The citizen. (Honesdale, Pa.) 1908-1914, 1909-10-29
Another railroad king.

who's Hawley?" Wall street
asked, not 30 many years ago; Wall
street, that maelstrom of finance
which never knows genius until
he bobs up with the money that
all the rest of the little genuines
have been after.
But Wall Street, once curious
about this man, now takes his hat
Off to him.
When the wizard" died, people
who are big in the railroad world
naturally looked around for his sue
cessor. A few timid guesses were
made that Hawley might be the man,
but the guessers were squelcned.
Then. the other day, the country
was astounded to learn that Haw-
ley had gotten control of the Mis-
souri,, Kansas & Texas, the Katy"
railroad, right from under the noses
of the men who thought they owned
1t.
This road, one of the most desir-
able properties in the southwest,
provided Hawley at once with an out
let for his other roads to the gulf of
Mexico, and gave him the great and
rich southwest to draw on for freight
to the north and east.
Hawley is known to his friends as
the Bachelor of Broad Street." His
Office high up in the Broad Exchange
building, has been center of specu-
lation and financial strife in the past.
Hawley himself, lacking sentiment,
can see farther in business than any
other big railroad man in the coun-
try. He is one of the few who, COM
ing from the east, went out west
to make a name for himself, then
came back to New York as a mas
ter.
Born in 1850 in Chatham, NJ Y,
he went at 16, to New York, with a
carpet bag full of shirts and a strong
determination to be railroad man.
He got job as Erie railroad mes
senger, worked up to be bill of lad
ing clerk with the Rock Island, and
then Coils P. Huntington of Cali
fornia discovered him.
Thereafter Hawley was Hunting
toms right-hand man till the latter's
death. He got into a controversy
with Hartman over the Southern
Pacific, was beaten, then turned
around and GRABBED the Alton from
the wizards grasp.
After that he was marked. Any
body who could beat e. H. Harri-
man, Wall Street men said, was good
enough for them.
When he got the Alton, the Glover
Leaf passed into his control. He
had the Iowa Central bought as a
gold brick from Russell Sage, and
to it he added the Minneapolis & St.
Louis. Thus the western wheat
country was pretty we'll covered by
the Hawley interests. He branched
out.
The Chesapeake & Ohio, which he
got with the help of Henry E. Hunt
ington, son of his old chief, and
several others who believed in him,
gave him an ocean outlet.
Then group of central western
capitalists allowed him to get into
the Hooking Valley, Toledo & Ohio
Central, and the Chicago, Cincinnati
& Louisville, the latter a strictly in
dependent road.
The acquisition of the C. & o. gave
him other alliances, which enabled
Hawley to buy into the Atlantic
Coast line and it's control of Louis
vile & Nashville.
In both these railroads he is a
powerful influence.
Then came the big katy" deal
which Wall Street said must have
taken a lot of money.
Wall Street looked around for the
source of the money, and found that
the tremendous power of the banking
house of Speyer & Co. was backing
the Bachelor Of Broad street."
What will he do next?" they ask
now, because, with the Huntington,
Syeper and Hawley fortunes to-
gether, he is able to do almost any
thing in the railroad world.
AS it is, he controls nearly 10000
miles of road, with a capitalization
of over $400,00O,00O
Hawley is little man-about
feet tall. His face is smooth, his
eyes intensely bright, his hair steel
gray. He speaks almost in a whis-
per; his talk is direct.
Looking at him on the street, one
would be tempted to call him a typi-
cal successful gambler. His is the
steel gaze that goes through one,
like the gaze of race track specu-
lator, like mans who takes desper-
ate chances and always wins.
But there Is little of the gambler
about Hawley. He always figures
ahead what the result will be; the
others only guess.
Hawley knows what they don't
know-that they are gamblers and
he is the profit-taker.
So, no wonder Wall Street says:
Hartman is dead; long live
To Dam Susquehanna at Harrisburg.
IA