St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1904-01-16
OWNED BY TIE PEOPLE.
American Railways Divide Two
Thirds of Earnings with PeO-
PIE Directly Interested.

I'm one way and another the people Of
the United States own the railways of
the United States, and something like
1000 persons, through wages, interest
and dividends, divide two-thirds of their
gross earnings of 81 ,726, 1886, 267 Q90l-02)
among them, and the other third goes
for fuel, taxes, supplies and equipment. !"
This statement, says the Railway World.
Slason Thompson, head of one of the bu-
reaus of the General Managers associa-
ton. with headquarters in Chicago, was
led to make as result of replies to the
question: Are there 1000, 900 owners
of railway securities in the United
States?" received from 80 of the leading
railway companies of the country.
These roads represent 1O7 GAO miles out
of the 202,471 of single-track mileage in
the United States. They gave the total
number of stockholders on their books
as 49, 1897.
"This is pretty nearly equal to two
stockholders of every mile of railway, I"
says Mr.. Thompson. 'The ratio on the
illinois Central, as given by Stuyvesant
Fish, is little over two to one. On
some of the railroads the ratio rises to
three to one, and in two cases as high as
eight to one, while in one case the ratio
swung as far as one to six the other way.
Applying two to one as the ratio, approx
mated in the total. would give 400, 600
stockholders in round numbers for the
100000 miles of railway in the United
States as owning $6024, 201 .295 of cap
ital stock, as reported June 80, 1902.
Assuming that the Sc, 1O9, 1881 ,669 funded
debt is as widely distributed among
bondho1ders. the railway ownership
would appear to be held in something
like 100000 hands. But. large as these
figures are, and approaching the total OF
railway employees Il ,315), as they do,
they by no means represent the total OF
those interested in railway ownership.
The figures given ere for registered
stock, and, as the controller of one of
the largest systems wrote: 1t is very
proba BILE that the number of actual
stockholders is twice as great as the
number of registered stockholders
Then there is the holding of railway
stock by insurance companies, savings
banks and trust companies, extending
their ownership among thousands. And
what is true of these institutions as to
stocks. is also true as to railway bonds
only more So"
President Stuyvesant Fish, of the Illi-
nois Central railroad, at the recent an
nual meeting of that company, presented
statistics showing that one year ago the
company had total of 1928 stockhold-
ers, and among them we're $500 persons
who owned less than 100 shares each,
and who, combined, owned $13 ,152, 900 of
total capital stock issued amounting tc
sos OBS, 400. During the year the total
number of stockholders increased to
s,647, out of whom 6,72S owned collec-
lively $15.947,6 This shows that the
increase of 1919 in the total number of
came mainly from the
small investor.
1t is matter of considerable impor-
lance that the. people residing along the
lines Of great railway systems are be-
coming more and more financially in
terested in these companies. as evil
denced by the fact that 2,218 of the ILL
nois Central stockholders reside in the
IL states in which the company has lines
and 1924 are residents of the state of
Illinois, the home of the company.