Montana news. [volume] (Lewistown, Mont.) 1904-191?, 1905-08-16
Rockefeller a
Heartless Thief


cry and duplicity is told of John ID.
Rockefeller in his dealings with
James Corrigan, of Cleveland, by
Miss Ida Tarbell, in McClure's.
Says Miss Tarbell:
MIR. Corrigan was one of the
many with Mr.. Rockefeller, whether
he is building corporation or deal
ing with friend. That is, the end
with him is not the completion of
a great idea, it is money. Take the
incident of his acquisition, in 1895,
of 2, 500 shares of Standared Oil stock
which had belonged to one of his
boyhood friends, James Corrigan
of Cleveland. The tale is public
property, being all written in legal
documents.
Mr.. Corrigan was one of the many
enterprising young men who, like
Mr.. Rockefeller, took advantage in
the sixties of the discovery of petro-
leum, to build up a plant for its re-
fining. He brought to the business
something even Mr.. Rockefeller
himself never was able to give it
the ingenuity and resourcefulness
of the born inventor. The process
ess he devised made him prosper
ous-so prosperous that he attract
ed the attention of the Standard Oil
company, and about 1877 he began
to have trouble. He could not get
the crude oil he bought on Oil creek
shipped to Cleveland. The railroads
refused him cars-delayed to run
them, even if they we're loaded. 1t
was not only getting oil which began
to trouble him, it was disposing of
his product. AT last, tired of oppo-
sition, he leased his works to the
Standard Oil company, and went to
Europe to look up the oil business
there. In 1883 he returned and sold
his plant for 5000 shares of the
Standard Oil Trust certificates.
After selling his oil property, Mr..
Corrigan embarked in the iron bust
ness. He and Mr.. Frank Rocke-
feller, a brother of John D., bought
the Franklin mine, in the Lake Sup
erior region, mine rich in Bessemer
ore. He put $500, 900 into feet of
lake propellers and schooners, and
he went into other similar enterprises
all of which were prospering when,
early in the 'oo's the hard times in
the iron business came on. Mr..
Corrigan saw himself obliged to
have money. What more natural
friend, John ID. Rockefeller, the
brother of his principle partnerr
Mr.. Rockefeller seems to have loaned
freely-frst $40, 900, then $50, 900
then S45, 900. Itwas good invest
ment for Mr.. Corrigan paid him
per cent interest, and secured him
with shares of Standard Oil trust
certificates and mortgage on his
vessels; so good that when Mr..
Rockefeller learned that Mr.. Corri-
gan had borrowed Sas, 900 from the
Citizens Savings and loan associa-
ton of Cleveland, giving I,aoo
shares of Standard Oil trust certifi-
Gates as collateral, he offered to
take up the loan. The result was
that he soon had all of Mr.. Corri-
gan's interest in the trust in his
hands. About the same time Frank
Rockefeller found il necessary to
borrow money from his brother, and
Mr.. Corrigan was asked to endorse
the note he gave, and a little later
to secure this endorsement by de-
posting 1890 shares of Franklin
mining stock, the sum total of his
holdings in that property. Mr..
Corrigan did so, not rejecting at
the time, probably, that this put all
the property he owned under Mr..
Rockefeller's control.
The hard times of 1898 became a
panic. Mr.. Corrigan was terribly
pushed. In October he had no
money with which to meet the in