The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1905-07-08


ness mind cannot master in a short
time, and nothing about "frenzied
finance" requiring either great mental
power or intuition to grasp. And the
khievery, thuggery and murder of it
can all be taken in in half the time it
takes the burglar and the pickpocket
to acquire mastery of their profess
Stons, and in much briefer period
put in to initiate successfully the ma
tons money. 1 pledge you my word
that 1 can hire from the newspapers,
law and banking offices of the country
per year each, whom in nine months
can educate to become hnanciers
equal in knowledge and capacity to
the so-called great financiers about
whom you read in your papers. True,
cannot show them how to become
thieves and thugs, but 1 can equip
them with an understanding of all the
devices used in the game of making
millions over night.
An Overnight Made Financier.
Take, for instance, John A. Mccall.
president of the New York Life, and
recognized in Wall street as a very
great fnancier. A few years ago this
wonderful person was an ordinary, hard
working insurance agent who knew no
more about the business of the nation,
of stocks or bonds and 'tfrenzied fin
ance" than one of my $1,000-a-year
clerks-as much, but no more. By those
pulls and hauls, slips and slides of city
politics with which you are all as fannil-
lar as I, John A. Mccall got into the in
surance department of New York state,
and presently there was an explosion in
the great New York Life Insurance
company, an explosion which was heard
round the world. This corporation had
been built up by one of the early gen.
Grafton of ''frenzied f1nanciers,' a man
who originated some of the methods of
working insurance graft which have
cir aIo DIT III
lions, were conducted on a limited scale
for he shared his swag with few-he
didn't make any "divvy" with the lead
erS of the Wall street grafterS, or, per-
hapS, he might have avoided the explo-
sion. There were examinations and in
vestigationS, and something the same
kind of scandal we are now having IN
the Equitable, and the windup was
that Pres Beers was fired and John A
Mccall, who had learned so many Sc
crets while in the insurance department
of the state of New York as to make
his services desirable to the Equitable,
was put into the reorganized New York
Life Insurance company as president
with a salary of $100, 900 per year and
the absolute control for all practical
purposes of its hundreds of millions of
assets and its scores of millions of sur
plus.
The next morning after John A. Nc
Calls election as president of the New
York Life Insurance company he was
one of the great American financiers,
for he had learned over night the I'M
masses cannot comprehend. And this
same John A. Mccall only a few years
ago an insurance agent at a email SAL
| airy, is one of Americas multimillion-
aires, for he has been able to save from
| the salary the policyholders pay him for
| the use of his great intelligence during
| the brief term of his presidency of the
| New York Life, a fortune of from $10,-
OOO.0 900 to $15,000,0O0.
| Ryan, King of Frenzied Finance.
You all know 1 hollered Thief so
loudly in my story ''Frenzied Finance"
that the officers and directors of the
Equitable Life Insurance. company got
alarmed, and two factions began grab
| bling for the control of the institution
so as to put the evidence of past rob-
closed in on them. They made such a
rumpus in their fighting that the au-
thorities were compelled to take cog
nizance of the scandal, and then in their
panic such a condition of rottenness was
| uncovered that something had to be
done to straighten out the muddle. 1t
was one of those sharp crises which even
| the System is sometimes unexpected
ly confronted with, and something had
to be done quickly to appeaSe you
American people whose $400, 900, 900 of
savings were involved. How did they
deal with this terrific situation-their
| bars all down, Wall street at a stand
| still the people of the country rising in
| their wrath? Did they go out and select
some man of unquestioned probity and
/ character to rehabilitate the devastated
institution? No, hurriedly they met at
night and next morning it was an
nounced to the world that the whole
| affair had been properly, fairly and
| SQuarely settled, and that the people
| need have no further fear for the safe
ty Of their surplus, for one Thomas F.
Ryan had purchased from the discredit-
ed Hyde five hundred and two shares
of the Equitable stock for two and a
half million dollars and that he would
see that no one else got away with the
hundreds of millions of your savings
which the great Equitable company
holds. You must know that these five
hundred and two shares for which Ryan
was willing to pay two and half mill
lion are only entitled, LEGALLY, to re-
ceive SO, 500 per annun. in dividends, and
are actually worth, a the outside, not
more than 100000 AS his representa-
tive, Mr.. Ryan appointed Mr.. Paul Nor
ton, the rebate-giving vice president of
the Atchison railroad, to manage the
corporation and to see to it that you
policv holders are given a square deal.
Who are these two men to whom you
are asked to trust the support of your
wives and children and mothers in case
of your death? Personally I know
neither of them, and in their individual
capacity I am told they are good fell
lows Mr.. Ryan, they say. is a generous
and whole-souled gentleman. who gives
back to the people in charity. just as
other good fellows do a mill on each of
the dollars he ia es from the people in
business. Mr.. Morton. I read the other
DAY, is a first-class man, and the man
who said it said he knew-and his say
so was good enough for me-for he is
one of dame fortunes pets. one of na-
lures pickings, the best man in the
country today-President Roosevelt
But about Ryan. You may have
. read what a certain Baltimore banker