told re-
peatedly. after it was found that there |
was a possibility to get this firm to 10
cate here, by our leading financiers of |
Albany, that if it could be located |
here on the terms which we under |
stood would be sufficient in case the de |
cision was made to locate in Albany, |
there would be absolutely no trouble |
in raising the funds for land, etc. We |
think the people of Albany are ready |
and anxious to do everything they can
to advance its interests. This has been |
shown a number of times and in
of ways, but, as stated early
must necessarily move slowly, and. as
shown by this report, we cannot re-
port a great amount of definite results
of our work during the past year, yet
We are very much encouraged and be-
lieve that continued work along the
same line will certainly result in great
good to the city of Albany. One trouble
we have found in the locating of small
here is that there are
few up-to-date manu-
featuring buildings in the city of AL
bany. We believe that it would be a
good paying investment for any citizen
TO erect one or more such buildings
hose which would accommodate small
manufacturers-and if a stock COM
any could be formed to put up build
ing something similar to the one which
we had plans made for last winter, we
think there is no doubt but that it