Great Falls tribune. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1921-current, 1922-10-08
ASTONISHING CHARGES
MADE

fthe government with selling army
supplies at ridiculous prices TO
brokers who resell them at eror-
nous profits. A recent cornmuni-
cation deals with the matter OF
canned roast beef sales as follows:
The government paid 43.S cents a
pound for roast beef which was
later sold to Philadelphia brokers
for is cents; once in private
hands, this beef went on the mar
ket at 81 cents a pound wholesale;
but for the short time that the
army was in the retail store bust
ness. it sold this same beef direct
TO the consumer for more than 81
cents a pound. Such was only one
minor item in one sale. This charge
was made public here today by
American Legion officials in an
nouncing that the American Legion
Weekly next Friday, in an expose
of war and postwar p~rofiteering IN
meat, sugar and mosquito bars Will
declare that official Washington is
considering the replacement OF IN
competent men and the punishment
of the dishonest. The article in
the legion publication was written
by Marquis James following weeks
of investigation and says IN part:
I'm a transaction between the
ouartermaster corps and Thomas
Roberts & Co., brokers OF Phila-
delphia, 5,63o,466 pounds of roast
q beef which cost 1873 cents a pound
was sold for 1.6 cents, netting a
! neat profit of a shade under 600
per cent, the government standing
a loss which amounted to $685.
= e48.o5. The foregoing is only a
minor item in one sale to this for
? tunate Philadelphia firm. The war
department, praising the superior
sasacity of its former director OF
u, sales. E. c. Morse, calls his dis
posal of surplus meats a feat be-
lieved impossible
80 Other startling excerpts from
the American Legion charges toll
low:
Zone of the methods by which
the government has sustained heavy
losses is through sales to favored
firms without competition BY
maens of negotiated or informal
bids. Many such corporations hav'
been shoestring affairs in which
ex-army officers and ex-employe'
~ of war department sales branche'
have been heavily interested. Jan
+ uary 7, 1920, 517,104 yards of o. D
waterproof duck which cost Sl.e3
ward was declared surplus, and fiv'
days later 23e,1o4 yards of it wa
4 sold by negotiation to H. Mile
ii & Co. of New York, a firm promi
4. nent in surplus transactions, who's
hackers operated under a hal
dozen different Miller pal
:, 65A cents a yard, but on Februar
"a II the price was reduced to AZ
y cents when Miller contended tn
10 material was full of oil and has
bad smell Four days later niue
.r of this material was sold by +
81 Miller & Co. to Wilson D. Tru:
blood, Inc, Chicago, for $l.41
s4s ward. Trueblood informed tn
department of justice it was i
good condition and he was able t
resell it for s1.75.
This is only one of a series {
extraordinary transactions in arm
duck which could be cited. Ho
many soldiers or sailors of oil
erstwhile fighting forces disco
cred taps a signal to crawl undo
a nice new $4.65 mosquito bar ar
make faces at the New Jers,
nishtinsales? If you werer
among them it may be becau
your mosquito bar was among Il
z,313,o00 such that an astonish'
ouartermaster corps found to be
hand after the arrnistice. F
these the government has pa
S1o,755,450. In December the 20
supply officer at New York W
told to sell 1000 0 bars. The A
i lantic Export Products cornpa'
offered him so cents a bar for SO
600 bars and sent in a certifi
, check for $4,000 to bind the agre
ment, and a few days later notifi
the government it had disposed
the bars to a Philadelphia fir
The government promptly ca
Selled the sale. A. H. Eastmol
vice president of the Atlantic co
psny, protested to Secretary B;
ef. claiming unjust discriminate