The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-06-18
CURB MEN OF new YORK
An Exchange Which Has No Home
and Will Not Have One.
The Anomalies of This Out-of-DOOr
for Headquarters Refused With
Quiet Contempt - scenes on the
Street When the Market Is Active.

NEW YORK, June l7.-The unlnStructe0
wanderer in Broad Street comes upon an
animated group of men opposite the Mills
Building, Just beyond the reach OF the
outstretched arm of Washington's statue,
which excited rural imaginations invest
with all the terrors of the Minotaur, the
Juggernaut, and other feroclous monsters.
And the uninstructed wanderer stops and
looks for the man with fit, or the drunk
and-disorderly who may have caused tins
gathering. But earnest search reveals no
such natural cause of commotion. Elk
cited enquiry will bring forth the infor-
nation that this is only the curb ex-
change, that mobilize body Of men with
out habitat or organization which yet per-
forms such a useful york in the system Of
finance.
They are cheerful and healthy-looking
passes more wholesome, outdoor life.
And like the sun dial they depend upon
the sun. In the morning they stand upon
one side Of the street, where its beams
may play upon them and give them COM
fort; in the afternoon they migrate to the
other side. Or II may be the beams be-
come too strong and shade Is what they
seek, when the process is reversed.
They are like unto sun dials with free
will-if that be imaginable; but unlike
the sun dial they work whether it be fair
or foul. Horas non numero nisi serenas
is no motto for them. True, when Ceras,
the goddess of the earth and the weather
thereof, or her modern deputy, the
weather clerk, is unkind they disappear
from the street. But though lost to sight
they are still very busy in the lobby and
on the staircase of the Mills Building.
Here they pursue their business, though
it block up the way and annoy the tenants
of the building and dissolve its owners
soul in wrath. 1t is said that Mr.. Mills
once offered the Curb Exchange members
room if only they would stay in it, but
they refused it with quiet contempt.
Gay ns Schoolboys.
From this it must not be inferred the
curb men are naughty and austere set.
On the contrary they conduct themselves
with the gayety and subtle humor Of the
schoolboy. Hardly a minute passes Cur
ing business hours that the rim Of the hat
of some broker is not gently depressed
Dtuinu, Win d idisib6 tAC ilout Va
the hat from his brow, and rolling it
finally in ignominy in the dirt-unless the
practical joker catches the hat as II falls
and restores 1t to the owner-or some
broker full Of the doings of Sullivan ard
Corbett. Fitzsimmons, Mccoy, and Nc
Govern, squares up to another and leads
off with his left, practices an uppercut or
half-arm jolt. encouraged by the immedi-
ate bystanders, oblivious for the moment
whether stocks go up or down.
The nerve-strain Of the business which
sends SO many of the regular brokers to
Bermuda for change or to sanitariums for
quiet appears less severe on these OPEN
air sons of the ticker. They look as
sturdy as motormen, bundled as they are
in their fur overcoats and listers. or
hardly facing the winter blasts without
outer garment Not that a man has less
need of his wits on the curb than in the
regular exchanges. On the contrary, one
has to be rather more wide-awake, since
the expression, sons Of the ticker" is
purely metaphorical
The curb market, while reported daily In
the newspapers is an impalpable kind OF
market with quotations-as the stories of
the ancients were-passed from mouth to
mouth, not recorded in any official man
ner At the end of the day among twenty
brokers giving the closing quotations, no
two, probably. would give identically the
same throughout the list.
The curb exchange, unimposing as 1t is.
plays its own part in the complex system
Of business. II is only few years old.
and constantly growing. In way--al-
though the analogy is false-it might be
called the kindergarten Of the older ex-
changes. From it not only do men grad
tnf be n1fvar uarfnrd
Many are called, but few get up" Here
is where the young iedgling stocks are
called, and while some of them get up into
The stock exchange, many never do.
Fortunes Made md Lost.
On the curb men have made fortunes
and have lost them; stocks have bounded
INTO a lusty youth, or have dwindled away
md died. Any stock is traded in-all are
welcome. AS to men, there are no rules,
and consequently none to keep out any
nan that wants to trade there. Anyone
nay walk among them. In the other ex-
changes common mortals may only look
1t the members from a gallery, something
as the Romans used to look at the beasts
n the Coliseum, to be sure. but distinctly
ledged off.
The curb exchange appears more demo-
he curb is close corporation OF unwrit-
ten membership-like society-and thus
even more difficult of entrance than where
bargain and sale enter into the question.
others declare that since money talks 1t
would cry as loudly and attract as much
attention in the hands of a rank outsider
rs in those of a habitue. Certainly the
voice of the dollar is not one that Wall
Street or Broad Street is in the habit OF
1isregarding.
The curb exchange has become of so
much importance that all the large COM |
mission houses have agents in it. The |
personnel of the exchange is curiously |
mixed. The majority of the members are
,oung, some of them very young. Others
ire grey haired. They seem curiosity |
unless body of men when business is |
lull They wander about in and out like |
water beetles on a quiet pond. Little |
,roups form, cohere for a few minutes, |
hen dissolve into the fluid mass.
Among she gossiping, laughing crowd a |
ew will always be plaintively piping salt |
ommon" or brown SOAP" like birds twit-
ering in the underbrush. No one pays |
my attention to them. From the ears OF |
he brown soap man cotton streamed, as |
hough he feared the siren song of some
,ther broker, and had thus, Ulysses like,
ortied himself against any other note
han his own: all he solicited in response
o his cry was an occasional below of
cast iron pipe"
When the Market Is Active.
But let the current of trade start up,
md like iron filings in an electric field
hey instantly arrange and rearrange
notebook in hand, voice at the
rass band power, and right hand gesticu-
ating wildly. II Southern planter were
o come upon them at some of these times
lie would jump at the conclusion that a
ynching bee of more than usual intensity
{ passion was in progress. And doubtless