The Birmingham age-herald., 1905-11-02
Was a Wealthy Man.

l Kansas City, November 1.-Charles J. Devlin. who died at Chicago last night,
 was before his failure in July last gen.
 erally credited with being one of the wealthiest men in Kansas. He was at | the head of twenty-six different com
 panies, coal mining enterprises and mer-
 cantile establishments in Kansas, Ms l souri. Illinois and other states. For many years he was one of the most active ousl-
 ness men in the southwest. His wealth
 consisted largely in coal mining proper l ties in southern Kansas, in the vicinity 1 of Marceline, Mo-, and in Illinois. AS the
 result of overwork MT. Devlin collapsed
 last summer. and while papers were De-
 ing drawn up at Kansas City to form | corporation intended to take over anu
 manage his vast enterprises the First Ma
 tional bank at Topeka. Kan, of which ne
 was the principal stockholder, failed ow-
 ing depositors over $1CO0,0O0, the state
 of Kansas over s500,O00. the city of Topeka $40. 900. and various banks and concerns several hundred thousand dollars addi- l tional. The bank was found to hold close
 to s1 100000 of Devlin paper, and its fall
 ure caused runs on several Topeka banks,
 and caused the failure of one Kansas
 City bank that held his paper. The failure of the First National bank or l Toneka nut a stop to the incorporation
 of Devlins properties and instead Dev- l lin went into bankruptcy. The report or
 the Devlin receivers made on October l5
 placed his liabilities at $5,63l,O0
 Rise Was Phenomenal.
 1 c. J. Devlin was born of Irish parentage
 In St. Louis 54 years ago. Until few
 months ago he was a powerful man physically and mentally. His rise Tn the
 financial world has been phenomenal. He l started in the coal business as a clerk l In a coal office, and soon became manager
 of one of the small coal companies in northern Illinois. In 1889 he was made
 manager of fuel properties of the Santa Fe railroad system with general control | of all the company's mines After the
 Santa Fe receivership ten years ago the railroad stopped mining and leased It's coal
 properties to MT. Devlln. He already 1 owned mines in Illinois and later bought others in Kansas and Missouri. He was a ] big operator at the time of the long strike | in 1897.
 l The miners and big coal companies had l a long battle over the question of recog-
 nition of the union, the United Mine Workers of America. The men wanted a | small advance In pay Ine other DIE oper-
 ators refused it. The worst trouble was 1 in the southeastern Kansas field Devlin l sat around with the miners, talked things over and then with some other operators made a contract with the mineworkers | While the Kansas and Texas company
 and the Gould mining companies were
 bringing in negro miners from Alabama l and the strikers were shooting at them, | the Devlin miners were working two | in a room. Each of the miners took a
 striker into partnership. Two men worked l where one would work ordinarily. The | coal supply was short Extensive coal
 users would pay almost any price and l soon Devlin made money so fast that he
 hardly knew what he was making. Then MT Devlin spread out, purchasing | other coal properties. When. the mine l operators finally started, they cut prices I and in the war that followed Devlin un- | occasionally suffered. But his properties l all prospered and he made money fast un- I til he was compelled to stop active in l terest because of a physical and mental
 collapse following long period of over | work.