Vernon County censor. [volume] (Viroqua, Wis.) 1865-1955, 1906-03-07

worth or N0FtOIk anu western railway
stock certificates has caused great
sensation among bankers brokerage
houses and all others interested il
transactions carried on by means OF
bonds, stock and other kinds OF nego-
table paper 1t has been discovered
that a regularly organized gang was
concerned In these frauds. which sue
cessfully imposed upon some Of the
sharpest man in Wall street and might
have been entirely successful had it
not been for some absurd plumbers in
the manufacture of the bogus certli
certain from the moment that they
were carefully examined.
Stock certificates are so many and
so varied in appearance that iuIIta
lions canont be readily detected by
even the most experienced clerks and
thrown out on sight as spurious im.the
way that thousands of bank tellers
can instantly detect false bank notes
Said an officer of the Trust Compan
Of America the other day: The only
means by which certificates can be
readily and. certainly proved genuine
is by having them carefully looked IN
No broker can be sure that certIf-
cate is genuine and properly made out
until he has had the transfer agents
approval
The system he employs, this Official
went Ito explain, makes any such de.
ception as the Seton case impossible
When a certificate is submitted. no
payment or other action is taken upon
it for tggenbyfour hours During la
ample period for protection, the sigma.
lures on the paper can be fully verl
fed, the certificate number compared
with the. pRmber upon the company's
books, and the entire transaction made
certain throughout The Seton imita-
tons did not commence with a num-
Der consecutive with the last certi1
Gates of Che genuine issue. Ii the
Trust Company of America receives
a certificate whose number does not
follow directly from the ones already
registered npon its books, that certi
cate is held and no transfer or regis
tration made until the intervening
numbers have been fully accounted
for. Such a system, combined with
the numerous other checks which the
company employs supplies a safe
guard TO the public which only care
lessness and lack of sound business
methods would neglect to make use
OF.
Yet, system or no system, the dan,
gers of successful counterfeiting are
much exaggerated in the public mind
While the carelessness of some houses.
which allowed these forgeries 10 pass
unquestioned certainly needs reForma
ton. the affair has done much TO
prove the safety in present me,Aods
.of engraving and printing 1ue certl-
ticats in question We're only clumsy
limitations and were not even engraved
but were merely autographed
No engraved stock or bond, as a
matter Of fact so far as the stock cx
change knows, has ever haeu counter
feited, nor is it likely any VIII be as
long as the existing carefully safe
guarded plan of manufacturing such
securities is followed
The Union Pacific forgeries OF 1872.
by which 100000 of income bonus
were so initiated that the money they
represented was lost 30 the company,
are no case in point against the fore
going statement, for these bonds were
not engraved or autographed but
were simply printed protected only
against imitation by a seal OF plate
representing one This device was
successfully initiated and the sigma.
ture of the trustee who signed the
bonds was exactly reproduced by
photogra phy; but in these days no
great company would think of putting
lo. valuable securities prepared la SO
cheap and unsafe a manner.
The Seton limitations of the Norfolk
and Western Railway company's com
mon stock certificates were ridiculous
ly erroneous in almosot every detail.
In the first place, these LOCUS certii
Gates were made upon very cheap
paper entirely lacking in those tough,
sun, cracking qualities which are so
characteristic of the regulation linen
paper used for the genuine article.
Then, the yignette of the locomotive
was not only faced in an entirely oppo-
site direction, but the reproduction
itself was nearly twice as large as the
original The inks, too, were quite Oft
color, and the details of the bordering
design lacked all resemblance to the
real Norfolk and Western ceIl.lcates.
Besides all these defects in the imita,
ton itself, the bogus certificates were
made up in books of $50 each, instead
of being cut separately, as were the
genuine. The ragged edge, where they
we're torn from the book, was one OF
the earliest and most damning evil
dences that brought about their detec
ton.
The difficulties ia the way of imitat,
inc stock certificates and bank notes
| are so many and of such an insuper-
able character that the imitator's er-
forts are practically futile The Seton
affair shows that the men who tried to
sell their limitations fully realized ene
uselessness of attempting an exact
representation, brt merely relied up
! on the ignorance of the public to
whom they submitted their goods. The
system employed by any large bank
/ mote company is such that not even