The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1912-03-28

property. Mayor Grants father was
ShreWd and careful investor in real
estate. 1t was his friendship with the
late John Kelly, when Kelly was the
leader of Tammany Hall, which led
Kelly to take special heed of Hugh
j. Grant when he was still a very
young man. Kellys friendship made
it possible for young Grant to be
elected sheriff of New York county
when under thirty years of age and
while in that office he first revealed
his remarkable gift for anticipating
real estate appropriations. This was no
Dental information which he, as sher-
iff and as one of the favored mem
bers of Tammany, obtained respect
ing contemplated public improve
mentS.
Hugh j. Grants Career.
Grant was also under 80 years of
age when he was first nominated for
mayor. He was beaten by the late
William r. Grace. A few years later
he was nominated and elected and
then reelected.
AS mayor he had very great oppor-
tunities for estimating" the possible ap-
precautions of real property. And it
was said of him that very rarely did
street was to be opened in a section
which had been long neglected, it re-
quired no great business acumen on
the part of any one who had secret
provement to buy unimproved prop
erty at a low figure, sure of an appre-
citation when the public work was
completed.
Grant and others who made ventures
of this kind was that he was able to
look years ahead or else to forecast
an unsupported development of new
business centers- Opportunities of
that kind were the ones which Mr..
Grant usually looked for. His invest
ments were almost uniformly not
merely successful, but very sue
the values of his property caused
him to be enumerated just after he
had finished his second term as mayor
as one of the rich men who possessed
several million dollars, approximately.
Opportunity Came Often.
In addition to his real estate I'M
dertakings ex-Mayor Grant had many
favorable opportunities for entering
upon what is called the ground floor
in certain promotions. These oppor-
tunities arose from the fact that he
maintained his political influence in
the Tammany organization and gained,
as well as maintained, the confidence
Of some of the men of larger affairs
who were associated with Tammany
Hall. In only one case did Mayor
Grant experience not exactly a revers-
al, but a serious diSapp ointment. 1t
was presumed that he would have au-
Third Avenue railroad. The oppor-
tunities for greatly increasing his
fortune would thereby have been larg-
er and he is understood to have been
on the verge of securing the property
when by one of the most brilliant of
the several brilliant coups d'etat, so
to call them. executed by William c.
Whitney, Mayor Grant lost control. 1t
will probably be disclosed, either
through probate proceedings or in
some other legal way, speedily that
when Mr.. Grant died he was properly
enumerated among the multimillion-
aires of New York. That is to say,
his estate, reckoned by millions. is at
least ten millions, and that figure now,
by common consent, constitutes the
multimillionaire.
Ministry Cut Hoffman Fortune.
If Dean Hoffman had not entered
the ministry. but instead had devoted
himself exclusively to real estate OPP
erations, almost any estimate in excess
of twenty millions as the value of his
estate would have been justified. Like
Mayor Grant, Dean Hoffman inherited
a good deal of property from his
father. The dean, however, soon af-
ter he came into his inheritance, re-
vealed an intuitive and prophetic