Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1902-11-26
DROP TIE MERGER DEA
Chicago Packers Give Up the
Scheme to Combine Pack
ing Concerns
INDEFINITELY POSTPONED
Tight Money and Uncertain Condition
of Affairs Together With Various
Discourage the Gigantic Enterprise
Packing House Employees Caught.


Chicago's beef packing firms has beel
indefinitely postponed. This is not ru
NOR: 1t is an authoritatively confirmed
fact Stock ''tickers" in La Sale stree
offices gave cut the following informa
ton yesterday:
'The beef combine has been dropped
indefinitely"
The message was shown to the heat
of one of the big packing houses 70
confirmation. He said
81 guess that Is about right"
Tight money, an uncertain condition
of affairs in Wall street, and an un
derwriting syndicate dubious of results
have all combined to cause the post
ponement.
There are other reasons. Chic
unofficial way from the white house
that the beef merger would certainly be
attacked by the government the mo.
ment it was launched.
Again, the public pulse has beer
"felt" and found to be in no condition tt
absorb the S200,00O,O00 common stock
largely of liquid character, which the
merger proposes to float.
Let Swift Stock Alone.
For the first time in weeks the trad
ing in Swift & Co. stock yesterday di-
unfinished in dullness to below the
"a, Of I'd ;cc,, hon
Up to noon less than 200 shares hae
changed hands, and the last hour was
dull The high, low, and closing prices
We're 1917, 1888, and 119A, respec-
lively.
This meant that the small spectators
the employees of Swift, Armour ane
Morris, are keeping away from the fire
They have all been burnt, some so SER
iously as to amount to real tragedies
since the stock began its swift down
ward course from $1.70. Now, wher
they have lost almost all they owned
they are, perforce, letting the stock
alone.
For some time it has been an open
secret that the three big packers have
been loading themselves up with prop
critics bought at high figures to be pu,
in the combine at still higher figures
II has been known that the indebted
ness incurred for promotive purposes
is already enormous. the total being
placed as high as $50,000,000.
One single loan of $4,000, 900 is known
to have been made the packers by the
Illinois Trust and Savings Bank.
But until yesterday no confirmation
of the reports that a serious hitch had
occurred in their plans could be ex-
tracted from any of the men at the
head of the deal. Repeatedly j. Ogden
denied the rumors, and COM
plaeently announced she had nothing
to say; not q thing" The same COM
prehensive declarations were made by
Gustavus F. Swift and Nelson Morris.
And repeatedly hints We're dropped that
the project had not been really halted
"a mere pause until money again gets
cheap and plentiful, as it will in week
the trouble"
Yesterday the packers had dropped
their deboniar manner They looked
serious.
This confidence, assumed or real, that
the promoters of the deal have hither-
TO shown in It's immediate success is di-
rectly responsible for the tragedies"
N the finances of the packing house
The latter have felt that the
of their lives to n\ake enor-
nous fortunes lay in buying Swift &
Co. stock on margins.
The supposed opportunity was not al
lowed to go begging. They bought the
stock with a vengeance, some of them
paying as high as $50 and 165. Getting
it on margins did not require much cap
ital, so they took over as much as they
could afford.