The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-03-06

Sweden. Such a declaration would release the machines and they could easily be shipped to Germany
 Possibly seven out of every ten American business men have little hope that the situation is to be or can be remedied
 typical example of the crippled American business enterprise in Ger many is the largest shoe firm handling American goods in the empire. This firm, according to it's proprietor, does on the average a business of half a million dollars a year. It maintains stores in Berlin, Frankfort-on-the- Main. and in Hamburg.
 In August, 1914, the firm had an order for $60,OOO worth of shoes plac- never has been delivered. When it became evident that direct, or indi- rect, shipments were impossible it re- sorted to the parcels post. In driblets it has received up to date about $5,OC0 worth of goods. Tn normal times the stores would have imported $500, 900 worth of goods Stock has been so exhausted that in one day recently CT store hal to turn away IA GUS timers who wanted American sh hoes such as they had bought before and could not get elsewhere. Expenses for maintaining the three stores amount to about $250. a day. The owner is cutting down his force as fast as he can, but at last has arrived at the point where a definite and perhaps permanent closing of his establish ments is necessary.
 The largest American typewriter company in Germany has an invest ment here of about two and 8 half million dollars, and after eighteen 1aonths of w9c has given up the ehost.'' Its guiding official, after trying every possible diplomatic and jo1 Of inF .7 down to the task of unloading as judicious1y as possible. The assets of this concern are great-out they can- not be turned into cash at tho pres ent time. The concerns representa- tive has keen brought 10 believe at last that he will be lucky if he can liquidate so as to come out even, that is to say, if he can wind up his af- fairs without sacrificing more than the capital invested
 This company was one of the pio- neers in the typewriter industry. Tn competition to it, a whole row of German firms sprang up a number of years ago, and f1curished because they put out cheaper, though inferior machines. Gradually an intense trade jealousy was evolved. The numerous German concerns in einne outstripped, in point of business done, the Ameri- can firm with it's three subsidiary companies, but the American company nevertheless made gigantic strides in Germany and Austria, until it's annlI-i al business had risen into the mil lions.
 All that stopped when the war be- gan. The head of the concern refus- es to resort to any subterfuge in ob- taining either machines or supplies and the warehouses of Goteborg are cIogged with typewriters originally in- tended for Berlin. The Berlin offic has orders for hundreds if not thou sands of machines which it can not fill.
 Germany has always been a Mecca for American dentists. Thousands of Germans go to the "parlors'' of Amer jeans. In consequence the largest den- tai supply house in the world long ago established a large branch in Berlin. From this branch American-and other-dentists all over Europe have drawn their supplies. This concern was doing, at the outbreak of the war, a business af between $5O,O0O and $75,oO0 a month. Today it is doing chiefly through the sale of German goods-a busiress ranging from seven to nine thousand dollars a, month.
 It struggled along while the parce! post was still working. Such things as dentists chairs, electric motors and the like have long since been sold out and cannot be replaced. But, by mail, fl was ab1e tc get gutta, percba and rubber, analgam, and the vari- ous ingredients for filings, but even that is impossible now.
 Its office force has had to be re- duced by about 80 per cent. It's head quarters have the appearance of a barn with few articles standing forlornly about. For weeks and months it's manager has been fighting to stave off the eventual closing down until the end of the war.
 
 other one of several American firms that had comparatively large stocks on hand at the beginning of the war. The firm at first was not at all in cIined to side in with other American business establishments in their com plaints against the English blockade. | The business fell off only during the first months of the war, and picked up during the first half of 1915. Then i the pinch began to make itself felt. | Old machines were returned for re- pairs that could not be made, in spite 1 of contracts, because of the lack of parts Orders for new machines | continued to pour in until existing | stocks were exhausted. They are | practically gone now, and the man ager looks with regretful eye at the sixty thousand dollars worth of ma chimes that, at the last accounting, | were held at Kirkwa1l, England
 With varying details, it is the same | story with half a dozen American 1 firms who sell farming machinery.
 For months it also has been almost | an impossibi1ity to buy American toi- l let articles in Berlin. The wife of | an American recently spent days and | taxicab fare in visiting | every drug store of importance in | the residential sections of the city in l a vain search for few things which l she and her husband wanted. A big | American firm dealing in toilet arti- cIes has for years maintained a | branch here, but business has gone | so hopelessly bad that the manager even has left, and the office is merely kept open by subordinates in the more l or less indefinite hope that affairs will better themselves soon.
 American has formerly had some what of a vogue here, but they now are excluded. So did radiators, sep