New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1900-05-10
SLIPPERY AS IT'S ICE.
TRUST REFUSES TO BE BOUND BY A
WRITTEN CONTRACT.

1T WAS MADE BY A COMPANY WHICH THE
TRUST ABSORBED AND IT CALLED
FOR ICE AT 81 50 A TON.
A few people have criticised The Tribune's
statement that the Ice Trust has adopted the
methods OF the highwayman and is holding UP
the citizens Of New-York with e your-money-or-
your-life kind OF truculency and bravado These
few have expressed surprise that paper which
weighs its words SO carefully and is averse
10 anything like sensationalism should make
comparison extreme. But II these critics
could have heard what Broadway hotel pro-
prietor told a Tribune reporter yesterday, and
could have seen the documentary testimony
which he produced to substantiate his state
naents they might have concluded that high
wayman" was a somewhat mild expression to
apply TO the Ice Trust. after all
This Broadway botelkeeper. who dare not
allow his name to be published for fear the Ice
Trust would destroy his business by refusing
TO sell him fee at any price showed the writer
yesterday written contract whereby the West
Side Hygeia Ice Company, Of No. OLA West
Nineteenth-st agreed TO furnish ice TO his hotel
for II cents a hundred pounds. or 81 so a ton,
from the date of the contract, January s, 1900,
TO December 81 1900. The contract is signed
for the ice company by John Turl, vice-presi
dent. Relying upon this reasonable contract,
the hotel proprietor decided not to install
artificial ice plant in his hotel he had been
advised to do. Not long afterward he heard
rumors that the Hygeia company was about to
be absorbed by the Trust. but thinking that
a trust would be guided in its dealings by
common honesty. he did not let the rumors dis
turb him. His ice being delivered regu-
larry. and he paying for it IA cents hun
dred.
About the middle Of March he informed
by the Hygeia company that 1t had been alb
sorbed by the American Ice Company (the
Trust). which would continue delivering ice
according TO the terms of the contract. The
Trust did deliver ice TO the hotel at 81 SO a ton
until April 1, when of its bullying agents
called on the hotel steward and informed him
that thereafter the charge for ice would be So
a ton The steward produced the written
tract and asked If the Trust intended to re-
pudiate it, ITO hell with the contract" ex-
claimed the agent. Contracts don't go now.
VIII you pay So a ton, or will you go without
fee altogether The steward called the pro-
pTietor who when he heard the impudent de-
mand declared that he would bring suit to COM
pei the Trust to carry out the contract of the
company which It absorbed.
sue and be hanged to you!" exclaimed the
tnsolent agent. You can't get a decision be-
fore next winter anyway. and the very day you
start proceedings We will cut off your ice alto
gether, and where will you be them"
TYRANNY OVER A HOTEL MAN.
AZ can buy ice elsewhere" retorted the hotel
man
NO. you can't" responded the agent with a
triumphant chuckle. We've cornered the trade
in this city, and we've got all the ice piers,
No Independent company land ice the
piers of this city long our friends control
them. You've got pay So ton go with
out ice. We have Tammany Hall back Of US,
and what are you going TO do about it?"
The hotel proprietor that he help
less and that he was dealing with who
cared nothing about breaking solemn obliga-
ton, and realizing that he could not carry on
his hotel day without ice he consented to
pay s. ton, and preserves his written
contract as a memento Of the highwayman who
held him up. To q Tribune reporter he said
yesterday:
This is the most conscenceless. perhdous and
witnessed. What makes IT ell the more CALLING is
the fact that it is wholly without excuse, because
! know of my knowledge that ice can be
manufactured and sold at a profit at the rate OF
g % ton The reason know TINS SO Wen Is oe
as my New-York house, and in Boston to-day ] am
buying manufactured ice at 81 so ton from Moore
& Bros, who manufacture it in Roxbury, Mass.
But / you that the trust is killing the
goose that lays the golden eggs Just as soon as II
Squeezed ordered an ice plant for my hotel
here. but found, 10 my surprise, that all the ice
machine makers working overtime, and can
get plant installed until next winter. This
abnormal activity among the ice machine makers is
due the fact that hundreds of hotel proprietors
given similar orders, and will install ice plants
their premises soon as possible, as a protec-
ton against further extortion of this kind. In
years when the natural crop is large and prices
low they VIII buy from ice dealers, but If the
natural crop fails the supply is cornered they
will make their ice and sell the surplus. The
extortion of the also resulted in many big
apartment houses ordering ice plants. 1t will be
big advertisement for them when they can secure
tenants against outrageous prices for ice, and at
the time each one which does this will add
little to breaking the power Of the trust
ICE COMPANY SUED AS A TRUST.
NJ. S. Guiterman, Of the firm of Einstein &
Townsend, representing w. p Hearst at 10
o'clock yesterday morning, in the Manhattan
Hotel. served q petition on Attorney-General
John c. Davies asking him to take the neces-
sary steps to prohibit the American Ice Com
pany from doing business in this State, on the