Custer County Republican. (Broken Bow, Neb.) 1882-1921, 1907-09-26
FREAK CORPORATIONS
STATE OF MAINE FOSTERS
GROWTH OF ODD CONCERNS.
List Of Those Which Have Died Late
ly Through Failure to Pay Taxes
Shows Some Organized for
Peculiar Purposes.


Portland, Me.-Do you want a com
pany to supply the people OF Mars
with steam shovels to dig their ca,
nails? Do you want to form company
to raise bananas in Alaska? Do you
desire concern to trade in the spir
its Of the heroes of the past? Well, II
you do, come to Maine and file your
papers. You can form a corporation
with a capital limit only exceeded by
the skyline and it won't cost you
enough to set you back very material
ly either.
For years Maine has been the Mecca
for those who wished to launch com.
panies. The fees for granting a charter
are merely nominal. The taxes are
still more so, something like an annu-
al franchise tax of So on $4,000 CAPT
talization. Almost no questions are
asked, and it is as easy for a company
with any object whatever, and few
dollars to pay the necessary fees and
printing, to get a full-hedged charter
as 1t is for a man to get drink in
the city of Bangor-and no man who
ever went to that city and wanted the
stuff that cheers but inebriates ever
went very dry either.
All sorts of fanciful corporations are
filed in the Office of the secretary of
state in Augusta, and gaudily printed
shares of the stock are offered to the
public. You need not limit your CAPT
talization-to be sure, the more CAPT
tai you have the more tax you are sup
posed to pay, but after you have dis
posed of your shares you probably
won't pay your tax anyway, and will
let the charter of the company expire.
The other day a list of delinquent
corporations was published, corpora
lions whose charters were to expire
on account of unpaid taxes. 1t filled
two pages in nonpareil type, with close
spacing at that. But hundreds of 9th.
ers are formed every month, so a few
more or less aren't missed very much.
All kinds of companies are being
floated all the time.
Companies to dig tunnels in regions
where travel is absolutely nil; COM
panies to raise mussels and put them
on the market; companies dealing in
oil; companies dealing in assurance
(about all of them have plenty of this
for their stock in trade, although it is
more commonly known as galD; COM
panies dealing in patent medicines of
all kinds; in synthetic COAL" if any
one knows what that is; in amuse-
ments and womens wear; in rubber,
concrete, paving stones, engines, foods
and land are only too common.
The most interesting ones are the
freak ones. They abound, from the
propagation Of cats to the saving Of
souls. Among few in the advertised
list which haven't paid their taxes are
the Baldwin Airship company, the Ar
tistic Display company, the Blue
Blazes Heater company, the College
of Physiognomy and Sublime Wisdom
OF Life, the Boston Exploration COM
pany, the Beacon Ethical union, the
Conscience Law corporation Zone cor
poration evidently has a conscience),
a concern organized up in Kittery, for
the purpose of dealing in bananas, a
company known simply as the Super
lative company, which didn't appear to
have any business at all; a company
for the development of two republics,
according to its title, and so on ad in
finitum ct ad nauseam.