The age-herald., 1901-11-10
CONSPICUOUS FIGURES IN ec4rEy COURT OF INQUIRY.
Borden and The Print Goods Trade.
From the New York Sun.

Just before the end of September, when for weeks there had been serious talk of an impending strike of the mill op- eratfves at Fall River, owing to belief that wages would have to be cut Mat thew c. D. Borden of this city announced an increase in the wages of his mill hands at Fall River to the extent of per cent The announcement was a surprise and a shock to the dry goods trade. a sur prise that any body should increase wages when the question of reducing them had been very generally considered and a shock because this action of Mir Bor- den's upset the calculations of his com petitors and left them wondering how they were to come out of the situation.
 Now, in less than one month after that first increase, MT. Borden had made tho announcement that, beginning on Novem- Der ?, there will be a further increase of per cent in the rate of wages paid in his mill If hls competit ors were sur prised in September they were still more astonished by his October action. They were not slow in finding motives for his course and although the motives are such as govern generally in business, the implications made in mentioning them were calculated to place MT. Bordens conduct in an unfavorable light. It is. however because his opponents talk louder. usually, than his friends. that more has been heard in adverse criticism than In praise of him.
 Mir. Borden has made his competit ors squirm before As they are many, while he Is but a single individual it might be supposed that sharp and radical move ments by him which so disturb them would come to be unfavorably regarded by many persons in the business world; and thls would undoubtedly be the case if MT. Borden's actions caused real upset in the business situation, but it is generally when the situation is already a disturbed one that MT. Borden adminis- ters his emergency treatment. He has done this now for several years and up to the present time, so outsiders say, events have justified his course not only in the increase of his profits but in a strengthening of the market, which his action has affected. 5
 A Remarkable. Man.
 Mr. Borden is a. remarkable man, and his history as a New York merchant has been an extraordinary one. Yet he says that what he has accomplished may be done by any one who knows the business. Men who know of him only as very rich man, say. when this aspect of the case is presented:
 "Oh, but with all his money he can do what to the rest of us Is impossible
 Which is quite true. Only MT. Bor- den made all his money by conducting his business along the lines which he per ceived to be those of large success.
 He's done 1t all right Dere,'' said an- otfer successful New York dry goods merchant vest erday. why, I remember when Matt Borden used to come around here with print cloths under his arm selilng. them."
 In few words this Is what he has done: He came here as a clerk he be- came a firm member; when his father died leaving the Fall River business in a state of failure and he disagreed with his brother as to business management he bought out his brother, reorganized the business and built it mp so that 1t is enc of the greatest plants Of it's kind in the world; he branched out established q mill of his own to feed his printing es- tablishment, equipped himself so that he can now make 50.000 pieces of cotton cloth week and print 75.0O0 pieces a week. em- blowing 5000 men to oo 1t; he prospered until he can now, single handed. effect his transactions in millions-$1 GOO at a single deal--and manipulate the market as no other single interest can. To ef- feet the reorganization of the Fall River business he ran into debt to the extent of the very utmost credit he could get: today he devotes two hours daily to his office, luncheon on bread and milk, and enjoys life on his luxurious yachts.
 A Man Talked About.
 This Is the sort of man with whom the dry goods men have to reckon, so it is not to be wondered at that they have things to say about him. There are said to be 25.O00 men employed in the Fall River Mills, so that he has less than one | eighth of them. The value of the mill plants up there is nearly $50,00O, 900, and all the other manufacturers are banded together in manufacturers associa- ton. But MT. Borden copes with them himself. He stirs them up 1t seems. whenever he wants to, but so far as is known they are not able to do anything to him.. At any rate if they do hit him little or nothing is heard about it, but when he hits them, as he has done just now by his 10 per. cent. advance in the wages of his employees, attention is called to what, is going on. His enemies con- 6emn him, his admirers smile compla- cciltly at another trick turned, and us- uallv are able to point out that while he has made a profit for himself he has also relieved the general situation if it has been bad one
 As 1t has been in previous instances, so in this one: Mir. Borden's friends say that had he not advanced wages in his mills last September. there would cer- tainly have been strike in Fall River, for the other manufacturers would have cut wages and the operatives would not have stood the cut. His action in rais- l,g the wages in his mills made it i'm possible for the other manufacturers to lower them in their mills. He had just