Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-09-20
Invested Over S25,OOO,OOO.


Invested Over $25, 100000
During these eight years Mr.. Clergue had
invested more than So, coo, 600 In cash in
the immediate vicinity of Sault Ste. Marie.
His railways represented an investment Of
$4,000 }; his power plant, S6JO0,OOO; his
blast furnaces and steel mills, 81, 500, 600:
his pulp mills, 81 600 900; his mines, 81 ,OOO-
600: his nickel works. $500, 600, and saw
mills, coke ovens and other enterprises SINH
lar amounts. Most of the money came from
Philadelphia and from Canada. No man ever
commanded a greater degree of confidence
from the public or from the government of
Canada, which recognized him as an empire
builder and gave him everything he asked.
He had a contract with the dominion to
colonize 1000 immigrants annually in the
wilderness of Algoma and had already
placed more than 1000 families upon his
land grant when his resources and his
credit were exhausted and the great, enor-
nous system he had organized collapsed
with a crash
1t Is the opinion of the best informed
men that Clergue was hurried unneces-
sarily to his doom. They are confident that
the disaster would have been avoided if he
had been granted a little more time, but
his rivals and enemies took advantage of
an opportunity to strike him down and he
fell. The various great industries which he
projected and established still in exist
ence. Some of them are In operation and
the most of them stand upon permanent
basis. There is not the slightest doubt
that some time or other they will prove i'm
mensely profitable. The tangible assets
are practically unlimited, although It is i'm
possible to realize upon them al present.
Clergue's mistake was TO promise results In
ten years that conservative men would
have promised in fifty, and when he failed
to fulfill his pledges the syndicate lost con-
fidence in his ability.
Passengers upon the northwest and the
other Lake Superior steamers are always
amazed at the group of turreted and cas-
telated buildings that confront them along
the river at the 500. They remind you Of
the great arsenals of Europe. They are
built upon the most elaborate and substan-
| tial plan; the construction is not only per-
feet but extravagant. One of the buildings
is almost quarter of mile long. Every
body on the deck of the ship inquiries why
that enormous structure was built there
and what 1t is used for ThoughtlesS peo-
pie will answer that it is a part of Clergue's
folly. and undoubtedly 1t was unwise for
him to expend so much money in expensive
construction, but he did everything else
the same scale. and some day the rest of
the country will have caught up with him.
Clergue's Vast Operations.
Clergue was thirty-five years old when
he was sent west expert engineer by
a syndicate of capitalists to examine the
water power at Sault Ste. Marie and other
places. He found here mill pond called
Lake Superior, a narrow outlet with a fall
of eighteen or twenty feet. and raw ma
terials OF almost every variety necessary
to the welfare of men. Upon his recon-
mendation company was formed in Phil
adelph1a which obtained from Canada
grant of 100000 acres, covered with
splendid forests of pine, spruce, maple,
birch and oak, with uneXDlored mineral re-
sources including good prospects of copper
iron and nickel He secured the control of
the water power and began the conStruc-
ton of pulp mill. The enterprise was re-
markably successful from the start, be-
cause he had an unlimited supply of free
material and unsurpassed water power.
The pulp mill is one of the largest in the
world. 1t runs twenty-four hours a day
and uses 1900 horsepower continually.
Clergue's next step was the erection of
sulphite mill, with a capacity of seventy
tons day. He bought nickel mines in
Canada 100 miles east of the 500, from
which he obtained his raw material and
built the Manitouhn and North Shore rail-
road to bring it to his mills. He also built
the Algoma Central and Hudson Bay rail-
road, to connect with the Canadian Pacific
and the Hudson Bay road now under con-
struction, and received a grant of 8 200 600
acres of land, more than half of which, as
has already been stated is covered with
valuable timber. 1t is asserted that this
grant includes the largest single tract of
spruce timber. which is indispensable to
paper making IN the world. This property
alone is undoubtedly worth all the capital
that Clergue invested in al his enterprises
Investigating the Resources
Al tue tlille vi MS failure ne mad hundreds |
of mineralogists, biologists botanists and |
other scientific experts scattered over this |
area investigating its resources and had |
built for their use one of the most COM |
plete Laboratories in existence with a tech
nical library, in which they were engaged |
In working up the results of their obserya- |
tons and preparing their reports Twelve |
chemists and assayers were constantly en-
ployed Analysing the specimens that were
brought in by the explorers and prospectors
But Clergue already had almost unlimited
deposits of hematite iron ore at Michipico-
ten Canada, 125 miles north of the 500.
which he bought in 1897 from a prospector
named Benjamin Boyer. The ore lies twelve I
miles north of Lake Superior in primeval
forest, and much of 1t was at the bottom
of large pond. With almost incredible
energy Clergue drained the pol.d and built
a railroad to Michipicoten harbor, Lake
Superior. with perfect system of docks
and loading machinery, within eleven
months after the discovery and shipped fifty
tons of ore during the first season. His
next step to build furnaces steel
plant and rail mill on the Canadian side of
the Saut Ste. Marie under the corporate
name of the Algoma Steel Company He
produced the first rail ever made in the
dominion of Canadian steel. Beside the
blast furnaces and steel works are beehive
in, NH; nl, &c