Bisbee daily review., 1903-02-10

Tt can be truthfully said that Mexi- \ co owes most of her recent material progress to the building of railroads through her territory. Amercian cap . ital has followed the steel rail and so ] has other foreign capital, and native l capital as well. Nothing makes for the development of a country so much as railroads. Mexico and the United States are bound together, fguratively and literally, by bands of steel.
 : "Sinaloa leads the list of Mexican States in regard to the amount ot American capital invested in manu- featuring enterprises.
 Next in importance to the rail- roads, from the standpoint of Ameri- can capital invested is the mining | industry. Since the time of Cortez mining has been the principal source of Mexico's wealth The amount in ! vested by Americans in mining in ! ! Mexico may be stated in round figures | at $SO,OOOOOO.
 This is a comparatively small per Centage of the total amount of capital { invested in Mexican mining enterpris- l es. Yet a large amount of this ESQ., | 100000 is invested iu up-to-date min ing machinery, which is competently handled, and MeXicO's mineral wealth has been greatly increased by this American investment. Mines that ] were given up years ago, and mines that could not be worked at all on ac- } count Of the law grode of the ores, can l now be prCftably worked by the new l CT method, for which Mexico is most : ly indebted to Americans. The in | creased output of Mexican mines, as
 well as the opening up of new mining | districts, is largely due to Americans, : both through the improved mining l methods and through the development e of the country by railroads built by our s capital Thus, taken on the whole, s American capital is a stronger factor | in Mexico's principal industry than s the amount invested indicates on the l. surface. All of Mexico's large smelt- b CTS are operated by merican capital l. Tt is certain that many of the so- | called tropical agricultural companies $ have greatly exaggerated the amounts s of capital actually invested by them. g The first cost of virgin land in the s tropics of Mexico is very small-Say h 50 cents to S1 per acres as a liberal Is average Development work is ex- a. pensiye, and some of the older com F. panies have no doubt spent y considerable sums in improving their
 properties; but in a general way, the 'nontly payment companies have not | invested much in Mexico, however
 much the small investors may have | paid to the promoters for the privilege
 of holding stock in their companies The speculative bubble will be pick
 ed one of these days, and the small in l yestors in the United States, will have
 a lot of preLjily-engrayed shares O
 stock and some more or less valuable
 experience to show for the money the!
 have invested.
 Rubber culture in Mexico is a!
 yet iu the experimental stage Prom ises of dividends by companies wht
 propose to engage in tn rubber grow
 ing business are purely specu ativ' -I and theoretical. Other American
 agricul ural companies who propose
 to raise various tropical products ma! <. or may rot be successful. Some art 4 successful, but they are comparativel! < few.
 < Another erroneous idea, whicl + seems to be quite common amonl 7 Americans residing in the Unitet | States, is that Mexico is a good plac' < for persons of small means to com, < to. to engage in agricultural or othe ' pursuits. In most cases it is not" < Perhaps the greatest strides in Mex T ican development, by American cap < tai, are today being made in the Stat
 of Sinaloa. A railroad is under COT z struction from the Gulf of California < up the valley of the Fuerte River b. 7 way of Choix and Chihuahua to Kar z. sas City, Mo, and vast mining entel 4 prises are springing into existence al
 along the route. Americans are stei j. ping into all lines of business wher ' they find trade profitable. IL, how * ever, takes capital to start, even in 4 moderate way, at the present time a 7 the country is very difficult of access :. the transportation being almost excll < sively done on the backs of burro :. All this will quickly change when th + railroad is built up the Fuerte and th z s5,000030 mining operations of Choi < Consolidated Mining company T 4 spends to the advantages afforded