The Ward County independent. [volume] (Minot, Ward County, N.D.) 1902-1965, 1919-09-11
CHAS. OLSON SAW
PERU REVOLUTION
Former Minot Man Who is in Bank
ing Business at Lima Thot
Fourth of July Celebration
Was in Progress.

r. E. Barron received very inter-
esting letter from Chas. w. Olson, son
of Olaf A. Olson Of this city, who is
now connected with a big banking
concern at Lima, Peru:
Lima, Aug. 8, 1919.
Dear Mr.. Barron:
Your letter of June 10th came II
think on the same boat on which we
arrived here on July 3rd.
We left New York on June II on a
United Fruit Co. boat, arriving att
Colon on the Oath, after a short stop
at Kingston, Jamaica. We remained
at Colon until the 26th, leaving on a
Peruvian boat for the trip thru the
canal and down the west coast Of
South America. There were several
stops between Balboa and Callao, the
port of Lima, at which latter place
we arrived sixteen days after leaving
New York.
After getting to the hotel in Lima
on the evening of the 3rd of July, we
learned that the 4th had been de-
clared a public holiday in honor of
the U. S., inasmuch as Peru had been
one of the allies in the war and is
very friendly with her former asso-I
GATES. We thought this very nice of
her and felt particularly proud when
about five o'clock on the morning of
the 4th we heard the celebration be-
gin by the firing Of guns. It made
me feel the same thrill as in the old
days on Main street in Minot at about
that hour on the 4th when we used to
get two anvils and can of powder
and fire salute in front Of Jim John
sons office or Scofeld's livery barn.
1t didn't take me long to get out into
the street and on the Plaza in front
of the Palace, where there were sew
eral companies Of soldiers and large
crowd Of people shouting viva Lequia.
thought perhaps they had started
the celebration in honor of Wilson's
League until l met someone on the
corner who remarked that everything
was alright and that President Pardo
was in the penitentiary and Lequia
was now the President of Peru and
that this wasn't Fourth of July eel
ebration at all but a South American
revolution. Fortunately Lequia was
very popular and had in fact been elect
ed to take the office about August 1st
and Pardo had so few friends, at least
in the army, that the revolution was
about as one sided as the Willard
Dempsey affair, 80 in reality there
was no fighting. After a few days in
the penitentiary the ex-president was
permitted to leave Peru for Europe.
Business conditions here are good
and Judging from the high prices of
everything there must be plenty of
money.
As more and more ships are releas-
ed by the q. S. government for the
South American trade business will
increase as one of the main difficult
ties is shipping.
On our way down from Panama we
stopped at some places on the Peruvian
coast which looked entirely barren
and as though nothing would grow
there but these places were merely
ports for richer interior towns and
territory raising cotton, rice, sugar
cattle, ETC., for export, and l noticed
we unloaded at these places consider
able mining machinery.
There are five or six large banks in
Lima besides smaller banking and
semi-banking institutions and we hear
the National City bank and another
large English bank are to open here
soon and there seems to be plenty Of
business for them all.
Inc native currency here is the
pound divided into ten soils and each
sol into 100 centavos. The pound
formerly was on par with the Eng
lish pound sterling but is now worth
more. When ! landed here it was
worth about $50 and is now worth
about $4.85 to $4.95 while the sterling
pound is at about $4.35.
Our U. S. money took squirt up
wards soon after we arrived here, due
to the shipment Of gold to Lima from
the U. S. Ny first OBJ at the bank