The Cairo bulletin. (Cairo, Ill.) 1???-1928, 1914-07-09
MONEY BUBBLFl
Bursts; WOMEN
FAIL FOR $4,000
y ~. %s.6RS
Southeast Missouri Financial
Queens Go Into Bankruptcy
at Hayti, Mo. :
aE SpnlAl
OWNED HALF OF THE
TOWN AND WANTED MORE
New Madrid Bank Forecloses Mort
cages on the Women's Prop
erty and Bought it In.
OWNED HALF OF THE
TOWN AND WANTED MORE

Hayti. Mo-, July S.---This is the
story of Mrs. Laura May Trautmann
who describes herself as a house
wife" In her voluntary bankruptcy
petition. filed last Friday at st.
Louis, but whose claim to fame in
Southeastern Missouri rests upon
her 10 years career as real es-
tate operator and town builder.
Ii was a meteoric career, charac-
terized towards the last by transac-
tions that brought criticism upon
which she and her sister, Mrs.
Mamie Dunn, lost everything and in
which a good many others lost
heavily. The filing of bankruptcy
petitions by the sisters closes the
chapter.
Miss Laura's Skill Prevailed.
According to the lists of liabili-
ties filed by the sisters Mrs. Dunn's
| obligations are far the greatest,
S73,423.00, as against Mrs. Traut-
mans $4,000, but 1t is Miss
| Laura as she Is still called by
many, whose will and skill have
prevailed in the affairs of the sis
ters and who conceived and carried
out the transactions which made
her, until the bubble burst, fac
tor to be reckoned with in the finan-
cial affairs of this section.
Mrs. Trautman and Mrs. Dunn
were the Oates sister, Miss Laura"
and Miss Name" when the dream
of empire was born in the brain of
Laura Oates. They and their broth
er, w. |, Oates of Cape Girardeau,
had inherited from their mother a
farm, the value of Oates of Cape
Girardeau. had inherited by the
frequency of overfiows. AS farm
er's daughters they had picked cot
ton as other farmers daughters did.
Then Louis Houck OF Cape Glrar-
deau had built a railroad through
there close to the Oates farm, and
DIR. Granville NJ. Hayes had prevail
cd upon him to establish station
on the Hayes farm adjoining.
Hayes had plated his farm as
townsite and had given Houck each
alternate lot in exchange for locat
ing the station there. And that had
been the beginning of the metropo-
lis of Havti.
Miss Laura visioned a greater
city than Hayes had dreamed of.
She plated her farm lying on the
opposite side of the new railroad
!, and embarked Gpon a career whose
!; ultimate ramifications astounded the
financial wiseaeres Of the section.
Soon Owned 1000 Acres.
Her farm town lots did not sell
as rapidly as she wished and to
raise money she began giving mort
) cages. She built houses in the
Oates additions to encouage others
to do likewise. And she bought
houses in "old town." bought them
as often as not, they say. for consid-
erably more than they were worth.
kept on buying them until she own
ed 400, which was well toward half
= of the total And she bought sur
rounding farm and timber lands un-
til she owned thousand acres
which she visioned as the future
: city's suburbs.
Her transactions soon gave her a
rating as wealthy woman and it
was not difficult for her to obtain
loans on security which might have
not been accepted from another.
When she had no real estate seeur-
ity to offer she had no difficulty in
getting persons to indorse her pa
per- She went on accumulating
Y houses and lands, and paying for
5 them with borrowed money until
I she had difficulty in making her in
? come from rents pay the interest.
When she could not do that she bor-
rowed more money TO pay the inter-
est and thereby increased her in
terest obligations, already too
heavy.
ID was when her affairs were In
about such condition that she went
5 to an attorney and said she would
: like to borrow $4,000 to take up a
number of smaller obligations The