The Tacoma times. [volume] (Tacoma, Wash.) 1903-1949, 1909-03-17
KING" PATTENS WHEAT CORNER
MAY MAKE YOUR BREAD COST lOc
This Is Big Bulls PredictonSuppy Short Paten
Prices Skies-Prvation Suicide, Ruin
Of Riot, Gives
Money Worthy Charities

tween Japan and the United States
anyhow the consumption will
exceed the supply. So, with ex-
pensive wheat, flour will go up
and the bakers will add to the
price.
The great Patten wheat corner,
which is now in full force, really
started on June 20, when wheat
for May delivery was offered at
SO cents. 1t was promptly snap
ped up by Patterns agents.
The real starting point In price
then was SO cents. The regular
options for May deliveries were
not posted in the exchange until
Nov. 2. BY this time Patten' s
activities had pushed the price to
l$1.02. He was determined that 1t
should not 60 down.
Lucky Jim" they called him
around Chicago. He had been
known as the Corn King before,
also as the Dat King. Now he
Ihad started on wheat. For months
This agents had been busy around
the world, gathering figures, es-
Inmates of the coming crop, and of
the amount of wheat already av-
ailable.
Patten decided that this was his
lucky year. He says himself that
he is just betting that the year
will be short one in production,
which would naturally force prices
up. He says he hasn't made
prices, that he is just a prophet,
who guessed that prices would go
up naturally.
Believing that wheat would go
up, Patten began to buy with the
first ringing of the gong on Nov.
2. He has been buying ever since,
with the result that the price has
climbed to close on $3.50 a bushel
"a length of corner which goes
to the record. -
When wheat was at $1.02 Pat
ten would be offering $1.O3 and
taking all that was offered. When
$1.03 became standard, he would
offer $1.O4.
Other brokers sold him wheat
which they did not have, believ-
ing that the price would drop so
that they could buy and sell to
him at profit. But wheat kept
on rising a point at a time. e
One of these was John G. Ltlnd
of Minneapolis, whose agents had
given him facorable reports about
the size of the new crop. He be-
lieved that $1.04 was an abnor-
NAL price, that since there was
so much wheat the price would
certainly drop. He sold large
quantities to Patterns agents.
Probably Lund was right. But
the market believed Patten and
helped push the price up. Lund,
a multimillionaire, was crushed.
With ruin staring him in the face,
Lund killed himself.
The Pillsbury Flour Co., a gi-
gantic concern, whose agents and
branches encompassed the world,
got caught in the path of Patten' s
advancing prices. A receiver took
charge of this great business.
Failures and suicides and men
driven insane-these are bi-prod-
ucts of wheat corners.
But Lucky Jim" never stopped
for suicides or failures. His giant
machine, like new steam roller,
passed on and on.
Dollar wheat Is a high price for
the wheat pit. One cent advance
over that is like 10 points ad-
vance below. But Patten pushed
the price up and up. 1t reached
$1.19. 1t will go higher, he
says. Every day the stock ex-
changes are wild.
All the sales are made for May
delivery. This means that all the
men who sold to Patten must de-
liver what they promised then.
None of them hold the actual
wheat. They sold with the belief
that the price would drop SO that
they can buy and fill their orders
with Patten at a profit.
May, then, or, rather, the last
day Of April, will see the deluge.
Those who can't buy wheat at any
figure, will go down broken, dis
honored, ruined. Those who can,
will have to do so at tremendous
sacrifices. Many of them will
close out before May comes-per-
haps like John Lund did--with a
pistol bullet.
This In case Patten holds up his
corner till May. If wheat should
|get the better of him, he will have
ito pay at the inflated prices for all
1.-THE wheat he bargained for-or he
himself be the ruined man. But he
expects to win. Already he has
held up the corner longer than
any but two or three men in his
tory.
For cornering wheat is NO new
thing. Many daring operators
with money to spare have tried It,
John w. Gates, Joe Letter, Harper
lof Cincinnati, are only a few OF
the recent ones. All failed, Letter
at the cost of a million and hiatt.
Harper dragging score of banks
and business houses with him.
And now Patten is at It! Will he
win? ~
IL wheat continues to rise
f1onr m 1auf rico than hraoA TIL q ~