Macon beacon. [volume] (Macon, Miss.) 1859-1995, 1910-07-08
SOUTH HAS MONEY.
Says So Itself-Adds That it Knows
How to Take Care of 1t.

part OF It's area was Dy
mortgages. The farmers labOred
from season to season with the
bare expectancy of meeting the
interest on fertilizer notes. The
bulk of the cotton crop was mark
eted in the form of raw material
and at prices that barely cleared
the cost of production without al
Iowance for interest or profit.
Such capital as was needed for
improvements or developments Of
any kind had naturally to be sup
piled from outside sources. Such
capital as the South had accumu-
lated by it's own efforts was needed
to carry on the ordinary course of
business. Even the funds neces-
sary to move the cotton crop were
largely borrowed in New York
City and all Southern banks were
hugh debtors at certain seasons
of the year.
With the return Of general pros
perity after the depression of 1895
the South entered upon a new era
of industrial and financial devel-
opment. First came the cotton
mills in the CarOlinas, waylaying
the white staple on it's journey
northward and making it into
yarn and cloth for the worlds
consumption.
Alabama's iron and coal were
next opened up, and a new Pitts
burg arose in that state. Gradu
ally the South began to be less
and less dependent on the rest of
the world, first for manufactured
products and then for accumulate
ed capital.
Not until the panic of 1907,
however, was the extent Of the
SOuth's financial independence
HduC HldIlllCSC. uIIC UI1C1u
industries were more or less affect
ed by that stringency and some
Southern banks collapsed under
the strain, yet the whole world
viewed with amazement the com
parative ease with which our
people weathnred the storm.
With New York City in the
grip of a money famine such as a
generation had not witnessed the
South went serenely ahead, rails
ing her cotton and paying off her
negroes in greenbacks. At the
first intimatiOn of returning pros
perity, the Southern states were
first to feel the returning tide.
All this is a matter of common
knowledge. What the average
man who is not in the investment
business does not know is that
there is o moro money in the
South seeking profitable invest
ment than in any other part of
the United States in proportion
to population, that this money is
not only being used for develop
mcnt of home enterprises but is
ever seeking an outlet in the
North and West.
The writer calls to mind d syn
dictate Of Atlanta gentlemen who
recently made a few thousand dol
lars in New York City real estate,
a number of individual investors
who cleaned up a profit of from
$1,000 to 800, 900 each on Union
Pacific, United States Steel and
other stocks which they bought
outright during the panic and had
sent down to their strong boxes in
old Georgia, to say nothing of
Southern money which has already
gone into the building Of Western
railroads and is now going into
such enterprises.
The Southern investor is a great
believer in real estate, having
seen values in his own community
IRISH to such astounding heights.
He is also partial to home indus
tries. You can organize a cotton
mill in any town of nor than
1000 peOpleemerely by telling the
people that the mill is going to be