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LIFE AND CHARACTER
OF
WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER

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LIFE AND CHARACTER
OF
WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER

PRESIDENT of the
WORLD'S COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION
AND OF THE
CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE

BY HIS SON
CHARLES H. BAKER

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS

NEW YORK
THE PREMIER PRESS
1908

AUTHOR'S NOTE.
THREE hundred copies of this book have been
printed for gratuitous distribution among the
friends of William T. Baker, in the belief that
those who knew him intimately in life would value
highly this brief story of his career. If any have been
overlooked, it was unintentional on the part of those
few of his intimate friends who made up the list of
names to whom copies have been presented by the
author, and from whom prompt acknowledgment is
requested in order that the safe delivery of the books
may be noted.

Dorothy

DEDICATION
TO you, my little daughter Dorothy, your Daddy
dedicates this book. I do so because your
Grandpa loved you from the day you first came
into the world on his birthday until the day he
went out of it, and he loves you still. He loves you
because you came down from him and are of him; —
but he loves you most because it is you, just as he
would a flower, because it is a flower — because it is
pretty and sweet, God-given and inspiring.

PREFACE
"We should look at the lives of all as at a mirror, and
take from others an example for ourselves." — Terrence.
THE idea of this book first came into my mind as
a medium for giving to my children a picture of a
character worthy of their emulation, by placing
them in close touch with the life and character of a
real person of their own blood, who had lived a whole
some, useful and honorable life, and had added more
than one man's share to the world's work. By reading
of my father's life, and letting him dwell in spirit
with them, his grandchildren and his posterity will
find inspiration and encouragement for better and
more useful living and for greater accomplishment,
although his name would live without this book. This
story I had thought to make up in a few typewritten
copies for the restricted use related, but I soon found
while gathering my data together, that many outside
of kinship claimed the right to a copy, and hence the
printed book.
The preparation of this biography during my spare
moments of the last two years has been a most pleas
ant task although it has been fraught with difficulties
and discouragement, owing to the fact that it is
founded more upon the personal recollections of people
than upon documentary evidence. The older gener
ation from whom I might draw, has gone, or else
its remnants are falling like autumnal leaves and
have only hazy memories of the past. The newer gen
eration knew him only in his later life and cannot tell

of him as a young man or boy. No relatives except
his children and a younger brother survive him.
There are those still living in the three little New
York villages, where I recently visited for the pur
poses of this biography, who lived there when he did
as a boy before the villages grew too small for him,
but they, naturally enough, with dulled memories, do
not recollect much about him. There are others who
were his playmates and associates, and a sweetheart
or two who survive him and remember him well, and
to these as well as to reminiscences by himself and
such as I remember of his telling, I look largely for
the story of his early life. To all those friends of my
father and myself who have so kindly and earnestly
assisted me in gathering the material for this
biography, I extend my grateful appreciation.
In telling this story, I have tried to do so without
any coloring or prejudice, so as to display my father
in the light of cold facts as he was — no better and no
worse, as he himself always wished to be considered.
If, therefore, I have seemingly made a hero out of him
where moderation would have done, I beg as my
excuse that I had a father of whom I was justly
proud and whom I loved without reserve— so that I
saw him from a different viewpoint than others did —
that's all. CHARLES H. BAKER.
100 Broadway, New York City.
January I, 1908.

CONTENTS
Chapters Page
Author's Note  4
Dedication  5
Preface  7
I. Boyhood Life in West Winfield, 1841-1855  13
II. As a Youth in Groton and McLean, 1855-1861. . . 37
III. Career in Chicago, 1861-1903  41
IV. Eliza Annie Dunster, 1838-1873  83
V. Chicago Board of Trade, 1890-1897  Ill
VI. World's Columbian Exposition, 1890-1893  153
VII. The Civic Federation, 1895-1897  165
VIII. Snoqualmie Falls and White River Power Develop
ments, 1887-1904  175
IX. Art Institute of Chicago, 1878-1903  367
X. Home Life and Character  273

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

William Taylor Baker  Frontispiece
Dorothy  Page 5
West Winfield, New York  Facing " 13
Birthplace of William Taylor Baker  18
Rural Scene at West Winfield  18
Cobble Stone School House, West Winfield, " " 18
Mother of William Taylor Baker  " " 22
William Taylor Baker, Aged 8 Years  " " 22
In This Store My Father Worked as a Boy
at Groton, New York  " " 27
Village Hotel, Groton, New York  " " 27
Millpond and Swimming Pool at McLean. . . " " 34
Residence of Mr. Marsh, at McLean  " " 34
Village of McLean, New York  " " 38
William Taylor Baker (four portraits)  " " 41
Cartoon. "The Wheat Kings"  " 71
The Chicago Homestead  Facing " 74
Anna Franklin (Phipps) (Morgan) Baker. . " " 78
Exmoor Cottage — The Summer Home  " " 78
Grave of Henry Dunster  " " 83
Birthplace of Eliza Annie Dunster  " " 83
The Original Bradford Academy, 1858  " " 83

List of Illustrations — Continued
Samuel Dunster  Facing Page 100
Eliza Annie (Dunster) Baker  " " 100
Grandchildren of William Taylor Baker. ... " 100
The Dunster Farmhouse near Attleboro, Mass. 106
Chicago Board of Trade, "The Pit"  " " 111
Cartoon, "Scenes at the Polls"  " 132
Cartoon, "Gov. Tanner's 'Monte Carlo' "  146
World's Columbian Exposition
The Court of Honor  Facing 153
Administration Building  " " 160
Snoqualmie Falls, Height 270 Feet  " " 175
Subterranean 19,000 H. P. Generating Plant. " " 175
Longitudinal Section, Snoqualmie Power Plant '' 192
Constructing Dam Above Snoqualmie Falls. " " 192
Diagram of Power Distribution  " 193
Seattle Substation and General Offices  Facing " 198
Tacoma Substation  " " 198
Centennial Mill  " " 224
White River Power Plant  " " 224
Cartoon, "Charge of the Light Brigade"  " 236
Cartoon, "Grand Hypnotic Exhibition at City Hall" . " 253
Art Institute of Chicago  Facing " 267
Glimpses of My Father at Exmoor  " " 273
The Baker Lot in Graceland  " " 293

West Winfield, N. Y.
THE BAKER HOUSE IS SHOWN ON THE EXTREME LEFT.

Chapter I
BOYHOOD LIFE IN WEST WINFIELD
1841-1855
NOTHING appears to be known of this par
ticular Baker family prior to my grandfather,
who was William Baker, born in Bradford,
England, about 1799. In that country, he was a baker
by trade as well as by name, and he had been a butcher
too. He came to this country in 1838 and drifted to
West Winfield, a small village of about one hundred
and fifty people, in Herkimer County, New York.
Here he made a pretence of earning a livelihood, by
doing chores about the village, acting as porter and
hostler to the village inn, and working upon the neigh
borhood farms. He is remembered as a man who was
not always sober, which fact to some extent at least
undermined his usefulness. Yet notwithstanding his
shortcomings, he was in some respects, a remarkable
character. He was a man of good address, and well
groomed considering his circumstances. He was well
versed in the current topics of the day and was con
sidered an authority in the village upon political,
scientific and social subjects pertaining to any part of
the world that excited ordinary interest. He was a
reader of many books and papers, chiefly historical,
and so in a way was scholarly, deep and intellectual,

14 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
although without the fundamental advantages of very
much school education. He could talk and tell stories
better than any one in the village, and so he was enter
taining, not only because of a certain fluency of speech
and pleasing diction, but because of a well developed
sense of humor. But in this grandsire of mine, there
was something lacking to make a complete man of
him. He seemed not to be able to put out an anchor
that would hold. In commercial and financial instinct
he apparently was a void. He was not religious. He
lacked the capacity to find profitable work or to do it
well if he found it. The knack of getting on in the
world was not his, and so he was unsettled and shift
less, obstinate in disposition, and not fixed in any
purpose except to be agreeable around the village inn
and drown his discontent in the flowing bowl.
"A man so various, that he seemed to be
• Not one, but all mankind's epitome ;
Stiff in opinion, always in the wrong,
Was everything by starts, and nothing long ;
But in the course of one revolving moon,
Was chymist, fiddler, statesman and buffoon." — Dryden.
There lived in West Winfield, about this time, a
sterling widow, Mrs. Williams, who as a maiden was
Matilda Taylor, and she was born in Stonington,
Connecticut, on the ioth of May, 1801. Her husband,
Ralph Williams, had been a thrifty farmer, attending
to his business and providing amply for his family.
He died with but small estate after there had been
three children. These children were: — Samuel G.

BOYHOOD LIFE IN WEST WINFIELD 15
Williams, who in his later life became Professor of
Geology in Cornell University; Ralph B. Williams,
who became Secretary of the Groton Bridge Company,
of Groton, N. Y., and Minnie Williams, who became
Mrs. Charles Perrigo, of Groton, N. Y. A small
house was purchased with the diminutive fortune of
her deceased husband and here the family lived as
long as they remained in the village. Then it came
about that Mrs. Williams married my grandfather
William Baker, and to them came children in the
following order, all born in her homestead: — Alfred
Baker, William Taylor Baker, my father, Eliza Baker
and George Henry Baker, the last named being the
only one now living, and who is successfully engaged
in the butcher's trade at Ithaca, N. Y.
What brought my grandparents together as a mar
ried pair is hardly decypherable at this late time. Per
haps he wanted shelter over his head which she was
already able to provide. Perhaps she wanted some
one to talk to or to help around the garden and house,
or perhaps they loved each other, — who knows? At
any rate, they decided to live their lives together.
Now, inasmuch as she was a deep dyed Methodist
who believed devoutedly in hellfire and brimstone for
those who wandered from the straight and narrow
path and heaven for those who did not do so, she of
course, believed in cold water in preference to alcohol,
and so probably grew to have less esteem for her
husband than she would have had, had he been as
virtuous as she. She possessed the highest order of

16 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
thrift, intelligence, nerve, good sense, morality and
spirituality. She was what he was not. His inten
tions were good, but he failed to fulfill them. He
only helped support his family, but that was not
enough when the number of little hungry mouths was
increasing every year. So she learned the trade of
tailoress and worked early and late at such times as
she could spare from her children, at making clothes
by hand, for sewing machines were not thought of
then. Thus it was that my grandfather and grandmother
got on together, like oil and water.' So it was natural
enough that they should go their own ways independ
ently, he resigning her to the task of bringing up the
children, and she resigning him to a job on a farm
near Winfield, where he died January 4th, 1870. He
was buried in the village cemetery, where his grand
children have provided a suitable stone to mark his
resting place.
Grandmother Baker lived to be eighty-one years
old and died in Groton, N. Y., November 15th, 1882,
where she had lived the latter part of her life. Her
children claim that the good in them came from her,
either by direct inheritance or by the training with
which she followed it up. This undoubtedly is true
to a large extent, and yet in my father's case, as I
see him, he drew from both his parents, and as the
composite of the best in them both, he developed into
the really great man as we know him. But what
great man ever lived who did not have a great mother ?

BOYHOOD LIFE IN WEST WINFIELD 17
Not necessarily great in the glamour of world history,
but great' in the undisclosed measure of us all as we
finally appear before the last Tribunal. Is it not reas
onable that it should be so, for who but the mother
gives to the child directly that which was of herself ?
And so in recognition of this, and of my father's devo
tion to his mother, I place her as a character of the
first order in this book which tells his story.
The situation in the Baker household as I have
portrayed it, had its logical outcome, and so the family
old and young, big and little, had to scatter and face
the world upon their individual resources. Maybe
this situation in life was a good thing for the subject
of this sketch, as it put him on his mettle. But the
embryo of greatness was in him anyway and would
undoubtedly have developed in true Rooseveltian
fashion even though the vicissitudes of life and pov
erty had not spurred him to his best efforts.
William Taylor Baker was born in West Winfield,
Herkimer County, New York, September nth, 1841,
and he lived there until his fourteenth year. He was
given his father's christian name and his mother's
maiden name. Just what he was and what he did
there until he was fourteen years old, I have been
unable to discover much about, although I doubt not
that as a baby he was one of the precocious kind, who
sit up in their cradles to better view the surroundings,
who try to invent improvements in their cradles, or
trade them for something better or something more
to eat, and who manage their mothers with an assumed

18 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
authority which is seldom disputed. At least, I justify
my theory upon the hypothesis that what he after
wards became, had its beginning in the cradle in his
first year. He grew to be a freckled faced boy, lively
and wide awake in every way and was the favorite
brother of his older sister Minnie, who had much to
do in helping their mother to bring him up. He was
slight in build and not overly robust physically,
although all people who dicuss him at that stage of
his life, tell of his active and very earnest mind and
his spirited and happy disposition. He was also a
bad boy when he wanted to be but only to a degree
made necessary by the fact that he was a boy. The
Baptist Church stands next to his mother's house. It
did then and it does now, although the little old wooden
one has given place to a new one of brick. "Billy
Baker" as they called him had grown rich enough in
his own right and through his small earnings at odd
times to own a powerful pistol. With this he shot holes
through the walls of the church, and the bombard
ment caused the plaster to fall on the pulpit and in
the pews, and prompted his mother to whip him until
he was humble enough to beg forgiveness from the
preacher. And then again at one time he issued a
declaration of independence in favor of himself and
against home and mother, and apprenticed himself
out to be a carpenter until the time of his majority,
which was only a dozen of years ahead. But he was
not long at work in his chosen profession before he
saw his father coming down the road in the distance

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BOYHOOD LIFE IN WEST WINFIELD 19
wearing a stern look and a strap which meant a
licking, so he deserted his new master and went back
home by a round about way. He did not apprentice
himself out again. It was natural enough that he
should have gravitated to a carpenter's shop, for he
was clever with his hands and could whittle skillfully
with his jackknife, and do other things which he liked
to do. He could build little railroads around in his
mother's garden, shaping up the earth into miniature
railroad grades, crossing little imaginary rivers on
bridges and running his lines under the current bushes
for forests and through tunnels under hand made
mountains. Construction operations came natural to
him at that time. So also was trading, and his jack-
knife was apt to be a better one than the one he traded
off for it. Even when a grown man he liked to work
with tools and study plans and watch construction,
and this instinct, together with his liking and aptitude
for business were the fundamental elements under
lying his future career.
This same Billy Baker was good to his mother
and sisters as were the other brothers. He
helped his mother in the work about the place,
and he did chores around the village; also such
farm work as a boy could do, and there wasn't
much about a farm a boy could not do or was not
made to do in those days. He could tread hay, and
guide the horse riding bareback in front of the plow
or cultivator in the corn field, and he took the cow
out in the morning and brought her back at night and

20 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
milked her; and he didn't often aim at spots or flies
on the wall with the thin white filaments, unless some
one was around to be entertained thereby, for milk
in those days was food, and it was not right to waste
food while mother had to work.
My father often said he only had one year's school
ing in his life, and this was at the little cobblestone
district school house in West Winfield, which has since
been torn down. I was fortunate, however, in being
able to secure a picture of it as shown in this
book. He stood at the head of the school and I sup
pose he learned all they had to teach him, for such
schools in those days did not have much learning to
dispense. And yet with this primitive and limited
inoculation of erudition, see the manner of man he
eventuated into finally! Who would know in talking
with him and listening to him as we saw him last,
but what he had taken several degrees in some of the
great universities? Where could be found a more
cultured gentleman? Or one more impressive and
scholarly? Notwithstanding however his restricted
opportunities, he was very studious, and read books
in his idle hours from the time he first learned to read,
and particularly historical books. He was an authority
upon the life of Napoleon Bonaparte and knew him
through and through as a historical character, and
he delivered lectures on the subject to the boys of the
village. I suspect that he took his cue in life from
Napoleon, for most boys usually set up in their minds
a model to follow and he evidently chose Napoleon for

BOYHOOD LIFE IN WEST WINFIELD 21
his, and unconsciously took on many of his stronger
attributes. He was a most ardent admirer of the
great French hero, and proclaimed his genius and
virtues upon every suitable occasion, condoning his
shortcomings like a champion, and sympathizing with
him in his reverses. A schoolmate of his remembers
him saying — "How very unjust it is to Napoleon's
memory for the people to consider the reverses and
the record of his last years of life as the just measure
of his whole career."
The brief schooling which Father got in West Win
field, inadequate as it was, had to be discontinued when
the necessities of the family compelled him to do
something to assist in his and their support ; therefore,
when he was about fourteen years old, he went to
work for Julius Bisby, who owned the country store
in the village. His duties consisted in measuring out
calico, beans, vinegar, tobacco, candy and other things
to the villagers and farmers, and in helping to keep
the books of the establishment, always first on the
scene in the morning to open the store in order to
sweep it out and get ready for business. This he did
all day and every day, excepting Sundays, and he
devoted himself largely to reading and studying in
the evenings. The fact that his mother was an ortho
dox Christian who believed in heaven and hell and no
middle situation for departed souls, scared him and
the other children into keeping in the straight path.
Under the threat of eternal damnation, she invoked
their obedience to the ordinary and accepted code of

22 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
morals, with the promise that such obedience would
eventually make white winged angels of them; and
they all looked forward to becoming angels. Father
was not a churchman, due doubtless to the over drastic
religious teachings of his mother with which he was
not in accord, for although he was a Christian gentle
man and reverently believed in God and the hereafter,
he was inclined to be liberal in his views and to suffer
himself to be guided by the teachings of his own
conscience, rather than by the precepts and the stric
tures of an old fashioned and narrow school of
religion. My father as a boy, and in fact throughout his
development, looked like his father, but his tempera
ment, disposition and character have been drawn more
largely from his estimable mother. I did not learn
that he was athletic in the way that country boys are
apt to be, or that he had had recorded to his credit any
victories in pugilistic encounters with the village boys.
His fighting tendencies seem to have been developed
more in a mental capacity than physical, and every
one with whom he came in contact in matters of debate
or clash of wits got worsted. Such encounters he
seemed to have sought, as being much to his liking.
He evidently had, however, a pair of fine arms, for
they tell of his liking to roll up his sleeves and display
their good form and grace with their muscles in
tension, and this show of physical excellence seems to
be about the only demonstration which he was in
the habit of making.

Matilda Taylor Baker — Aged 70.
mother of wm. t. baker.

Wm. T. Baker 1849— Aged 8.
his brother and sister on either side.

BOYHOOD LIFE IN WEST WINFIELD 23
The year of service in the country store paid him
well in experience but little in money. How well this
particular first business engagement in his life paid
him, I was unable to ascertain from his contemporaries
now living, although I was more successful in the two
succeeding villages to which he migrated later. He
probably did not earn over a dollar a week. He slept
under the counter in the store, not only for the purpose
of being the first on hand in the morning, in order to
clear. the decks for business, but as a sort of watch
dog of the supplies which were kept in the store. In
fact, it was common in those days to shut a dog up in
a store at night with liberty to roam about and attack
intruders, or else to have a boy sleep there to perform
the same duty, for it was common for thieves to
attempt to pillage such places, in order to supply their
needs without rendering the usual equivalent there
for. His mother, as I have stated, was industrious from
morning to night in the care of her children and in
the doing of tailoring work for their support, while
their father spent much of his time as an idle orna
ment about the place, or the village rendezvous. She
worked after the sun set in order to accomplish more,
and these late hours had to be illuminated by the light
of tallow dips or candles, which were in vogue before
the invention of kerosene oil. Then came the cam-
phine lamps, no larger nor no better than the tallow
dip, and finally in the evolution of artificial illumina
tion as the country grew, kerosene oil and lamps to

24 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
use it came into practice. Father, ever devoted to
his, mother, and solicitous for her welfare, immedi
ately bought from his savings a primitive kerosene
lamp, to conserve his mother's eyes ; — and for the pur
pose of operating it, he supplied her with a gallon of
kerosene oil, which bore a red color in those days, and
which cost him $1.25.
The village of West Winfield is sixteen miles south
of Utica, which was the nearest railway station at
that time (1855) and accessible by a stage running
daily. The village contained a bank, a weekly paper,
a Methodist and a Baptist church, a tannery and two
grist mills. The fifty years since then has not any
more than doubled its population. There are now
about four or five hundred people there and in that
vicinity. Father never went back to his native village
after he left it as a boy, and I often wonder that neither
sentiment nor curiosity ever impelled him to do so.
I went there last summer and tramped over every
inch of ground that he did. All I needed to do was to
roll back half a century of years and imagine that I
was the real and original Billy. It thrilled me to do
so. It filled me with unspeakable joy just to sleep one
night as I did there in the same night stillness, to be
lulled to my dreams by the same cricket and katydid,
to see the same houses and the same trees — now more
stately with age, to stand by the. same mill pond where
he went swimming and fishing, to see the same pretty
girls flirting and gossiping with the same ruddy boys,
to tramp on the same dusty road and to gaze at the

BOYHOOD LIFE IN WEST WINFIELD 25
same beautiful hills and valleys. Yes, all just the
same as when he was there, only, with fresh crickets,
katydids and girls to take the place of those which
had gone down the corridors of time. I knocked at
the door of the very house in which he was born; —
little, humble, and old it is. I told them who I was
and that I had come after fifty years to see the place
where he had been. They respected my errand and
allowed me to go all through it, in every nook and
corner, — apologizing for appearances, as they said
they had not expected visitors; — up the creaky stairs
with the same thin and rickety railing, and in the
little room, the very identical little room, where he
came into being. In my imagination, I could hear
the baby cry and could see its mother's look of tender
love and pride for the new come joy. And then I
left, and as I went off down the street, I looked back
again and again where little Billy had been, and won
dered if he from the Great Beyond could then see
me and feel my great love for him as I stood there
transfixed in the contemplation of the spirits of the
past, and feeling for the moment that I too was a
little boy myself, waiting — waiting for him to come
out who never could come again.

In this Store My Father Worked as a Boy, at Groton, N. Y.

Village Hotel, Groton, N. Y.
WHERE THE DANCES WERE HELD.

Chapter II
AS A YOUTH IN GROTON AND McLEAN
185S-1861
WITH his education apparently completed at
the age of thirteen and having completed a
preliminary business career of one year as
related at the age of fourteen, Father grew too big
for West Winfield and resolved to seek a larger and
more inviting field. The vilage of Groton, Tompkins
County, New York, of about four or five hundred
people, and ninety miles from Winfield to the south
west, was the place which attracted him ; probably for
the reason that he had a better opportunity, but
undoubtedly for the principal reason that his older
brother, Professor Williams, was in that village teach
ing the only school in the place, namely the Groton
Academy. Thither he went without his mother, and
because of his brother's connection with the school
he was able to get free the schooling, which otherwise
would have cost him $21.00 per year. In the same
school his brother Ralph was janitor and his sister
Minnie was also a student, so that the family as a
whole were an important factor in educational matters
in Groton. There were no railroads running to Groton
nor within fifty miles of it, so Father may have
tramped it in reaching there, or staged it, or got a

28 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
lift in some farmer's wagon. The village had a
machine shop and foundry, and having more stores
and houses, was more pretentious generally than
West Winfield.
Father went to work as clerk for Styles Berry, who
ran a general store in Groton, and served for a period
of six months. Some say that Berry was the meanest
man in Groton village and much too close with his
money, and consequently Father was under much
restraint, and the liberties usually allowed to a grow
ing boy were well curtailed. He slept under Mr.
Berry's counter at night, dreaming of what a mean
employer he had and how unpromising his prospects
seemed to be. Berry was or pretended to be religious,
and went early to Church on Sunday, looking sancti
monious and good, while in the week days under the
cloak of piety, he would wonder how he could squeeze
his neighbors just a little harder or get a little more
work out of Billy, his clerk-bookkeeper- janitor- watch
dog combination. From Berry's, Father went to work
for Hyland K. Clark and took his meals at Mr.
Clark's house, but slept at the store as usual. Just
how and when he worked in any schooling during his
life in Groton in 1855 and 1856, is hard to imagine,
but he did get some by getting out of store duty dur
ing the hours when business was slack.
Mr. Clark took more of an interest in Father's
welfare because he was a better constructed man than
was Styles, and also because his sister married Pro
fessor Williams who was Father's half brother. The

AS A YOUTH IN GROTON AND McLEAN 29
echoes of Father's life in Groton village still sounding,
indicate that he was a happy young man and took
things philosophically as they came along, enjoying
life as best he could, but ever restless and ambitious
to better his condition in a material way. Grotonites
speak of him as nice looking. He was jolly, full of
fun, a good scholar, very cheerful, apt at learning,
and was the most popular young man in the village
with the girls, and therefore a society leader. He
loved to coast down the Groton hills in winter time,
and was captain and pilot of a big bob sled called
"Brimstone" which would carry twelve boys at one
time at a terrific rate of speed. They had a dancing
school which met every week in the village hotel,
which was then called the Groton House, but which is
now the Hotel Goodyear. The dances were held in
the parlor of this hotel and for the small price which
it cost every boy to belong, he was privileged and
expected to bring his "steady," as one's sweetheart
was then styled, and he was also privileged to bring
as many more girls as he chose, not exceeding eight
in number, and these extra girls were called "fillers."
It is remembered that Father, as being the most
popular young man in the village and perhaps the
most patriotic, was wont to exercise his fullest privi
leges in this way, much to the joy and appreciation
of the wallflower "fillers" in a village which seemed
to teem with many more girls than boys. His par
ticular fancy or steady, lived in a house which still
exists in Groton and which I forbore to take a photo-

30 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
graph of or to reminisce further about, because the
lady still lives and would likely prefer to let the matter
rest in the obscure past. She was "Esteline" to him,
which name is long enough for this book, and for the
lady too, who might object to seeing the rest of it in
print, besides she has changed the rest of it since then.
It was in Groton that Father organized and became
the leading spirit in a debating club, which was made
up of young men of the village. They debated upon
popular questions and particularly upon topics which
were being discussed as national issues, such as
slavery, which were leading up to the great Civil
War drama, which was soon to be enacted. It was
then that he grew enthusiastic as the expounder of his
hero, Napoleon, for which purpose he would have
large maps hanging on the wall and would direct the
attention of his listeners to them in a most interesting
way, spellbinding them into following him through all
of Napoleon's great campaigns, showing how the
armies of both sides were lined up against each other
and how they manoeuvred their forces to victory or
defeat. Father early had the gift of language and of
clearly and concisely expressing his thoughts, which
fact all his early contemporaries seem to remember
as one of his most conspicuous endowments.
In the village store were two other young clerks,
who probably served mostly during the hours when
Father was at school. A rivalry between the three
sprang up in the matter of penmanship and each
strove to outdo the other in the excellence of his skill

AS A YOUTH IN GROTON AND McLEAN 31
in that direction. It is told of them that they consumed
large stores of stationery in practicing this art and
that when their employer was seen coming down the
street, they would hastily stuff the stove full of the
paper upon which they had been writing and set fire
to it in order to destroy the evidence, not only of the
paper used, but of the valuable time which they had
diverted from their employer's service. Father's
friends both early and recent, will remember the excel
lence of his penmanship throughout his whole life and
they will be pleased to know how he attained perfec
tion in the art in the manner above related.
It appears in Groton also, that Father was not
religious, although reverential in the highest degree.
The cloak of religion which his former employer wore
as a covering, added to the recollection of the ten
verses from the Bible that he had to learn every Sun
day, as well as going to "meeting" and Sunday School
on every occasion; — these things probably all com
bined to draw him away from religious ideas as they
were then taught. He had, however, all the compen
sating graces that a young man could have. He was
never known to do a mean thing nor to tell a lie nor
steal, even in such forgivable ways as invading a
neighbor's melon patch. He could be depended upon
as the everlasting friend of any one who had claims
upon his friendship. One lovely lady in Groton told
me that if she ever got into any straits in her girl
hood, she always depended upon Will Baker to help
her out of them and Will Baker's fertility of resource

32 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
and his ever ready wit always succeeded in saving her,
or any one else he had under his protection, from the
wrath of irate schoolmasters, parents or neighbors.
I was unable to learn that Father ever did anything
that he was ashamed of afterwards, although they say
he cut plenty of capers of a nature not very serious;
that he was a practical joker and very fond of dis
playing his skill in this direction on anybody and
everybody, and that he liked to win a girl away from
another fellow, not because he wanted the girl, but to
show the other fellow that he could do it.
There lived in the village of Groton at this time,
Robert C. Reynolds, who was the partner of Hyland
Clark and therefore was Father's employer. He was
the patron saint of the village among the boys. He
was the one who financed their picnics, their base
ball contests and many of their good times generally.
It was about this time that the ice cream age began.
Early in that important epoch, when this dainty article
was first discovered or invented, there was a display
of it at the County Fair, to which Father and the
other boys and girls of course went. It was pink and
it was white, and it was 5 cents for a whole glass
and 3 cents for half a glass. It is said that Mr.
Reynolds who beheld Billy Baker as he gazed upon ice
cream for the first time in his life, with mouth awater
and eyes agleam, perceived a strong affinity existing
between the icecream and Billy and accordingly slipped
into his hand, three copper pennies. So Billy had his
first ice cream, and never again did anything taste

AS A YOUTH IN GROTON AND McLEAN 33
so good to him. He took pink, topped with a dash
of white. And again, it was Mr. Reynolds, who when
the village school house came near being sold for
debt, bought it in and saved it for the village until
such a time as it could be redeemed. The boys all
loved him and Father did as well as the rest, and
there is no doubt but what this good man's interest
in him tended much to mould his early career.
Finally in the course of events, and in less than
two years, Father outgrew Groton as he had out
grown Winfield, and the time came for him to move
on to greater opportunities. His instinct drew him
another pace to the West, this time to the village of
McLean six miles away. Preliminary to his depart
ure, there were scenes, some open and some undis
closed, where disappointment and grief reigned
among those whom he was to leave behind. The
schoolboys and girls grieved at his going away,
especially as he was going alone and so far, — six
miles. There were little farewells for his benefit;
some formal and some informal. In the village school,
little speeches were made by the boys and girls and
it was hard to restrain a sob or two. His brother
Ralph in order to stifle his feelings upon one of these
occasions, had stuffed his mouth full of dry bread,
but when the pressure of grief became greater than
the tension of his lips and cheeks, the bread could
no longer be restrained and so flew in a shower of
crumbs all over the floor, which incident prompted
Father to say that he hoped "he would make in his

34 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
future career, as many dollars as Ralph had expelled
grains of bread from his mouth." At this point it is
well to mention that the commercial instinct satur
ated Father through and through; that he had an
ambition to make money and that he was a natural
born trader and money maker, as demonstrated so
well in his later business career.
Father landed in McLean village, New York, from
Groton in 1856, and his life there altogether com
prised five years. He worked for Daniel B. Marsh
& Co., and took his meals at the house of John O.
Marsh, sleeping in the store as usual, his employ
ment being in the same lines that engaged him in
Winfield and Groton, namely clerk in the village store,
including the postoffice job and distributing the village
mail, but it is said he never read the post cards the
way country postmistresses usually do. He was too
busy and too honorable. McLean is a little village
of about 1 50 now, sleeping among the hills of Central
New York, figuratively and in reality, in a most beau
tiful natural environment. It probably had more
people in it then, than now, for the coming of the
railroad there in later years did not help it at all, but
rather diverted business from it to the larger towns.
Although he went to a smaller place, he went to
larger opportunities, for the country around traded in
McLean more often and upon a larger scale than in
other places, and "Marsh's store" was the principal
emporium of that part of the State. Father kept
books there and sold beans, spruce gum, and cheese-

% ¥

Millpond and Swimming Pool at McLean.

Residence of Mr. Marsh, at McLean.

AS A YOUTH IN GROTON AND McLEAN 35
cloth, bolts, plows and pickles the same as in the other
places, and was an expert on all of these commodities.
Here he outgrew "Billy" and became "Bill."
His power as a debator and as an orator in embryo
became here more rounded out than in the other
places. The village store in McLean was in every
sense the club of the village. Store kept open until nine
or ten o'clock at night and the villagers always rounded
up there at mail time and for the purpose of discuss
ing slavery and war topics and all the news generally.
They would sit on the top of vinegar kegs and sugar
barrels and on the corners of the counter and listen
to each other's views, and Bill Baker, as master of
ceremonies, made the place lively with his opinions
and theories, positive then as ever afterwards, and
he was looked upon as the 'one best calculated to
mould public opinion locally and to reflect the mean
ing of events transpiring in the country at large.
He had a debating society here and also discoursed
upon Napoleon as he had done before, believing in
him as the best exponent of popular liberty. The
debating club met once in two weeks at the school
house. He proclaimed himself in this village as a
Republican in politics in 1858, which was his first
pronouncement of a political faith, in which he was
ardent and active, and he continued through his life
as a Republican in politics, until Grover Cleveland
appeared as. a candidate for President. He became
very popular with the old people in McLean. He
was quick witted, quick at repartee, and was the

36 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
brightest there. He was intensely earnest in his work
and in everything else including play. For his ser
vices in the store at McLean he received $50.00 per
year, but he also got his board and washing, although
he had to provide his clothes independently. In the
loft of the store, one may still see where he carved
"Wm. T. Baker" on the back wall.
In the country about McLean are maple tree
groves, and the making of maple sugar was one of
the industries. They used to have sugar grove pic
nics and there were no picnics in those days in that
part of the world that Bill Baker did not go to. They
used to tap the sugar trees and lap the raw sap as it
came percolating through the bark, for it was very
inviting to the taste. One's capacity for this kind of
diet comes to a sudden limit, and I remember Father
telling stories of the sugar camps and how he and the
other boys and girls used to eat sugar sap until they
got sick, and then they would eat cucumber pickles,
which acted as an antidote and thus put them in shape
to go at the sugar sap again, which operation would
be repeated until the sap gave out or the pickles did,
or until night came, or some other cause prevented a
continuance of the operation. Father had time to play
as well as work, and he was as earnest in his play as
he was in his work. He was especially fond of base
ball, for the reason that being light of foot he was a
splendid runner in making the bases and securing
home runs. Being a sprinter stood him in good stead
in this game. He always liked the game even in later

AS A YOUTH IN GROTON AND McLEAN 37
life, and used to attend many of them with me when
I was a boyi
In my rural pilgrimage following Father's trail
from one village to another, and in the villages, I cov
ered McLean as well, — I rambled about wherever I
thought he rambled. I went to the Marsh home where
he boarded and to the store where he clerked, stood
behind the same counter that he did, and for five'
minutes was as ready as he was to sell goods, but it
was a dull day and no customers came. I strolled up
the road by the creek to ask a man ninety years old who
had always lived there, what he knew about a boy named
Bill Baker who used to live there, but he didn't know
anything on the subject, for the poor old man lived
only in the present, with the end of it all just down
the way in the future. So then I took a snapshot of
the pond by the grist mill, made by a dam in the
creek where the boys used to swim and where they
still do.
In McLean, Father took sick and nearly died with
typhoid fever. There seemed little likelihood of his
living to get well again, but he did after a long and
lingering siege of it, and it was due largely to the
tender nursing of a young woman to whom he was
devoted and who was in turn to him, that he finally
got well. This illness left him partially deaf and
he ever afterwards so remained. It is not necessary
to mention the name of the young woman that I have
just referred to or to describe her except to say that
she was an attractive "schoolmarm" and that she is

38 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
still living in another part of the same State, having
married another and raised a family of her own. To
her I am grateful for a picture of my father as he
appeared at the age of nineteen. This affair is said
to have been of considerable time standing and very
serious with both parties, but there finally came a mis
understanding, after which they ceased to "keep com
pany," so that I looked elsewhere for a mother and
in time really did get a "schoolmarm" for one. It
is possible that this love affair had something to do
with Father's finally leaving McLean for good, for
undoubtedly he would be as intensely serious in love
as he would be in business.
How could he have lived in this little place for five
years, through the long cold snowbound winters and
the hot summers? I wondered at it when I looked
about the store. He doubtless wondered at it too
whenever he lifted his head high enough to see how
the world was moving on, how great the country was
becoming, and how big cities and towns were spring
ing up throughout the great unbounded West. He
was getting to be a man and he was all aglow with
an ambition to strike out for new fields. He grew
into the powers of young manhood and with it came
a spirit of great unrest. The world seemed to beckon to
him to come on and match himself against all men. He
saw that he was already all he could expect to be if he
remained — he felt that boundless opportunity stood
before him if he went. He had the courage, the
strength, the ability and the indomitable spirit neces-

Village of McLean, N. Y.
THE STORE BEHIND THE BUGGY IS WHERE MY FATHER WORKED AS A YOUTH.

AS A YOUTH IN GROTON AND McLEAN 39
sary for success. He had a good name and no money.
He was fired with an ambition often expressed to
make his mark in the world. He was filled with the
highest hopes and he had fears of nothing. His whole
nature was afire with the spirit of adventure, conquest
and independence. Thus appointed, was he the one to
stay in McLean ? Not he, — not in a thousand years !
Leave there he would, and make his fortune in the
far West, and the time to do it was now, and not
tomorrow. He talked much with the boys in the village, trying
to get some of them to go out West with him and seek
their fortunes with him, showing them how the oppor
tunities in the village were few and limited and that
it was not a place to tie to if one wanted to expand
and grow with the progress of things in the world at
large. There seems to have been no one with nerve
or bravery enough to wish to follow him out into the
world, but he went nevertheless — alone, while the
others stayed and watched his star rise in the West
as he came to the threshhold of the great destiny
which the future had in store for him, while theirs
stood still over McLean.
About this time the gold discoveries in the Rocky
Mountains caused a frenzy of excitement throughout
the land. It stampeded Father just at the time he
wanted to be stampeded. He saw the roadway of his
future paved with gold and glory. Westward the
course of Empire was going and in that procession
he felt he belonged. He rose to the occasion in the

40 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
full stature of his life and met the crisis before him.
He shook off the mantle of McLean, borrowed forty
dollars from his employer and struck out for the great
wide West. The boy of Winfield, Groton and Mc
Lean had ceased to be; it was a man and every inch
a man, that then stepped foot into the young town of
Chicago in 1861, stranded, en route to the gold fields
of the Rocky Mountains.

1860— Aged 19.

1868— Aged 27.

1878— Aged 37. 1893— Aged 5a.
William Taylor Baker.

Chapter III
CAREER IN CHICAGO'
1861-1903
44 \\ JILLIAM T. BAKER, bookkeeper, Hinck-
\\ ley & Handy, 2d Washington."
The above is what one will read in the
city directory of Chicago for the year 1862, and that
tells the story of his beginning there and for a while
at least. When he landed at the depot in Chicago it was
night and he had with him his full stock in trade, viz.,
his grip, $4.00 and himself, together with the inspira
tion he had read of George Washington having for his
guide, "I hope I shall always possess firmness enough
to maintain what I consider the most enviable of all
titles, the character of an 'Honest Man.' " He was a
stranger and was tired out and had never been in
so big a place before, so he felt justified in hiring a
hack to go to a hotel which some one on the train
had recommended to him as being reasonable and
decent. The hackman "knew where it was all right"
and drove him a long way around several squares in
the city and finally put him down at the place to which
he had been directed to go. Father then had $1.50
less in money, but he went to bed that night and
dreamed of the future and all that he hoped it had in
store for him, and when he awoke he looked out the

42 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
window upon the city. In front of him and only
across the street stood the depot where he had gotten
off the train the night before, and then he felt as green
as he had doubtless appeared to the hackman. And
this was his beginning in Chicago in the year 1861.
Chicago at that time was a husky young town of
120,000 people and had had for ten years the most
rapid growth of any previous period in its history,
or in fact, of any subsequent period. Only ten years
before, in 1851, it had not more than 30,000 people,
and everybody is familiar with the well known picture
of Chicago in 1833 when it was merely a trading post
where the Indians came to barter their skins and other
merchandise to the white people. The town was then
composed of a small stockade called Ft. Dearborn, a
store and a dwelling; and the Chicago River was
merely a winding creek or rivulet which could hardly
accommodate a craft any larger than an Indian canoe.
The Minneways, a tribe of Indians, inhabited this sec
tion of the land, and they called the post "Checagau,"
which in their language meant "wild onion." Of
course the town growing as it had been doing since
that primitive time and drawing people as it was then
doing from all sections of the country, gave it a wide
advertisement, and resulted in its being talked about
and discussed just as is now the case of Seattle.
Chicago then of course, became the Mecca of am
bitious and adventurous spirits, and it was that kind
of people who laid the foundation for the metropolis
which the future was to bring forth. The total value

CAREER IN CHICAGO 43
of Chicago, as Father first saw it, was only about
$36,000,000 in real estate and personal property
according to the then assessed valuation, and against
this it had a debt of a little over $2,000,000. Think of
the number of her citizens now who could buy and
pay for the whole city as it was then, and still have
something left. Even a man of frugal means could
have bought the whole city a few years before the time
of Father's coming, for it will be recalled how Mr.
Kinzie the first American settler there bought all the
north half of Chicago for the sum of $50.00, having
taken the trade off the hands of another man who
had made it, and who felt that he had gotten a bad
bargain, and so worried himself sick over it until
Kinzie came along and did him this good turn, after
having been begged and beseeched to do so.
In 1858 the business district of Chicago was con
fined to that part of the city north of Madison Street
to the River, and from Fifth Avenue to Michigan Ave
nue. The rest of what is now called the Loop District
was mainly a residential quarter, where lived the mer
chant princes and traders of the time. Van Buren
Street on the South, Halsted on the West, and
Chicago Avenue on the North were the extreme
limits of the City. At this time local transportation
was principally by omnibus. Street railways were just
coming into operation on a few of the principal streets,
and were of course operated by animal power.
When Father came to Chicago, most of the streets
were dirt roads, which later they began to surface

44 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
with gravel, and some of the streets in the business
part were planked over, but modern paving was not
thought of. The town had a water works, and build
ings commensurate with its size, but most of the
buildings were of wood, especially in the residence dis
trict. John Wentworth was Mayor — 6 feet 6 inches
tall, and that is why they called him "Long John." He
might have been called Honest John or Fighting John,
for he was all that such names imply; and old Chi-
cagoans look back upon his several terms of service
in the Mayor's chair as perhaps the most efficient in
the city's history.
It was the natural place for a city to grow, and
that is why it was born there; for nobody would
deliberately choose as the site for a future city a dis
mal swamp as Chicago was then. It was however
the point where the trade with the vast and growing
agricultural districts of the Middle West converged
and established the commerce of the Great Lakes.
The farmers at this time brought their wheat to town
by wagons and unloaded it by hand into the grain
warehouses. The wheat merchants in those days went
out into the rural districts and met the farmers and
traded with them, buying their wheat after actually
seeing it grow in the fields or stored in the graneries
on the farms. That was the wheat business then —
quite in contrast with what it has developed into since
and as one sees it today, when the grain kings seldom
see their grain and only know of it by holding un
certain options upon it.

CAREER IN CHICAGO 45
It was not Chicago, however, that my father started
out to find. His ambition, as I have already stated,
was to dig for gold in the Rocky Mountains rather
than to find it in the channels of business. His touch
ing at Chicago was an incident of his trip, and his
staying there was an incident of the financial condition
in which he found himself and which made it impos
sible for him to proceed further. So he started out
to look the town over and see what it would do for him
in the way of his getting a temporary living and sav
ing enough besides to permit him to continue on his
journey at a later time. He remembered that he had
in his pocket a letter to Julius Chambers from Mrs.
Marsh of McLean, for whose husband he had worked
in that village, and in whose home he boarded there.
Mr. Chambers and Mrs. Marsh were related in some
way. Pie did not expect to use the letter except per
haps to afford him a few hours acquaintance and rec
reation while passing through the town, but as the
letter stated that "Billy was the best clerk Mr. Marsh
ever had in his store," he thought he would use it and
see if the "best clerk" certificate for McLean would
have any value or meaning for a place as big as
Chicago. Undaunted, therefore, he sought out Mr.
Chambers and told him of his purpose and ambition.
Mr. Chambers took a real interest in him, as people
generally did when he was first presented to them. It
was through Mr. Chambers, therefore, that he was
introduced to the firm of Hinckley & Handy, which
firm ran a commission business on South Water Street

46 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
near the river, dealing in grain and general prov
isions. The firm sized up the candidate for a job very
thoroughly and carefully, and they particularly
wanted to know if he could keep books. "O, yes, he
could keep books all right; he had done that in the
largest and only store in McLean," and although the
bookkeeping there had consisted only of adding up
the sales at the bottom of the page every day, and
seeing if it footed with the cash in the drawer, yet he
did not go into details as to that, but simply asserted
his ability as a master of the art. He was therefore
engaged on trial and told to report the next morning.
He went out feeling very happy at getting to work
so soon, for it made Pikes' Peak and the Rocky Moun
tains loom up much larger and nearer than they had
ever done before in his contemplation of that ambi
tion. But he realized as he left the store that keeping
books in McLean was one thing and keeping them in
Chicago for a large commission house was another
thing. So he hunted up a book store and purchased
a text book on the subject of bookkeeping, which took
nearly all the money he had left. He staid up all night
with his book and studied it from beginning to end, so
that when he took his position for duty the next day he
felt himself pretty well equipped to cope with the situ
ation. He applied himself to this new task with the
same earnestness that he always did to anything which
he undertook, so that he not only was able to do the
work, but he soon became an expert bookkeeper and

CAREER IN CHICAGO 47
accountant, and he invented forms and devices for
keeping books which were particularly adapted to the
grain trade, and which are today in vogue in the grain
business in Chicago. He soon gave up the ambition
to go further West as he became better acquainted
with the people and more contented with his immedi
ate environment. He made friends rapidly and grew
in the esteem and favor of his employers, and he soon
began to feel himself a part of the bone and sinew
of the throbbing young Chicago.
Being an expert bookkeeper, however, even for a
Chicago firm, which perhaps at one time might have
been the zenith of his ambition, would not do for one
of his calibre indefinitely. The firm which employed
him also began to see that he was really too big for
his job and that his sphere of usefulness should be
expanded; so he went into the pit on the board of
trade and became the trader for the firm while his
salary was increased correspondingly. Then it was
not very long, and in fact not over a year after his
arrival, before the firm saw that they were going to lose
him if they did not take him in and make him one of
them as a partner, and this was done, although his
name did not appear at the time in the firm name,
but a "Co." was added to it, he being the "Co.," and
the firm thereafter being styled Hinckley, Handy & Co.
This business arrangement continued for only a year
or so, when both Messrs. Hinckley and Handy con
cluded to retire from business and so withdrew from
the firm which was therefore dissolved about the year

48 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
1864. My father then continued alone under the style
of William T. Baker, and he so continued to do until
1868, his place of business being first on South Water
Street, and then on LaSalle Street, near Washington.
He was twenty-seven years old at this time and is
remembered as being well groomed, fastidious in his
attire and five feet eight inches tall and about 165
pounds in weight. In order to inspire confidence and
lend to his appearance that dignity which perhaps a
youthful countenance failed to give it, he began about
this time to wear bushy sandy side whiskers and a
moustache, which style in changing degrees he
affected for the balance of his life. He favored the
blond type in his complexion and the color of his
hair and eyes.
Being a chip off the old block — his mother — he
was thrifty and saved his money and soon begun to
have little investments of his own, both in the firm
and out of it. Then in a little while he felt that he
was getting rich enough to take care of still another
besides himself, and his mother and sister whom he
had been supporting.
Now, of course, a young man, like what we know
him to have been at that time, was not the kind to
shut himself up from all society and good times; in
fact if there was anything going on he was sure to
be identified in some way or other, and so it came to
pass that among the young ladies whom he knew and
liked to go with, he finally met my mother, who was
a school teacher. He had a liking for "schoolmarms."

CAREER IN CHICAGO 49
This affair became serious after about a year and re
sulted in their getting married, but I will tell about
that event in the next chapter which I will give to
a brief sketch of her. They went first to the Sherman
House and afterwards to live modestly in a .boarding
house at 24 Washington Street, but like most young
wives she wanted a home of their own, so they rented
a small cottage on the west side, which in after times
we used to drive by and which Father used to point
to as the first home he had in Chicago and as the
place where I was born. I have no idea just where
this house was or if it is still in existence, although I
do remember that with the raising of the grade of
the streets of Chicago it was left about ten feet below
the sidewalk. Later they moved into 22nd Street on
the corner of the alley between Prairie and Indian
Avenues, being the end 'house in a row of four small
frame houses which were in after years demolished to
give place to the residence of Mr. Byaion L. Smith.
At this time the great Civil War was begirmimg and
every one's fortunes were affected in varying degrees.
Father was fired with the patriotism and warlike
spirit which characterized most of the young Ameri
cans at that time. He was bent upon shouldering a
musket and going to the front where hostilities were
already under way -between the North and South. But
he had a young and pleading wife who clung to him
and tearfully besought him to remember her little self
who did not waat to be a widow, so that he stayed
home and hired a man for $1,000 to go in his place as

50 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
a substitute. This man turned out to be a "bounty
jumper," as it developed later that he did not go to
the war as agreed, although he took Father's money.
However, there was a threatened outbreak at Camp
Douglas, near Chicago, where many Southern pris
oners were held captive, so that Father volunteered
and was sworn in for picket duty in connection with
that encampment ; and it is told of him that in the chilly
and spectral night he paraded up and down with a
rifle on his shoulder ready to shoot down any bold
Southern rebel who might dare to try to get away.
This picket duty was all the actual active warfare in
which he engaged for the protection of the republic,
and how long he thus served I do not know. He how
ever was active with his voice, and was a ready and
lively participant in public meetings and debates where
the burning questions of the times were under dis
cussion. Now if the nation lost by Father's staying home
from the war, it probably gained in another way, for
babies began to arrive in the 22nd Street home. The
stork roosted on the roof of that house with more
indulgence to those inside of it, than he did to any of
the neighbors, and so quite a little colony was formed
as more specifically set forth in the following chapter.
It became a little kingdom in itself, ruled by a real
king and presided over by a fond and indulgent sun
shine queen, with lesser subjects varying in import
ance, size and temperament, who warred with each
other or made peace according to the conditions exist-

CAREER IN CHICAGO 51
ing from time to time, which best served for the one
or the other.
In this house the children were all born except the
first two and the last one. It was in this house that
my brother and I received our first real and undiluted
paternal discipline. It came about from the fact that
Father had indulged the family in the luxury of a new
set of cane-seated chairs for the dining room, and in
deed, to us at that time such a set of chairs was a luxury.
Then came an evil genus into the heads of my brother
and myself, which prompted us to rise up exceptionally
early one morning and go to the dining room, where
with hatchet and hammer we pounded the seats out
of every chair in the room. It was useless to attempt
to prove an alibi, and he therefore exercised his right
of "habeas corpus," we being the "corpuses," and im
prisoned us each in a room by himself with the light
shut off, moored to the bedpost by a clothesline for the
space of three days, after first having been whipped
with a horse whip. This is my candid recollection of
that incident, but Father always claimed that we were
only spanked and shut up for an hour.
Thus it was that Father's children made interesting
his domestic life, which may have added more zeal to
his business career,— at least I shall be happy to think
that any of our little acts of thoughtlessness may have
spurred him on to greater efforts in his business. It
was in this house or rather in the barn in the rear of
it, that ten cents of Father's money appropriated for
our Sunday school exchequer was diverted from and

52 life of William tayi^r baker
never yet has reached the said exchequer, but was con
verted instead into a long black cigar which gave my
brother and me and another boy at the average age
of ten, our first (my last) smoke, instead of being
bored by going to Sunday school. That smoking party
broke up before it was over or the fire out, and resulted
in three small boys dragging themselves home, as they
thought, to die. The mother who stooped to kiss the
coming angels, smiled in her grief and became un
sympathetic, for our breaths were fragrant with the
tell-tale tobacco. It was in this house that Father
began to spank, and as time went on more spankees
came in for spanks. It is hardly possible that real
good reasons existed for such ministrations, so maybe
it was simply a passing down to posterity that which
undoubtedly formed in his youth — a part of his par
ental blessings. Doubtless the advanced guards of his
posterity felt at the time that he was actuated solely
by the wotthy motive of getting even for what ances
tral discipline had showered upon him, and doubtless
the same advanced guards then finally resolved to
abide their time through the years to follow, when
they too might hope to do some showering.
As the family grew in numbers and prosperity, the
end house of the wooden row was outgrown, and so
we moved to 797 Michigan Avenue, which was after
wards numbered 2238, being the southernmost one of
the Orphan Asylum's brick houses between 22nd and
23rd Streets. We took up our abode at this place in
1867, the new environment being to our family quite

CAREER IN CHICAGO 53
a coming up in the world. Father took this, house
under a ten year lease at a thousand dollars, a year.
This house had a back yard to it with a high board
fence in the rear, which served as a barricade between
our premises and the playground of the Orphan
Asylum children. There were knot holes in this fence,
which we boys used as loop holes when we engaged in
warfare with the orphans on the other side. We
would shoot pebbles through at them with sling shots
and often seriously damaged them, and they would
throw heavy missiles back, which often went over
the top of the fence and through the rear windows of
our house, which would result in peace being arranged
between our parents and the managers of the Orphan
Asylum, by the terms of which our parents usually
had to pay a financial forfeit or indemnity, taking the
same out of our several hides. While our business
was thus going on through the fence and over it,
Father was conducting his with equal energy,
although in a more peaceful way down town. Father
was well on the way to fortune and we children were
in the halcyon days of our childhood joys, when on
September 17th, 1873 a great sorrow came to our
household, for our young mother was. killed in a run
away. I will tell more of this in the chapter I will
write about her. The sunshine which was thus
clouded from my father's life probably caused him
to plunge more deeply into business and lend austerity
and sternness to his character. It in a way drew him
from his children, whose proper bringing up he then

54 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
delegated to our mother's sister, Mrs. Mary Smith,
a widow, who then came and presided over the home.
Among his business acquaintances at this time were
two other young men — Mr. Walter F. Cobb and
Charles A. Knight, who in a partnership relation be
tween themselves had been operating a business simi
lar to Father's, with more or less success. The clients
of Messrs. Knight and Cobb and those of my father
and several other commission houses had bought a
very considerable amount of corn about this time, both
seller September and buyer October, and foolishly
enough as it afterwards proved, these several interests
combined together to force grain to a higher price level.
The result of this attempted corner proved very dis
astrous to the trade generally, as it also did to all the
parties interested, as it caused the failure of six or
seven Board of Trade houses. When the horizon
cleared after this occurrence, my father found that
he must seek for a new line of customers and more
capital, as he was left with only moderate means ; and
Mr. Cobb and Mr. Knight found themselves in the
same situation. As a result of this misfortune the
three young men were brought closer together, with
the result that after several conferences they estab
lished a new firm under the style of Knight, Baker
& Co., in which firm Mr. Cobb also joined. This firm
began business in 1869 with offices opposite the Board
of Trade in La Salle Street. Under the partnership
arrangement it became the duty of Mr. Knight and
my father to take turns in travelling to look up cus-

CAREER IN CHICAGO 55
tomers and attending to the business on the Board of
Trade, while Mr. Cobb had charge of the finances and
general business of the office. Theirs was essentially
a grain shipping business, it being their purpose to
develop it principally along that line and to the great
est extent possible, in the ambition of making their
firm the strongest and most important one in the busi
ness. The business, however, consisted mostly in ship
ping grain to the New England States by the different
railway systems — called through lines — and they also
did a moderate business via the Lakes and the Erie
Canal, which required very close watching as very
keen competition had to be met. The combined
energies of the three partners developed the business
rapidly and the firm soon became one of the most
prosperous. Then when the future was beginning to look the
brightest, the great Chicago fire came along, begin
ning October 8, 1871, and for two days devastated
the most valuable portion of the city, destroying al
most entirely the business section, and driving thou
sands of people from their homes. History had re
corded no greater conflagration than this. In the
short time that the flames were at work, 3^ square
miles in area were devastated and $187,000,000 of
property went up in smoke, and over 300 people lost
their lives. That which had been a magnificent, sub
stantial and prosperous city of forty-seven years'
building, was reduced in a few hours to a heap of
smouldering ruins. Nothing was left but ashes and

56 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
debris to show where the young metropolis, only two
days before had stood. This catastrophe of course,
destroyed the business of my father's firm, although
it caused them comparatively little property loss for
the reason that their holdings of grain had been
largely stored in elevators which had not been reached
by the fire, and they were fortunate as well in collect
ing a good percentage of insurance on grain destroyed.
Nothing daunted, however, they took heart again in
common with the prevailing spirit of the stricken citi
zens, and in a few days they opened up a temporary
office in the basement of our house at 797 Michigan
Avenue, about two miles from the former business
centre. There was no business centre immediately follow
ing the fire and the people conducted their business in
their homes, — if they had not been destroyed by the
fire, or in tents or board sheds constructed for the pur
pose in private yards or vacant lots scattered about
the city. The temporary office at home was soon
abandoned and a new location secured in a loft on
Canal Street on the west bank of the river, near where
the Board of Trade was temporarily holding its busi
ness sessions. Soon afterwards the Board of Trade
constructed a temporary edifice which was known as
the "Wigwam," and which occupied Washington
Street from Market Street to the river. The office
next in order occupied by the firm was a space about
15 x 30 feet in this wigwam. This location also was
temporary, and later, after the city had begun to re-

CAREER IN CHICAGO 57
build, they moved down Washington Street to a loca
tion between La Salle and Wells Streets. Although
they againi begun to do fairly well, as their business
was strictly brokerage and commission, the same
could not be said of their clients, and this fact resulted
in Mr. Knight becoming very discouraged at the busi
ness outlook, so that he withdrew from the firm in
1872, taking with him the bulk of the capital. Mr.
Cobb and my father thereupon with a capital of not
over $10,000 between the two of them, branched out
once more under the firm name of Wm. T. Baker &
Co., and took a fine large suite of offices at 84 and 86
La Salle Street.
At this location they displayed a good front, spend
ing a large sum of money in elaborate office furniture
and fittings, together with an arrangement of private
offices, with the idea that this display would give the
impression of prosperity. In undoubtedly did give
that impression and helped them to build up a valuable
line of customers. With much zeal, nerve and indus
try, Father then started out to get a share of the busi
ness of some of the largest houses in New York, Phila
delphia and Boston, and he succeeded in this purpose
with the result that the business from that time grew
very rapidly. Jesse Hoyt & Co. and David Dows
& Co. of New York handled their business for them
at the eastern end. In 1877 Mr. Cobb, in behalf
of the firm, went abroad and established connections
in Europe, with the result that in a very short time
the firm became large exporters of grain on through

58 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
bills of lading, the grain being transferred at the sea
board from cars to ocean going vessels. Dewar and
Webb of London, an extensive grain house of that
city, were their chief correspondents abroad. The
firm of Wm. T. Baker & Co. now came into the zenith
of its career and developed into one of the largest
grain shipping houses in the world.
Each success stimulated Father to greater ambi
tions and the broadening of the scope of his com
mercial activities, setting higher each time the goal
to which they aspired. He began to think that the
firm should have a navy of its own to ply upon the
Great Lakes and engage in the carrying trade, not only
for their own shipments, but for independent ship
ments as well. This idea resulted in the building of the
schooner Rutherford B. Hayes in 1878. At that time
she was the largest carrier upon the Great Lakes, her
capacity being 50,000 bushels of corn. While they
were casting about for a name for the schooner which
was then on the ways, my father happened to be in
attendance at the Republican National Convention,
which was then being held in Chicago, and on that
day Rutherford B. Hayes was nominated for the
Presidency of the United States. When he returned
to the office he said, "I have a name for the schooner.
We will name her after the luckiest man in the coun
try." She was accordingly so named, and Father took
one of my brothers and myself to the christening when
she was launched near Detroit. This schooner not
only served the purpose of carrier for the convenience

CAREER IN CHICAGO 59
of the firm and its clients, but served the profitable
purpose at times of a regulator of freight rates out
of Chicago, for Father undoubtedly had this feature
in mind when he conceived the idea of building the
ship. When it happened that the firm had no cargo
of their own for the Playes, she was immediately let
out to other shippers and the rates she made for the
service did much towards establishing reasonable
charges by other vessel owners. Often too, they used
the Hayes in this way to lower rates, of which they
availed themselves by chartering other vessels for
their own business. The schooner Hayes was a re
markable vessel in that she had a larger capacity than
any vessel of her dimensions, and she was endowed
with unusual seaworthiness, however, she now lies
at the bottom of the lakes, having foundered as the
result of a collision several years after the firm ceased
to own her.
As a companion to the Hayes, Baker & Co. pur
chased the powerful steamer Antelope with the idea
of having her tow the Hayes in tandem with other
vessels for the purpose of making better time between
Chicago and Buffalo than could be insured from sail
ing independently and depending upon the winds
alone. The Antelope carried considerable cargo, as
well as serving in the towing capacity, but this experi
ment did not prove successful so that the steamer was
sold some time after.
The business of the firm grew and continued more
and more prosperous. At one time they had borrowed

60 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
in connection with this business half of the deposits
of the First National Bank of Chicago. In other
words their loans amounted to about. $3,000,000 at
3 per cent. The bank then was, of course, much smaller
than at the present time. Naturally they had. de
veloped a very high order of credit and were held in
great esteem and confidence by the banks generally
and the other Board of Trade firms.
It was about this time that James R. Keene owned
practically all the wheat in Chicago and the lard as
well, while Baker & Co. owned most of the corn. Mr.
Keene and associates had formed a combination to
control the wheat market and Mr. Keene was manipu
lating it. J. K. Fisher & Co. who represented part of
the Keene interests in Chicago, had bought and held
for him about three million bushels of wheat, when
one morning Mr. A. J. Fisher received a telephone
message at the Chicago Club saying that an important
night dispatch had been received at his office which
said "Sell all wheat you can" (above a certain price),
and the dispatch was signed "Keene." Mr. Fisher
hurried to the Board of Trade and began disposing
of the wheat as rapidly as he could, at the same time
telegraphing Mr. Keene of the amounts as fast as he
sold. My father happened to be in Mr. Keene's office
at the time in New York, and of course they were
much perplexed and disturbed by Mr. Fisher's dis
patches, as they knew that something was wrong and
that probably Mr. Fisher was acting under instruc
tions contained in a bogus telegram. As a check upon

CAREER IN CHICAGO 61
Fisher's operations, therefore, my father's firm, who
were also large holders of wheat bought for Keene,
under his telegraphic instructions immediately began
buying in wheat under authority from Mr. Keene to
replace that which had been sold, and Fisher did not
find out until after he had sold all of Keene's holdings
that he had really acted without his orders. Fisher,
as soon as he knew that he had been duped, immedi
ately went to Mr. Cobb as the only person in Chicago
with whom to trust with his secret, knowing that he
had full information as to what he had done, and he
therefore gave Baker & Co. an order to buy back all
the wheat which he had sold' — 3/000,000 bushels — and
this was done the next day by Baker & Co. at a slight
profit over the sales. This bogus dispatch episode
was one of the things that will always be remembered
m connection with Board of Trade history, and the
result of it was that Fathers' firm thereafter handled
all the Keene business.
In 1 88 1 the firm of William T. Baker & Co. took
a large office in the corner of the new Chamber of
Commerce Building at the corner of La Salle Street
and Washington Street, and in addition to their estab
lished grain business, they opened up a department for
buying and selling stocks and bonds on the New York
Stock Exchange. In this connection the firm inaugu
rated a private wire system -between New York and
Chicago, they being one of the first to attempt such a
novel and expensive innovation. The wire cost $25,-
000 a year under a lease from the Western Union

62 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
Telegraph Company, to which had to be added the
expense of the operator at both ends of the line. They
established their business and private wire connection
in New York for their new department with McGinnis
Bros. & Fearing, who afterwards failed, causing them
a loss of $100,000. The next New York connec
tion was Jameson, Smith & Cotting, which firm after
wards became J. D. Smith & Co., and this business
relation was kept up as long as the business was con
tinued, and it proved a profitable one. It is said how
ever, that Father had no liking for the stock business
and much preferred the grain trade. As soon as the
Board of Trade moved to its present location at the
head of La Salle Street, Baker & Co. took the large
banking office in the Counselman Building where they
remained until the spring of 1888. Mr. Cobb in this
year withdrew from the firm, thus leaving Father alone
in the business, which continued under the style of
William T. Baker & Co. as previously. The relations
of the two partners during their twenty years of
association were always of the pleasantest, each hav
ing the entire respect and confidence and friendship of
the other, and Mr. Cobb's retirement which was actu
ated by his desire to cease the activities and worries of
a business career and to enjoy life quietly, was regret
fully yielded to by his associate. At the time of Mr.
Cobb's retirement Father moved his business head
quarters to the Phoenix Building, now the Western
Union Telegraph Company Building. This was in
1888. He continued the business there until 1893,

CAREER IN CHICAGO 63
when he was elected President of the World's Fair
and he thereupon retired from business and closed up
the affairs of his firm.
He suffered the usual ups and downs which are
apt to be met with in that line of business. The firm
began with practically nothing, and their combined
assets varying from time to time, never exceeded $i,-
000,000, the respective interests of my father and Mr.
Cobb being two-thirds and one-third. Father was
almost invariably a bull in the market, and the persist
ency which characterized him in other things mani
fested itself most strongly in this regard. He was
consistent as well as persistent. His operations were
always based upon a careful study of crop conditions
and other conditions which affected the price move
ments. At one time he felt that grain was a good buy
at a given price and he bought largely. It crept up
gradually ten cents higher per bushel, but it had not
reached the mark he had set for it. It slumped and
went back again below the original purchase price,
and still he held to it. It crept up again, and again
exceeded ten cents over the purchase price, and again
it slumped to a lower level than before, and still he
held on. A third time the price stiffened and finally
reached the high mark that he had figured out for it,
when he let go and made the profit he had aimed at.
He never permitted himself to be under obligations
to railroad companies, and never accepted proffered
passes, but preferred rather to pay his freight bills
as any one less favored would have to do. His credit

64 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
always stood the hardest test that could be put upon
it, and as an example of this I will cite the incident of
the Cincinnati corner some twenty-five years ago,
which Mr. E. L. Harper, President of a bank of that
city had secretly attempted to run but which failed
disastrously, and resulted in his going to the peni
tentiary for stealing the money to run the corner.
The collapse of the corner resulted in the failure of
Harpers' bank and of several large firms, which
brought on a panic, so that Baker & Co. were being
sharply called upon for additional margins in great
amounts to protect their trades. As a result of this it
became apparent to Father and Mr. Cobb that they
would go under if they were not provided with some
thing like half a million dollars before the following
day. He went to Mr. Hutchinson of the Corn Ex
change Bank and explained the situation and the
seriousness of it, stating that they had to have that
much money to keep them in business and preserve
their credit. He was asked for a statement of the
firm's affairs. He answered, "It would take three
days to prepare a statement and the relief is needed
now. I can only tell you that / know that we are
solvent and can soon pay the loan." The result was
that the •directors 'of the hank were called together
quickly to act in this emergency. The Executive Com
mittee were Mr. Sidney Kent, Mr. B. P. Hutchinson,
familiarly known as "Old Hutch," and Charles L.
Hutchinson. "Old Hutch" was 'determmed to break
Father and so opposed the loan, but it was carried by

CAREER IN CHICAGO 65
the favorable vote of the other two, so that over a
half million dollars was passed out the next day on
their overdrawn account, and with not even the giv
ing of a promissory note. For those days, this was a
large operation, and as such was an endorsement not
only of Father's integrity and honor, but of his judg
ment as well, and the fact that the obligation was half
paid back in thirty days and fully paid back in sixty
days, vindicated the confidence which the bank had
in him. The foregoing recital tells briefly the business
career of my father as it proceeded through the sev
eral firms with which he was identified in doing busi
ness upon the Board of Trade. He, however, did not
confine his energies entirely to the steering of his
business firm, but in his personal capacity was promi
nent and indefatigable in many directions. He was
generally in the forefront of movements calculated
for the public good. He was one of the original
twenty-eight charter members who founded and
organized the Commercial Club of Chicago in 1887,
a body of the strongest and most select men, limited
in number to sixty, which met monthly at dinner and
discussed local and national topics. It also undertook
important works and worthy charities, founding
among other things the Chicago Manual Training
School. He was a member of the first executive com
mittee of the club, an honor conferred upon him many
times since, and he was treasurer of the club in 1892,
Vice-President in 1893, and President of it in 1894.

66 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
He was devoted to the interests of this organization
and was never absent from its monthly meetings ex
cept through illness or absence from the city. There
was seldom a topic of interest under discussion by the-
club upon which he did not have pronounced ideas
and was therefore a frequent speaker. The club keeps
no records of the speeches of its members, as only
those of the invited guests are reported, but the
minutes of the club show that he addressed it upon
many topics, the most important of which were :
A Review of the World's Fair, Nov. 25, 1893.
Interstate Commerce Law, Feb. 27, 1894.
Our Currency, Oct. 27, 1894.
Chicago's Municipal Finances, Dec. 28, 1895.
Louisiana Purchase Exposition, Dec. 27, 1902.
He was also the principal speaker at a compli
mentary dinner given to his life long friend, the Hon
orable Lyman J. Gage, February 11, 1897.
Father was also a member of the Chicago Club and
the Iroquois Club, and also of the Cobden Club of
England. He was one of the original directors of
the National Biscuit Co. and continued as one of its
most influential directors until the time of his death.
Likewise he was a director of the American Radiator
Co. He was also an influential director of the Union
National Bank. He was one of the original sub
scribers to the Chicago Auditorium and active upon
its directory. He was a life member of the Appollo
Commandery of the Knight Templars, in which order
he attained the 32nd degree. He was an original

CAREER IN CHICAGO 67
member of and one of the principal pillars of the Art
Institute of Chicago, and a member and director of the
Chicago Board of Trade. He was one of the most
efficient directors of the World's Columbian Exposi
tion and also its President, and he also joined actively
with me in the development of the water power of
Snoqualmie Falls and the White River in the State of
Washington, for supplying the cities of Puget Sound
with electric light and power, which ranks among the
few most successful and notable achievements among
the world's best hydro-electric power developments.
These last four mentioned subjects should have more
than passing notice, and I will, therefore, give them
separate chapters in this history.
Father always took an active and thoughtful inter
est in politics as a theme in which he felt that as a
public duty every patriotic citizen should study and
have clear cut ideas upon. He had no personal ambi
tions in this direction, although he was prominent at
all times when national crises were the subject of dis
cussion. From his first vote and until the year when
Mr. James G. Blaine became a candidate for Presi
dent he was always a Republican, but in that year he
foreswore his allegiance to the Republican party, re
pudiated its candidate and became the earnest cham
pion of Mr. Grover Cleveland. He made speeches in
that campaign, some of which were printed and dis
tributed with much effect by the Democratic National
Committee. He was the chairman of the "Illinois
Mugwump" Committee. He continued as a Democrat

68 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
from that time until the Republicans began to absorb
their best platform principles from the Democratic
party, and until the Democratic party itself began to
disavow its own principles, and put forward Mr.
Bryan as their expression of belief. Then Father
came back in the Republican fold again and there re
mained for the remainder of his life. He was ardent
for free trade and believed that tariff reform would
cure the great trust evils.
He was a conspicuous figure at the time of the
"Debs Rebellion," in which connection his life at one
time was in great danger. He had been on a visit to
my home in Seattle with his invalid wife and daughter,
and it happened that the great Pullman strike broke
out while he was returning to Chicago. At the com
mand of Debs who was President of the American
Railway Union, every train in the United States haul
ing Pullman coaches was stopped upon a given day
and hour. This found Father at Livingstone, Mon
tana, where his train was stalled for nearly two weeks
at the instance of the strikers. This situation resulted
in not only serious inconvenience to the passengers,
but positive distress in the lack of food and comfort,
as a result of which Father was designated spokesman
of the passengers for the purpose of attempting peace
ful negotiations with the strikers for the purpose of
allowing them to proceed upon their journeys to
their homes. He addressed them in a body at Liv
ingstone, but got no sympathetic ear, as they were
acting in strict obedience to the edict of their

CAREER IN CHICAGO 69
leader Debs, whose watchword to his followers
during that insurrection was "Save your money
and buy a gun!" Finally it became known that
Father was a director of the Pullman Car Company,
which excited the wrath of the local strikers to the
extent that a conspiracy was set on foot among them
to assassinate him. This danger he escaped, however,
by departing quietly one night with his invalid wife
and daughter, travelling in a mountain buckboard
over more than one hundred miles of almost impass
able mountain roads to a distant station on the Great
Northern Railroad, where traffic had not been inter
rupted for the reason that that road was immune from
the tyranny of Debs because of not operating Pullman
rolling stock. When Debs was tried for treason and
conspiracy, my father was invited to be the foreman
of the jury which tried him, but preferred to be the
star witness against him instead, which resulted in
the conviction and imprisonment of Debs. The trial
would have meant the hanging of Debs for murder
had there been any fatalities in connection with the
strike. After his retirement from active business as a
Board of Trade firm, Father had a private office
in the Women's Temple Building which he retained
until the time of his death. He was not the
character of man to entirely cease his activities, and he
was, therefore, generally present at the Board of
Trade sessions, but made his trades through other
brokerage firms.

70 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
During the spring and summer of 1897 Joe Leiter
engineered his world famous corner in wheat, which
brought the price up to over a dollar and made the
farmers very prosperous and happy. Father was
happy too, for dollar wheat was what he was
looking for, and therefore being in the same situation
and frame of mind as the farmer, he was in that year
in connection with Armour, Alerton and Leiter cari
catured as a prosperous and contented farmer in a
cartoon in one of the daily papers which is reproduced
herewith. The Leiter corner failed and Joe Leiter went
under as a result of it, but there are a great many
people today who raised wheat in that year who still
bless his memory for his good intentions and what he
did for them, and Father himself, undoubtedly had a
kindly feeling for the part which young Leiter took
in the history of wheat, and I have myself, like
wise, for it undoubtedly had something to do with
my own achievement in the harnessing of Snoqualmie
Falls. Father's fortune at. this time when he was fifty-six
years old was probably about two-thirds of a million
dollars, and at no time before or since was it likely
any greater until the successful issue of the Snoqualmie
and White River power developments in the West
resulted in the practical trebling of his own fortune
as well as adding equally to mine. He never set his
mind on the swollen fortune idea, caring more as to
the method of attaining an end, rather than the attain
ment of the end itself. He was one of the ablest,

THE WHEAT KINGS.
P. D. ARMOUR--WELL, BOYS; THIS DOLLAR WHEAT IS A GREAT BLESSING TO THE FARMERS/

(MfrTv&t"'

Cartoon published in Chicago Record, August 24, 1S97.

72 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
boldest and most successful operators in the history
of the Board of Trade. He studied speculation as an
exact science, founded upon the laws of supply and
demand, in accordance with the doctrine laid down by
John Stuart Mill, "When speculation in a commodity
proves profitable it is because in the interval between
buying and reselling the price raises from some cause
independent of the speculators, their only connection
with it consisting in having foreseen it." As a far-
sighted speculator he also saw how in the lapse of an
interval of time, prices might shrink instead of rise,
which situation he directed likewise to his own advant
age. As a successful speculator he was a student of all
things and conditions which go to establish the law of
supply and demand. There was not a day in the year that
he did not know the crop conditions as they existed in
all countries that supply the grain of the world. In
this connection he studied weather conditions, trans
portation facilities, the financial situation and legis
lation. In this way he was in the forefront in market
movements and was generally right, and because of
his known shrewdness and close study of all condi
tions which established prices he had a large follow
ing of traders who relied upon his judgment in figur
ing out future market conditions as a basis for their
own operations. He looked upon speculation as the life
of business, whether it be trading in grain or groceries
or metals, or anything else. Like him, all business
men are speculators for the reason that they make or
buy a commodity in the anticipation of being able to

CAREER IN CHICAGO 73
sell it at a profit. A good business man is one who is
a good speculator. It is speculation which electrifies
the intelligence carrying agencies of the world, so
that every man in his office or in his farmhouse knows
daily the changing commercial conditions throughout
the world, and the consequent fluctuation in prices of
commodities in which he is interested directly or indi
rectly. It becomes the regulator of proper values and
it stimulates commercial and industrial activities. It
becomes the pathfinder through all countries and
markets for the common good, disseminating its in
telligence to all alike. It is unselfish and it leads the
way to the best civilization. This is the view he took
of it as a student, as an economist, and as a practical
and enlightened business man. His operations as a
speculator were not confined to the commodities of
the Board of Trade or the Stock Exchange. He had
many of the attributes of the hardy pioneer and so
helped to blaze the trail to many a new country. In
this way he became indentified with early irrigation
projects in California, with an extensive railroad pro
ject in South America, with coal mining and water
power developments in the State of Washington, with
copper mining in the West, and with street car pro
jects in St. Louis.
He was a strict adherent to principle in his busi
ness affairs even though he knew it would cost him
money to be so. As illustrating this I will cite the
incident of his being one of a syndicate of several
operators including "Old Hutch" which was carrying

74 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
a large line of grain and waiting for an advance
under a mutual covenant to sell only in concert with
each other. The appreciation in value of the com
modity carried, soon showed a handsome profit on
paper, and "Old Hutch" without regard to his prom
ises to the others began to let go. Others of the syn
dicate followed in line one by one and did the same,
which resulted in the price shrinking point by point.
Nevertheless Father held himself true to his word,
and so did not dispose of his interest until he was the
last one left, and until the price had dropped in conse
quence of the selling movement to a level which en
tirely deprived him of any profit.
More might be said of his business career if space
permitted. Let me instead, however, return for a
moment to his private life and to the time when the
family moved to their first Michigan Avenue resi
dence. Father at that time was a master of the shot
gun and very frequently went duck hunting upon the
preserves of the Tollaston Gun Club some distance
from Chicago, of which club he was a member. He
was instinctively a good shot and brought home many
a trophy of the sport. He was also fond of horses
and drove to and from his business behind one of the
fastest trotters in the city, and he kept fine carriage
horses and equipages for the use of the family as well.
Father remained a widower until 1879 when he
married Mrs. Anna Franklin (Phipps) Morgan of
Troy, New York, the widow of Mr. Azro B. Morgan,
whom he had met in the course of his business oper-

The Chicago Homestead.

CAREER IN CHICAGO 75
ations. They spent their honeymoon extending over a
period of several months, in European travel. During
his absence, the handsome residence at the corner of
Michigan Avenue and 23d Street was in course of
erection, but was not completed until several months
after their return. Here the family lived until some
time after his death, with the exception of the sum
mer seasons, which were spent in Exmoor Cottage,
their summer home upon the golf links at Highland
Park. Father was an adept and great devotee of
golf, and this recreation did much to keep him in
good health the last years of his life. He looked very
little older than his sons when he was sixty years old.
He furnished his house with costly works of art and
libraries, and while not ostentatious in arranging his
surroundings and comforts, his environment was sug
gestive of the abode of a scholar and a prince.
Father's second wife and our stepmother came as
the two oldest of us were getting ready for college,
but while the youngest to whom she was particularly
devoted was yet a small boy, so that she had more
to do with his bringing up than with that of the other
children. As the result of an accident which was
thought trivial at the time, she developed into an in
valid, and gradually in the course of several years,
her nervous system failed and she became bereft of
reason, until finally on October 15, 1906 she died, —
surviving Father three years.
The summer of 1903 was as usual being spent at
Exmoor Cottage, near Highland Park. It was an

76 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
ideal country home, with its colonial style of archi
tecture, its large and airy rooms, its broad verandas,
and the surrounding stately trees. To this place
Father would steal out from town as early each day
as he could, and as often as he could he did not go to
the city at all. While coming down stairs in the house
one morning he stumbled and fell most of the dis
tance, and as a result he fainted. He thought noth
ing of the incident. Then later he began to have pains
which he attributed to indigestion as they appeared to
be in the region of the stomach. In the evening of
Tuesday, October 6, 1903, and about two weeks after
his fall, he retired in good spirits after the usual
afternoon golf game, the evening meal and the game
of dominoes with the family, and went to sleep with a
hot water bag to his breast to comfort his supposed
disorder of the stomach, but an hour later, about 10.30
P. M., he gave a slight gasp in his sleep which at
tracted the attention of Mother's nurse, who went to
him and discovered that he was dead. It was heart
failure. So unlooked for and so sudden an event
came as a terrible shock to the family, excepting his
wife, who in her distressful mental condition lived on
until her end came three years later without ever
knowing that he had gone before. In the same hour
in which his life went out in Chicago, I was aroused
from my sleep 2,000 miles away in Seattle, by an
ominous nightmare which told me what had occurred,
after a few. hours of restless waiting, a messenger
came to the house and delivered the telegram which

CAREER IN CHICAGO 77
confirmed the death message. The next day the Board
of Trade adjourned during the business session out
of respect for him, a tribute it had never paid before
to any other member. That organization felt that
it had lost its master mind, and his death cast a
gloom over all. The community of Chicago which
had now grown in size to over 2,000,000 people felt
that the taking of him away was a distinct loss, for
he represented the highest type of citizenship, and as
such stood out in bold relief as a character worthy of
the emulation of his fellow men — those present and
those yet to come.
He left no will.
The funeral was held at the Second Presbyterian
Church on the following Sunday, and the interment
was in the family lot in Graceland Cemetery, Dr. Gun-
saleus officiating. Father had been a pewholder, and
regular attendant at this church since his second mar
riage, although not a member of it. Prior to that
time he had always attended Christ Reformed Epis
copal Church, ministered by Bishop Cheney.
The death of William T. Baker, at the age of sixty-
two years, drew from the daily press of Chicago and
elsewhere, editorials of eulogy upon the man of whom
the whole city was justly proud and whose loss was
the subject of universal lamentation and regret. The
different corporations and institutions in Chicago and
other cities of which he had been a member, met in
special sessions and adopted resolutions of respect and
affection, which were engrossed and bound and sent

78 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
to the bereaved family, and letters from many friends
and admirers were received from different parts of
the country. I wish that space would permit of all
their sentiments being chronicled here. I think I
ought to record the contribution of persons outside of
kinship as an expression of the publics' view of him,
and the one whose statement is typical of all the
others, and who is ablest of all to speak by virtue of
a lifelong acquaintance and friendship with him is
Mr. Lyman J. Gage, Secretary of the Treasury under
President McKinley, with whose tribute, dated Sept.
26, 1906, at Point Loma, Cal., and that of the Na
tional Biscuit Company, I will close this chapter.
"Your letter asking me for some facts relating to your
father's history, my estimate of his character, etc., is received.
I wish I could set forth in clear language, what is so well
portrayed in my own mind concerning him ; — but this is the
effect of incidents, circumstances, associations and conversa
tions, the particulars of which cannot be recalled and described.
Thus I remember him way back in his early days in
Chicago. He was young, wide awake, enterprising and
vigorous, firm in principle and uncompromising. These quali
ties he showed as the years went on — but just how and when
this feature and that were demonstrated, I cannot recall. I
only know he possessed them and that the fruits of these
qualities were seen, appreciated and enjoyed by his friends
and acquaintances. He was a lover of Truth and Justice, and
fearless to espouse them, when occasion demanded. He hated
their opposites and unsparingly denounced those who excused
or defended these opposites.
These characteristics excited opposition and bitterness
towards him, and he could not escape the darts of malice
and defamation. As an enemy he was uncompromising and

Anna Franklin (Phipps) (Morgan) Baker.

Exmoor Cottage.
the summer home near highland park, ills.
in this house my father died.

CAREER IN CHICAGO 79
relentless. As a friend he was affectionate, steadfast and true.
It was my great privilege to bear this relation to him. In
the year 1891 or '92, he and I went together to New York
to attend a banquet given by friends of the "Columbian
Exposition." On the train I was attacked with symptoms of
"Appendicitis." As that trouble had at that time received little
or no recognition, I was of course unconscious of the serious
nature of my symptoms and would have ignored them, but
your father seemed to know by intuition that there was
trouble ahead. At his own cost and without my knowledge,
he wired to a physician in New York to meet us on arrival
at the Holland House. The doctor diagnosed the trouble
correctly and within thirty hours I was under the surgeon's
knife. Needless to say your father was tireless in his attention
to all details. He remained near me several days, and I am
fully satisfied that to his foresight in summoning the doctor
and to his wise advice I owe really my life.
He was as prompt to public duty as he was faithful to
private friendship. That a cause was unpopular, — did not
discourage him in supporting it. If it were popular he would
not follow it if opposed to his conviction.
In 1895 (I think it was) he accepted the Presidency of the
Civic Federation. Like all reform bodies, it was received with
sneers and met with contumely. It required courage and devo
tion to assume the head of that organization. That the Feder
ation accomplished a valuable work, did much to correct
municipal abuses, and to harmonize the prejudices of a diverse
population, would now be admitted, and out of that organiza
tion has developed "The National Civic Federation" with
headquarters m New York.
Your father also held the position of President of the
"World's Columbian Exposition" in the second year of its
history. The work was arduous and difficult, but Mr. Baker
found his wav and contributed much to the final triumphs of

80 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
the great exposition, and for all his services so rendered
refused all salaried compensation.
His active business life was related more closely to the
Board of Trade. There his influence was felt in the establish
ment of good rules and in the endorsement of just discipline
for violation.
You will see that I have had to speak in general terms
and my contribution may not be of much service. Whether
or not you write his biography, the influence of his life and
character will not be lost. 'No man liveth to himself.' His
personality affects for good or evil other lives. The seed
of the fruit he produced will fall into other hearts and lives,
and so go on like nature's order, producing after its kind."
The following testimonial was issued by the National
Biscuit Company :
"William Taylor Baker, a director of the National Biscuit
Company, died at his country home near Chicago, on Tues
day, October 6, 1903, at the age of sixty-two years.
The first president of the World's Fair, held in Chicago in
1893, many times president of the Chicago Board of Trade,
president of the Civic Federation, vice-president of the Chicago
Bureau of Charities, a director of the Chicago Art Institute,
and associated in an official capacity with other public organi
zations, he was a patriotic citizen, who sacrificed personal
interest for the welfare of the people of Chicago in particular,
and for the general good of humanity everywhere. At one
time the largest grain merchant in the northwest, a member
of the board of directors of banks and of various manufac
turing and mercantile institutions in which he was financially
interested, his reputation as a successful man of affairs was
national in its scope.
It is, however, as a large stockholder and one of its direc
tors continuously from its formation, that the National Biscuit
Company has had brought home to it the serious loss
occasioned by the death of Mr. Baker. He was a clear-headed

CAREER IN CHICAGO 81
advisor. He investigated carefully and intelligently the many
important questions of policy with which the board of direc
tors of the company has had to deal during the past six years.
His conclusions were always logical. He saw them projected
before him in a luminous way, distinct in every detail. When
his mind was made up, he never swerved or faltered. He
walked straight the one road he believed would lead him to
his goal. One of the first to appreciate the value to the com
pany of its advertised package goods, he was a strenuous and
persistent advocate of the vital necessity of making them the
most prominent feature of its business. He never claimed to
have any knowledge of the baking trade, but this very fact
made him all the more helpful to those of his associates who
had spent their lifetime in it. His wide experience in other
lines gave him a point of view denied to them, as a man stand
ing miles away from tall mountain peaks sees conformations
sharply outlined against the distant sky which are invisible
to the dwellers at their base.
The chief characteristics of William T. Baker were rigid
honesty and the moral courage to assert and maintain his con
victions. He was true hearted. In his family life he was one
of the most tender and unselfish of men. Dignified, courteous,
and of unfailing good humor, he was the ideal gentleman in
business. His influence and example will live long in the
memory of his fellow directors, each of whom was proud to
call him friend.
He has gone to the reward God has prepared for just men."

Grave of Henry Dunster.
my first maternal american ancestor.
cambridge, mass.

Birthplace of Eliza Annie Dunster, Durham, N H.

The Original Bradford Academy — 1S5S.
hrapford, mass.

Chapter IV.
ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER.
1838-1873.
EVEN as my father's life would have been in
complete without my mother who helped
make him the man that he was, so would his
biography be only half done without more than
a reference to her. She came into his life at the
threshold of his career in Chicago and brought with
her all those talents and attributes best calculated to
sustain him in the realization of his fondest hopes and
ambitions. I made a pilgrimage last summer to the
scenes of her girlhood similar to the one I made to
those of my father, for I felt the same devotion to each
of them, and neither exploration interested me less
than did the other. But like all mothers, my mother
was a woman, and being a woman she became a wife,
and like most wives her glory thereafter was to shine
in the reflected light of her husband, as the better
half of him, or as the world looks at it, his satellite.
Her sphere was their home, while his was the whole
world. Therefore by the nature of things and events
he was the larger luminary and she the lesser one,
and hence in this biography there must needs be more
told of him and less of her. Had she remained un
married, it is quite likely that her gifts and accomp-

84 ' LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
lishments would have entitled her to an independent
biography without the excuse for its justification in
the being the wife of a great man. How truly it has
been said — "There is a tide in the affairs of men,
which taken at its flood leads on to fortune," and truer
still, "There is a tide in the affairs of women, which
taken at its flood leads God knows where." But what
grander destiny can any woman have than wifehood
and motherhood?
She was Eliza Annie Dunster, the youngest child
of Samuel and Susan Dunster, born October 24, 1838,
on a farm at Durham, New Hampshire, a village of
only a few families, at that time. She came from a
sturdy line. The first Dunster in this country came
over from England in 1640, and he was Henry Dun
ster, a learned and devoted Minister of the Gospel,
a son of Henry Dunster of Lancastershire, England.
His most conspicuous place in history lies in the fact
that he was the first President of Harvard University,
and assisted John Harvard in the founding of it.
President Dunster was educated at Cambridge Uni
versity, England, which also gave to the world an
other of Harvard's presidents, President Chauncey,
as well as John Winthrop and John Cotton of early
Massachusetts, and such notable characters as Bacon,
Milton, Dryden, Jeremy Taylor, Newton, Pitt, Byron,
McCauley, Tennyson, Gray, Wordsworth and Thack-
ery, — a brilliant setting indeed for the name of my
first American maternal ancestor. His administration
as President of Harvard while this school was in its

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER 85
infancy, was eminently successful for fifteen years,
at the end of which period he was compelled to resign
because of views which he held in regard to infant
baptism which were too advanced for those times and
which caused him to be pronounced a heretic. His
fearlessness and courage in his beliefs showed him to
be no less a martyr than if he had been burned at the
stake. He died in 1659, and he now lies in the ancient
cemetery opposite the college grounds in Cambridge,
held down by a weighty Latin inscription and a slab
of stone.History does not record that the Dunster family
achieved great fame in the Revolutionary War. It
does say, however, that my great grandfather was a
private in the Revolutionary War, and in the printed
genealogy of the family about an inch of space is given
to his heroic exploits, while over a page is given to
his attempt at procuring a Revolutionary pension. It
seems that under the rules then existing, pensions
were only given to those who were really needy and
could show good proofs of being paupers. My Revo
lutionary sire claimed that honor and a pension, but
upon investigation it was found that he possessed
assets consisting of a table worth $1.25 and a chair
worth 25 cents, total assets of $1.50, and so he failed
in his pension claim. There is also a pair of great
iron handcuffs locked and unlocked by a big iron key,
which an ancestor of mine through this line wore for
some purpose, either as a civil prisoner or a military
one, but I have no data to determine which of the

86 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
two types he belonged to, although my warlike spirit
leads me to hope it was the latter.
Samuel Dunster, my grandfather, of the sixth gen
eration since the emigrant ancestor, was born in
Mason Village, New Hampshire, August I, 1803,
which place I visited last summer. He went to school
eight weeks in winter, and ten weeks in summer at a
small district school and worked the rest of the time,
so that at the age of sixteen he had not yet learned
arithmetic or geography. He then attended an
academy for six weeks and finished his education. He
became a house carpenter and later on a machinist,
in the meantime devoting his spare time to practical
self-education, and thus became a surveyor of land,
doing engineering work in his own and adjacent vil
lages. Later he became a calico printer with more or
less varied success, his aptitude being however more in
mechanical lines than in commercial pursuits. He
lived successively in Dover, New Hampshire, and in
Durham, about five miles distant, at which latter place
he owned a farm upon which still stands the little
house in which my mother was born, which is unused
and neglected today as I saw it. He also lived in
Providence, Rhode Island, superintending a calico
print works there, and finally settled down near Attle-
boro, Massachusetts, upon a small farm where he
passed the remainder of his days, and where he died
in 1887. His wife, my grandmother, was Susan Per
kins Dow, born July 27, 1806, in Hollis, Maine, and
whose parents were among the early settlers of Dover.

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER, 87
She died a few years before her husband, and both
of them were buried in the Dunster lot at Mason Vil
lage. Returning now to my mother ; — her early girlhood
was spent in Dover, and there are people living there
still who remember her as a girl of remarkable intel
lectuality, full of fun, and very bright and attractive
in many ways. Physically she was of the petite order,
round and plump very much in looks and figure like
her daughter Bertha. A lady there whom I met, said
with a twinkle in her eye after describing my mother's
looks and accomplishments, and observing that I did
not much resemble her, "I guess though she acted
much like you." She loved her parents and family
and friends with ajwhole heart, and she was loved by
all in return as ardently as she herself loved. The
house her family lived in is still there, and it gave
me great pleasure to visit it and go through the sev
eral rooms, where she romped about as a girl. While
the family lived in Providence, my mother attended
the public school there, passing through all the grades
up to the high school to which she was promoted. She
did not know what it was to have the blues, and she
made light of the troubles which would depress an
ordinary person. "What matter does it make," she
would say, "we will all be dead in a hundred years."
While she was in the public schools at this time, and
in the twelfth year of her age, she kept a diary, or a
"journal" as she called it, which is very neatly written
in her own handwriting, and which is still preserved.

88 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
As this journal reflects her young girl mode of think
ing, and gives strong suggestions as well of the liter
ary talent which she developed later, it may be of
interest to copy here a few pages from it : —
"Friday, March 27th, 1851. This afternoon .a girl came
in with her head bleeding dreadfully. Someone had fired a
stone anfcl had hit her on the head. I think it is too bad
that the boys should throw stones. Miss Bancroft went down
cellar with her and fixed her. Mr. Keith asked the boys
about it but none of them would own it. We did not recite
in Geography this afternoon or Reading. Mr. Keith looked
at our Journals this afternoon. I do not expect Marion over
tonight for it is not her turn. The weather is very warm to
day. May is quite sick today. The baby is about the same
as ever. Recited all of my lessons correctly."
"Tuesday, March 1st, 1851. There I have made a mistake.
I believe it is April 1st, but I shall not scratch it out and alter
it for father does not wish me to. I have not been April fooled
yet but I have April fooled Mary Northrep. It is very pleas
ant today. Our washwoman came today and brought her
little baby. She is 10 months old. My baby is about the
same. She does not grow any. I wish she was smart like
other children. I missed in Geography this afternoon. I
got April fooled by Emily Winsor this afternoon. I will here
copy a piece of poetry which I made about the school a good
while ago. If one of the scholars breaks the rule
Of Mr. Keith's large Grammar School,
They have to go and bring the stick
Which makes the tears flow down so quick.
They feel as if they were a-flying
While they go to their seats a-crying.
But when their shedding tears are over
They begin to look so very sober

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER 89
They soon get very tired and weary,
And then get up their good old cheery,
Which makes them go and bring the stick
And then they have a harder lick,
And I do not think it more than fair
For the stick to be raised high as their hair."
"Monday, June 2nd. Today is the first day of the term.
I recited in Reading this afternoon. Mr. Keith let all the
first class go to the High School and Frederic Bacheldor.
He did not get in. I do not know what girls have got in.
We had quite a shower this afternoon. I spent the vacation
very pleasantly. I was over to Marion's part of the time and
the rest of the time she was up to my house. I hope I shall
have a higher seat this term. I guess I will make some reso
lutions which I shall try and keep this term. I will write
them on the opposite page.
Resolved —
1st, that I will not talk neither, make letters with my
fingers.
2nd, study my lessons.
3rd, write as good as I can in my journal.
4th, sit up or study when my teacher tells me to.
5th, not turn around in my seat unless I forget it.
6th, not eat anything in school.
7th, not write to anyone on my slate.
8th, will not copy my sums from another's slate.
9th, will strive to keep all my resolutions."
It was at this time the family moved to Dover,
and then she went to a little school called Franklin
Academy a picture of which is shown in this book.
This school has since been torn down to give place
to a manufacturing structure. At this time, she was
fifteen years of age, when her father although of most
modest means, sent her to Bradford Academy, a select

90 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
finishing school for girls, in Bradford, Massachusetts,
on account of her unusual aptitude in her studies and
her ambition for a more complete education. At this
academy she remained for the full term of four years,
and graduated therefrom in 1856 at the head of her
class, although the youngest in it. This academy has
since grown to be a much larger school and has moved
from its ancient quarters to a more pretentious and
modern building. I visited the old school and the new
one in the adjoining block, and made myself
acquainted with the teaching staff, and the equipment
and the curriculum of the present day. The teachers
took a very genuine interest in my coming for the
purpose of looking up the traditions of my mother,
and they very gladly looked up the records and the
old catalogues, wherein they found her chronicled
with the rest of the girls of her time. It pleased me
to see the school and the young ladies there, and to
imagine how fifty years ago she tripped about as
gayly and happily as did those young ladies whom I
saw, and studied as hard as they did or vice versa,
and looked as pretty or prettier.
My mother as a girl was remarkably fond of Latin
and Geometry, and could demonstrate from memory
every theorem in the first four books of Euclid. At her
graduation from Bradford Academy, she wrote the
parting hymn, which in that institution was equivalent
to the valedictory of a college course. After her
graduation from this academy, she went to Mrs. Wil-
lard's school, at Troy, New York, finishing a short

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER 91
term there, and then fired with a great ambition to
make her own way, she went to St. Charles, Illinois,
and secured a position as school teacher. It was at
this place that she so distinguished herself for scholar
ship and ability that it led to her being selected by
the Amite Female Academy at Liberty, Mississippi, as
an instructor in English Literature and other branches
which were taught in that institution.
It was about this time that important events lead
ing up to the Civil War were transpiring in the coun
try, and situated as she was in Mississippi, she was
quite within the arena where the anti-bellum troubles
were rapidly crystalizing into that great and terrible
war which was soon to divide the nation against itself.
As a result of these trying times, the Amite Seminary
was dissolved and she then pursued her course north
ward again, going this time to Chicago, where she
soon became a teacher in the public schools. In top
ical subjects which formed a prominent part of the
exercises there, she raised her particular school to a
higher standard than any other in the city. Her
career as teacher ended with her marriage to my
father. My mother was remarkably gifted in a literary
way, and early in childhood she manifested a pro
nounced fondness for standard poetry and an aptitude
for verse of her own creation, which talent she im
proved or neglected according to impulse. Poetic
taste and appreciation is good for the soul and reflects
a person's higher nature such as hers was and she

92 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
indulged it frequently. At Bradford Academy she
wrote several pieces for the "Olive Branch," a paper
published by the girl students and of which she was
in her turn the editor. At Chicago, for two years she
wrote the annual New Year's Carrier's Address for
the Chicago Tribune, which took the form of a supple
ment sent out with the New Year's edition each year,
which recited in verse the most important history of
the year pertaining to the nation at large, but more
particularly to Chicago. This practice, I believe, has
long since been discontinued. At that time the matter
was the subject of competition open to the public, the
reward to the person successful in presenting the
best poem being $100, which as stated before, my
mother won twice. One of her poems she wrote in its
entirety the night before she delivered it, for the set
purpose of earning money to buy Father a beautiful
ring for a Christmas present. The Chicago Tribune
was the leading Republican paper of the West, and in
her address which enabled her to buy the ring she re
viewed the political situation with the tact of an old
campaign leader. In 1867 the submarine cable across
the Atlantic Ocean was successfully laid, and the
tunnel supplying water to the city of Chicago from a
crib two miles out in Lake Michigan had been com
pleted, and these events she thus notices in her
address : —
"What has last year left as dowry to the hand-maids, Science,
Art?
Ah ! how rife with grand achievements is the Scientific part !

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER 93
Buried in the ocean's bosom, down below the mighty deep,
'Mid the wreck of myriad vessels, where their human cargoes
sleep,
Darts the lightnings, chained and tempered, guided by a
single thread,
And from Europe to our own land, instant weal or woe is
read.
Wondrous triumph of a genius! Whispered words are eager
caught,
Through abyss of depth unfathomed, news and rumors now
are brought.
Europe bids the States "Good morning" ; Liverpool doth New
York greet,
Fast Chicago joins the refrain, Commerce asks the price of
wheat ;
So the 'Cable' prates and gossips, spinning out the watery
miles,
And the 'mermaids' laugh and listen, laving it with dripping
smiles.
Fact! it seems there's nothing left now; Science may her
hands but fold.
Wonder if the future ages can excel our doings bold !
At some distant 'Happy New Year' will Orion's glittering
belt,
Gossiped be in star-hung Cables, and his salutations felt?
Shall the growling 'Ursa-Major' send dispatches to the earth,
Anjd the 'Pleiads' hunt their Sister, telegraphing of her
worth ?
Nor forget we great Chicago, mighty umpire of the West,
Wreathe for her distinguished honor, for she leadeth all the
rest.
Queen she is of all the cities; Commerce, Art, Religion, too,
Here have built their proudest temples, mammoth structures
rise to view

94 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
As by magic, and, completed, always are the largest, best,
Spite of foreign grunts and envies, spite of Eastern sneers
and jest.
Who but she has wrought a 'Tunnel' poising lakes upon its
back,
Never resting till she brought us crystal waters o'er its track ?
Now farewell ! ye slimy waters ! fluid of most dubious look !
Henceforth shall our drink be limpid, lucid as the babbling
brook.
Here 'adieux' we make in parting, to our piscatory friends ;
Showers of blessings, not of fishes, happily not the 'Tunnel'
sends."
And again, and upon the occasion of the reunion
of Bradford Academy graduates at the home of Miss
Gilman, the former principal, at Boston, she read the
following clever poem which she had composed for the
occasion and which was afterwards printed and distri
buted among the graduates. This poem is well worth
reading, not only for its literary merit, but as a display
of her womanly instincts and her wife-like senti
ments : —
TO ALL GREETING.
Reminiscence ! Reminiscence !
Blessings on the word and gift;
Praises to the Heavenly Author,
Gladly for this day we lift —
That in History, thro' life's mistery,
He hath painted pleasant scenes
Thus with gladness, yet with sadness
We come back to olden dreams.

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER 95
Lay aside the veil of "Present,"
Stand upon the ancient shore,
Girlhood's hopes and youthful visions,
Which we had in days of yore,
Rise before us, with the chorus
Of a hundred happy hearts ;
Little dreaming of the seeming
Of this "Future's" sober parts.
Back with trembling step we wander,
Thro' old halls so rife with scene,
Here and there to dream and ponder,
From each nook, a thought to glean.
Olden beauties — troublous duties —
Make us smile or fret in turn;
These recalling, rising, falling,
Change our hearts, with chill or burn.
Can it be but yester-even,
That the brain-wrought, weary head,
Heard with joy, that bell of omen,
Summon all while prayer was said?
O that blessing ! then caressing
Each loved form that bent to hear,
Still we're listening, eyelids glistening,
With soft reminiscent tear !
Many a voice that worshipped with us,
Hushed is now — nor rises here —
Each of us can trace the vacant,
Lonesome place of memory's dear.
Yet in glory, pure and holy,
Stand those sister spirits now.
Far above us, still they love us,
If to earth, Heaven's own may bow.

96 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
Yet why dim this festive hour
With the saddened thoughts that rise?
Fondly let sweet memory's bower
Revel here in pleasant ties,
Let us laughing, ever quaffing,
Happy cups from "Auld Lang Syne,"
Intermingle; merry jingle;
With the silver bells of Time.
Let us smile at early "castles,"
Queer, fantastic, girlhood's dreams,
Melted now to "airy nothings,"
With their gorgeous tinsel gleams.
Olden picture ! — Present mixture !
Let us turn from that, to this —
Curious scatterings ! furious batterings !
Yet here's larger love and bliss !
, Mayhap old heroes have turned "Neros,"
Or temple "niche" of fickle "Fame,"
Has but refused us, or abused us,
Denying e'er illustrious name.
Alas! how once with thrill ecstatic
In our wondrous journals then,
Did we depict our glorious Future
With the girl's romantic pen.
Every one to wealth, or glory,
Heroine, or hero's wife,
We turn — sublime, contrasting story,
To the present earnest life.
Plain John Smith has proven hero,
The niche in Fame has been a — crib !
Women's lives have all turned out so,
Since Adam old first lost a "rib" !

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER 97
Few move out of narrow orbit,
Or shine but with reflected light;
Occasionally a restless "comet"
Soars aloft with reckless flight.
But with "trailing" comes a wailing,
"Woman's Sphere" is wailed by men,
"Homo" pulling at the "check rein,"
She soon drops down to home again !
Still which mother, would seek other
Brighter jewels for her life.
Bless our children! bless our darlings!
Blessings on the name of wife !
Precious are our Pearls and Rubies,
Eternal is the mother's crown,
Paradise but opened to us,
When old "castles" tumbled down.
Many, too, have fought with honor,
In the pedagogic field,
Brains have worked o'er brainless pupils,
'Neath the patient learning's shield,
So she bearing once our wearing,
Trying acts and hapless pranks,
Still hath bravely passed thus safely
Up the honored classic ranks.
She who tasked us, now hath asked us,
Back from busy life, or sport,
Again to meet her, and to greet her,
With life's story and report.
As those soldiers summoned forward
By the voice that led the host,
Fervently with heart responded,
As they marched with joyful toast.

98 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
"We are coming, Abraham, Father,
With a hundred thousand strong."
So from East and West we answer,
With like fervor, love and song,
"We are coming, Alma Mater,
Coming back to scenes of yore,
Come to greet thee, still loved teacher,
Ere the "vesper" hour is o'er.
Come reciting of our loved ones,
Come to tell thee of our lives,
Come to beg thee bless our darlings,
Come as true and honest wives.
Come to tell of these, our glories,
Come to lisp our trials, too.
Come to whisper, gentle Teacher,
Many a solemn passage through.
And when each shall say her lesson,
Matron, maiden, mother, wife,
Each one give her present "abstract,"
Of this riper, nobler life,
Thou shalt "mark" us, "Smiths," "Jones," "Parkers,"
With that faithful hand of yore,
Not severely, but as nearly
As thou can'st, please "mark" us "4."
With her girlhood spent among the hills of New
Hampshire, and with all the inspirations that the best
of nature could afford, it is not to be wondered at that
if she had poetic talent it should find early demonstra
tion. The whole environment was poetical. Hardly
a stone's throw away lived the poet John G. Whittier,
who stirred the country with his verses in a manner

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER .99
that will endure for all time. She lived in an age of
poets, and in a country seared with the patriotic his
tory of the two first American wars. Not far from
the birthplace of her father, and only a few rods from
his final burying place is situated a humble little cot
tage, called "Uncle Sam's House." This is the
original birthplace and abode of Samuel Wilson, from
whom the character of "Uncle Sam" as impersonat
ing the United States of America, was derived. Dur
ing the War of 1812, he was a government contrac
tor living at Troy, New York, furnishing supplies to
the army. The consignments sent out by him to the
government were all branded "U. S.," and as he was
familiarly called "Uncle Sam," to distinguish him
from his brother who was called "Uncle Ned," it soon
grew into practice for all government goods to be
dubbed as "Uncle Sam's." U. S. stood for him and
U. S. stood for the country too, so in time this real
and living Uncle Sam came to stand figuratively for
the United States Nation, not only in the army, but
later throughout the whole country, and the people
have been pleased to keep it up. Whether the real
"Uncle Sam" really looked the way he is characterized
or not, is not known. He died in 1844.
My mother was romantic, as was my father, and
no better demonstration of this can be had than the
particular event of their marriage. It seems that he
had been "waiting on her" for something over a year
with the usual attentions of an ardent lover, when on
the 5th day of July, 1862, they happened to go on a

100 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
railroad excursion and picnic to Beloit, Wisconsin,
which is not a very long ride from Chicago. The
occasion was one of great merriment and joy to all
who went. Some one suggested as a feature of the
outing, while they were all in the midst of their
luncheon, that they have a wedding. Boys, girls and
chaperones all fell in with the idea, as one that
would lend unusual interest to the day. The senti
ment was unanimous. But who would they have to
get married? In response to the call for volunteers,
my mother and father came forward, and were upon
that day and on the spot united in marriage by the
Rev. Dr. H. N. Brinsmade, of Beloit. It is of course,
quite likely that their minds had been made up to
this end some time before the happy event really took
place. At this point should be mentioned the children
which came to William Taylor Baker and Eliza Annie
Dunster through this union.
1. William Dunster Baker, named for his father and his
maternal grandfather, Samuel Dunster, was born at Attleboro,
Massachusetts, September 12, 1863. He was a frail and sickly
baby and his mother was unable to give him the health and
strength necessary to prolong his life. He died July 27th,
1864, at the age of 10 months and 15 days, and was buried in
Graceland Cemetery, Chicago.
2. Charles Hinckley Baker — the author of this book —
named in honor of his father's first Chicago employer and
subsequent partner, Charles Hinckley, was born in Chicago,
November 30, 1864. He was educated at Cornell University,
from which he was graduated with honors as a civil engineer
in June, 1886. He at once entered railroad engineering and

&*

W tf*

u

1 -*r
1 ss^

M

Samuel Dunster.

Eliza Annie (Dunster) Baker.

Leslie D. F. Baker. Wm. T. Baker, Jr.
Dorothy Elizabeth Baker.

GRANDCHILDREN OF WM. T. BAKER AND CHILDREN OF THE AUTHOR.

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER 101
construction work in Dakota for the Chicago & Northwestern
Railway at $30 a month, which lasted a year, and he then
went to Seattle, Washington, and engaged in the same line
of work for the Seattle, Lake Shore & Eastern Railroad.
After three years he resigned and opened a private engineering
office, which later developed into a contracting business for
railroad and water works construction. From 1898 to 1904
he projected and built, in partnership with his father, the
Snoqualmie Falls and White River Power plants, which supply
electric light and power to Seattle, Tacoma, Everett, and the
intervening towns. Since the completion of this work he
with his college mate and associate, Frank S. Washburn, also
an engineer, organized the Muscle Shoals Hydro-Electric
Power Company, and the Alabama Interstate Power Company,
of Alabama, in each of which companies he is half owner
These companies have under development about 200,000 H. P.
on the Tennessee and Talapoosa Rivers in Alabama, which
will be distributed in Alabama, Tennessee and Georgia, and
constitute a project about ten times larger than Snoqualmie.
With the same associate he also organized and controls and is
vice-president of the American Cyanamid Company, own
ing the rights in America for the manufacture and sale of
calcium cyanamid or lime nitrogen, the nitrogen being derived
from the atmosphere. This will be universally used as a
fertilizer and in the arts, for which purpose great quantities
of power from the water power plants will be required. He
was married in 1888 to Miss Gertrude Gladys France, of Rome,
N. Y., and they have had four children, William Taylor Baker,
named after the subject of this book, Theodore Anderson
Baker, who died at the age of ten months, Leslie David France
Baker, and Dorothy Elizabeth Baker.
3. Howard Winfield Baker, named in honor of his father's
native town, West Winfield, New York, was born in Chicago,
March 19, 1866. Contemporaneously with his older brother
he was educated at Cornell University, and was graduated

102 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
from there at the same time, the youngest in his class, as a
civil engineer. He engaged in railroad work in Dakota for
about a year for the Chicago & Northwestern Railroad, and
then went to Seattle, where for a year he served as engineer
of construction on the waterfront trestle of the Seattle, Lake
Shore & Eastern Railroad. He then gave up engineering
and engaged in the real estate business with considerable profit
to himself, and finally and for about five years he developed
a profitable business on the harbor front, in the shipping of
merchandise and as agent for several steamship lines. The
panic of 1893,, together with the collapse of his dock due to
a storm, put him out of business in Seattle. He then returned
to Chicago, where his older brother soon secured for him a
position in the employ of Butler Brothers' wholesale establish
ment, with which concern he is still officially connected, hav
ing been promoted from a humble beginning to the position
of assistant manager of the Chicago house, which he now
holds. He also has a considerable financial interest in the busi
ness, secured through the assistance of his father. Butler
Brothers is the largest concern in the United States, dealing
at wholesale in notions, toys, dry goods, and general small
counter goods. They have business houses in Chicago, St.
Louis, Minneapolis and New York. He has been twice
married and twice a widower, having first been married to
Mrs. Josephine Geiger, of Chicago, and the second time to
Mrs. Josephine Nevins, of New York.
4. Annie Merriam Baker, familiarly called by her mother
"Kitty," was born in Chicago, March 29, 1868. While still an
infant she was attacked with scarletine and brain fever, which
permanently impaired her mental faculties, so that she grew
up into a woman perfect in her physical development but
mentally deficient. She is cared for in a private sanitarium
at Kalamazoo, Michigan. This child possessed all the grace,
beauty and charm of her mother, and but for the distressful
incident of her babyhood, would have grown into a woman of

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER 103
charming traits and talents, including the gift of music. This
musical instinct she displays now even under the cloud of
her mental derangement. As a girl she had the physical
features and figure and lovely hair worthy of the sculptor's
or the painter's highest art. Though in years she is now a
woman, yet she still remains a child, happy and contented,
knowing no grief nor sorrow, living within herself unmindful
of passing events, and not appreciating the changes which time
has made in her family; — and so she will continue to do while
she lives.
5. Bertha Cozette Baker, so named by her mother, who
as a child gave the same name to her dolls, was born in
Chicago, November 14, 1869, and was educated in the public
schools and in Dearborn Seminary in that city. Growing into
womanhood about the time that her step-mother began to
fail, she naturally entered into the management of her father's
household affairs, which she did with grace and dignity, and
with the business acumen of a trained matron, up to the time
of his death and the consequent dismantelling of the home
stead. Towards her step-mother in her failing mental and
physical health she acted more than the part of an own
daughter. She put away her girlhood pleasures, in order
that she might with greater devotion perform the duty to her
father as she saw it in the caring for his wife, and this devotion
has consecrated her in the hearts of all who know her, as a
person of gentleness, patience, loyalty, and self-sacrifice. She
was married in September, 1903, to Mr. Van Wagenen Ailing,
of Chicago, who at the time was a mechanical engineer con
nected with the staff of Wells Brothers, Contractors. Since
then he has resigned and organized and now heads the Ailing
Construction Co., which is engaged in general building con
trading. They were absent on her wedding trip at the time of
her father's sudden death. They have one child, a daughter
named Bertha, after its mother.
6. Henry Dunster Baker was born on his Grandfather

104 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
Dunster's farm near Attleboro, Massachusetts, February 26,
1872. His name was given him by his grandfather at the
request of his mother, who named him in honor of Henry
Dunster, the first of the line in this country. He 'was the
favorite of the children with his step-mother, who coming
as she did while he was yet a small child, had most to do with
his bringing up. He was educated at Yale College, where he
achieved distinction in his class and where he was graduated
in 1896, in the literary branches. He entered journalism after
his graduation, taking a position as reporter for the Chicago
Tribune. He did this work with such success that he was in
time promoted in charge of the editorial work of the financial
column of that paper, succeeding to the position formerly held
by Mr. Vanderlip, now Vice-President of the National City
Bank, of New York. While serving as reporter he is remem
bered as having distinguished himself by ingeniously securing
for his paper a number of valuable "scoops." He kept this
position for several years, and then engaged in writing upon
financial topics for several different papers. Later he moved
to Minneapolis and became associate editor of the Commercial
West, one of the leading financial and trade papers in the
Northwest. He finally withdrew from this paper and returned
to Chicago, where he still continues his literary pursuits, com
bining the same with financial operations, in which he has
been successful. He was married in November, 1906, to Miss
Edna Woolen, of Boston, Massachusetts. He has recently
been appointed consul at Hobart, Tasmania.
If our mother and father have given in fair meas
ure their attributes to their children, — the children
are indeed richly endowed.
My mother was active in church matters, and very
popular in society where she was always in demand
because of her literary and dramatic ability, but her
devotion to her children was the great and con-

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER 105
spicuous charm of her life among those who knew
her best. She was clever indeed in amateur theatricals
and several most creditable productions were held in
our home for the benefit of some of the church organi
zations. It was the custom of the family to spend every sum
mer upon Grandfather Dunster's farm in Massa
chusetts. We, the children, looked forward to the
coming of summer, months in advance, chaffing at the
way the school term dragged along, with no desire to
close itself, and impatiently packing and unpacking
our little trunks every few days to kill time. And
when we went it was like a circus moving; — trunks,
boxes and baby carriages piled high on vans, and a
carriage or two full of children of all ages and sexes,
and a Papa going along to the depot to give final
directions and to say goodbye, half sorry to have us
go and yet half glad withal to get free of us for a
time. We took stacks of cold lunches, for dining cars
were not then invented. Grandpa adopted us every
year. We learned from him how to plow and culti
vate, make hay, run a lathe and make dovetail boxes,
and to be expert geologists as well. We helped to
manage the setting hens, and suckling calves. We fed
the pigs and churned the butter. We went swimming
and berrying and did all those things which made
Grandpa's farm appear as we look backwards in our
lives as the real oasis, where our young characters
received a great deal of their early and best mould
ing. Late in the summer before our vacation was

106 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
over, Father would usually come to join us for a couple
of weeks, and while there he would assist us in making
kites and flying them, in which art as a boy he had
been an expert; and he would also work in Grandpa's
shop and turn clever things on the lathe. I went back
there last summer and rambled around all over as of
old, and I could not help but think; —
"How dear to my heart are the scenes of my childhood
When fond recollection present them to view;
The orchard, the meadow, the dear-tangled wildwood,
And all the loved spots which my infancy knew."
From the summer visit of 1871, our mother had
just returned to Chicago, leaving us children to come
later with our Aunt Mary, when the great Chicago
fire broke out, so that Father had her return to Attle
boro again immediately, where we all spent the fall
and winter, and where during this time, the last child
was born. The summer of 1873 was as usual spent in
the East, and during this visit our mother renewed
acquaintance with all the friends of her early days,
and returned with us all to Chicago about the first
of September of that year. Not long after this, she
started from the house one Saturday afternoon to
go to a matinee, but within an hour she was brought
back upon a stretcher in an unconscious condition and
with a terrible gash across her temple. She had taken
an omnibus to go down town, when the horses becom
ing frightened engaged in a mad runaway down
Wabash Avenue, which resulted in her being thrown
on her head against the curbstone of the street while

The Dunster Farmhouse Near Attleboro, Mass.

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER 107
foolishly attempting to get out of the conveyance.
The person following behind in the general panic,
stepped on her skirt and caused her to trip. At first
it was thought that she was not dangerously injured,
but after a few days she again became delirious, in
which state of mind she repeatedly called for her chil
dren and for her husband, he being in New York City
at the time, and not having been sent for as her con
dition was not at first considered really serious. How
ever, after a week of suffering, she died September
17, 1873, but not before Father had returned to her
and consciousness had been regained, so that with the
knowledge that the end was at hand, she was able to
tell him and her five little children her last good bye.
For three days while waiting the coming of relatives,
Father wept by her casket night and day, and his great
grief was shared by us little children in a dazed sort
of way, and we hardly appreciated the terribleness of
the calamity which had befallen us. She was then
only thirty-five years old. Bishop Charles Edward
Cheney, her pastor, made an affectionate address at
the funeral, to which nearly all the congregation of
Christ Church attended at the family residence on
Michigan Avenue. She was buried in Graceland
Cemtery, beside her first baby.
Mr. Cheney in writing to her father said: —
"You speak of gratitude for what I said at your daughter's
funeral. I assure it was the sincere utterance of my heart.
Mrs. Baker was exceedingly dear to Mrs. Cheney and myself.
Our acquaintance began when she was in deep affliction (the
death of Willie, her first born), and the ties thus formed grew

108 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
stronger every year. She was universally beloved by all our
church as well as by a large circle of friends outside its limits.
Her fondness for literary pursuits and literary society rendered
her the centre of attraction for a great many who had similar
tastes, while her devotion to her family and children was her
chief charm to those who knew her best.
Besides what I have already alluded to, viz., her literary
culture and her love for her children, the most marked char
acteristics of Mrs. Baker's life were her cheerfulness under
all circumstances, and her unselfish, gentle, Christian spirit.
These made her beloved by rich and poor alike; and her
memory is cherished by many who will never forget her words
and deeds of kindness."
And so our young mother was taken away, and
left us five little children, I being nine years old and
the oldest, and the youngest only a baby. Her sister,
our Aunt Mary Smith, then came and took her place
for six years, and no mother ever lived who gave more
real love and devotion to her own children than did
Aunt Mary to us. She died in about a year after
leaving us and was buried beside her two infant chil
dren at Dover, New Hampshire. I have often won
dered, had our mother lived, if we children would
have scattered around the country as we did when we
grew up.
On President Dunster's coat of arms designed by
himself appeared this Latin word, — "Veritas," mean
ing that that symbol would be a guide star to his daily
life, to the end that he might aspire to be an incarnation
of that exalted principle. Over the gateway of Har
vard University is also inscribed today this same

ELIZA ANNIE DUNSTER

109

"Veritas," handed down from him. And it came even
further and to my mother whose whole life exempli
fied the truth.

Chicago Board of Trade — "The Pit.'

Chapter V
CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE
1 890- 1 897
CHICAGO, by virtue of her geographical loca
tion naturally in her early history became the
grain centre of the United States. The great
grain producing areas of the country extended
hundreds of miles out from her borders and
three-fourths around her horizon. She was situ
ated at the head of navigation on the Great
Lakes and was in the line of railroad develop
ment. It was only logical that grain and trans
portation converging at that point, should result in
a trade mart springing up there. As the outlying
agricultural districts were put under cultivation more
and more, it came about that a small colony of grain
merchants and traders developed and became an im
portant feature of the business community. They had
no particular organization. The farmers came in
from the fields and sold their produce to commission
merchants or warehousemen, or some times these mer
chants went out and met the farmer upon his own
premises, viewed the grain growing in his fields or
stored in his grannery, and purchased it from him
there. The merchant in turn would make up carloads
of grain and ship them to the millers, and to seaboard
points upon the Atlantic, and in later years to foreign

112 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
countries. As a matter of convenience to both mer
chant and farmer, it became necessary for the trading
to be done in a particular place, rather than wherever
the farmer would find his merchant or the merchant
find his farmer, and so there developed in 1848 a vol
untary organization on South Water Street, which
went by the name of the Board of Trade. This or
ganization a year later, was incorporated under the
general incorporation laws of the State with Thomas
Dyer as its first President, and so continued until
1859, when it was reorganized under a special charter
given by the State of Illinois. The declared objects of
the organization were: — "To maintain a commercial
exchange; to promote uniformity in the customs and
objects of merchants ; to inculcate principles of justice
and honesty in trade; to facilitate the speedy adjust
ment of business disputes ; to acquire and disseminate
valuable commercial and economic information; and
generally, to secure to its members the benefits of co
operation in the furtherance of their legitimate pur
suits." With a foundation resting upon this declara
tion of principles and purposes, and dwelling in the
midst of a natural situation which of necessity gave
birth to it, the Chicago Board of Trade grew from
its primitive beginning until it became, in fact, the
greatest organization of its kind in the world, and as
such it has exercised a widespread influence and
power. Other similar organizations, although of
smaller stature, developed in other parts of the coun
try, and each of the others has served its useful pur-

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 113
pose and exercised its own particular sphere of in
fluence. In 1853 the Board moved its quarters to No. 8
Dearborn Street, at which time the interest taken in
the Board was so small that the Secretary was ordered
to provide refreshments for the members in order to
induce them to attend. A reading room was also in
stalled for the same purpose. The Board moved
again in 1856 to the corner of South Water and La
Salle Streets, and two years later for the first time
in its history it began to receive daily reports of
market conditions from outside points like New York,
Montreal and Buffalo. The Board was not on a
stable or paying basis until 1857. During the early
part of its existence it took a leading part in all affairs
touching the City of Chicago and the extension of its
trade. It donated $10,000 to the support of the Civil
War in April, 1861, and made many other similar
donations before the war closed. In this year which
was the year my father came to town, its membership
was only 725. In 1864 it again moved and this time
to the Chamber of Commerce Building where it re
mained until the great fire. Its present building was
completed in 1885 at a cost of $1,800,000. Prior to
1858 the chief measure which it had inaugurated and
was responsible for, was the substitution of weights
instead of measures in measuring grains, seeds and
other commodities, and later the designation of wheat
by standard grades, which has since become the sys
tem in universal use.

114 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
Following the success of the Chicago Board of
Trade and others like it, there came into being the
National Board of Trade, being a combination of all
American Boards of Trade, having for its purpose
the bringing of the igredient members into closer re
lationship with each other for the establishment of a
community of interests and for the betterment and
furtherance of their individual purposes and their
purposes as a whole. The National Board of Trade
has its headquarters in Philadelphia, and meets in
convention once a year, generally in Washington,
D. C, and often in other important cities. In the evo
lution of trade as it may proceed from now on and into
the future, it might be reasonable to expect that an
International Board of Trade may result, for the pur
pose of bringing into closer relation the trade organi
zations of Europe and other countries, with those of
America. The railroads, the telegraphs, and the sub
marine cables are apparently making the world grow
smaller and smaller as time goes on, and business in
terests are thereby brought into closer and closer re
lationship, and an International Board of Trade may
be the final result of it.
The parts which Boards of Trade play in our mod
ern civilization are impressive. They bring into corre
lation the resources of the mind and field with the
power of human thought and activity. They give rise
to the simplifying of business methods, and to reduc
ing expenses incidental to the distribution of mer
chandise, and to the minimizing of risks. They are

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 115
able to mirror the trade situation not only as to its
local aspects, but to worldwide conditions and in
fluences. They stimulate and sustain industry and
commercial conditions, and so help lay the foundation
stones of prosperity by creating regulated and equit
able competition among merchants, not only in re
stricted areas, but in worldwide spheres.
It was either men or conditions, or a combination
of both, which eventually caused the Chicago Board
of Trade to tower and loom high in the ranks of simi
lar organizations, until in prestige and in dignity, in
power and influence, and in volume of business, it
stood without a peer. Then came a blight upon it
like a festering sore, the bucket-shops, which from an
insignificant beginning, at first hardly noticed, grew
to such a degree that it threatened the very underpin
ning of the Board of Trade itself. The bucket-shop
idea, was to trade upon the Board of Trade quota
tions; to extend to its patrons the privilege of gam
bling upon or guessing what the Board of Trade
quotations in a given commodity would be from one
moment to another, and charging a small stipend or
bet to the person who wished to indulge in the gam
bling or guessing. The development of this business
attracted by its allurements a large number of people
of small means, who would make bets in varying
amounts from $10 up. This system grew as parasites
grow, thriving upon the more wholesome thing upon
which it fastens itself. It well and consistently took
its name "Bucket-shop" from a degraded order of

116 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
scavengers in England, whose avocation was to go
around from place to place and drain the dregs from
empty and abandoned beer and wine casks into
buckets, until a sufficient quantity had been gathered
to make it the subject of barter, when it would be sold
to a place called a bucket shop, and where in turn the
dregs would be bought by people who were willing to
accept such a low standard of goods. The bucket-shop
evil was contended with by the Board of Trade organ
ization in a desultory way as time went on, permitting
the incubus to grow to its full strength until it reached
a point where a definite and determined fight would
have to be made against it to preserve the existence of
the Board of Trade itself.
At this point in the history of the Board of Trade
my father begins to loom conspicuously. The mem
bers of the Board with one accord, looked to him as
the man of the hour, and as their Moses to lead them
through this sea of trouble and to destroy their com
mon enemy. With bucket-shops as an issue therefore
and with my father as the champion of the proposed
crusade, the election of January, 1890, found him at
the age of forty-nine beginning his first term as Presi
dent of the Board of Trade, and then and there the
fight began. I have heard him spoken of figuratively
in this connection later as having been to the Board
of Trade what President Roosevelt is to the United
States. The net result of choosing this "Teddy" for
captain, and turning him loose like a bulldog upon the
situation, was for the first time in the history of the

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 117
Board to route the bucket-shop industry. To accom
plish this, heroic measures had to be resorted to, but
Father employed them without hesitation. The pow
erful telegraph companies, which for years had en
joyed the undisturbed privilege of sending continuous
quotations from the floor of the Board were peremp
torily ordered off the floor. It was found that promi
nent brokers on the Exchange were in collusion with
bucket-shopmen on the outside, and these were sternly
disciplined, and such other action was taken from
time to time as was necessary to cut off all communi
cation with the Board through which the bucket-shops
received their quotations, and they were thus unable
to do business in the same old way. One by one these
parasites on the Board were killed off, and their illegal
business stamped out in large installments. As the
plague grew less in Chicago, however, it took root
and began to thrive in other cities, so that the fight
had to be carried on outside of the limits of the State
of Illinois. My Father's first administration as President of
the Board covered the most prosperous year in its
history, which condition was due not only to the gen
eral prosperity throughout the country, but to the
making of such great strides in disinfecting the busi
ness from the bucket-shop iniquity. There were 19 13
enrolled members of the Board in this year, which
at the time was the high water mark in its member
ship. Chicago as a city had risen to a population of
nearly a million and a quarter, with over 85,000 miles

118 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
of railroad track tributary to it, as against 4,500 miles
in 1861, the year of Father's first coming to Chicago.
The prosperity of the Board of Trade as an organi
zation, which the general prosperity and measures of
reform had given it, placed the organization in such
financial shape that it began the retirement of its
bonds which had been previously issued for the pur
pose of erecting the fine structure which has ever
since been the home of the Exchange. $50,000 of
the bonds were thus retired during this administra
tion, and this set the pace for additional retirements in
equal amounts during the following years.
In addition to its being the principal grain ex
change in the world, the Board of Trade exercises a
potent influence as one of the most important organi
zations in the country. In this year it exerted its
tremendous influence with its endorsement of the In
terstate Commerce Law, which soon became of very
great benefit to the people through the medium of
the Interstate Commerce Commission which that law
created. The Board also took a strong stand on the
currency situation of the country, and against the
silver agitation, which was then being promulgated
about the country. It was in connection with this agi
tation that my father wrote an able paper upon the
currency question which was published in pamphlet
form and widely distributed, and this paper, together
with his several inaugural addresses touching upon
the important issues of the nation, the city and the
Board of Trade, are frequently even at this late day

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 119
and long after his demise, brought forth as platform
principles at the different Board of Trade elections.
The Board therefore, became very influential in the
nation, and deference was paid to the stand which it
took upon all issues, for which issues, my father was
generally responsible. The Board also in this year
did effective work in securing the deepening of the
Chicago River, and by a general petition it addressed
the Congress of the United States for the improve
ment of the Mississippi River. It also did much to
establish reciprocity in the trade relations between this
country and South America, and to bring into nearer
commercial relations the people of all the countries of
the two Americas.
Another incubus which fastened itself upon the
Board of Trade and against which Father directed
his attention during his first administration was the
elevator monopoly. The elevator men as public ware
housemen and as the custodians of grain belonging to
different merchants occupied a position of high trust,
which they took advantage of to the detriment of their
patrons. Unjust discrimination and classification in
grain began to be practiced, and the elevators, besides
being the depository of grain for others, entered the
trade for themselves and owned and housed grain of
their own, contrary to the established principle of
the relation between warehousemen and merchants.
Father, therefore, opened fire upon the elevators with
the same ardor that he did upon the bucket-shops,
under the contention that elevators could not buy, sell,

120 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
clean, mix, receive or ship grain, except for others
than, themselves. To get at the root of the trouble,
the drastic measure was inaugurated of excluding ele
vator men from membership on the Board. The ques
tion finally became one of judicial determination and
Judge Tuley accordingly decided against the ele
vators, and confined them to the performance of their
duties as public custodians of grain and against their
position as traders in the commodity. It seems that
Father's fire was directed more particularly against
the Armour elevator interests, undoubtedly for the
reason that these interests were more justly the sub
ject of criticism and condemnation. These interests
went so far as issuing illegal warehouse receipts upon
property which did not really exist, but was supposed
to be stored within their elevators. Warehouse re
ceipts for wheat are bankable collateral, as they repre
sent property as good as gold, so that if they can be
turned out fradulently and without property behind
them, they make bank accommodations possible to the
elevator owner who is hard up, which would not be
possible if the actual possession of property were
necessary. My father kept hot on the trail of P. D.
Armour until he lost the scent, and it is said that Mr.
Armour was more afraid of him than any other man.
It was natural as a result of my father's warlike
attitude, that the displeasure and hostility of the united
elevator interests should be invoked against him, so
that whenever the Board of Trade members wished
him to head the administration ticket at any election,

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 121
it was a natural result that the opposition ticket if any,
should be the one known as the "Elevator Ticket." At
the end of his first administration, which had been re
sponsible for such genuine and far-reaching reforms,
it was only logical and inevitable that he should be
asked to run again for the office; which he did, with
the result that he was again elected in January, 1891.
His second year was not as conspicuous for new re
forms as it was for the continued and unremitting
prosecution of the reforms already begun. The war
fare on the bucket-shops was continued and new
methods were adopted from time to time to outflank
them. Among other things done in this connection, was
securing official declaration from the United States
Post Office Department that all mail matter coming
from and directed to bucket-shops was illegal mail
matter, so that bucket-shops were consequently de
prived of the privilege of the mail service. In this
year the telegraph instruments were installed again
on the floor of the Exchange, under proper restric
tions as to their use. The rules of the Board, many of
which had grown into disuse, were revived and were
rigidly enforced. As the President of the Exchange,
my father was as rigid a disciplinarian as he would have
been had he been running a military school. He ap
plied the lash to big and little alike. He enforced
rigidly the rule that there should be no trading after
the closing hour of the Exchange, and he opposed
most strenuously the illegal practice of puts and calls,

122 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
and for this reason he became unpopular with the
scalpers. At the close of 1891, his second term, and as the
result of there having been so strong a man at the
helm, the skies had cleared about the Board of Trade
horizon. He felt that he had done his duty to his fel
low members, and that there was no further need of
his accepting the office again, and he did not therefore,
allow the presentation of his name, and so was able to
give his time to the World's Fair matters, which were
then beginning to absorb his attention.
Some one had truly said :
"When the cat's away
The mice will play."
and such proved to be the case in the next three years
of the Board of Trade history during my father's
retirement. The bucket-shops seemed to take on life
again and the trade was threatened again with this
old time spectre in formidable proportions, and the
elevator men also had grown bold and sought to domi
nate the Board of Trade. As the result of these re
turning conditions, the logical candidate for President
— my father — was again put forward, and for the
third time he was elected to the office to serve during
the year 1895. This was a bad year in the commercial
world as the great panic of 1893 had not entirely dis
appeared. Prosperity had not yet again begun to
declare itself. The currency situation in the country
was uncertain, and therefore unsettled all business
conditions. The price of corn was the lowest in the

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 123
history of the country since 1880, as also was the price
of wheat, and when these two mainstays get down to
such low levels, one need look for no further sign of
distressful conditions. Crops were all larger than
usual but prices lower. A farmer's wife could sell
a dozen of eggs for almost as much as he could get
for a bushel of wheat, for wheat had gotten down to
the low level of 25 cents a bushel. The conditions at
home and abroad which Father had to face upon
entering his third term as President, and the purposes
of his coming administration as the corrective of bad
conditions, are well set forth in his inaugural address
of that year, which I can do no better than to embody
herein, not only for the subject matter therein con
tained, but also to display as a feature of this bio
graphy, the forcefulness of his manner of expression,
and the terseness and pure style of his diction. As
far as they go, his addresses serve as his own auto
biography.
"In accepting for a third term the office to which you have
elected me, I thank you for the expression of your continued
confidence, while I shrink from the responsibilities involved.
I can only hope that at the end of my term you will let a
record of good intentions palliate whatever failure there may
be on my part to satisfy your expectations."
"This Board of Trade has always been a leading and influ
ential factor in the commerce of the country. Its prosperity
and continued ascendency are essential to the progress of
this city and the expansion of the trade of the great North
west. As we bear our share of the burdens and disasters that
befall the country, we may also claim our right to participate
in the general prosperity when fortune smiles again. If there

124 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
is any inherent reason why we may not so participate, let us
find it out and remove the cause."
"The silver panic of 1893 prostrated every branch of business
and paralyzed all enterprises. But the business of this Board
has also suffered from evils distinctly local and that do not
operate elsewhere. Bucket-shop dealing has so honeycombed
the trade as to seem irradicable, though this association is
furnishing to bucket-shops that without which they never could
have started and without which they cannot exist. The capital
in trade of bucket-shops is official continuous quotations which
you only can supply. Business would go on in your exchange
if no quotations ever left the floor, but no bucket-shop can
run an instant without your quotations. To be of value enough
to bucket-shops to attract victims, the quotations must be not
only continuous but official. However simple-minded a man
must be who ventures in a bucket-shop, he will not long trust
himself to the tender mercies of swindlers who could and
would make figures to suit themselves in robbing their patrons.
The various gambling devices in pool rooms or elsewhere in
this city should not be confounded with bucket-shop uses of
your quotations. While you permit additional attraction to the
habitues of gambling resorts which add nothing to your credit,
the greatest wrong is done throughout the country where
patrons fail to distinguish between the bucket-shop thieves
and honorable business establishments. The city gambler sees
only a wager and may be as willing to bet on your quotations
as on anything else that has an uncertain future. The cus
tomers of country bucket-shops, on the other hand, believe
their transactions are legitimate and are made on the Chicago
Board of Trade. This Board once tried the experiment of
discontinuing supplies to bucket-shops. Was your business
better while that experiment was operating, or since it has
been discontinued? I ask you for an expression on this sub
ject at this meeting, and recommend that your Directors be
authorized to discontinue the present plan of supplying con-

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 125
tinuous official quotations of our markets. I am aware of
the possible embarrassment of again making this arrangement
acceptable, owing to the unequal use of private telegraph wires
by members, but think I may pledge the Directory that the dis
cretion, if given them, will not be used to your disadvantage."
"Next to the incubus of the bucket-shops is the tyranny of
the elevator monopoly, which, from a fair and legitimate
beginning, has grown to such proportions within your Associ
ation as to threaten its very existence. And it is a broader
question than the survival of the fittest among groups of
business men and interests in this Exchange. It concerns every
merchant and common carrier engaged in the great commerce
of this city, and every farmer who contributes to make that
commerce possible. The warehousing of grain is only an inci
dent in its transit from producer to consumer. Its natural
and healthy function is in accepting on storage the overflow
of the season of freest movements that the channels of com
merce may not be clogged or obstructed, and safely caring
for the same while waiting a demand. But in Chicago the
accumulation and storage of grain has come to be the chief
end and aim of potential and dominating forces. The alliance
between railroads and elevators has resulted in reaching out
after millions of bushels not naturally tributary to us, and
when gathered here preventing it by such tricks of trade as
you are familiar with from ever getting away again as long as
storage can be collected on it. This policy has resulted in
such congestion of grain here as to depress prices to the lowest
point in history. For it is not the Chicago stock alone that
this market has to carry. Its very volume invites dealers
in every market in the world to make sales here against hold
ings elsewhere, which they would not dare to do but for
abnormal accumulations brought and held here by unnatural
means. Cargoes of wheat bought on European account in
Australia, India, Russia and Argentina, as well as stocks at
all other points of accumulation, are sold against here, so that

126 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
our market feels the weight of the entire world's surplus.
This condition is only made possible by the enormous and
unnatural hoard brought and retained here to satisfy the
avarice of half a dozen corporations the largest of which is
owned in London."
"A system that permits the proprietors of public
elevators, directly or indirectly, to deal in the property
of which they are custodians is essentially immoral. The
temptation to reserve for themselves the best of a grade is
one to which the law never contemplated that they should be
subjected. Indeed, the principal motive of the warehouse
law was to prevent their ownership or control of grain in
public warehouses. Yet it is notorious that during the past
year the proprietors of elevators have had for sale and have
sold millions of bushels of grain at a large premium, not one
cent of which in equity belonged to them. The grain bought
elsewhere by elevator proprietors is promptly sold here to
you for some future delivery, so they become the custodians
of your property, which, however, you can only get on pay
ment of such premiums as the urgency of the demand may
enable them to exact. It is an unwelcome task for me to
criticise the methods of any class of our members, but this is
an occasion for plain speech and honest, earnest efforts to
restore to this Association its vanishing glory and traditions."
"The elevator monopoly is the same blight on legitimate
business that anti-option legislation would have been if enacted.
The old-time open competition of thousands has been super
seded by new conditions under which each railroad terminat
ing in Chicago is practically controlled by a single buyer.
Special rates are made to favored individuals who have the
further advantage of elevator control, so that rates charged
to the public are rebated to themselves, thus enabling them to
outbid or undersell all competitors. This charge of three-
quarters of a cent per bushel for the first term of storage
is retained only as a protection to elevator managers against

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 127
the competition of legitimate dealers in grain. It is a charge
that you cannot avoid, but which is ignored by them in their
own transactions, thus forcing every one to sell to or buy of
them. The fact that this charge is not bona-fide, but only a
foil to competition, proves that it is unjust and should be
abolished. While elevator proprietors are willing to pay one
cent per bushel more for grain 'to go to store' in their own
warehouses than the market price of the same grain in store
(and subject to the charge of three-quarters of a cent per
bushel), is conclusive that the first storage charge is not legiti
mate, and also that the subsequent terms of storage are unduly
profitable. The charge for the transfer of grain from cars
to vessels, a distance of perhaps 100 feet, is greater than the
average rate of freight, during the past season, from Chicago
to Buffalo. The same grain is transferred on track by the
railroads themselves from western to eastern cars for nothing."
"A proper solution of our difficulties must include facilities
by railroads entering here for free warehousing of grain on
arrival, and fair rates for storage on naturally acquired accu
mulations. The device of collecting storage in advance of
delivery of grain has supplied largely increased capital to
elevator proprietors to be used against you in the unequal
competition for business. There is no legal or moral right
in this practice, and it should be terminated altogether. Ware
house receipts for grain are made current by your rules.
These rules are absolutely binding on every buyer in your
market whether he is a member of your Board or not. It
therefore behooves you to protect the innocent purchaser by
every safeguard within your power. It is not only your right
but your imperative duty to have such an oversight of elevator
management as will assure to holders of warehouse receipts
made regular by your rules that their receipts represent not
only property, but uncontaminated grades and condition. In
providing the requisites for regular receipts, it may be pos
sible to correct some of the abuses complained of, as well as

128 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
give adequate security to holders of warehouse receipts. But
the Legislature must be appealed to to so amend the ware
house law as to make it impossible for public warehousemen to
be also dealers in grain ; and railroad companies having termi
nals here should be required to warehouse their grain on
arrival as they do every other species of merchandise. With
this purpose in view, I recommend the appointment of a com
mittee on legislation outside the Board of Directors to promote
the necessary legislation at Springfield."
"The uniformity and integrity of the inspection of grain
is of paramount importance to the members of this Association.
It has been placed by the State entirely beyond our control,
and so long as it is fairly conducted we would not have it
otherwise. Thus far there has been little to complain of, but
there is and always will be danger of politics dominating the
department to the detriment and demoralization of the service.
I therefore earnestly recommend that you direct your efforts
toward such a modification of the law as will place the depart
ment under Civil Service Reform rules. There should be no
appointments except for merit and no removal except for
cause. There can be no question of the necessity and justice
of this proposition. An inspector of grain in fixing its grade
thereby determines its value, a trust that should not be confided
to men who are not skilled in their calling."
"Zeal in partisan campaign work does not qutlify men for
this occupation, and none should ever be employed who can
not pass such an examination as only a ripe experience will
prepare them for."
"Trading in privileges has become so common outside of
Exchange hours as to impair the good name of the Associ
ation. These transactions are outside the law and are dis
tinctly obnoxious to your own rules. They cannot be enforced
either in the courts or under the rules of this Board, and
anyone can sue at any time and recover for even consequential
losses. The Illinois statute prescribes penalties of fine and

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 129
imprisonment for making such contracts, and specifically
declares that all such contracts 'shall be considered gambling
contracts and shall be void.' It is claimed that the dull state
of trade makes these transactions necessary, but do they not
contribute to an important extent to the very stagnation you
complain of? By coopering prices within a narrow limit
day after day, do you not discourage business that you would
count on in a free and unrestricted market ? The risks assumed
by you as commission merchants are beyond computation, and
more than all else in making these transactions we violate the
law. I sincerely urge that means may be taken to put an
end to the practice at once."
"No reputable citizen requires to be admonished to obey
the laws made necessary for the well being and order of the
community, but there is a more immediate and direct obli
gation upon members of this Board to fidelity to its rules, for
every member has signed his name to a solemn compact in
these words : 'We, the undersigned, members of the Board of
Trade of the City of Chicago, do, by our respective signatures
and by virtue of our membership in said corporatiton, hereby
mutually agree and covenant with each other, and with the
said corporation, that we will in our actions and dealings with
each other, and the said corporation, be in all respects, gov
erned by and respect the Rules, Regulations and By-Laws of
said corporation, as they now exist, or as they may be here
after modified, altered or amended.'
"No more serious or valid contract can be signed by any
one. Any violation of a rule of this Board by a member is
an act of bad faith to each one of his associates, and a dis
credit to the fair name of the Association. It is the highest
duty of every one of you to understand your rules and assist
your officers in maintaining them. Your individual and hearty
cooperation is necessary, and I pledge the officers you have
chosen to their full measure of duty."
"In an Exchange of such importance as ours, there is and

130 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
must be room for all. No single or selfish interest must be
permitted to dominate, but absolute fairness must prevail.
What is best for the whole Board is best for each one of us,
and let us unite in raising higher and even higher our ideal,
until the Chicago Board of Trade shall be the standard of
integrity and commercial ethics wherever known."
My father undertook the fight against the railroads
because of their unjust discrimination between patrons
who were favored and those who were not. His con
tention is summed up in a report to the Board, of a
committee of which he was the chairman, in whose
behalf he declared as follows:
"Your committee insists upon the observance on the part
of common carriers of their proper attitude to the public,
namely : that these lines derive their franchise from the people,
and to the people without discrimination they owe an equitable
distribution and allotment of transportation privileges, includ
ing rates, conveniences and facilities for business at terminal
points ; while your committee concedes that transportation lines
are entitled to reasonable compensation for services rendered,
they are not entitled directly or indirectly by any ingenious
system of accounts to excess rates."
In looking backward from the present day scene
of Harrimanism, Father's attitude seems at least
prophetic. In continuing the fight on bucket-shops,
rigid strictures were placed upon membership in the
Board of Trade, which admitted no bucket-shops to
the privilege of membership, and any member or firm
found guilty of bucket-shopping, directly or indirectly,
was suspended from membership; also the rigid en
forcements of the laws of Illinois were invoked against
the grain elevators as a result of which nine licenses

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 131
were revoked by the Warehouse Commissioner of the
State. When his third term of office drew near to a close,
the usual division of sentiment took place, with the
active members of the Board on one side — who in
sisted upon Father again for their President, and the
Armour crowd, the elevator men, and the millionaire
members of the Board upon the other side with their
candidate. The election of January, 1896, therefore,
was the hottest in the history of the Board of Trade ;
and it is noteworthy in this connection that Father
gave the situation no attention whatsoever, but allowed
matters to take their own course. On the other hand,
the opposing party organized a most vigorous cam
paign. In this way inactive members were brought
even from as remote points as Buffalo to come and
cast their vote in favor of the elevator monopoly and
the bucket-shop plague. Carriages were sent out all
over the city to bring in delinquent members, who never
attended the regular sessions, purely for the purpose
of voting, all of which, however, were to naught, for
when the polls were closed and the votes counted it
was known that Father had received 777 votes, as
against 562 votes for his opponent.
He therefore entered upon his duties for the fourth
time, upon his own platform as he set it forth in his
inaugural address of that year, which it is well to
incorporate in this story at this point, calling especial
attention to his remarks upon the silver question.

132 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER

Chicago Tribune cartoon upon the occasion of the election of
William T. Baker to his fourth term as president.

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 133
"Once again it is my privilege to thank you for the honor
you have conferred upon me. This renewed expression of
your confidence and esteem is all the recompense I ask for
such service as I shall be able to render your Association for
another year."
"On the beginning of this new year I think we are justified
in anticipating better times and more prosperous business.
But there are three obstacles that confront us, two of which
are peculiar to ourselves but from which the entire grain trade
both East and West is suffering, and the other of which con
cerns not us alone but every one who lives or expects to live
in the United States of America. I refer to the bucket-shop
iniquity, the elevator monopoly and the free-silver lunacy.
The first two of these evils are local in their origin, though
widespread in their effects, and their cure must depend mainly
on ourselves. The last can be averted only by the united
efforts of business men, laboring men and professional men
of the entire country, and in this we may take a leading part."
"Your Board of Directors during the past year has been
united in its purpose to suppress bucket-shops and bucket-shop
ping, and distinct progress has been made. All that has
been attempted has borne some fruit, and it is likely that
future operations may be facilitated by a more general appre
ciation by the community of what bucket-shops really are. It
is beginning to dawn upon the comprehension of the public
that every one connected with the bucket-shops are thieves
and swindlers, and the man who is guilty of bucket-shop prac
tices can no longer shield himself under the cloak of respecta
bility. It would be obviously improper to indicate in detail
what may be proposed, but I can assure you that no effort
will be spared to eradicate this evil. Membership in this
Board will not shield any one if found guilty, for it must be
our highest aim to keep the roster of our members above sus
picion, to make it, in fact, a roll of honor."
"While something has been accomplished toward improving

134 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
the status of the elevator question, there is much remaining
to be done. The law's delay has been invoked against you,
not with the hope of ultimate success, but to weary you and
to tire you out. The recent court decision did not touch the
merits of our cases, which will be pressed with such vigor as
your Directors are capable of, and an early decision is hoped
for. There is some misapprehension apparent outside this
Board as to the relation of elevator companies to the general
business of the city. They claim to be public benefactors, in
that they bring grain in large amounts to this city that would
otherwise go elsewhere. This is said to furnish employment
to more banking capital and keep up the rate of interest and to
give business to railroads and insurance companies. But we
know that half a dozen firms and corporations have a monopoly
of the business. They cannot bring grain here that is not
naturally tributary to us, except cut rates of freight denied
the general public and forbidden by law. Nearly every rail
road terminating here has some favored elevator system under
its protection, the proprietors of which are given such profit
able concessions as to enable them to control the business. If
the contention of this Board is sustained each railroad will
have a host of competing patrons instead of one ; bankers will
have a thousand active accounts instead of the small group of
large borrowers who are now able to combine and dictate
rates, while the short rate card of insurance offices will again
come into use."
"But the real question is not whether it may add to
the traffic of railroads or increase the profits of bank
ing or insurance capital, but whether it is right for public
custodians of grain to be at the same time dealers in grain and
enabled to select and set aside for their own purposes the best
of what may come under their charge. No objection is made
to all the grain coming to Chicago that can be legitimately
brought here, but it is against public policy, and is not the
legitimate function of a public warehouseman, operating under

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 135
a license from the State and the rules of this Board, to be
so engaged. It is the dual capacity that we object to and that
is prohibited by law. Last spring the quality of millions of
bushels of grain stored in public warehouses was aspersed by
interested speculators. This Board, through its officers, sought
to have such an investigation made as would refute the slander
against grain stored in public warehouses and restore the
confidence of buyers and holders of property made regular by
our rules. But every elevator proprietor in Chicago joined in
refusing permission to your representatives to make that neces
sary and wholesome examination. They knew the grain was
above the average in quality and condition but were unwilling
to have it inspected in order to increase the carrying charges.
The present monopoly is against everything and everybody
but themselves."
"By the rankest and most brazen manipulation they seek
to control the price and movement of our commodities and
force every buyer and every seller to their terms. A year
ago they were selling Spring Wheat at 5 or 6 cents premium.
Now they are selling Winter Wheat at a like premium, while
they have not been the owners of either. While they are
nominally the custodians of your property they are able in
violation of the laws of the State, to set aside and sell at a
premium millions of bushels every year, not owned by them
but in their custody as warehousemen. Would any court
permit a trustee of an estate to thus handle trust funds for
his own advantage? This gain is not the legitimate property
of a public warehouseman. It belongs to you or whoever
owns the grain. The lawful profit of the business of public
warehousing has been attractive enough to create an enormous
system of elevators here. If the business has been overdone it
is due to the cupidity of those engaged in it. This Board
will cheerfully concede a fair return on capital actually
employed in lawful operation of elevators, but will forever
resist the use of its machinery for unjust or illegal practices.

136 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
If it is possible to close the courts against us we have remedies
within our own Association that neither money nor influence
can buy."
"The pulse of business is sought in the great exchanges of
the country and nowhere is it more sensitive than in this
Board of Trade. Whatever affects the weal or woe of the
commerce of this country is immediately reflected here, so
that no class of business men can have greater interest than
we in the impending crisis in national finances."
"All our internal differences are small or of passing import
ance compared with the one great question whether the credit
of the nation is to be sacrificed through the ignorance or
demagoguery of Congress. Between the rapacity of the mine
owners, who among their other assets are able to schedule
Senators of the United States, and the zeal of politicians whose
patriotism is bounded by their partisanship, we are in constant
danger of drifting to a silver basis. The treasury is forced
to dubious expedients in order to postpone the calamity.
These expedients are likely to be less effectual and more
embarrassing as our stock of gold is drawn upon for export,
and no matter what party may control the government, there
can be but one final result from present conditions. Our stock
of gold is not unlimited, and the drain upon it will never per
manently cease until we turn from the blind fatuity of forcing
the circulation of a good dollar and a bad dollar side by side
on equal terms."
"In our transactions on 'Change No. 2, Spring Wheat and
No. 2, Red Winter Wheat are each a legal tender on contracts.
We have the double standard, and for years past we have seen
that it is the kind that has least commercial value that weighs
upon the market. The better or more valuable grade dis
appears — is either hoarded or shipped away, while the cheaper
or less desirable kind remains to plague us. This is a forcible
though familiar illustration of the operation of the Gresham
law, the law that never in the world's history has failed to

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 137
operate when the money of the country has a varying or
unequal standard. We encourage the speedy and ceaseless
operation of this law by a system of legislation which, if
intended to drive gold from circulation, could not have been
more ingeniously devised."
"In order to maintain the credit of the government by
keeping parity between gold and silver as required by law, the
treasury must redeem greenbacks and Sherman notes in gold,
and this redemption is accompanied by the absurd requirement
that such money must be paid out again and kept in circula
tion, to be again and again redeemed in gold. This imbecile
legislative contrivance has placed us at the mercy of foreign
enemies or alien speculators in bullion, and recent events
have shown us that such enemies and speculators know their
advantage and are not slow to profit by our weakness. There
is but one remedy for this deplorable condition of affairs. Pro
vision must be made for the permanent retirement of the five
hundred millions of greenbacks and Sherman notes. Long
time bonds bearing a low rate of interest and payable in gold
should be authorized for this purpose, and if such bonds were
permitted to be used by national banks as security for circu
lation redeemable in gold, they would be quickly absorbed,
and the transition would be easily and safely made; all the
hoarded gold in the country would immediately come back
into circulation and this country would enter upon an era
of unexampled prosperity. There is no politics in this propo
sition. There are only partisanship, ignorance and greed
opposed to it. There should be patriotism enough in Congress
to take this, the only wise course to restore American credit
and invite the capital of the world to American enterprises. It
would restore confidence and start the wheels of every mill
and give employment to all the unemployed, and labor would
continue to be paid in money worth 100 cents on the dollar."
"The prospect of any intelligent legislation is at this time
doubtful, but it is nevertheless the duty of every business man

138 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
who knows the value of credit in business enterprises, and of
every citizen who cherishes the honor of his country to cry
out in protest against the puerility of Congress. No man who
represents an honest and intelligent constituency in either
house of Congress who fails in his duty on this supreme
question can look for future preferment. But the next elec
tion is a long way off. We should not wait to get at them
with our votes, for delay may mean ruin to the business of
the country. Let every one of us by letter or petition or in
any way in which we can make our influence felt, do what we
may to secure this currency reform and save the country from
humiliation and disgrace. This Board of Trade controlling
the commerce of the Northwest can serve no higher purpose
than to lead in this crusade in behalf of the national honor
as it has always led in patriotic endeavor."
It will be remembered in this connection, that con
temporaneously with his serving as President of the
Board of Trade during his last three terms, my father
was likewise President of the Civic Federation, the
co-operation of which organization he was therefore
always able to command in putting down infractions
of law and morality in connection with the grain trade.
His fourth administration continued its crusade
against the bucket-shops and the elevator iniquities,
and developed new reforms. The history of this year
was largely a repetition of the year preceding it, and it
ended with much good accomplished, and with the
sentiment prevailing as usual among the members of
the Board that he must again and for the fifth time
be the President of the organization. In fact, it is
likely that had he been willing, he would have been
elected President of the Board of Trade for the rest

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 139
of his life. Never in the history of the Board had
any one member been elected its President for a fifth
time, or even a fourth time, and my father, therefore,
stands alone in its history with this unique honor rest
ing upon him. He was elected in January, 1897, to
serve for that year. So unusual was the distinction
of a fifth term that it called forth editorials from the
leading press of the city, but I call particular attention
to that in the Times Herald of January 13, 1897, as
follows :
"For the fifth time Mr. William T. Baker has been called
to the presidency of the Board of Trade, an honor so unusual
and so unprecedented that it is in itself conclusive proof of
the value the members of the board place upon the services
of their distinguished associate. And, indeed, not only in the
eyes of his fellow members, but in the eyes of his fellow
citizens, President Baker is deserving of this high esteem. He
has stood before the community as a man faithful in the dis
charge of the duties of citizenship, zealous for every good
work and reform, and ever keeping in mind the highest civil
ideals of business, jealous to the quick of everything that
tends to the degradation of the honorable name of merchant."
"Animated by such feelings, he has sought to purge the
floor of the great mart of the rapacious and the dishonest
of mercantile welshers and of those who make victims of their
patrons. The records of the board show how well he has suc
ceeded, and how dangerous to themselves it is for the tricky
and the unscrupulous to perpetrate their frauds on the floor
of the exchange."
"In his annual address on Monday President Baker re
viewed some of the reforms that had been accomplished in the
past and mentioned others that were yet to be accomplished."
"The first battle with the elevator monopoly has resulted

140 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
in; a legal victory that in all probability will be final. This
has been the chief gain of the year. The war against the
bucket-shops still continues, but President Baker promises that
the crusade against those swindling gambling shops shall con
tinue until success is achieved."
"Another subject of vital importance to the board is the
system of grain inspection and the methods of appointing grain
inspectors. Gradually the politicians have been getting a greater
and greater hold on this department, and ward heelers and
political dependents have found their way to the pay rolls. This
is too serious a matter to be lightly passed over, and it is recom
mended that an effort be made to place the inspection depart
ment under civil service rules. If this is refused by the
Legislature the board should assert its chartered rights and
have an inspection system of its own."
"The Times-Herald congratulates President Baker on his
re-election and upon the honorable career that has been
crowned with this distinction. Long may he illustrate by pre
cept and example the highest standards of commercial
morality !"
As setting forth concisely his work of the preceding
year, and the hopes and purposes of his administration
for the year to come, and his pronounced convictions
upon currency reform, I will add here his fifth and
last inaugural address as a part of his life's story:
"In accepting the office to which you have a fifth time
elected me, I acknowledge the obligation due you for the
unusual honor, and shall endeavor to show my appreciation of
it by such fidelity and care for the interests of this Board as
my limitations will permit."
"I congratulate the members of this board on a fairly pros
perous business during the past year, and on the prospects of
still better times to come. The year has been marked by most
alarming vicissitudes in all branches of business in this country,

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 141
and I therefore felicitate you that failures have been almost
unknown among us, and that you have closed the year
generally with a balance on the right side of the ledger. I
sincerely hope the improvement in business here is the har
binger of prosperity for the whole country, for we can hardly
expect permanent improvement in which all branches of indus
try do not share. We are therefore justified in exerting our
influence whenever we can do so in the direction of improv
ing present conditions, and especially for such congressional
enactments as will relieve us from the peril that has already
nearly wrecked the country."
"Politics and business have become so closely allied that
we can scarcely discuss business concerns of the first import
ance to every one without inviting the imputation of partisan
ship. The tendency of our time forbids the hope of such
an Utopian condition that merely academic discussion of
National questions will be possible. The people have so long
been taught that the principal functipn of government
is to do something for everybody, that every citizen looks
to Washington with hope and fear, and it is only by frank
expressions of business men that vital errors may be avoided.
We owe it to ourselves, therefore, and to the business com
munity of which we are a part, to give vigorous expression
of our views on business questions on which legislation by
Congress is likely or desirable. There is no place where such
questions can be discussed more dispassionately than in this
Board of Trade, for no member of it is or expects to be a
beneficiary of any act of Congress further than any citizen
is benefitted by honest legislation for the public good."
"The currency question is as far from being settled as it has
been at any time since the repeal of the Sherman Act. All the
machinery for precipitating the country to a silver basis is
in perfect order, and ready to operate whenever anything occurs
to arouse suspicion or start alarm. It is criminal folly for
business men to lapse into indifference again until the treas-

142 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
ury surplus approaches the danger line. It is positively mon
strous that the whole business fabric of this country and the
honor and credit of the government should be permitted to
continue at the mercy of circumstances that may arise at any
time, and are as sure to arise some time in the future as they
have already in the recent past. The last election barely
extinguished the burning fuse that led to the mine, but the
mine is still there, and the danger, though less imminent, is
just as great as it always has been since otir currency laws
were enacted. It is the paramount duty of Congress to revise
these laws, to take the government out of banking business by
retiring all its demand notes and substituting National bank
notes redeemable in gold. Practically the only issue in the
last campaign was the money issue. Familiar questions of
political economy were either ignored or perfunctorily dis
cussed as evidence of party consistency, but the appeal to the
intelligent electorate was for honest money, and more than
two millions of voters laid aside their most cherished convic
tions in voting with the majority to save the National honor.
I believe they now have a right to demand that those with
whom they voted shall be equally patriotic, and put all other
party questions behind them until the currency question, on
which they were agreed, is settled and settled forever. The
people can afford to wait for increased taxation, but they
cannot afford to wait for that return of confidence which a
proper reform of our curency laws will bring about, and
which nothing else in the way of legislation will accomplish."
"The question between the board and the elevator pro
prietors has reached a decision in the Circuit Court in our
favor on every controverted point. The decision of Judge
Tuley is so comprehensive and convincing that the elevator
proprietors can hardly hope to have it reversed by the Supreme
Court, though they have taken an appeal. I earnestly recom
mend that no backward step be taken by this board. There
has been nothing in the events of the past year to make the

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 143
elevator monopoly more endurable. Their control of the
property of which they should be simply guardians or trustees,
the property which does not belong to them but to the members
of this board to whom they have sold it, has enabled them
not only to manipulate prices, but to create intollerable obstruc
tions to the free current of commerce which is the most import
ant function of this board to foster. The legitimate storage
charge is no longer a prime consideration with them. Their
alliance with the railroads and the privilege and immunities
enjoyed by them on this board enables them to levy tribute on
producer and consumer alike, while the centralization of the
control of stocks of grain in store robs the banker and the
common carrier of the legitimate advantage of competition
that would come with a restoration of the natural order of
business. This board has never questioned the right of any
of its members to deal in grain and store it in their own
warehouses, but when its members elect to do such business
they should not at the same time become public warehousemen
with the stamp of regularity on their warehouse receipts. The
opportunity to select and sell at a premium the best of a
grade while offering holders of their receipts the poorest, is
a manifest injustice and contrary to public policy. The market
price is always based on the least desirable, while for the better
qualities such a premium as the necessities or desires of con
sumers may warrant, is exacted by the custodians of the prop
erty who do not even pretend to be its real owners. The well
known fact that the poorest quality that is deliverable on con
tracts establishes the price of the entire stock in store, and to
a certain extent depresses the general market, is a constant
injustice to producers in all the territory tributary to our
market. It is an application of the pinciples of the Gresham
law to the familiar operations of the grain market that must
be intelligible to anybody."
"The integrity of the system of grain inspection in
this district is marked on our exchange, and though

144 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
we have no voice in the management of the inspec
tion department, yet our credit is impaired and our business
injured by its inefficiency. When the inspection of grain was
surrendered by this board to the State in compliance with the
warehouse law, we had reason to expect faithful and uniform
administration of the service. For many years we had no
ground for serious complaint, but it has gradually become a
useful part of machine politics, and ward heelers are crowded
upon the pay rolls without regard to the technical require
ments of the work. The inspection department should be
petitioned to pass a bill to this end. An effort was made at
the last meeting of the Legislature to accomplish this but
failed. If such an act cannot be passed by the present Legis
lature, it may be well to consider the propriety of asserting our
rights under our charter and have our own inspection system."
"The extermination of bucket-shops should continue to be
the aim of this board. It is no longer necessary to explain
their practices to convince the community of their viciousness.
The public has come to understand their pernicious effects and
their demoralizing influence. They furnish the most attractive
gambling hells in every city and village where they can effect
a lodgment, and are more dangerous to public morals than
other forms of gambling because of the quasi-respectability
and immunity from police raids. Their proprietors are without
exception thieves and swindlers."
"Bucket-shops and pool-rooms are twin outlaws in nearly
every State in the Union. Their united corruption fund has
enabled them to baffle justice by debauchery of the constituted
authority for the investigation and prosecution of crime, but
they could not continue in existence a day but for their alliance
with the Western Union Telegraph Company. That company
furnishes all the machinery and all the news on which bets are
laid, and it is the only telegraph company in the United States
that leases wires for the private use of bucket-shops in swindling
their patrons. The spectacle of a corporation with a hundred

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 145
million dollars capital paying dividends gleaned from the vice
and crime of the country is one to make any American blush.
Contrast this with the conduct of some of the great news
papers of this city, which cannot be hired to print the harmless
appearing advertisements of bucket-shops. It may be said
that a great commercial organization like this has no need to
concern itself with questions of morals, but the ethics of busi
ness are based on a high standard of commercial morality,
which it is our duty to preach and to practice. When we
see our efforts to rid ourselves of the incubus of bucket-shops
embarrassed by such a condition as is here outlined, we find
our self-interest exalted by our patriotic duty as citizens in
striking down a wrong. The crusade in which we have been
so long engaged will not cease. Complete success will, how
ever, be hastened by our maintaining among ourselves an
unimpeachable standard of business honor. Our rules are
based on such a standard, and if any member is unfaithful
to them, it is your duty, individually, to expose the derelict
and aid your officers in purging your membership of any who
are found unworthy to enjoy its privileges."
"Let us enter upon the new year with a renewed pledge of
loyalty to this great exchange and a determination to keep
its honor above suspicion, so that our membership in it may
be a source of pride and gratification to us and to our children."
It was in this last term that Governor Tanner of the
State of Illinois and the Board of Trade came
into conflict. The Governor had made a good
deal of money on the Board of Trade through
some of his brokers, which fact he did not deplore,
but he did hold resentment against the Board
of Trade for an attack made upon him in connec
tion with standing in with the crooked element
and vetoing certain legislation which the Board

146 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER

THE BOARD OF TRADE-GOV. TANNER'S "MONTE CARLO--AS SEEN BY FURNISS.
Illustrating the Governor's hostility to President Baker.
Chicago Tribune cartoon of June 8, 1897.

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 147
of Trade had championed for the purpose of puri
fying the trade of the evil things which beset it.
This led the Governor in an interview with a reporter
of the Tribune to say that "The Chicago Board of
Trade was the biggest gambling place on earth, Monte
Carlo not excepted. I retort, that if Mr. Baker or
any of his friends so desire I can give proof, facts and
figures to substantiate what I said, and now empha
size in that respect." The Governor's tirade was em
bodied in a personal attack upon Father as the official
head of the organization. It resulted in an amusing
cartoon being published of Chicago's Temple of Com
merce which is interesting enough to be reproduced
in this book.
The year 1897 was a most prosperous one for the
Board of Trade. In this year Father succeeded in
getting the Post Office Department to order the word
"fraudulent" stamped on all letters sent to bucket-
shops, so that no bucket-shops closed up in conse
quence, while 58 were closed by fraud orders, 26 by
indictments, and 26 grew weary of the struggle and
went out of business. The liquidation throughout the
country had ceased and the great depression was at
an end. The stocks and goods of all merchants were
low, and the demand for new goods was brisk, which
stimulated industry and trade in every channel. As
high prices obtained more and more for the cereals,
the price of silver went down, which did much to
cure the people of the silver heresy that had been
during the preceding years disturbing financial con-

148 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
ditions so disastrously. The price of wheat soaring
aboye a dollar, and the great Leiter wheat corner were
the principal Board of Trade events that will go down
in its history for that year.
The Chicago Board of Trade is a member of
the National Board of Trade which meets each year in
the different cities. My father was the delegate to the
National Board of Trade in the years of 1882-83-87-
88-89. He was most active in debate and had very
pronounced views on all subjects coming before that
body bearing upon the then current questions of the
day. The records show that he addressed the meeting
in 1882 upon the subject of the Hawaiian Treaty,
Postal Telegraph, and the Shipping question, in
Washington. In 1887 in Washington he addressed
the meeting on the subject of the Agricultural Bureau
Reports, Postal Telegraph, the Shipping question, the
Silver question and the Tariff. In 1888 in Chicago
he spoke upon the subject of the Lard adulterations
and Crop bulletins, and again in the same year in
Washington he spoke on Agricultural Statistics,
River and Harbor Improvements, the Shipping ques
tion, Finance and Currency, and Tariff Reform. At
Louisville in 1889 he discussed the National Clearing
House, the Independent Telegraph Company, the
Shipping bill, and Penny postage.
Although my father commanded the universal re
spect of the Board of Trade members by virtue of his
distinguished ability and his high character, yet
it was accorded to him in an unusual way

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 149
not given to other men who might have been
entitled to equal respect. Great deference was
paid to his personal feelings and pleasure in
the same way that a good boy pays deference to
his parents. There are occasions on the Board of
Trade, notably on New Year's Day when the crowd
breaks loose and indulges in antics such as they used to
do when they were school boys. Flour sacks and grain
sacks are thrown at each other, and hats knocked off,
but if in the midst of such pandemonium, Father
would happen to come in upon the floor of the Ex
change, the racket would cease immediately, and busi
ness would go on peacefully again just as though the
members were all good little boys who had turned to
their books again when the teacher came in sight.
One of the strongest points of my father's char
acter was his instinctive sense of justice. This was
recognized in a most practical way on the Board of
Trade, where, during the later years of his life, he
was looked upon as a tribunal of justice and the court
of last resort, before whom disputing members of the
Board of Trade would lay their grievances and dis
putes. He was by common consent, set up as their
judge and jury and they invariably referred their mat
ters to him and accepted his decision as final. Since
his death a special committee of the Board of Trade
has acted in this capacity. I think no higher compli
ment can be paid a man than to have him involuntarily
made the referee of disputes where great sums of
money and friendships are inovlved. When left to

150 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
him they always knew that his determination of their
equities would be founded upon the most rigid hon
esty and superlative wisdom.
The administration of his fifth term came to its
end, and thus ended his official connection with the
management of the Board of Trade, although his suc
cessors in office looked largely to him for advice and
guidance as the Nestor and oracle among their coun
sellors. The members of the Board will always look
back with affection and regard for their great leader,
who will always appear to them as the Napoleon who
came upon the scene at the time of a great crisis,
did his duty, fought their fights, and then re
tired with the honor and respect of all. When he died,
the strongest pillar of the group fell down and a prop
went out from under the Board of Trade. Other pil
lars have fallen and other props have gone out, and
it does not seem that the Board of Trade of today is
the same as of old, or occupies the same stronghold
that it did in days of yore. It is possible that the
building of railroads and the shifting of commercial
centres has done much to relieve the Board of Trade
of its ancient splendor and prestige, while the shift
ing of the logical scene of its best usefulness to other
cities in the land, and the changed conditions effecting
agriculture and commerce, have put their shadows
upon the Board of Trade. The arteries of trade
which at one time found their most natural way
through the pit of that Exchange, now take shorter
cuts — avoiding the middlemen, and thus eliminating

CHICAGO BOARD OF TRADE 151
or reducing commissions, and go past it to other centres.
Is it altogether this that has happened, or is it that
the men of old are not there now to uphold its dignity
and its old time power ? And if such be the case, is it
that changing conditions — the product of which is
men — have ceased to produce in the same manner and
quality as when the Board of Trade was in the meri
dian of its career?

•A
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Chapter VI
WORLD'S COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION
1890- 1893
AS the ending of the period of four hundred
years following the discovery of America by
Christopher Columbus in 1492 began to come
to its close, there developed in the minds of our coun
try's leaders the thought that special significance at
tached to the coming event, and that it should be duly
celebrated accordingly in a manner characteristic of
American spirit and enterprise. As the idea crystal-
ized into more definite form it was determined as the
climax of the four centuries of development in Amer
ica to hold a world's exposition of the progress, not
only of America, but of all nations, in the arts, indus
tries and science down to the time of holding it.
Finally in 1889 a bill was introduced in Congress for
the purpose of inaugurating the exposition and con
ducting it in a befitting manner. Then there arose
great rivalry between the several principal cities of
the United States that were contending with each
other for the honor of holding it, the chief contestants
being New York, Chicago, Washington and St.
Louis. At this time my father became active in the agita
tion as far as Chicago was concerned, and he was
particularly instrumental in obtaining the honor for

154 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
Chicago through his influence and personal presence
at Washington where he was well and favorably
known to public men in general and particularly to
President Cleveland, whose champion he had been as
a Cleveland Republican or Mugwump during his first
Presidential campaign. He therefore was present at
Washington with others of the committee to push the
claims of Chicago at the several times the matter came
up in Congress for discussion and decision. Tre
mendous opposition was brought against Chicago in
favor of other cities, but her claims to the distinction
finally prevailed over all other contestants as a result
of the extraordinary perseverance and forceful work
of the committee in proving to Congress the superior
advantages which Chicago would be able to afford
for the occasion, and her ability to cope successfully
with the great problem. The result was that the bill
authorizing the exposition passed in Congress on
April 25, 1890. This provided for a national com
mission for exercising functions national in character
pertaining to the exposition ; while the actual work of
preparing for the exposition, financing it, erecting the
buildings and conducting the business of it was to be
assumed by an Illinois corporation to be organized for
the purpose. This corporation was at first known as
the "World's Exposition of 1892" but was afterwards
appropriately changed in name to the "World's
Columbian Exposition."
The Exposition Company was capitalized first at
$5,000,000 which represented the first idea of cost,

WORLD'S COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION 155
and then increased to $10,000,000, the project being
popularized by inviting subscribers large and small
from all classes of citizens, rich and poor, high and
low, with the result that there were over 30,000 stock
holders. Forty-five of Chicago's leading citizens were
named as the original directors, my father being one
of the number, and Mr. Lyman J. Gage was named as
the first President of the organization. In framing
his committees, Mr. Gage named my father as Chair
man of the committee on foreign exhibits which had
to do with interesting all the nations of the earth in
the exposition, and he also placed him upon the im
portant committee on legislation. The work of prelimi
nary organization began and was well under way
when Mr. Gage determined to resign, as his duties,
taken together with other responsibilities which he
could not avoid, overtaxed his strength and health
and made it necessary for him to do so. The directors
then focused their minds on my father as the man to
place at the helm and drive this tremendous under
taking to a successful finality and he was, therefore,
elected President of the World's Fair in the spring of
1 89 1, and at once began his duties and gave all his
time without any compensation other than popular
approval of his work, and so continued to do as
long as he served. In fact, it was a labor of love with
all the directors, most of whom gave half their time
to it, and none of them, with but one exception, ever
accepted a cent of compensation from the exposition
company from the beginning to the end.

156 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
The corporation opened up its offices in the begin
ning of the year 1891 occupying the entire floor
of one of the large down-town office buildings,
and then began the great task of financing the
plan, erecting the buildings which were to consti
tute a city in themselves, and interesting all the
nations of the earth in sending exhibits character
istic of their respective countries. The ambition
of Chicago was to make it an exposition such as had
never been in the history of the world. There had
been fifteen universal expositions preceding it in dif
ferent parts of the world during the preceding forty-
three years, and the ambition of my father and his
fellow directors was to make this a show that would
go down through all history as the very quintessence
of expositions; as one that would overshadow all
preceding ones in grandeur and magnificence, and
discourage all future ones in their attempts to rival it.
All this would take much money to accomplish in
addition to brains and unceasing work. The very
cream of Chicago's citizenship in business and pro
fessional ability made up the directory, but where to
get the money in so much larger amounts than
originally contemplated, was indeed a serious ques
tion. The public spiritedness of the City of Chicago
showed itself in the City bonding itself for $5,000,000.
The exposition company also bonded itself and its
gate receipts for another $5,000,000, and Congress
was asked to appropriate still another $5,000,000. In
the effort to get this last appropriation my father was

WORLD'S COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION 157
unusually active, and he visited the City of Washing
ton a great deal in connection with securing Federal
aid. Congress was not friendly to the exposition idea
and begrudged any aid that it could give. It was
opposed to granting in full the aid applied for, but
it finally relaxed to the extent of giving the exposition
company $2,500,000 in silver half dollar coins, specially
designed as souvenirs for commemorating the exposi
tion year. While these coins were a novelty at first
the directors were able to sell them for a dollar each,
and in this way realized from them considerably more
than the $2,500,000 which represented their face value,
but as soon as the fad wore off they could only be
disposed of at their face value.
Father was a member of the original budget com
mittee which had to do with the financial operations
of the fair. He had much to do with the work of
securing the co-operation of the different States and
Nations in connection with the exposition. In the
very beginning of the operations the Board of Direc
tors and National Commission began to clash. The
commission which was principally made up of poli
ticians, hung like a millstone around the neck of the
exposition and did much to retard it in its early work.
It was very eager to have something to do with the
spending of the many millions of dollars in building
the White City. Every one knew what that would
mean and that it would lead to the failure to accom
plish results and to undoubted scandal. The direc
tors, however, who were business and professional

158 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
men of tried experience and known honor, did not for
a moment contemplate allowing the disbursement of
the money to go out of their hands. The subscribers
of it had placed it in their hands, and they looked to
them to spend it rightly and make the exposition a
success. The relations of the two bodies were, how
ever, harmoniously adjusted as soon as the smell of
the money was cut off, and it is said that Father had
much to do with bringing this about, with the result
that thereafter the business affairs of the exposition
went on quite smoothly and without interference from
the commission.
Of course, with the spending of so much money
in sight, the avarice and greed of different interests
which had been excited by the hope of being benefitted,
had to be met and the interests of the exposition care
fully guarded. Perhaps more on this account than
any other was Father selected as the head of the Fair
as a barrier against corruption because of his known
scrupulousness and rigid honesty.
One of the first of the many grafts which were at
tempted to be levied was the electrical contract for
the fair, which the General Electric Company hoped
to get at its tender of $1,800,000 "which meant no
profit to them as the bid only contemplated giving
them an advertisement and helping out the World's
Fair corporation." Although my father at the time
had had little experience in the cost of electrical appa
ratus, his common sense suggested to him that the
price offered was unreasonably high. An attempt

WORLD'S COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION 159
was made to railroad it through, for certain directors
were also stockholders in the General Electric Com
pany, but my father thwarted this and directed that
an investigation of other companies be made for the
purpose of cutting down what seemed to him to be
an extortionate appropriation for a single object. As
a result of his stand the General Electric Company
reduced its bill to the charitable sum of $554,000.
Then Mr. Westinghouse in behalf of his company
issued his promise supported by a very large bond,
that if allowed to bid, his company would do the same
work for a sum less than $400,000. As a result of all
this the Westinghouse Company made a tender of
$399,000 and secured the contract, at which figure it
made a slight profit in addition to securing a very
great advertisement.
The construction operations were, of course, laid
out upon a very extensive scale, and the working or
ganization necessary for the spending of so many
millions of dollars in so short a time in practically
building a new city within the space of months, was
necessarily one which had to be well thought out.
Contracts had to be let for the construction of each
building, and this had to be done most carefully and
under well considered specifications. The great archi
tectural firms of the country were invited to furnish
plans for the several buildings. There was no com
petitive contest for these honors, but the architects
were selected by the directors from among the best
and most noted and they were paid a liberal fee or

160 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
honorarium for such services, although the honor of
doing the work was considered their best return for
the so doing.
The prairie waste where the Fair was to be located
south of Chicago on Lake Michigan had to be trans
formed entirely with respect to its landscape features.
Great dredges were put to work excavating artificial
lakes and lagoons, and trees and shrubbery were
planted under the directions of the best landscape
engineers in the land, in order to give the fair grounds
a picturesqueness which they otherwise would not
have had. Then Chicago's dream began to become a
reality, and the exposition finally loomed up in all its
artistic, enchanting and grand proportions as a new
landscape, and a new city began to take completed
form there out of the original prairie waste. It is
now but a memory of a beautiful vision beside the
Lake. Then came the question of the exhibits to be in
stalled within the several palaces which had been pre
pared for their reception. The entire world was can
vassed for this purpose by emissaries sent out on a
tour of the different countries for the purpose of
interesting them to their advantage in participating
in the great work. All this met with flattering suc
cess, and the nations came as with one accord to dis
play the best results of their individual civilizations.
Then the gates were opened and the people came in
armies from all over the world, and although the
country was in a state of panic and hard times, yet

Administration Building, World's Columr.ian Exposition.
TAKEN ON "CllKACIO DAY."'

WORLD'S COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION 161
the attendance was extraordinarily large. Some of
the single day's attendance were record breakers, such
as Chicago Day which brought three-quarters of a
million people to the fair grounds. It is evident
enough without emphasizing the fact, that to accom
plish all this meant an organization equal in ability
and effectiveness to any in the land, and the fact that
Father presided over it in a manner entirely to his
credit, and to the satisfaction of the directors and the
citizens of Chicago, is a source of great pride and
satisfaction to his friends and to those who are related
to him. The Fair was dedicated October 23, 1892, by the
Vice-President of the United States. It was opened
to the public on May 1, 1893, by President Cleveland,
which act was signalized by the simultaneous unfurl
ing of the flags of all nations, the starting of the elec
tric fountains, the dazzle of electric lights, and the
unveiling of the statue of the Republic. The total cost
of the fair was $43,000,000 and it covered an area
of one square mile, the largest single building covering
thirty-one acres, being large enough to hold under its
roof the entire army of Russia. The report of the
Congressional committee on the World's Fair con
tained this tribute to the exposition : —
"In its scope and magnificance the exposition stands alone.
There is nothing like it in all history. It easily surpasses all
similar enterprises, and will amply illustrate the marvelous
genius of the American people in the great domains of science,
commerce, manufactures, and invention, which constitutes the

162 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
foundation upon which rests the structure of our national glory
and prosperity."
Father served as President throughout the year
1891 and was re-elected for the following year. The
transportation problem was perhaps the greatest one
that concerned the directors of the fair. How to
handle the great crowds that the exposition would
attract to the city, and how to transport them safely
to and fro, was the most vital question to be settled.
Whether Father was originally responsible for the
idea of track-raising to insure public safety, by allow
ing the street thoroughfares to go under the rail
roads instead of crossing at grade does not seem to
be known, but it is quite certain that the tremendous
influence and energy which he put behind the execu
tion of this idea was responsible for its successful con
summation. The World's Fair Company donated to
the Illinois Central Railroad over $200,000, or a sum
of money equal to what it would have had to spend in
building bridges and viaducts for the traffic to cross
over and above the railroad tracks. With this encour
agement, the Illinois Central was inspired to raise
its entire roadbed from its city terminal to the out
skirts of the city. This served the purpose of the fair,
but the object lesson which it gave was of more far-
reaching influence still, for it resulted later in all the
railroads coming into Chicago being compelled to like
wise raise their tracks at their own expense. This
was the theme in connection with the exposition work
that Father talked most about, and the one in which

WORLD'S COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION 163
his heart was more firmly set, and its accomplishment
has proved a great and permanent blessing to the City
of Chicago. The terrible strain of so herculean a task, together
with the worries incidental to an invalid wife, caused
Father to break down in health in the summer of 1892.
He therefore went abroad with his family for the
purpose of rest and recuperation, but finding that he
did not mend as rapidly as he had hoped, and feeling
that the success of the exposition would be jeopardized
by his absence from the scene of operations, he felt
constrained in the fall of 1892 to resign the Presi
dency, which he did while in Europe. This was
reluctantly accepted by the directory, and thereafter
his work in connection with the fair was less exacting
than it had been before, although he still remained a
director. The great task of blocking out the edifice
in the rough having been completed, the direction of
the work thereafter, and the finishing touches went on
in other hands.

Chapter VII
THE CIVIC FEDERATION
1895-1897
WHEN public plundering became so rampant
in Chicago and political morality reached the
low ebb which it did in the early 90's, it was
only natural that a distressed and exasperated people
should take measures to provide an antidote and cor
rective. Thus there gathered together from time to
time, meetings of outraged citizens, with the final re
sult that they formed themselves together into an
organization and styled it the Civic Federation. The
association had for its object the purifying of city
politics, the securing of efficient administration of
civic affairs, the suppression of vice, and the improve
ment of public morality, the institution of charities,
and the furtherance and betterment of industrial and
educational conditions. Evidently the organization
took upon its shoulders a herculean task. It was
officered by public spirited citizens possessed of the
courage of their convictions, the love of country, and
unselfish devotion to a most righteous cause. These
men gave their time from their business and other
affairs without any compensation whatever, but what
they have done has left its lasting impress upon the
character of Chicago as a city, for which posterity

166 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
will be grateful. The association divided its work
into six departments, presided over by six standing
committees appointed from the membership of the
organization. These departments were known as the
Political, Municipal, Philanthropic, Morals, Indus
trial, and Educational Departments. As an offshoot
from this organization has grown the National Civic
Federation, with headquarters in New York City,
having the same general purposes, but wider in its
scope, so as to include situations national in aspect.
My father was one of the few men who originally
got together and crystalized this movement for bet
ter conditions, into the working organization which
has been described. As the first President of it, Mr.
Lyman J. Gage directed its affairs in the beginning.
At the end of the first year he was succeeded in office
by my father, who served as President during the
years 1895, 1896, and 1897, resigning from the office
during the latter part of his last year on account of
poor health and failing strength, for he was at the
same time burdened with the Board of Trade presi
dency. The period of his administration was marked
by brilliant achievements which have become a part of
the best history of Chicago. It took a man of nerve
and physical courage to be at the head of an organi
zation of this character and direct its movements, and
in casting about for such a man his fellow associates
made no mistake in lighting upon my father. Fight
ing, to him was second nature, and carried with it a
genuine pleasure, but fighting for principles as he

THE CIVIC FEDERATION 167
always did, inspired him to efficient action to a degree
more than is common among men.
To tell all that this association accomplished
for the public good under his leadership during
these three years would mean to write a separate
book upon the. subject. Contemporaneously with
his duties in connection with this association, he
was serving as President of the Board of Trade,
and the great fight he was conducting in behalf
of the latter organization against the iniquitous
bucket-shops of Chicago was taken up through the
Civic Federation as well. The joint fight through
the two organizations resulted in the practical
extinguishment of the bucket-shop plague in Chicago
and was so far-reaching in its effects, as to
strike deadly blows to the same industry in other
cities. In fact in this feature of its work the Civic
Federation's operations extended into Iowa, New
York City and other parts of the country. The Civic
Federation had at its command a well organized
secret service, so that it never struck a blow without
being provided with full ammunition. Upon the in
formation obtained through this service there were
281 bucket-shop persons indited at one time. Six
Skekle bucket-shops were raided by the Chicago
police under the direction of the Federation and 350
people were arrested. When brought before the
courts to plead to the charges preferred against them,
many of them gave fictitious names for the purpose of
indicating how indifferent they were to the crusade

168 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
against them. Among the names given by some of
the prisoners were William T. Baker, William Mc-
Kinley and Lyman J. Gage.
Father next directed his guns against the gambling
element of Chicago, and particularly against the pool
rooms and the Westside Racetrack. Fortunately for
the purposes of the Federation and the good of the
city, Chief of Police Badenoch was a good citizen and
friendly to the purposes of the Federation, and be
cause of this fact the Federation was enabled to do
much more effective work than would have been pos
sible otherwise. The Federation discovered the in
iquitous and vicious situations, planned the mode of
attack, and Chief Badenoch would lead the charge.
In this way seven pool rooms were raided at one
time and five hundred people taken prisoners. Gam
bling in this way was practically driven out of Chi
cago, for without protection from the police it could
not thrive. This protection was lacking, due largely
to the influence of the Federation in securing the ap
pointment of honest and effective patrolmen. The
warfare upon the gamblers completely demoralized
their business and made their calling so unattractive
that they quit business or moved to other cities. Some
of them felt that they had as much right to thrive in
their line of business as other people did in their busi
ness, and they felt that Father and his lieutenants
were unrighteously serving in the role of persecutors
of them. As a result of this feeling upon their part,
the gamblers brought damage suits against Father

THE CIVIC FEDERATION 169
for large amounts, aggregating over a quarter of a
million dollars, but it is needless to say that these
suits never came to a hearing. Some of the gamblers
would change their names and the outward style of
their business and attempt to live again but without
success. The McClure den was one of the most per
sistent in this manner but finally gave up the ghost.
The Federation took a look in on Grand Jury
methods and found that many of its members were
soliciting bribes, and as a result they got their punish
ment. The Civil Service Commissioners were indicted
for irregular conduct in office. These Commissioners
were Dudley Winston, Hempstead Washburn and
Adolph Klaus. Without fear or favor the Federation
struck its blows. One of the Commissioners, Mr.
Klaus, grew humorous and circulated the following
verse of his own composition:
"Paddy cake, paddy cake Baker man,
Make us indited as fast as you can,
Make them and mark them with W. T.,
And fire them at Dudley and Hempy and me."
In the Political Department, the Federation in sup
port of the Crawford Primary Election Law began
prosecutions for violations of the same. In this con
nection they sent abstracts of the law to 4,500 judges
and clerks, giving notice that violators would be
prosecuted. Evidence was secured against a large
number and indictments obtained.
For the purpose of securing good men in office and
the prevention of boodle associations, there was or-

170 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
ganized the Municipal Voters League, which co-oper
ated with the Civic Federation and other reform or
ganizations. In this way it was discovered that
through fraud and intimidation and other tactics of
desperate men, the good work of the Federation was
about to be defeated at the coming elections. This
was thwarted by the discovery of illegal registrations
and false naturalizations to a wholesale extent. Re
wards of $100 were offered throughout the city for
evidence sufficient to convict people of illegal voting.
All evidence of prospective crimes in this direction
were immediately published broadcast, and the judges
and clerks of the election were carefully selected after
the closest scrutiny, with the general result that the
election was saved and good men conducted into office.
The Federation through its Municipal Department
was instrumental in securing a just and equitable as
sessment of property so that taxation might be placed
where it belonged, allowing no favored interests to
escape from bearing their share of the city's burdens.
The consolidation of the various towns around Chi
cago, such as Hyde Park, Englewood and others, was
put under way by the Federation. One of the most
practical benefits which the Federation was able to
secure for the city in all its history was to demonstrate
that the street cleaning department was extravagant
and that this work could be better done for half what
the city was paying. A street cleaning bureau was
organized, which investigated street cleaning in
neighboring cities with a showing that $8.50 per mile

THE CIVIC FEDERATION 171
was all the work was worth, although Chicago had
been paying $18.50. The Federation secured private
subscriptions along the principal down town streets,
and through its bureau organized for the pur
pose, actually did the work for $10 per mile. The
result of this was that when bids were next opened
by the Commissioner of Public Works, the lowest bid
was $8.40 per mile, while the highest was only $9.99,
and this was tendered by the firm which the previous
year had been getting $18.50.
A sanitary inspection service was organized which
watched with eagle eye the garbage contractors of the
city and the inspectors employed by the city who
supervised the work. The investigation also ex
tended to the milk supply, the ice and water supply,
fruit stands, &c, and many other things effecting the
public health and cleanliness. The Federation made
it difficult for the granting of public franchises with
out compensation to the city. It also discovered that
the packing houses at the stockyards had tapped the
city water mains and were stealing water for the pur
pose of running their factories, which illicit use of
water had probably been going on for years. It was
impossible to jail any for this offense as the guilt
could not be laid at any particular door, and innocence
of evil intent was claimed by the offenders. However,
the Federation made it impossible for them to do the
thing again. The Federation organized the Bureau
of Charities, with Father as Vice-President, and this
is the predominating charity organization in Chicago

172 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
today. It has for its object the bringing of all the
different charity organizations of the city into co
operation in order to examine into conditions of real
and legitimate want, and to bring thoughtful persons
individually into personal and friendly communica
tion with families in need. Its work has resulted in
young children being kept off the streets at night and
given an opportunity to go to school, and beggars
have been found employment. The Federation's war
fare was directed against slot machines, and it did
much under Father's leadership in establishing purity,
by the restriction of vice, and the securing of employ
ment and good homes for evil doers. It did much dur
ing his administration towards adjusting strikes by
urging arbitration, and towards the solution of the
child labor problem. It has secured better practice in
the heating and ventilation of school buildings, the
qualification of teachers, and the safety of pupils.
The Federation inaugurated branch offices in
twenty-five wards, each taking up in its own district
the important reform measures promulgated by the
parent organization over which my father presided.
At the time of his introduction to the office three-
fourths of the common council of the city were thieves,
known as "Grafters and gray wolves," and such had
been the situation for the three or four years prior.
It is now safe to say that seventy-five per cent of the
Chicago City councilmen are capable, reliable and
honest men. In fact, it has today the best council of
any large city in the United States, and the Feder-

THE CIVIC FEDERATION 173
ation, and those who worked for it, have ample reason
to be proud of what they were the means of bringing
about. It is not to be wondered at therefore, in view
of the drastic house-cleaning which was going on
throughout the city, that my father became the target
for abuse and hatred among the criminal and the law
less element. Many times did he receive anonymous
letters through the mails, stating that he would be
assassinated if he did not let up in the warfare which
he was engineering, and many times he was followed
by persons with evil intent when walking alone at a
late hour; but all this had as much effect upon his
determination to follow his convictions and to do his
duty as he saw it, as a baby's breath would have had
in attempting to blow out the Chicago fire.

Snoqualmie Falls.
height, 270 ft.

Subterranean 19,000 H.P. Generating Plant.
SNOQUALMIE FALLS.

Chapter VIII.
SNOQUALMIE FALLS AND WHITE RIVER
POWER DEVELOPMENTS. 1887-1904. I.
AS my father entered upon the later years of his
life, he began to have a joy and pride in his
children, which earlier in their lives he did not
display to so great a degree, for like most natures,
his mellowed with the years and as his children grew
up. He looked upon his children as a business propo
sition. Towards them he had always been exacting
and severe. He was as sparing of his personal en
dorsement of their capabilities as he was of his
financial assistance to them. In our early life we
looked upon him as a hard master. We did not get
the inspiration from him that we would have done
had he leaned a little closer, so we often got dis
couraged in the hope of pleasing him. But that was
his way, and it was perhaps for the good of us. When
my brother Howard and I were attending Cornell
University we were not restricted by him in the least
in the quality of board, our dress, or in the essentials.
We were required to schedule our requirements in
detail each month in advance, to which list of necessi-

176 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
ties we were allowed to add two dollars and a half,
"pocket money" for each of us. This seems a frugal
pocket money allowance for the sons of a wealthy
man. Our entire allowance for the whole four years
for board, tuition, fraternity dues, and the essentials,
including traveling expenses twice a year each way
between Chicago and Ithaca, New York, was less than
$600.00 a year for each. He was in no sense mean
nor stingy, but he did what he thought best for his
children; and as a result he has no spoiled sons to
blush for. When we finished college, we each wanted
a job. I asked him to give me letters to some of his
railroad friends so I could get started in some rail
road engineering corps. He said, "He couldn't do
that, — he never endorsed anyone without knowing
something of his abilities, etc., and in that regard,
I was quite a stranger to him." So it happened that
having an illustrious father at that time was no help
at all to an ambitious son, for it looked to a man up
a tree, as though this father's failure to recommend
was due to the having of a black sheep for a son.
But again 1 say, that was his way and he acted as he
believed right. No one gave him money nor pushed
him ahead when he was a boy and it did not hurt him,
— so why should it hurt us, he reasoned. He was
particularly conscientious in the dispensation of any
patronage or favors within his command to members
of his family. As President of the Chicago World's
Fair he commanded a great deal of patronage in the
shape of very attractive and lucrative positions which

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 177
were his to give, but none such were ever offered to
his sons, who would doubtless during the hard times
at that time have been glad to have them; and they
knew him too well to ask for any such official consid
eration by virtue of filial relation. It was one of the
set maxims of his life to treat patronage in this way,
and he often criticized public men for violating his
ideas of etiquette in such matters by injecting their
relations into positions of official favor.
As he began to withdraw gradually from public life
and from the activities of business during his later
years, he relaxed more and more in favor of his chil
dren, and gave them a helping hand. This he had
done at times previously, in the way of making them
small loans and exacting prompt payment of the same,
just as he would from strangers, but he was always
looking forward to the time when we would be sea
soned and tried by experience, so that then he might
stand behind us, not only as a father but as a banker,
after he deemed our fitness for such confidence fully
demonstrated. And so the time came after we had been upon our
own resources and independent of him for a period
of about ten years, when he backed his son Howard
in the purchase of a considerable interest in Butler
Brothers' establishment whose position in that firm
I had previously secured for him. His letters to me
indicated an intention later on of backing his son-in-law
in the contracting business, and he was also disposed
to back his son Henry in a newspaper enterprise, as

178 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
soon as an associate might be found to invest in it
and take the business end, while Henry would take
the literary end. For Bertha, his daughter, he in
sured his life for $50,000 which is now being paid
to her in an annuity. But his most signal favor fell
upon me at the age of thirty-four, and the result of it
has since shown that his confidence and judgment
were not misplaced.
Now comes the period in his history when for five
years, although we were nearly two thousand miles
apart, his daily life was closely interwoven with my
own, in the carrying out of the great engineering and
construction enterprises of harnessing the falls of the
Snoqualmie River and the rapids of the White River
in the State of Washington, and transmitting the
power thereof electrically to Seattle, Tacoma and
Everett, and the intervening towns. He really knew
this work only as it was reflected through my daily
letters to him, for by actual visitation he has only seen
the Snoqualmie project three times in his life, and
then for about an hour each time, while White River
he never saw at all. He was quick to grasp the mean
ing of the engineering plans as I explained them to
him, and the progress of the physical construction
from day to day as I reported it to him was clear to
his mind. He saw it not only with the eye of a shrewd
business man, but with the eye of an engineer, for by
nature he was designed for such. I venture to say
that he took more genuine interest in my work in de
veloping these enterprises, than he ever took in any

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 179
work of his own, except possibly the World's Fair.
He took an unconcealed pride in what I was under
taking to do and was actually accomplishing, and he
made it almost the daily topic of conversation between
himself and his friends when they chanced to meet at
lunch or at other places. He would tell them "Charley
is accomplishing a great undertaking out there in the
Puget Sound country and is going to make his for
tune and fame out of it and mine too, besides doing
a public good. I am with him financially and I know
he will succeed, although the difficulties before him are
very great and he has a big fight on his hands be
sides." "We are actually taking the waste of nature,"
he would say, "and making useful and valuable power
out of it, and bringing it down to the cities, and sell
ing it to the people for much less than such power
costs them by any other method, and they are glad to
get it. That's business !" He felt that we were doing
an integral part of the world building, and as he had
always been a trader before, having only had to do
with property already created, he felt that this was
different and better, in that we were actually creating
property and adding to the wealth of society thereby.
This is how we happened to get together on this
undertaking and finally to accomplish it; and telling
it as a part of his life, I must of necessity tell it as
the best part of my own. By education and profession
I am a civil engineer, and have always since my
graduation from college been identified with large
works and undertakings of an engineering and con-

180 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
structional character. I went to Seattle in 1887 and
joined the engineering staff of a railroad there, which
was building northward from Seattle to the Canadian
boundary and eastward across the Cascade Mountains
to Spokane. This latter line passed within fifty feet
of the great Snoqualmie Falls cataract, which at that
time had no commercial value, and was only thought
of as a place of resort for fishermen, tourists, and
campers. In the performance of my particular duties
there was hardly a week passed that I did not see
this wasting waterfall; and it came into my mind at
that early time when I was still only a boy, that some
day it would be, or ought to be, a useful agency as
an industrial factor, and that its power would
eventually be carried to the distant cities for utiliza
tion there. Then the daring hope sprang up in my
breast — the hope that I might in some degree at least
— work it out! Long distance electrical transmission
of power at that time was more a theory than a prac
tice, owing to the fact that the transformer for raising
to high voltages for transmission and lowering to
low voltages for distribution had not yet been per
fected. The power project developed more and more
in my mind however, expanding from the first thought
of harnessing the cataract for near at hand uses only,
until, as the science of transmission developed, my
idea expanded accordingly, so that in a few years I
had conceived a well defined plan for utilizing the
power of Snoqualmie Falls and transmitting it to
Seattle for industrial and illuminating purposes.

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 181
I realized, however, that such a project could not
be undertaken with success unless the commercial sit
uation warranted it as a business measure, and so
I set about planning to provide a market for the power
as soon as it could be delivered. For this market I
looked to Seattle, and in looking that far, a distance of
thirty-two miles, it seemed a chimerical and uncertain
task, and to say the least bold. Seattle then was not
in a large sense a manufacturing or industrial city,
except in the way of saw mills, which were scattered
about more or less, and which used their waste for
power producing fuel. There were at that time
( 1889) certain street car lines in Seattle, and an elec
tric light plant called the Home (afterwards Union)
Electric Co., of which I was one of the original organ
izers, all having independent steam power plants; —
and these I looked upon as the prospective market.
They were owned by different companies, and al
though there did not seem to be enough even of this
business to make success an assured thing, yet the
matter still nursed itself in my mind for a number of
years. The population was about 10,000 people then
when I first considered the matter as against 240,000
at present. In the meantime, on account of the attractive pros
pects offering in a private engineering practice due to
the city's rapid growth, I had resigned from the rail
road company and took work outside, which resulted
in my earnings immediately trebling and later increas
ing even more rapidly, all of which I profitably in-

182 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
vested in Seattle real estate. From this, I gradually
drifted into electrical and general construction work
as an engineer and contractor, — in which I was suc
cessful. Finally in 1891 I built by contract the Third
Street and Suburban Electric Railway in Seattle, and
an electric light plant in connection therewith for the
Dennys, then considered the wealthiest people in that
city. The work was done for considerably less than
my estimate and should have given me a profit of
about eighteen thousand dollars. On the eve of the
completion of this contract however, the Dennys
failed, due to their inability to refund their obligations.
I had borrowed large sums of money to carry out the
contract, hypothecating my estate for this purpose as
well as the Denny securities which had come to me
through my contract, so that I became involved with
the Dennys and went down with them, resulting in the
sweeping away of my first fortune of my own accumu
lation amounting to about forty thousand dollars, and
leaving me indebted about sixty thousand dollars be
sides. This situation was made more particularly
aggravating on account of my losing my lien upon the
railroad property, due to some technicality in the law.
Then began a period of great distress for me, for
contemporaneously with this catastrophe came the
general panic of 1893, and no section of the land felt
the distresses of that situation quite so much as did
the Puget Sound country. People were idle and going
hungry. No one escaped. Claims in connection with
the railroad contract amounting to over sixty thou-

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 183
sand dollars were put in judgment against me as the
result of the Denny failure, and under this deluge I
had to carry myself for a number of years. There
was no work going on and practically no employment
for any one. It was a hand-to-mouth process for all.
Rich men were land poor. The clothing of all was
threadbare and frilled at the edges. Mine especially
was so, and I stayed at home and worked in a garden
most of the time so as to hide my poverty. My father
knew but little of all this for I was too proud to tell
him. There were fifty applicants for every job, both
private and political. I was always in line with the
fifty, and always just missed being chosen. I bid on
several pieces of work, and always just missed — for
tunately perhaps for me, as in those distressful days
the successful bidder in his extreme anxiety to get
work, usually bid so low that he afterwards went
broke. I missed the U. S. Dry Dock at Port Orchard
Bay on Puget Sound by only $15.00 by bidding $509,-
000 instead of $508,985, which was the successful bid.
1 was actively and for over a year the leading candi
date for postmaster at Seattle, but failed at the last
moment because of the Postmaster General at Wash
ington resigning and being succeeded by one who
happened to be an old time Civil War crony of one of
the candidates, who locally at least was considered the
most unfit of any of the fourteen aspirants, and until
then supposed to be the least likely.
I finally became receiver of the Merchants National
Bank, which was the only bank in Seattle that failed,

184 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
and this was the first symptom of a clear sky that
had come into my career for some years. I was ap
pointed by Hon. Jas. H. Eckels, Comptroller of Cur
rency upon the endorsement of Seattle's leading citi
zens, there being twenty-eight other candidates
equally shabby, starved and clamorous. With this
breathing spell ahead of me and a chance to live and
think, I then set myself about studying out an escape
from under the mountain of debt that was holding
me down. I knew that it was not within my limita
tions to earn at any scale of salary a sum sufficient to
extricate myself during any ordinary lifetime, and to
assure at the same time a comfortable future for my
self and family. I knew that the accomplishment of
such a herculean task would have to be by a master
stroke of some sort, and I looked therefore to find
within me such genius, if any existed, as would be
necessary to accomplish it.
My thoughts then turned back again to the earlier
dreams of Snoqualmie, which had been less active in
my mind during the period of the panic. I took the
matter up again as actively as I could from time to
time consistently with my duties to the bank receiver
ship. There were at this time ten street railway com
panies operating in Seattle, and three electric light
companies. None of them earned their expenses, and
it seemed almost an impossible task to approach them
along the lines of selling them cheaper power at the
expense of abandoning their steam plants and buying
new electrical installations suitable for adaptation to

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 185
the proposed power transmission plant. They were
hard up, and could not afford such investments, and
most of them too were in the hands of receivers.
There then crystalized in my mind a comprehensive,
economical, well defined and reasonable plan for buy
ing up and consolidating all the street railway systems
in Seattle into one company, under one management
and having one source of power, thereby eliminating
the wasteful expense due to maintaining numerous
managing organizations, and a multiplicity of power
stations consuming expensive fuel and employing
many men. I attacked the problem of consolidation
as the solution of my pet scheme for developing the
water power of Snoqualmie Falls. I not only made
my own plans and estimates concerning the proposed
enterprise of the water power development and its pro
posed feeder the street railway and lighting combina
tion, but I secured corroborative estimates from other
engineers as well. To carry out my purposes I made
the consolidation my primary object, and the water
power the secondary one. In 1895 I made a very com
plete and exhaustive study of the street railway and
power situation. The books, records, and other facili
ties of all the companies were freely accorded to me
for my purpose, and as a result I obtained not only an
option on the Snoqualmie Falls, but upon all the rail
way properties in Seattle except one, — the Second
Street Road, which was controlled by N. W. Harris
& Co., of Chicago, who refused. These options were
taken in my name in contract form in writing, and I

186 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
then went East for the purpose of financing the con
solidation. I negotiated with several banking firms,
and more particularly with Mason, Lewis & Co., of
Chicago, who agreed to undertake the underwriting
provided the situation could be given to them in
blanket form, i. e., all roads to be included.
I returned to Seattle and made another attempt to
get the Second Street Road in line, but was frustrated
in this purpose by Mr. S. Z. Mitchell, local manager
of the General Electric Co., which company as well
as Harris & Co. had a large interest in that particular
road. It seems that Mr. Mitchell appreciated the
value of my ambitious plan as soon as he knew of it,
and so began to take measures to forestall me in put
ting it through. About this time I sought the co
operation of my father who at my solicitation then
actively assisted me at the Chicago end, and frequently
saw Mr. N. W. Harris in connection therewith. I
invited him to join me in pushing the consolidation,
promising that we would be in it on equal terms if
he would subscribe a liberal amount to the undertak
ing to give it a good start and the prestige which his
name would lend to it. He was not enthusiastic, as he
thought it premature. He later agreed however to
invest fifty thousand dollars in the bonds of my con
solidation enterprise if I succeeded in shaping it up.
In connection with these various negotiations, I
compiled a comprehensive report upon the street rail
way situation in Seattle, displaying the data acquired,
and outlining my views as to a proper physical and

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 187
financial plan of consolidation. In this report I for
the first time in writing in 1896 set forth my idea of
developing the water power of Snoqualmie Falls. As
stated before, my whole thought and ambition, aim
and work, centered around this one idea, namely the
proposed Snoqualmie Falls Power Plant, and my dis
appointment in the failure of the consolidation on ac
count of the opposition of Mr. Mitchell of the General
Electric, and of N. ,W. Harris & Co., had its bitterness
more in the disappointment of not being able to carry
out the power development idea at that time than in
the failure of the consolidation itself. The street rail
ways were afterwards consolidated by Stone & Web
ster of Boston and their following, whom Mitchell
and the General Electric Co. had interested at a cost to
the purchasers of over a million dollars more than the
agreed cost would have been to us ; and thus was lost
to my father and myself the several million dollars
profit, which later went to Stone & Webtser and their
associates. Father had never taken kindly to "pro
moting," as otherwise this would not have escaped
us as it did, much to his later regret. Mitchell's oppo
sition to me sprang from his jealously and resent
ment at my having secured the Denny contract in
competition with his company, and also a profitable
contract for building an electric road in Spokane.
The apathy or reluctance upon the part of Harris &
Co. was probably due to Father's undisguised distrust
of that firm due to previous acquaintance with them.
The consolidation would have given us a very hand-

188 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
some profit, and it was my plan that the power fea
ture of it should take the form of a separate and
independent company, which as such, we would be
able to own personally and to finance out of the profit
to accrue to us from the consolidation after paying as
well the business debts which had foundered me dur
ing the panic. It was my aim and determination there
fore, to keep this power project separate and indepen
dent, and to maintain it as such throughout my life,
as a pleasant and profitable business for my father and
myself; to expand it as the country grew; to reach
out to other cities with its transmission lines; to add
to it other water powers from time to time, and
gradually to shape it so as to serve all the present and
prospective users of power in the Puget Sound coun
try. This youthful dream of mine, considered more
or less chimerical then, began to be appreciated a
few years later by my later rivals Stone & Webster,
who have since then been aggressively carrying out
my ideas in building up the great electrical system as
I had planned it, which for me was destined to be
a wil'o-the-wisp. It is interesting to note at this point,
that at the beginning of negotiations we soon after
had with Stone & Webster looking to furnishing their
company with power, that firm in a lengthy letter to
us asserted that "no water power had ever been me
chanically or commercially successful, and in their
judgment no water power ever would be successful."
The South side of Snoqualmie River was owned by
a woman in England, who owned 300 acres of land

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 189
upon which the Falls was situated, and which she had
acquired under a mortgage. Judge Burke, a leading
lawyer in Seattle was her attorney, and I had fre
quent consultations with him in regard to the matter,
letting him know my ideas and plans, which so in
spired his confidence that he finally gave me an option
on the property at the very low original cost to his
client, plus the accrued interest, taxes, etc., amounting
to $40,500.00. The General Electric Company which
had suddenly awakened to the possibilities of the situ
ation, were negotiating for this property at the same
time, and my taking it from under their nose was an
act for which they never forgave me, and they never
could quite understand how it happened.
I frequently discussed with my father by letters
from Seattle and in person while in Chicago, my
progress and disappointment in the failure of the con
solidation on account of my cherished idea of harness
ing the water power, which I had calculated would
deliver me from bondage to my creditors, and open
for us both a prosperous future. I then and therefore
laid the matter before him of the water power alone,
as an independent project by itself, upon the theory
that it would be within the limitations of one man to
accomplish the financing of the same, and that there
would be no opposition or barriers in the way such as
clouded my consolidation project. I asked him to
join me in this plan financially and to become inter
ested equally with me as a partner. I had previously
negotiated with other parties on the same terms but

190 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
they did not make good. I accordingly elucidated to
him -more fully my plans and purposes, all of which
interested him very greatly, for he had a mechanical
mind in addition to his well-known business shrewd
ness and commercial instinct. He gave the matter
more serious consideration than previously, for he had
just made a small fortune in wheat resulting from
Joe Leiter's famous corner and wanted to invest it.
He had also grown to have complete confidence in
my business and engineering ability. When I left
Chicago to return to Seattle, his last words in answer
to my importunities were : "I will send you the money
to buy the Falls," and this promise he fulfilled, so that
I was able to take up my option on the Falls in October,
1898; and his assurances in connection therewith and
his acceptance of the arrangement for partnership as
I proposed it led me then to stake my whole future
irrevocably upon the work ahead. This then was the
second important step in the inauguration of this great
enterprise and the beginning of our partnership
relations. Upon my return to Seattle I had the title to the
property examined, and the agreed purchase price of
$40,500.00 was paid before my option expired, I draw
ing upon Father with his authority for that amount.
During the period of my option, I could have made
$50,000.00 by releasing it to an Englishman, who sud
denly concluded that he wanted to own the Falls him
self. This opportunity I of course declined, knowing

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 191
that I could do many fold better by carrying my plans
to completion in connection with my father.
The purchase of the water power rights made
through Judge Burke covered the south side of
the river only, so I immediately began negoti
ations with certain Ohio people who owned the
north side, which resulted in the purchase of that
side as well, and thus was completed the control
and ownership of this magnificent spectacle of
nature and engine of industry. By my direction
the titles of these properties were taken in my
father's name, for the use of my name for the pur
pose would have encumbered them with my liabilities
and thus endangered the project, and besides I wanted
to attach the prestige of his name to the project. This
was the real beginning of the partnership entered into
between my father and myself for the purpose of
carrying out my plans for the development of the profi
table and valuable Baker electric properties in the
Puget Sound country. I needed such a person as him
self for the purpose of providing the initial money
necessary for the execution of my projects. I pre
ferred him to any one else because he was my father,
and because therefore I could trust him in the same
way that he trusted me. Because of this mutual and
reciprocal confidence our arrangement was purely
verbal, simply an understanding between a father and
his son as partners, that the one as financier would
provide or arrange for the money, while the other as
engineer and manager would contribute his invention

192 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
and discovery, his skill and ability, his time and his
labor, wholly and without distraction. We were to
share alike the honors and profit which success would
bring, as well as the loss and discredit which failure
would mean. Our partnership relations as related he
often talked of to his intimate friends. For me it
meant honorable fame or a blighted reputation, and
for us both it meant a fortune made or crippled. For
me success meant more than honor and fortune; it
meant the real joy to which I had long looked forward,
of drawing my father into a business relation with me
of my own conception, by which he would later take
additional pride in me as a son who had thus been the
means of adding to his fortune as well as to my own,
and of drawing him away from the wearisome and
wearing Board of Trade. My ambition was later
realized, but it came too late to do all for him that I
had counted upon as he died before our work was
finished. II.
Let me now describe this enterprise as I planned
it and as we finally in five years completed it in the
shape that one sees it today as the socalled "Eighth
Wonder of the World," by which name many have
dubbed it. Snoqualmie Falls, situated in the foothills
of the Cascade Mountains, results from the river of
the same name falling in one leap over a precipice
270 feet high. The name is the white man's corrup
tion of the name of a tribe of Indians called in their

Longitudinal Section Snoqualmie Power Plant.

Constructing Dam Above Snoqualmie Falls.

POWER DEVELOPMENTS

193

Snoqualmie Falls & White River Power Co
Seattle -- Tacoma
Chart of Power Transmission and Utilization
— -¦» ...c.c..,„ ..¦„,.¦{.¦

language "Sdoh-kwahl-bu," meaning the "Moon
People," because of their alleged lunar origin.
About 500 feet back from
the crest of the Falls the river
is diverted downward through
its bed through an excavated
shaft 10x28 feet, which at
the level of the lower river
abruptly turns towards the
foot of the falls, at the same
time being enlarged into a
large chamber, cave or cavity,
200 feet long, 40 feet wide,
and 30 feet high, all of which
was excavated out of the
solid rock with the use of
dynamite. This is the power
house, in which are installed
five great water wheels, — one
of which is the largest in the
world, and the generators, capable of delivering
altogether 19,000 electrical horse power. The water
after passing down the shaft through the two
eight foot wrought iron stand pipes and dis
charging through the water wheels, escapes through
a tunnel about 400 feet long, likewise excavated
out of the solid rock, and emptying back in
the river at the foot of the falls. The whole
conception is very bold, and is weird in aspect as one
looks upon the thundering machinery, nearly three

Diagramatic representation of
the Generation, Transmission
and Distribution of Sno
qualmie and White River
Power.

194 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
hundred feet below the ground, eternally busy at work
in the rock cave looking like white marble, — for the
rocks have been whitewashed. The "cavity" is
lighted by electricity and looks as gay and brilliant
as a ballroom. The electricity generated in the cavity
is transmitted on cables up the same shaft which car
ries the pressure pipes, and is led into the transformer
house above, where the voltage is raised to 32,000
through a series of transformers, at which high pres
sure it is transmitted over aluminum lines to the sub
stations in Seattle, 32 miles, Tacoma, 44 miles, Ever
ett, 36 miles, and the several intervening small towns.
At these places and in very handsome and substantial
buildings the location of which I personally and care
fully selected, the current is stepped down again in
voltage to 2,200 and distributed over a net work of
wires to the local customers.
Contemporaneously with this development, I ar
ranged with the Westinghouse Electric Company for
the purchase of certain water rights and lands held by
them upon the White River about 25 miles from Sno
qualmie Falls, for the sum of $30,500.00. I took this
in hand first as an option, but later on we paid the
money and acquired it outright. The plan I had de
vised for the development on this river made it the
simplest and least costly, and at that time, the largest
single power development in the world, namely, 60,-
000 H.P. I really took more pride in this project than
in the first one. It is as yet unfinished owing to the
attack made upon it in the courts by Stone & Webster,

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 195
who had rival interests in Seattle and Tacoma, and
were therefore anxious to crush out in its infancy this
new project, which by the very nature of it could de
stroy any rival opposing it. Up to the time of this
attack which interrupted our work there, we had ex
pended $165,000 on this development, in the purchase
of lands and rights and in actual construction work,
and most of this money came out of our Snoqualmie
earnings. These two enterprises, Snoqualmie and
White River, taken together as one, form probably
the most profitable, reliable and enduring hydro-elec
tric public utility power development known anywhere
in the world.
In brief, the plan for White River is to divert it
from its bed across a tableland through an excavated
canal only three miles in length, into a series of lakes,
which raised to a common level and overflowed to
gether, will submerge the intervening valleys and
form one lake 4,000 acres in area and capable of
being drawn down thirty feet. The geological forma
tion is cement gravel and is therefore ideal for reser
voir purposes. From this consolidated lake which T
named Lake Dorothy in honor of my little daughter,
the water will flow through pipes to the great brick
and stone power house in the valley below under a
head of 485 feet, nearly twice as high as Snoqualmie
Falls. In simplicity, substantiality and stupendous-
ness, the White River project is without its equal any
where. From this plant Seattle is twenty-five miles
distant, and Tacoma is only ten miles. I planned

196 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
to have this plant and Snoqualmie connected
together electrically into one great system, and hav
ing this in mind, I built the Snoqualmie transmission
lines so as to pass the doors of the White River power
house. It is interesting to repeat again right here, as ex
hibiting Father's absolute and unwavering faith in my
integrity, judgment and skill in these matters, which
were the principal security for his money advanced in
connection with our work, that he never saw the
White River property a single time, and he saw the
Snoqualmie property but three times, and then only
a very fezv hours each time. He rested absolutely
upon me, and his belief in me was never shaken, al
though more than once did our enemies adroitly at
tempt to do so. I seldom referred anything to him
until after it was done, and he never hindered me in my
plans. His part was to do the financing, — mine was
to contribute the plan, do the work and get the results,
although I helped in the financing by assisting nego
tiations in the East, and by arranging loans in Seattle
and Tacoma, and giving my personal endorsement
thereon at times. He gave me absolutely free rein in all
matters of policy, construction and finances, and only
questioned my motives at times to draw me out in
defense of the same, knowing that I held his interest
in our work more sacred than I did my own. He sel
dom advised me in matters of management but con
tented himself with the single duty of providing funds
upon my requisition. I of course almost daily re-

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 197
viewed my work to him by letter and gave him that
full confidence and attention that one partner should
give to another. He always acted under my direction
in all our mutual matters in furtherance of the part
nership relation. No father by his constant attitude
ever paid a finer tribute to a son than this father thus
did to me, and no son ever felt a keener regard for a
father's welfare and happiness than I did for mine.
It would be interesting to give some account of the
history of the construction of these plants and the
many physical and other difficulties which had to be
contended with and all of which were successfully sur
mounted. Such a history would begin with our pre
liminary engineering plans, and at a time when I went
on foot through the dense jungle above and below the
cataract for the purpose of exploring the situation
there ; and then as a pathfinder, blazing the trail over
the mountains and through the forests to the distant
cities for the purpose of locating the electric trans
mission lines thereto. In the same connection, other
water power possibilities were explored by me in
order to judge of what bearing, if any, they might
have upon this particular situation, and with the idea
of adding them to our general system later on in ac
cordance with my preconceived plan for one great
electrical system for Puget Sound.
Then next in order, we installed a steam plant at
the head works for operating the hoisting engines,
air compressors, and other machinery in connection
with our construction operations, and a coffer dam

198 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
was built around the proposed intake. Then drilling
at the tunnel below and at the shaft above was started
by means of the air-compressing plant, and the dyna
mite blasts began to do their work. None of the work
was contracted out, as it was uncertain in character
and had to be most carefully done ; so we did it by day
and night labor under an organization created and
supervised by myself, and running three shifts of men.
It would be interesting to tell of a party of men who
went to the scene of the operations at this time as my
guests and watched the slender air drills beginning to
hammer the hard basalt rock mountain side below
the Falls and the rock river bed above, and how when
I told them of the plan to thus dig a great subter-
annean chamber out of the solid rock 500 feet back
in the cliff for a power house, for the purpose of re
ceiving the water from the river above and discharg
ing it again into the river below after deriving the
energy from it through the water wheels they stood
in blank amazement and with looks of sympathy por
trayed upon their faces as much as to say "poor fool."
At the same time, our agents went out and pro
cured the rights of way for the transmission lines,
and following them came the several extensive crews
of laborers who felled the trees and cleared away the
forest debris in a swathe 500 feet wide in many places,
for no tree either good or bad was allowed to stand
which by its possible falling might reach the lines.
And then through this right of way thus prepared the
poles were set and the wires strung thereon, and then

Seattle Substation and General Offices.

Tacoma Substation.

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 199
the commodious distributing stations in the cities and
towns were built. Many tons of dynamite were ex
ploded in making the excavation for the power house,
and so skillfully was it managed that no one was
killed nor even hurt. Then came the lowering of the
mighty machinery into the artificial cave 300 feet be
low the ground without an untoward accident, many
of the single parts weighing 26,000 pounds, and soon
after that the finished plant began its noted and suc
cessful career.
The starting in operation of the first 10,000 H.P.
section of our completed plant was heralded by my
introducing to the situation at this time my mascot,
my little daughter Dorothy, who was then only
eighteen months old, and who had the same birthday
as my father and step-mother. Responding to her
part of the program at 8 o'clock one evening, she was
lifted high up and turned the switch in the presence
of many spectators, which for the first time in the his
tory of Snoqualmie Falls turned loose its subtle power
within the borders of Seattle, and proclaimed this
fact in dazzling evidence across the top of the sub
station by means of the words — "Snoqualmie Light"
outlined in electric lights. So much for a brief his
tory of our constructional operations ; now let me re
late something of our financial and commercial his
tory as well.
I deemed it best in the exploitation of our several
enterprises, to do so under the multiple company plan
and then later to put them together into one large

200 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
company. This plan we carried out. I therefore first
organized the parent or supply company, to which we
later turned over the power plant. This company was
to be related contracturally to its two subsidiary or
distributing companies organized upon financial
plans as follows : —
Snoqualmie Falls Power Co. (generating), $500,-
000 capital stock.
Seattle Cataract Co. (distributing), $100,000
capital stock.
Tacoma Cataract Co. (distributing), $100,000
capital stock.
These three companies I caused to authorize bond
issues of $750,000, $300,000 and $200,000 respect
ively. We also owned as mentioned before the White
River Power Company having $1,500,000 capital
stock. In the beginning of our operations in accordance
with the understanding of our partnership relation,
my father advanced his own money to defray the ex
penses of construction under my supervision. How
ever, as soon as we had made a substantial showing,
we began to look forward to financing our operations
in the open market, and to this end I arranged for
my father and Mason, Lewis & Company, a banking
firm of Chicago, to meet for the purpose of arranging
for the sale of a bond issue. Father was a stranger
to this firm, but my acquaintanceship with them was
close on account of my previous negotiations with
them in connection with the consolidation of the Street

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 201
Railways in Seattle, for which reason I wanted them
to undertake the Snoqualmie issue. I came East and
joined my father in presenting our matters to this
firm and we finally arranged for them to take our first
issue, viz.: $600,000.00 of bonds of the parent com
pany under the $750,000.00 mortgage, at the net price
to us of 95 and without any stock bonus or sweetening
whatsoever. This issue of bonds was the first that had
ever been put out in the open market by any hydro
electric company upon a water power long dis
tance transmission project, and it required a long
educational campaign to have the public think well
enough of them to take them in any quantities. It
looked at one time as though Mason, Lewis & Com
pany would make a complete failure of the flotation.
For the purpose of educating the bond buying public,
I therefore wrote many articles, descriptive of the
work and argumentative of its success, which were
published in various magazines, scientific papers and
daily newspapers. I also turned prominent visitors
to Tacoma and Seattle to our account by taking them
to the falls to inspect the work and thereby always
making them thereafter our champions. I did this
whether they were prospective bond buyers or not.
This educational campaign had its final effect and the
issue was in time disposed of at the price that had been
contracted to us.
When an underwriter buys an issue of bonds, he
has to consider the point of view of the man who be-

202 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
comes the actual and final investor in the bond. The
underwriter usually sells to the country banks or to
Trust Companies in large lots, and they in turn dis
tribute them about until finally widows, farmers, or
orphans own a single bond or very few at most.
These then are the persons who have to be educated.
When it was explained to such as these by the agents
of Mason, Lewis & Company that it was our purpose to
bring the power of a great cataract over three small
wires strung over the mountains and through the
valleys to Seattle and Tacoma, thirty and forty miles
away, they would have looks upon their faces sug
gestive of the thought that they were up against a
confidence game. It was too absurd a proposition for
most of them to take seriously, so that one can readily
understand the magnitude of the educational task be
fore us. Following our pioneering of this issue, the
water power bonds of other companies as a security
has crept up from the low estimate at which it was
first received until they now rank with high grade
railroads and gas bonds.
We also in accordance with my plan of organization
as stated before, placed bond mortgages upon the two
Cataract Companies and issued bonds thereunder
covering the cost of construction incurred by these
subsidiary companies. These bonds Father carried
himself as we wished to have them at our command
at a future time, when we planned to refund them
by the issues of a consolidated company.
In publishing Snoqualmie to the world I never

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 203
missed any opportunities that came along to make a
"story" out of some event or other. The event which
attracted the most widespread notice and caused our
project to be lectured about and published in Europe
as well as in this country, was the first great distance
test. We had two circuits built to Seattle and two
to Tacoma. These I connected up temporarily into
one long circuit — 154 miles — beginning and ending
at Snoqualmie. A generator at one end supplied the
current, while the neighboring generator at the other
end, — only ten feet distant in fact, although 1 54 miles
distant electrically, received the current as a motor
and was operated by it. The losses in transmission
were noted under varying loads and different volt
ages, and the results were given to the Associated
Press which gave it world-wide publicity.
When I organized the several companies, I in
stalled directors from among my trusted friends with
out consulting my father but with his consent, as he did
not want to hamper me in my management, inasmuch
as the responsibility for winning our final success
rested upon me. I handled all the campaigns for se
curing franchises in Seattle, Tacoma and other cities,
and I generally applied for them in his name in order
to attach to my application the greater importance and
prestige that his wellknown name would give to
them. In some of the smaller and unimportant places,
I took the franchises in my own name, and afterwards
assigned both those in his name and my own to the
proper companies. Because of Father being so well

204 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
and favorably known in the financial world I used his
name very often in connection with our projects, for
I regarded it as a valuable asset. I did this gen
erally without his knowledge in the first instance, but
always had him confirm my use of his name later,
which he always did very promptly.
There is probably no other plant in this country
of the same capacity so cheaply and at the same time
so well built as our Snoqualmie plant. The construc
tion cost per H.P. will be seen to be about $80.00, in
cluding the distributing systems in Seattle, Tacoma
and the small towns. With these local systems elimi
nated, the cost would be nearer $50.00 per H.P., an
extraordinarily low showing. This compares favor
ably with the Puyallup plant near Tacoma on the same
basis at $200.00, Niagara Falls at over $200.00, and
nearly all the rest of the list at $100.00 to $150.00
per H.P.
Before the Snoqualmie plant was completed, I be
gan to make contracts for selling the power at good
rates and for long terms. The business came faster
than we could handle it so that our capacity was soon
overtaxed resulting in our having to equip a 2,000
H.P. steam plant in Tacoma as a temporary relay
while we were doubling the capacity at the Falls. We
pulled the street railways, smelters, flour mills, ma
chine shops, lighting, etc. With Snoqualmie only half
loaded and with White River not finished nor in oper
ation, our enterprise was clearing at the time I was
euchred out of it after my father's death as related

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 205
further on, about $100,000 a year after paying all
expenses and fixed charges, and this surplus we al
ways applied to White River construction and Sno
qualmie extensions. The following statement shows
the gross earnings, expenses and profit for the year
1904, which year closed with my banishment from the
company : —
Net
Maintenance Earnings
Gross and from Bond Other
Month. Earnings. Expenses. Operations. Interest. Interest. Surplus.
January  $32,733.95 $7,693.85 $15,040.10 $4,020.88 $1,176.78 $9,842.49
February  22,290.41 7,174.13 15,116.28 3,908.33 1,317.08 9,890.87
March  20,631.98 8,030.95 12,601.03 3,908.33 1,349.33 7,343.37
April  19,571.59 8,449.46 11,122.13 3,908.33 1,424.62 5,789.18
May  19,581.65 8,773.34 10,808.21 3,908.33 1,653.15 5,246.73
Tune  18,898.78 8,288.64 10,610.14 3,908.33 1,578.44 5,123.37
July  16,139.05 9,871.55 6,267.50 3,908.33 1,585.54 773.63
August  18,146.38 7,966.18 10,180.20 3,908.33 1,695.94 4,575.93
September  20,147.64 7,816.09 12,331.55 3,908.33 1,672.86 6,750.36
October  24,947.10 8,860.73 16,086.37 3,908.33 1,604.39 10,573.65
November  25,103.40 9,251.01 15,852.39 4,462.50 236.69 11,626.58
December  25,596.49 11,224.92 14,371.57 4,462.50 1,957.30 7,961.77
Total  $253,788.32 $102,400.85 $150,387.47 $48,120.80 $16,778.74 $85,487.93
It will be observed that the company's operating cost
was only 40 per cent of its gross earnings, an extraor
dinary showing and not equalled anywhere else that
I am aware. This favorable showing is due to the
permanent style of construction and simplicity of
design. It should be here noted that March, April and
May earnings were shrunk as a result of a fire at Sno
qualmie Falls, which destroyed the transforming plant
and temporarily crippled the capacity of the plant.
It should be noted also that the Seattle Electric Com
pany load was dropped at one stroke in July as the
first move on our part to get rid of that undesirable
customer, and this shrunk the earnings for that month
$4,500.00. Had there been no untoward incidents
such as those referred to, the net earnings would have

206 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
been normally about $12,000 more, and the ratio of
expense to earnings would have then been 38 per cent.
With the doubling of the capacity by a 10 per cent in
crease in our investment, which I had nearly com
pleted at the time of my decapitation, and the conse
quential increase in earnings, this ratio should have
been reduced to 25 per cent, but it has not been pos
sible to improve upon the half capacity ratio above
cited, on account of the figure head staff expense, the
incompetent management, and the jobs which have
since been levied on the company. I often predicted
to Father that Snoqualmie would earn gross nearly
three-quarters of a million dollars a year, and this
prediction has since been fulfilled as the result of my
doubling the capacity of the plant.
It is apparent from the foregoing statement
that the six per cent, upon the preferred stock of our
company was at that time being earned with less than
the full capacity of the original plant being taxed for
the purpose, while we used the surplus in completing
the building of the plant, and developing the White
River power project. There was additionally avail
able for the future, the revenue to be derived from the
sales of the residue power, together with the 10,000
H.P. more which later came from the doubling of the
plant, together with 60,000 H.P. more which is now
awaiting the completion of the development at White
River, all of which will accrue to the benefit of the
common stock, and would eventually have made it
worth, as I told Father, $400 to $500 per share, a

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 207
result which would have been obtained had not the
company, through the accident of his death, gotten
into the hands of incompetents and unscrupulous
manipulators. Although his life forms no further
part of this story, yet this history will be continued
until the final completion of the work which we had
undertaken together.
My father's estate was taken in charge soon after
his death by his administrators, and my half of the
company not yet having been segregated from his es
tate, was likewise taken in charge by the same ad
ministrators. As a result of this, both his stock and
my own was turned against me, which he being dead
could not prevent, nor could I. My positions and
honors were then taken from me and given to four
others on the inside, for it took four unacquainted with
such work to do what I had been doing. The object
of this was not told at that time or since, although it
has been apparent since by what has transpired
under the new management as hereafter related. This
added expense was partly met by reducing the pay of
our operators and running two shifts in 24 hours in
place of three. This resulted in all the old men leav
ing and their places being given to cheap, inex
perienced men. It is estimated by experts that this
"econonmy" has probably added 1 per cent to the
annual depreciation of the plant.
After the Snoqualmie service had demonstrated
itself in Seattle, I then applied for franchises in
Whatcom at the north end of Puget Sound, in Port-

208 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
land, Oregon, about 125 miles south of Tacoma, and
in all the intervening towns and counties, in order to
pave the way for the "greater Snoqualmie," of which
our accomplishment so far was but the nucleus. These
franchises were allowed to die by my successors who
failed to comprehend the broad scope of our enter
prise, so that our competitors have since seized upon
the opportunities which we pointed out and my suc
cessors neglected.
My exile from the kingdom which Father and I
had created, which we owned together, and over
which we held sway, seems to have been inspired for
the purpose of eliminating all obstacles to the manipu
lation of the property for the private benefit of those
who drove me out. It was an act of injustice to me,
of reckless disregard of the interests of the stock
holders as has since been evident, and an insult to and
desecration of my father's memory. Father and I built
the plant to stand forever, and not as a stock jobbing
scheme, with the result that there is no better built
plant in the world, — to achieve which was my set pur
pose. The wisdom of this course which our oppon
ents at that time called "extravagant" is now daily ap
parent from the fact that the plant operates year in
and year out at low expense, without any steam plant
relay and without accidents or a second of interrup
tion, a record to be envied by the most up-to-date
steam plant. Because nature had done so much in
facilitating and simplifying our operations, and be
cause we spent no money in submitting to graft, our

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 209
plant cost only half as much per H.P. as most other
plants have done, although Father and I paid dearly
for this result in the trials and tribulations which we
endured by not submitting to graft.
Although the Snoqualmie project was inspired as
related to deliver me from a financial dilemma, yet it
has been too tardy to perform that duty on account
of the complications arising from the death of my
father. However, I have since been fortunate in other
ways notwithstanding and have been able to bring a
cloudless sky over my head again. At one time we
thought that certain of this indebtedness would pre
judice the credit of the company on account of my
being the head of it, and we therefore paid certain of
it under Father's direction, and the amount paid out
was charged against my interest in the partnership.
The conception of the Snoqualmie project was in
spired by my unfortunate financial condition at the
time, which I could only look forward to correcting
when our work shall have been completed and success
achieved. On account of this situation therefore, and
the fact that I had resigned the Bank receivership in
order to give up all my time to the power project I
had a small drawing account for bare living expenses
during the construction period as agreed to between
my father and myself which was to be charged against
my interest in the profits as they would later appear, —
and I denied myself all but bare necessities in order
to keep this down to a small sum, while at the same
time I personally turned in from time to time to our

210 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
joint account such money as I could spare, an account
of which was kept in our construction books. My
drawing account was nominally $500.00 a month, but
I turned it all back for a year or more, then half of it,
so that in that way I turned in something like $15,000
or a little over $400.00 less than I drew out. Until
therefore, our profit in stock as above noted is divided,
I will have received only the $400.00 referred to as
the requital for my part of the work in producing for
our joint account the profit of over a million and a
half dollars, as will be shown later on. After our
companies were in operation, I ceased availing myself
entirely of the drawing account which had been avail
able to me from the partnership estate, and I there
after drew a small salary for living expenses from the
parent power company as its president and chief en
gineer. This was in no sense adequate for the service
rendered nor was it so considered, but I looked rather
for my reward to the income I would be able to make
the stock yield, half of which was mine. Although I
also was the President and Manager of the Seattle
Cataract Company, the Manager and Chief Engineer
of the White River Company, which absorbed my best
skill and energy, and the managing director of the
Tacoma Cataract Company, yet I never at any time
drew a cent from them for services or for managing
our private properties, such as the Baker Block in
Seattle. Father drew large sums in cash, bonds and
notes from time to time which were charged to him
in the same books where the account with me was

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 211
kept, all of which was in accord with our mutual
agreement. Our main profit was the fortune in Power
Company shares, but as a byproduct of the enterprise
we owned the Baker Building, a business block in
Seattle which we originally built for a substation
that proved inadequate and which I afterwards sold
at a profit of $80,000 cash or 100 per cent upon our
investment running six years. In addition to this
profit we had enjoyed the yearly returns in rentals
from the building of about 15 per cent net, and this
we turned in on the Snoqualmie construction oper
ations. The several constituent companies mentioned above
were devised by me and approved by Father, as a
necessary and convenient expedient for handling our
business to its best advantage, and for maintaining
separate entities in Seattle and Tacoma, where the re
spective city councils sought to enact franchise re
quirements by which each town could dictate the pro
gram of our operations in the other. Later these dif
ficulties were removed, so that we then found it of
advantage to put all our companies together as one
company. To obtain the results shown, cost me not
only my best skill, energy, patience, and hard work
during the several years of our partnership period, but
the more or less attention I had given to it during the
ten years preceding our partnership relation, making
a total period of about eighteen years, and the best
eighteen years of my lifetime.
Agreeable to our mutual agreement, I personally

212 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
planned and supervised the work and the spending of
the money. I gave this one thing all my time, — days,
nights and Sundays — to the exclusion of other work
and other opportunities. "Sundays" is meant lit
erally, for not over ten of them in five years was I
able to take from the work and give to my family. I
was always in possession of the partnership property
and the designs and secrets relating thereto. I held
my father's general power of attorney for use in our
joint matters, and under it I made contracts and
incurred indebtedness in his name and in his
behalf as the financial partner. I carried all
the property in his name, did the construction
and kept the books on account likewise in his
name and with his consent. I deemed it best for
his credit and that of our enterprise to do so. At my
instance the Snoqualmie plant prior to its completion
was transferred by Father to the Company which I
had organized to receive it, for the consideration of
$1,100,000, which was paid to him with its capital
stock, $500,000 and its first bond issue, $600,000.
These bonds and those issued subsequently in addi
tion thereto, represented the cost of the enterprise
while the stock represented our profit. This transfer
I made myself by his power of attorney, and the
securities resulting from this step of my plans, I de
livered to him for temporary use in connection with
the partnership, and for later division between us in ac
cordance with out partnership understanding. By
agreement between us, Father carried my stock as well

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 213
as his own, in his name, for the purpose of increasing
his financial credit while financing our operations, and
to more conveniently and safely conduct the financing,
and to use the stock as collateral in connection with
our matters when necessary. In this way he held all
our stock and bonds and our Seattle business block
as trustee for us both, and to use the same for our
mutual benefit and to later divide between us, when
our work should have been finally accomplished. The
stock of the two Cataract companies however we
actually did divide, as its value was only nominal, and
it was useless as a basis of credit for the reason that
we issued bonds against these subsidiary companies
for the full amount of their cost. I kept my Cataract
companies shares in Seattle while he kept his in Chi
cago, although his administrators took possession of
my stock without my consent.
As we came near to the goal to which we had been
striving for several years, I naturally enough desired
a division of our securities, so that I would have actual
possession of my share of the same as a basis for my
own credit and for my personal enjoyment. I there
fore asked Father in the Spring of 1903 to let me have
my interest in the shares and real estate in my own
hands, but he answered that he felt that we were not
yet "out of the woods" and that he had better still hold
it all until our refunding plan then under way had
been consummated. "Can't you trust me?" he said.
He seemed to feel hurt, in that my insistance implied
a lack of confidence in the trust I had imposed in him,

214 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
— my own father — so with his positive promise to
divide with me as soon as it would be safe to do so, I
allowed the matter to rest until all uncertainties would
be removed ; but a few months later his death delayed
temporarily the fulfillment of his promise, so that my
shares so dearly earned, have never yet reached my
hands, but have since been used against me to ac
complish the temporary separation of myself from the
management of my property and the levying of jobs
upon it. Following Father's death I demanded of his
administrators the fulfillment of his stewardship to
me which resulted in $50,000 being offered me at one
time as a compromise, and 10 per cent of the Power
Company common stock at another time, both of
which I declined, as they were but a fraction of what
was mine. An adjustment was promised from time
to time; — but these promises with which I was cod
dled along during the year of probate were not kept
and ended in their telling me to sue, so that on the last
day of the probate year I was compelled to bring a
suit for the determination of my interest in our
western properties and the segregation of my estate
from that of my father's. My friend and champion
in this matter has been the distinguished lawyer the
Hon. James Hamilton Lewis, of Chicago, to whose
learning, ability and skill, and that of his able asso
ciate Mr. E. N. Zoline, the final triumph of my
cause will be largely due. When the matter was
finally referred to an attorney with the idea of arrang
ing a compromise settlement of my interest in order

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 215
to avoid the notoriety due to legal proceedings, the at
torney in question advised that nothing be paid to me
in requital for what I had done and that no part of the
$15,000 which I had invested in it be returned to me,
and the adoption of his advice of course, has since pro
vided an ample living for him as the result of the thou
sands of dollars which he is annually charging against
the estate in the carrying out of this program, and
which he will continue so to do as long as there is any
thing to litigate about or with, for this is the ex
pressed intention. It was thought by those who op
posed me, that I had no other resource except my
interest in the power company, and that with this
stripped from me I would be unable to litigate for pos
session of my property through such a long period of
time as the administrators with ample funds at their
command would be able to carry it, and the fact that
I have done so three years already has been a source
of much perplexity to them.
The final refusal to recognize my interest was
based upon the technical contention that I had ne
glected to have the contract with my father in writing,
and so as a penalty I would have to forfeit to his heirs
my half of our property, representing my invention of
the project itself as well as all the fruits of my years
of labor and industry and devotion to our work and
the $15,000 I had in it in cash. It is also contended
that I did not bring my suit within the time required
by law, and that the $400 portion of my drawing ac
count which I had not yet paid back, paid me in full

216 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
for all my years of strenuous work and for my inven
tions which this chapter sets forth. Not even a vote of
thanks has been received from those who seek enrich
ment at my hands and who in comfortable inaction
have done nothing of consequence during the long
and strenuous period while I upon the frontier was
engaged in carving the Snoqualmie fortune out of
the wilderness and defending it against the assaults
of envy and greed. Never before in my knowledge
has it been expected of any man to give the inventions
of years of careful thought to any one without a dol
lar of compensation. Such an idea is unprecedented
in the history of industrial development and scientific
progress, and the world would stand still if it were
the rule to put upon man's achievements such a ban.
No man ever works for another for any salary alone
as I worked in this business. No man sacrifices abso
lutely all other prospects, mortgages his brains to one
thing, gives up all thoughts of any other future,
impairs his health, strength and vitality, and suffers
the nightmares and man killing nerve strain such as
I have done, for any salaried compensation in money
whatsoever, and much less would any man perform
such a service covering a strenuous five years for the
few dollars which I drew out of it for the mere pur
pose of keeping body and soul together. Father him
self would have been the last man in the world to be
a party to such injustice. Half of that time I was
away from home and many nights there was more
work than -sleep and only about ten Sundays in five

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 217
years have I been able to be home, for that was my
day almost invariably to be on the work in the moun
tains. It is interesting to note at this point the parallel
situation of my brother Howard whom Father had
backed heavily for a large interest in Butler Brothers'.
The administrators made no claim upon this property
as belonging to the estate, although Father's liability
in connection therewith was in force at the time of his
death. The principal difference appears to be that
Howard fortunately had his Butler Brothers' property
in his own hands when Father died, while my Sno
qualmie property was still in Father's custody at the
time of his unfortunate death. The legal status of the
two cases is similar, and both situations involved
Father in the purpose of helping each of us in our
particular lines. There was no thought that either
of us should work out a fortune for the rest of the
family and other relatives. It is quite likely that if
"Charley Baker's Folly" had lived up to its misnomer,
I would have been left unmolested in my possession of it.
Although the absence of a written contract has
been made much of by those who seek to acquire my
interest in the property which I created, yet the exist
ence of the partnership relation was well known to
many of Father's friends to whom he stated it and
who have made affidavits to that effect and the fre
quent references to our joint properties in his let
ters to me very clearly bear it out. In this connec-

218 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
tion it may be interesting for me to quote from several
of his letters to me as follows:
Aug. 31, 1898. "In the first place, we do not want any
partners if we can help it.  Of course 17 years is quite a
long time, and may be as long as we shall be in business, but
if we should want to sell the property, the length of franchise
would be an important element in fixing values.  "
Mar. 6, 1899. "You may be right on the auxiliary com
pany business if it ever comes to that ; however, we must
retain not one-half but a majority."
Mar. 13, 1899. "I am unable to see from what you have
written what advantage it can be to us. I do not, however,
think it wise to let anybody know that we have control even
temporarily of the White River scheme.  1 see by the clip
ping you sent that others are looking out for power locations ;
/ wonder why some of them don't offer to buy us out."
Aug. 23, 1901. "I do not know exactly whether it will be
advisable to let Stone & Webster know we have bought the
White River. What do you think?"
Mar. 25, 1902. "When Mr. Hill was here he talked as if
he would buy or sell. What do you suppose he would pay for
our plant?"
June 5, 1902. "Maybe Sam Hill will call on me when he
comes East, but I have no particular desire to see him. /
presume he wants to sell, and not to buy us out."
June 30, 1902. "I told him (Hill) the same as you did,
that we could not go into a consolidation on the 5% basis
while we had our development incomplete."
Dec. 17, 1902. "Now Henry comes down on me with a
proposition to buy the 'Commercial-West.' I do not know
but he has already done it, on the expectation that I am to put
up the money. I have never put up anything for either Bertha
or Henry as / have for you and Howard."
Mar. 16, 1903. "Their proposition (Stone & Webster)

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 219
was to increase their preferred stock to $1,500,000 and pay us
the additional $500,000 even up for our Snoqualmie stock."
May 19, 1903. "If we could get legal possession of our
White River property, I should want to sell the building and
use the money for development, but that appears to be as far
away as ever. If the court had not made up its mind to beat
us, he would not do us the injustice of holding us up indefi
nitely." A strong effort has been made by those who seek
my undoing, to secure retractions from those who
made the affidavits in my behalf, but this attempt
failed, as evidently the truth of yesterday must be the
truth of today. I have been repeatedly slandered to
these witnesses for the same purpose, and a syste
matic crusade ag-ainst my credit has been continually
waged in the belief that thus undermined I would be
unable to carry my end of this expensive litigation
with the entire exchequer of the administrators
opposed to me.
It is interesting to note at this point, that three
years after Father's death, the administrators and
present managers had secretly arranged to sell both
Father's and my stock to our competitors, who had
never ceased wanting to own our company, and this
was to be done without consulting me in the matter.
However, the intending purchasers, with business
caution, had their lawyers review the situation as to
its legal aspects, with the result that they insisted that
my relinquishment would be necessary in order to
gain the title. This of course made a little stir, as
my claims had been very lightly regarded. I was then

220 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
made aware that considerable money would be paid
me and I would be retained to complete my building
of the White River plant if I would consent to the
selling out or consolidation, and if I did not do so they
would thereafter withhold dividends from the stock
holders. I however told them that persuasion of this
sort did not interest me, that I had no wish to make
money at the expense of the stockholders, and that
my consent would be forthcoming only upon the cor
rection of wrongs done to certain stockholders whom
I had interested in the company, and the restitution to
the company of certain private and illegal profits
which the president and some of the directors had
made at the expense of the stockholders, and there the
matter has since rested.
The death of my father was a staggering blow to
me and to our enterprise, for our work was not yet
entirely done, and the bulk of his part of it — the final
financing — was yet entirely to be done. I estimate
that three-fourths of a million dollars would not cover
the subsequent damage to our property due to the
recklessness, incompetency and trickery of those who
by the accident of his death became a vampire at the
throat of the project. The enterprise could no longer
have the support which his credit gave it. His burden
I then had to take up in addition to my own. I
immediately went to Mr. George Westinghouse, who
had been Father's friend as well as my own, and after
explaining my situation, asked him to authorize his
company to extend a credit to our company of $100,000

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 221
for at least a year. This he gladly did. I next went
to the Aluminum Company and asked them to do
the same for about $50,000, and the Waterwheel Com
pany for about $35,000, which they both did. This
was necessary, for prior to his death we had under
taken the doubling of the waterwheel and generator
capacity of the plant and also the aluminum trans
mission system. Then after the administrators of
Father's estate found themselves unable to borrow any
money for current needs of the company, I went to
Tacoma and upon the recommendation of my friend,
Mr. George Browne, there, I was able to borrow for
the company from the Fidelity Bank of which he was
a director, $26,000. It was necessary for me to
endorse this note personally in order to get the loan,
which of course I did not hesitate to do on account
of being the company's sponsor and a half owner in
it. I asked the other heirs to endorse this note with
me on account of their prospective inheritance from
Father's share in the company, but they thought the
risk too great and preferred to let it rest upon me
alone. As a further means of raising ready cash,
I persuaded the Tacoma Smelter, our largest cus
tomer, to pay up its bill for power one year in advance,
which meant another $12,000.
Shortly after making these temporary financial
arrangements I consolidated our four companies into
one at values which competent judges had appraised
them at, and called it Snoqualmie Falls & White River
Power Company, capitalized at $3,000,000, for the

222 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
properties had become very valuable by this time and
were well worth that sum. The name was later
changed to the one it now carries, viz., Seattle-Tacoma
Power Company, and the Company was then recapi
talized as follows : —
$1,250,000 6 per cent Preferred Stock,
2,250,000 Common Stock,

Total, $3,500,000 Capital Stock.
This completed the plan we had been working on sev
eral months prior to Father's death but which had
been temporarily held up by Stone & Webster's attack
on our White River Company. This consolidated
company created a mortgage of $7,500,000 upon all
its property, under which it issued $1,500,000 of
bonds, which were sold to N. W. Harris & Company
under a contract which I made with them for their
purchase, but which they repudiated a few months
after. A popular conundrum which wore itself
threadbare for about a year in the Power Company
office was: "When is a contract not a contract?"
Answer : "When it is made with Harris & Company."
A year later, however, they again agreed with the
administrators to purchase the bonds at the same price
(92), and this time they carried out their contract,
upon a more favorable basis to them. They had in the
interval loaned the estate $475,000 which was paid
up when the bonds were finally taken by them. The
administrators gave them a one-seventh interest in

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 223
the Company as a present at the time this loan was
made, and the loan was secured by a pledge of the
entire estate. These bonds refunded all previous
issues of parent and subsidiary companies, and pro
vided for doubling the capacity of the plant at the
Falls and the transmission system, as well as extend
ing the system in Seattle and Tacoma. Since my
departure from the Company contemporaneously with
the purchase of this issue of bonds as hereafter related,
additional bonds have been issued for extending the
system, and to enable the new president and some of
the directors to privately speculate in an ice factory
which they unloaded on the Company, at an expense
of $380,000. The total bonds issued represent the
cost of the enterprise as a whole and the stock our
profit. While my negotiations with the Harris firm were
pending I took advantage of a waiting interval to go
to New York to develop two other lines which I had
previously begun by correspondence with the aid of
the Westinghouse Company. While in New York I
was actually offered a syndicate arrangement for buy
ing up my father's interest in the Company but I did
not favor this as I wished to have Father's heirs con
tinue in the Company and enjoy the profit which I
believed they would realize in so doing. I also secured
a bid of 90 for our bonds without any sweetening and
conditioned that I would remain with the Company
as its Manager and would have my life insured for
the benefit of the Company for the sum of $200,000,

224 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
as the New York bankers naturally felt that I was the
chief asset of the Company. The bid of Harris &
Company was promised at about this time, so I intro
duced the administrators to them by letter and asked
them to get it for me and advise me by wire. They
wired that 92 was offered and I, therefore, terminated
my negotiations in New York with the explanation
that Harris & Company had made a better* price and
secured the business. The one-seventh interest in the
Company, however, as a present exacted by Harris
was a later development, but as I had burned our
bridges behind us in New York there was nothing to
do except to submit to any revised terms which
Harris might then demand and the administrators
agree to.
Much has been said and written about this Sno
qualmie Falls power plant, so absolutely unique, and
standing alone as it does in the annals of Hydro-
Electric Engineering. Housed in a great cavern hol
lowed out of the rock 300 feet under ground, it is the
only naturally fireproof and earthquake proof plant
extant. Scientists, public men and managers have
come from all parts of the world to see its wondrous
stupendousness, and withal simplicity. I entertained
at different times such visitors as Mr. M. LeBaudy, of
Paris, Baron Von Ketler, General in Chief of the
German Army, Admiral Schley, of Spanish War
fame, and the Commercial Club of Chicago, sometimes
called the "Billionaire Club." General Von Ketler,
who was closing a tour of the world at the time, pro-

Centennial Mill, Operated by Snoqualmie Power.

'ZfmwPWk

e

iSSfS^.S." T '

White River Power Plant, 60,000 H.P.

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 225
nounced it the greatest work he had seen. The Com
mercial Club which visited the power plant at Sno
qualmie Falls upon its 10,000 mile tour around the
country were so impressed by what they saw — and
it was not then completed — that their opinion very
freely expressed was that this plant was the only fea
ture of their entire itinerary that rivalled in interest
the sublime Grand Canyon of the Colorado River.
They wanted to buy it. President McKinley planned
to visit this plant and plant a tree there, but was
deterred by the illness of his wife, while President
Roosevelt had the same expectation but was deterred
by the local politicians who preferred to arrange some
other program for his entertainment. III.
(Several names used in this section are fictitious and are
designated A, B, C, etc., for convenience, in place of the
real names which the characters bear.)
So much for a brief recital of the results obtained
through our relation as partners in this enterprise.
The dramatic part of the story, however, running
parallel with the rest of it, is not told in the busy
water wheels, the raging river, the humming motors
thirty to fifty miles away, or the dividends earned,
but is reflected in the nightmares and sleepless nights,
the worries, the sickness, the heartache, and tre
mendous expenditure of mind force, nerve force,
patience and energy, which only we two knew about
in its fullness and acuteness, and which only we two

226 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
endured as a part of our contribution to the achieve
ment ; none of which a stranger would ever dream of
as he looked upon the finished work.
Our enterprise had been for a short time after its
birth, serenely jogging along as a young infant that
had come into the world with much acclaim of joy
from the people who looked upon it as their future
deliverer from extortionate prices for light and power.
'The whole Puget Sound country looked upon it as a
future benefit to their communities. But suddenly in its
pathway, this promising infant soon met face to face a
giant conspiracy to kill it which was engineered by
and for the benefit of the E. Company, one of the
largest of American electrical companies, M. & N.,
and a number of thieves and grafters in Seattle and
Tacoma. This drew us into a war for the defence of
our property, which lasted five long years and is with
out a parallel in the history of similar enterprises.
Father and I started out upon this enterprise upon
the theory that it would be a popular project in Seattle
and Tacoma. It was indeed popular among the people
at large who had been paying high rates for lighting
and power, and who had been riding on street car sys
tems whose poor service was due as much as anything
to inadequate and uncertain power. There was every
reason, therefore, for the public to herald our coming
with approbation, enthusiasm and pleasure, but never
theless we invoked by our operations the opposition
and emnity of those mentioned. Very soon after we
had begun our construction operations, the E. Com-

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 227
pany began a most hostile warfare upon us, as a
means of securing by compulsion our orders for elec
trical machinery and for the purpose of wrecking us
afterwards; — that is to hammer us with threats, and
injure us as they could until we would yield to the
purchase of machinery from them without considering
other concerns which might wish to compete for the
same. Mr. A. noted for his cunning, was their prin
cipal agent in the Puget Sound country, and he was
ably assisted by two lawyers, Mr. B. in Tacoma and
Mr. C. in Seattle. They devised an opposition com
pany, proposing to utilize the power of a neighboring
creek for the purpose of drawing the public favor
from us to themselves and for the apparent purpose
of diverting prospective revenue from us to them.
This company was on paper only, and never came to
actual realization, but it had its use for the time being
as a club for the purposes intended and for bedevilling
us generally. Negotiations were begun both in Seattle and Chi
cago with the E. Company and the Westinghouse
Company for our electrical apparatus. As soon as
the plans for the construction of the Snoqualmie plant
were definitely settled upon, I went East for the pur
pose of placing the orders for the electrical machinery,
transmission wires, insulators, etc. Bids had already
been filed to cover these and Father had practically
promised the contracts on the tenders made. I how
ever, proceeded to the different factories represented,
negotiated the business anew, and made these con-

228 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
tracts myself at a total saving to us of over thirty thou
sand dollars less than the prices bid. This was the first
order of any size on the boards in the United States since
the panic, and there was therefore most ardent com
petition for it among the manufacturers of apparatus
and supplies such as we were in the market for. We
commanded ample money for the purchase of what we
needed, and we desired the best goods in return there
for. We asked no one to take our bonds in payment,
not to extend us credit. We wanted the best that cash
could buy.
Mr. A.'s plan was to drive us into buying from his
company, regardless of any views we had on the sub
ject. I finally however contracted to purchase our
electrical apparatus from the Westinghouse Company
at slightly higher prices than the E. Co. (which we
concluded would be an unsafe alliance) had offered,
and this deal carried with it the option to purchase the
stock of the White River Company heretofore referred
to in this narrative. This precipitated a great war
upon us, which was intensified by the ill feeling the
E. Company had always had for me personally because
of my previously winning certain electrical contracts
which they had expected to get. They had pre
empted the Puget Sound country as their particular
pasture with the idea that they held a divine title
thereto, and my presuming to make a living at their
disadvantage was regarded by them as a piece of
ambitious impudence which could not be forgiven nor
forgotten.

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 229
The warfare to which my father and I were sub
jected as a result of our operations was conducted
against us with the skill and determination of an army
general. They still hoped to upset our contract with
the Westinghouse Company. Their idea was to
attack our project at every turn, to knock the props
from under it, and by a protracted system of bluster
and bulldozing, to finally scare us into repudiating
with Westinghouse and making a contract for our
machinery with the E. Company. Mr. A. then
revealed their purpose of developing the power of the
neighboring creek in opposition to us, unless we
bought machinery from them and consolidated with
them. We declined to consolidate our material project
with their myth.
The next point of attack against us was in the
matter of franchises which they proclaimed we could
not get in either town without their co-operation and
consent. They had their spies abroad, and every word
that I uttered in the committee conferences of the city
councils was promptly repeated to their headquarters
in the East. In the beginning, our project was
regarded as a boon to the two cities. Under the tac
tics employed the City Councils were led to believe
that we were the public enemy. The conspiracy was
not only local, but the campaign of threats and misrep
resentations was carried on in Chicago at the same
time. My father in Chicago was finally peremptorily
informed by the E. Company that if I did not come
East at once and arrange matters to their satisfaction

230 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
"we would have to take the consequences." I did not
obey. Like ubiquitous highwaymen they always
struck from behind and in the dark, so that our imagi
nations were constantly taxed to divine their next
move. It was early in the history of the conspiracy that
the E. Company employed the before mentioned
whisker-begrimed elfin lawyer-man of versatile
speech from Seattle, named C, who went East and
called upon my father, threatening annihilation of
our project if we did not come to terms with the E.
Company. Father rebuked him for his impudence
and ordered him out of his office. His opinion of him
is clearly enough defined in his letters to me from
which I quote:
May 14, 1898. "In view of my talk with  , you
had better give it out that you are likely to start East in a
few days; they may have somebody, C, perhaps, on the look
out, and he is just the sort of a fellow who would lend himself
to buying a common council."
June 17, 1898. "Your interview in the paper indicates
that you are not afraid to have C know why you delay coming
East. I am more afraid of him than of A."
We therefore had C. on our list as one to avoid,
but his grasshopper antics were always to me more
a source of amusement than of apprehension.
One of their first moves was to attack the title to
our property at Snoqualmie Falls, using for this pur
pose the Northern Pacific Railroad as a tool, Mr. B.
being attorney for that railroad as well as for our
opponent. He caused the railroad company to make

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 231
a demand upon us for possession of the Falls, alleging
that they held a prior and substantial title thereto.
Their contention had its foundation in an ancient,
abandoned and obsolete right of way easement for a
railroad line to which the Northern Pacific fell heir
from the Seattle, Lake Shore & Eastern Railway.
There was no foundation for the claim, and I soon
after laid the situation before President Chas. S.
Mellen of the Northern Pacific, in St. Paul, who stated
to me that "If my explanation was correct, his com
pany would be playing the part of a blackmailer in
pursuing it," and he therefore ordered an investiga
tion. As a result of that investigation, a quitclaim
deed from that company was soon sent to us. It was
easy to divine the purpose of this latest move by A.
It was thought undoubtedly that our operations had
progressed to such a point, that in order to go on with
the work, the property would have to be bonded and
loans placed upon it, which would be impossible to
do under a clouded title, but fortunately we were not
dependent upon this property nor upon any other
property for funds. j
Finally after several weeks, the E. Company
offered a truce, and argeed to do nothing further
offensive during my absence if I would go East and
take up negotiations with them, but I did not go until
our franchise in Seattle was granted, and then I went
East in order to place the contracts as above related.
During my absence, however, A.'s local agents violated
the pledge and still kept up their hostility to our

232 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
project, trying to break up power contracts made with
our company, stating that the thousands of dollars we
were spending was only a bluff; stating that Sno
qualmie Falls ran dry every summer and froze solid
in the winter; stating that any power contracts we
made could not possibly be carried out ; that no water
power had ever yet successfully driven an electric
lighting system, although in the same breath they
urged that it could be successfully done from their
neighboring creek owing to some specially endowed
qualities of that highly gifted stream. The threats were
made continually that they would bring vast stores
of power to Seattle from the neighboring creek and
run us into bankruptcy.
The war against our Seattle franchise as waged by
the E. Company was long and bitter, and the usual
unscrupulous methods of that Company were
employed in full force. The public kept a keen eye
upon the situation, and for this reason their plotting
was under greater restraint than would otherwise
have been the case. As it was however, different
members of the city council were unduly influenced,
and so I had to accept a franchise full of harsh and
almost unworkable restrictions in place of the liberal
one demanded by the public, and such an one as an
enterprise like ours was worthy of. Father had
known something of the E. Company's methods before
and he wrote:
Feb. 20, 1899. "I have never doubted the fight the E. Co.
were going to set up on us, so could not share your optimism.

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 233
They are willing to do anything to beat us and as they have
started on bribery, they will not stop. I am surprised at the
price they are paying aldermen, as they could better afford
to pay ten times $200 per head than for us to get the franchise."
After their failure to defeat the Seattle franchise,
the campaign was shifted bodily to Tacoma under the
direction of Mr. B., attorney for the E. Company, and
Mr. D., a professional lobbyist. Mr. B. proved him
self a better manipulator of men than the Seattle
coterie had shown themselves to be, and as a result
the Tacoma Council voted down the application for a
franchise there. The Tacoma Council was generally
thought to be owned body, soul and breeches by our
enemy. The matter then rested in Tacoma for several
months until public indignation became aroused and
got to a white heat, and then a new Council in that
city took the matter up again for consideration. Now
came a crisis in the situation, and the E. Company
immediately gave orders to have the franchise killed,
or failing in that to have it so loaded down with
iniquity that I would decline it. Their local super
intendent took active charge of the conspiracy out
side of the Council, and one of the Councilmen became
their agent within it. Between these two, a series of
most ingenious manoeuvres were planned, with, how
ever little success. Public interest in the discussion
became ardent, and prominent citizens filled the audi
ence chamber at the meetings, so that in a measure
they were kept at bay. The Tacoma Daily Ledger
then took up the fight in behalf of the citizens, and
showed up clearly the attitude of the E. Company,

234 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
and through its columns hundreds of citizens entered
their protest against the octopus whose tentacles had
been upon them for so many years. This made the
situation desperate for the E. Company, which it was
said had put an active agent in the field to unduly
influence the councilmen, but be it said however to
the credit of the city, this plan met with little success.
Then sensational articles were published about a
gigantic syndicate taking up the neighboring creek
power company, and bringing down water power by.
the many thousands of horse power to both cities, and
about a galaxy of millionaires buying up the street
railways of Tacoma through the influence of the E.
Company, but after a few days of telegraphing and
investigation by the Tacoma Daily Ledger these yarns
were shown to be fairy stories, invented for the purpose
of subtracting from the popular support accorded to
our Snoqualmie project. All this in the end served
as a boomerang in favor of the Snoqualmie Company,
so that the E. Company was compelled to yield to the
wishes of the citizens, and finally the council voted
the franchise into a law.
As soon as the Tacoma Franchise was granted one
of the principal councilmen wrote me a letter stating
that he had $100.00 for investment, and wanted me
to approach my father on the subject of investing it
for him on the Chicago Board of Trade in such a
manner as would return him a profit of $125.00 a
month. This was certainly a delicate way of putting
it, but, as Mark Anthony would have said of the

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 235
average Tacoma Councilmen, "and these are honor
able men," I of course answered the communication in
an equally polite vein that Father could not undertake
a Board of Trade transaction on so small a scale and
that he could not in any event guarantee results. I
was apparently too obtuse to see what was wanted.
After our cause had been consistently championed
for a considerable time by the daily newspapers, the
Tacoma Ledger turned bitterly against us and began
to attempt our undoing at a time when we most needed
their support. The fact that we refused to submit to
a graft of $3,000 levied by it may have had something
to do with it. Then later the Tacoma Daily News
followed suit, experiencing its change of heart over
night, and what happened during that night to change
its attitude can be guessed fairly correctly. The owner
of the News soon acquired the Ledger, and we were
daily bombarded through their news and editorial
columns by shots which invariably came from the
direction of the camp of our enemy. The most artistic
lies were invented for news items for the purpose of
discrediting our service and keeping us from getting
franchises and power contracts in the City and County,
while our opponent was given a most saintly charac
ter, that became it as well as would a halo on the
head of Satan.
It was of vital importance to the citizens that we
should live in order that the opposition to us should
not override them with its arrogant monopoly. And
so a political issue crystalized out of the situation

236

LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER

which had a run of about two years, in which at the
elections the people offered their ticket familiarly
known as the "Baker ticket" against the corruption or
"SNOQUALMIE BAKER" LEADING THE
CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE.

Tacoma Ledger cartoon during power fight. President C. H. Baker is
represented as riding his hobby horse "Snoqualmie" in the
interest of Seattle as opposed to Tacoma, while Mayor
Campbell and the other officials of Tacoma
join the procession.
"ring ticket" put up by the E. Company. The "ring
ticket" was invariably defeated, which event the citi
zens usually celebrated by hanging in effigy from a

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 237
telegraph pole in the business center the dwarflike
owner of the Tacoma papers whose warfare had been
so bitter upon us. I was cartooned daily by both
papers during the campaign as a tyrant and a hypno
tist who had corrupted the esteemed Mayor Campbell
with whom I was represented as conspiring to sap
Tacoma for the benefit of Seattle. This free car
tooning was worth more to our Company than any
paid advertising could possibly have been.
The opposition to our various franchises took the
form of undue influence, and we believe that con
siderable corrupt money was spent to defeat us.
Tainted money is thought to have found its way from
the opposition even into the ranks of our own men.
The contract for the penstock at the Falls which was
to conduct the water from the river above to the water
wheels below, was in the hands of a superintendent
sent from the East by the contractors, who apparently
had been corrupted by the enemy. It was necessary
to have this penstock completed and in operation at
a given date in order to save our franchise, which
called for the delivery of power at certain specified
dates. The joints of this penstock were padded with
chunks of lead so that when it was completed it would
not have held sand, much less water. This foreman
was removed and another one promptly put in his
place, who practically had to rebuild the work at great
expense to his employers in order to make it water
tight. Stories were circulated locally and in the East that

238 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
our power chamber at the Falls was submerged dur
ing the high water peniods in the river ; that the river
leaked through the roof of the same in great torrents
drowning out both men and machinery ; that the rocks
in the roof were loose and were continually falling
upon the men and machinery below, and that in self
protection the men had to wear firemen's helmets to
save their heads, and to go attired in gum boots and
rubber clothing to keep from being drowned, when in
fact the place is as dry and as safe as a lady's sitting
room. All the stories that an evil and desperate
genius could invent, and all the deviltry which could
be devised was perpetrated by the opposition, who it
was said, engaged men to give all their time to this
particular department of their business. The object
was to utterly destroy our property and our prospects,
and all this had to be defended against by me. I alone
bore the brunt of it, and watched for it, not knowing
where and when the snake would strike next, while
Father at the other end of a 2,000 mile telegraph line
was kept constantly in touch with the situation by me.
The credit of our company was attacked, and my
father's personal credit was attacked, and I was por
trayed before the minds of councilmen and legislators
as a man of the worst character imaginable, as an
ordinary gambler and as a person continually intoxi
cated, as one of great extravagance, and as a visionary
fool without ability bent upon breaking my father. It
is hardly necessary to comment upon these allegations
if this statement is to be read by any person who has

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 239
any knowledge of me whatsoever, and is mindful of
the results obtained. In any event, my father believed
in me to the core, and that to me was sufficient. He
believed in my honesty and honorable instincts. He
believed in my ability. He knew that I could fight if I
had to, and that I was not afraid to do so, if necessary
to defend our property. He often declared that I had
a talent for negotiation, organization and manage
ment, and a look at the companies developed by me
would seem to vindicate his judgment. The substantial
endorsement of me in this work by him, — one of this
country's great business men, is certainly more than
an offset for the invidious wailing of our enemies
who had ulterior motives to actuate them.
Flowever, these were the methods pursued and
carried out to the extreme wherever possible and at
all times. People who later bought bonds of our
Company were filled with these stories in order to
create distrust in their minds. People who wished to
buy bonds and wrote out to Seattle or Tacoma for
information upon the subject nearly always received
replies in which the enterprise was knocked upon one
score or another. Whenever these replies could be
located a prompt correction was always demanded and
received. Many came from unknown sources. At
one time we put out decoys under the plan of having
some of our heavy financial friends in the East write
to our opponents for opinions on the plant. M. & N.
were written to in such a way and replied that they
"understood there was such a company as the Sno-

240 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
qualmie but they knew very little about it." How
ever, prior to this time, they had made an elaborate
thirty-page contract with us for five thousand H.P.
for twenty-five years, obligating themselves to pay
us $90,000 a year, and yet "they knew nothing about
us." We were often stifled with faint praise, which
was worse than open condemnation. This crusade
caused an utter failure of Mason, Lewis & Co.'s first
attempt to place our bonds in the open market. It was
not until by accident that I found Mr. Demming, a
capitalist from Terre Haute, Ind., in a Seattle hotel,
and hired a special train and took him out to the Falls
and convinced him by what he saw that we were no
fake, that we were able to make a market. He took
$100,000 of the bonds, and the balance quickly went
thereafter on their merits in the open market at our
own price and without .any stock sweetening, much
to the dismay of M. & N., A., B., C, and the rest of the
coterie. These bonds sold later at 103. Father wrote
me such letters as these concerning the knocking we
were getting as it came to him:
Jan. 11th, 1901. "Even your friend Mr. Latimer stated
to a party that you had stuck me three or four hundred thou
sand dollars by extravagance in construction. This you must not
speak of to Latimer, as I cannot at present tell you more about
it,  and as he has written a fairly good letter about it, we
can perhaps afford to let it pass. It seems, however, that we
have had a bad reputation generally. The only explanation
I can make to them is that it is the first plant of any kind that
has been constructed west of the Rocky Mts., that was built
as thoroughly as it should be built, and that people who are
familiar with cheap construction call this 'extravagance.' "

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 241
Sept. 29th, 1902. "Harris of Mason, Lewis & Co., says that
the people who find fault with our bonds will not tell him
what it is nor who it is from, only that they have 'unfavorable
reports.' He says the letter Smith wrote to his mother (which
was the only one he saw) was very different from the one he
gave Hardin. The Milwaukee Trust Company was one of
the purchasers, but had bad reports, and sold their bonds, and
advised others to do so. They (M. L. & Co.) have bought
these, and found other purchasers for them. He says a repre
sentative of M. & N., in Terre Haute, who came from Seattle,
tells bond holders there the property is no good. There was
about $100,000 placed in Terre Haute, but the people there
are not disturbed yet. He says N. W. Harris & Co., were
actually bearing our bonds all the time they had them for
sale." The warfare against our enterprise continued in
various shapes and phases with unrelenting vigor to
the time of my father's untimely death. It partook
of all the various colors and forms of deviltry which
the ingenuity of a mind fertile in such expedients could
conceive. We were pitted at all times against the
corrupt money of the opposition together with their
galaxy of resourceful minds.
The greatest and most vital issue which we ever
had, and the one which redounds more to my own
credit than anything else, was the killing of the neigh
boring creek power proposition (alluded to before in
this narrative) proposed by A. and C. for the purpose
of defeating our project. I began an agitation against
this through the Seattle Daily Times, founded upon
such reasonable logic and facts that the City rose
in indignation against them. This project had for

242 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
its purpose not only our destruction, but the corralling
of the city water supply as well. By showing that this
proposed plant meant pollution of Seattle's future
water supply, I manoeuvred to turn the wrath of the
whole city upon these people, which became so over
whelming that they very promptly laid down, and
their scattered assets were later sold out to the City,
and the entire water shed of the neighboring creek
to the summit of the Cascade Mountains was at my
suggestion, condemned for the purpose of the future
Seattle water supply as it is now in operation today.
In this connection I have often been called the
"Father of Seattle's Water Supply System," — for it
really had its birth at my instigation, and in my posi
tion taken against the A. and C. people who were con
spiring to euchre the people out of it, and to ruin us at
the same time.
In the beginning, by the grace of our enemies, our
enterprise was locally dubbed "Charley Baker's folly,"
and continued under this misnomer until the wheels
began to turn and power was actually delivered. It
has since more frequently been called "Charley
Baker's Gold Mine." Even my friends thought we
were up against a hopeless task, and the warmest of
them advocated surrender to the enemy, even at a
loss. Even men in our own company held at times the
same views, and at times the unrelenting opposition
to us was so great that Father, notwithstanding all
the stubbornness and bravery and strength of his
nature, was inclined to yield and deliver the situation

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 243
to our opponents who coveted it, and take what we
could get out of it. Perhaps the greatest task I had
in this whole enterprise was to keep Father from fal
tering at times before our enterprise had progressed
far enough to prove itself, which would have meant
therefore, taking less money than we had in it, because
of the fact that it was at the time still undemonstrated.
The one great mistake and the only serious one
made in the carrying out of our enterprise, and the
one about which is grouped all the vicissitudes and
worries of every sort which we had, was the contract
tying us up with M. & N. for 5,000 H.P. for twenty-
five years. I must be excused from this error although
in this connection I do not wish to blame my father
either. He was anxious that we should have peace
with our opponents, and that our company should be
able to show a fixed income at the beginning of its
operations. I desired the same myself, but believed
it a wiser policy to sell our power to the public direct
instead of compelling it to pay a middleman's profits.
The five thousand H.P. contract purported to mean a
revenue of $90,000 per annum, and it seemed as if
this would have great weight in selling our bonds
when the time came to do so. The terms of this con
tract isolated us practically from the power and light
ing field ; that is to say, we agreed upon our part to do
no lighting nor to serve power in smaller amounts
than 100 H.P. nor to serve power to street railroad
companies at all. In other words, we practically
agreed to deal with no one except M. & N., and they,

244 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
therefore, with the ramifications of their system prac
tically absorbed the entire field. In other words, to
use their own language as. they proclaimed it from the
Atlantic to the Pacific, they "had us bottled up," and
our very relations with them did more to create dis
trust in our company from the bondbuyer's stand
point than anything else. The contract was known as
a "gentleman's agreement," but from the moment
it was signed their conspiracy against us was resumed
in all its worst forms, including withholding large
sums due us for power service. Not to go into details
of the history of our relations with M. & N. under this
contract, suffice it to say that in about a year, both the
Seattle and Tacoma contracts were brought into court
and outlawed as being contrary to public policy
and in restraint of trade and because of their violation
of them, and since our company was emancipated from
the thraldom which was thereby placed upon it, it
immediately began to grow and thrive as an inde
pendent, successful and prosperous concern.
The brunt of everything in the West came upon
me personally. Even Father was not fully aware of
the acuteness of the situation at all times, for I saw
no advantage in having him tormented as well as my
self. I did not wish to overtax his courage, for I knew
that the call to surrender which frequently came from
the enemy would be more apt to result in the white
flag going up in Chicago than in Seattle. I never
dreamed for an instant of lying down, for I saw as
clear as crystal the clear sky ahead if we kept our

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 245
wits and nerve together. The enemy regarded me as
a rock, — hard to either move or shatter, or rather as
a fool perhaps, too obtuse to yield, not knowing when
1 was beaten. It looked as though there was nothing
to which our adversaries would not stoop to do, except
such acts as being difficult to screen would lead its
shining lights to the penitentiary. Later on our trans
mission wires were frequently cut, presumably in
order to discredit our service while I was making
important negotiations for power. The bombard
ment in the East was centered against Father and it
was calculated to discourage him and if possible ruin
him. Probably no one ever faced the blackguarding
of the E. Company and M. & N. with more grim deter
mination and defiance than did he, and the worry that
they gave him at times when he was not in his best
health aroused my indignation to a degree which I
have not forgotten. Father wrote : —
Mar. t5h, 1903. "If we are beaten on these points, as I
am afraid we are, what is there left for us? The outlook is
so disheartening that it breaks me all up ; there appears to be
no end to our troubles whatever we try to do, and I am
thoroughly discouraged."
Perhaps one of the greatest achievements in con
nection with this enterprise was the securing of the
amendments to our Seattle Franchise, by which the
strictures which had been originally grafted therein
by our enemies for the purpose of making the fran
chise fatal were removed. When I started upon this
task, it seemed as though it could hardly be accom
plished (and Father thought so) having as I did have,

246 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
a corrupt council to work with, the majority of which
were thieves. Several in this council who had not
been known to have a dollar, blossomed out into large
real estate owners as soon as the fight against us
was well under way. However, I was able to arouse
public sentiment on the question, and the Manufac
turers' Association of Seattle, of which I was made
vice-president for the purpose, also took a hand in the
fight. Later the fight culminated in the calling of a
grand jury to investigate the corrupt practices in
Seattle. Two-thirds of their time was taken up in
the consideration of our franchise matter, and I my
self went before the grand jury and testified how the
city council in two different years, through their
agent, had come to me for the purpose of soliciting
bribes of $1,000 and $15,000 respectively, promising to
grant me any favor I would ask and also promising
to betray those who had been in the habit of bribing
them. Evidently there were few honest men in that
council, for "honest men stay bought." As a result
of the sitting of the grand jury, the leading council
members practically had the choice of accepting situ
ations in the penitentiary or passing the amendments,
so that naturally the amendments were carried, and
since then we have enjoyed liberal franchises. It was
generally understood at this time that there was a
sliding scale of prices for aldermanic votes, which ran
from $5.00 per head for small favors up to several
thousand dollars per head for railway franchises, etc.
I also testified before the grand jury of our experi-

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 247
ence in another and smaller town where we sought a
franchise, where some of the councilmen actually had
the open arrogance to offer their votes to us for
$1,000 each, stating that they could do $200 better
than that in another direction, but would prefer mak
ing them to us cheaper for the reason that we were
more popular with the public. They excused the
capitalization of their votes upon the theory that coun-
cilmanic votes brought high prices in Seattle, and they
did not see why they should not take advantage of a
good thing when it was coming their way, as well as
their brothers did in Seattle. Had there been an
honest prosecuting attorney on hand in Seattle and
Tacoma, such as a Folk or a Heney, our prisons would
have secured a richer harvest of recruits than St.
Louis gave or than San Francisco expects to give.
In their desperate zeal to destroy our property the
M. & N. interests blindly followed in the wake of Mr.
A., who led them to their Waterloo when in an unlucky
hour he inspired them to undertake as a measure of
spite against us, the development of a water power upon
a small stream flowing from Mt. Rainier which they
heralded to the world as the greatest achievement
which hydro-electric science had yet attempted. The
plan consisted of diverting a small mountain stream
at the foot of a glacier on Mt. Rainier and carrying
it through a tortuous wood flume following the
devious course of a precipitous and uncertain moun
tain canyon, to a point where a small reservoir was
dug out of the ground for temporary storage pur-

248 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
poses, from which the water in turn was supplied to
the water wheels below. Much was said about this
alleged engineering wonder before it was built, but
there has been an oppressive silence on the subject
ever since. Of course the coming of this dangerous
new enemy was flaunted in my father's face, and he,
therefore, asked me to report upon the same. This I
did after careful examination, making the statement
that the project would be most extravagant in con
struction, in operation and maintenance. I predicted
that the flume would slide out in sections, that trees
and rocks would fall upon it and put it out of com
mission, that the water would freeze up in winter and
cease to flow on account of having its source so near
the glaciers, that the glacial grit would cut out the
water wheels and fill up the reservoir, that forest fires
would endanger the structures, and that the plant
would prove a most extravagant and uncertain play
thing. This report and its predictions, reads almost
exactly like the history of the plant as it has since
transpired, in addition to which its construction cost
is almost twice the usual cost per H. P. If this project
had to stand upon its own legs entirely and thus
become deprived of the frequent assistance which the
allied steam plants in Seattle and Tacoma have to give
to it, it would cease doing business entirely and would
probably be dismantled and sold for junk. So much
for this boomerang which was devised for no other
purpose than to bankrupt our Snoqualmie Company.
I am glad to chronicle here that when great floods

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 249
visit the Puget Sound countries, when forest fires rage,
when drouth occurs, when the extreme cold of Winter
freezes up many of the rivers at their source, and
when, because of these things either some or all of the
electric power plants in the Puget Sound country go
out of commission, then always and invariably Sno
qualmie is doing business with colors flying; and in
the true spirit of a public service corporation it lends
its surplus power during such critical periods even to
its adversaries, who being always crippled as soon as
the shadows of these disasters approach are thus
enabled to keep their service going, to some extent at
least. Then came another bright idea likewise out of the
head of Mr. A., and this was to organize a company
on White River for the purpose of destroying or har
assing our White River power project by a well
devised plan of bulldozing. This company bought a
strip of land about three miles long on White River
below the intake of our White River Power Company,
subsequent to our having spent something like $100,-
ooo upon its development. The purpose sought to
be accomplished by this invasion was to place legal
strictures in the way of our diverting the river above
from their premises below, for they proclaimed that
they, too, were going to build a power plant on White
River about one-tenth the size of ours, although using
the same amount of water. We were, therefore, com
pelled to go into court in an action of condemnation
and we are still in court contesting for the rights

250 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
which these pirates have attacked, while in the mean
time the Puget Sound communities are suffering and
waiting anxiously for the power which this great
storehouse of nature will eventually give them
through the agency of our company. Had it not been
for this unfortunate attack upon the public welfare
and upon our plan in furtherance of it, White River
today would be driving all the standard railroads west
of the summit of the Cascade Mountains from Port
land to the British boundary, and the prosperity and
population of the Puget Sound country would have
been considerably increased on account of the impetus
to industrial development which this new power
would have given it.
Of course, the underlying motive for the warfare
upon our property was not entirely for the purpose
of destroying it in the sense of complete obliteration,
but to destroy its usefulness to us so that we would
have no other resource left than to sell out for any
price which might be offered. It was perhaps the most
notable case of blackmail ever put up in the West.
One of the features of the campaign against us was
the injecting of offers of purchase now and then,
which offers began early in our work at a price that
would no more than let us out or even less, and then as
time went on the price began to be more substantial as
the element of profit to us was recognized and consid
ered in the offers. As we began to impress our oppon
ents more and more that we were there to stay and not
to be bluffed or scared off, and that we proposed to

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 251
defend our property to the end, the offers rose in
amount until we could have retired with a most hand
some profit for the work which we had thus far put
in upon it. These offers of course, were not made
directly, but through other people from different
directions, and all purporting to represent interests
entirely unrelated to our opponents. There is no doubt
but what some offers were really independent, but
they were all declined upon the theory that we had
planned out a certain line of work, wide in its scope
and possibilities, and that the proper time to sell out
was not at any way-station, but at the terminal after
we should have reached it. These offers of course,
almost invariably came to me as I was thought to be
the entire owner of the enterprise, because of my being
the active projector of it and I always referred them
to Father, and he invariably coincided with my advice
in rejecting them. In other words, I was a
stumbling block, and upon the narrow reasoning that
I would change my views if it were made to my per
sonal interest to do so, and without regard to Father's
interest in the premises, I was offered at one time
$25,000 in money for no other consideration than giv
ing my consent to selling out; together with a sub
stantial interest in the property with the new owners,
and a contract to manage it as President of the com
pany at $15,000 a year salary. The nature of the
offer however precluded me from considering it, and
I felt moreover that we would do better to wait. This
offer was $2,000,000 for our stock and this would

252 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
have been abqut all profit to us. We were looking
ahead to the time when we could as readily get $3,-
000,000 if we would ever want to sell. This was the
first and only time in my life that a price was bid for
my honor.
The warfare against our company did not cease
by any means with the completion of the plant or the
financing of our operations. They could, of course,
pursue us no further in the thwarting of these accom
plishments, but they did follow us thereafter with the
most industrious persecution in order to prevent us
from getting any business, with the idea of making
our concern an unprofitable one and therefore easier
to buy, or else possibly driving it into bankruptcy
and buying it from a Receiver. The hardest fight
that they put up against us was in the matter of
securing the contract for furnishing power to the city
of Tacoma, which city in turn furnishes all the electric
light consumed by its inhabitants. I was pursued to
my wits end in securing this business, and did not
finally succeed until we had been routed once or twice.
The City Council was at that time generally corrupt,
but there stood up for the people of that city an honest
Mayor, the Honorable Louis D. Campbell, than whom
Tacoma nor any other city has ever possessed any
braver, more scrupulous, conscientious nor more
honest a mayor. I finally succeeded in securing this
business by a little ruse, as a result of which Mr. A.,
our opponent, fell into the trap which I had prepared
for him.

POWER DEVELOPMENTS

253

The bids for the city lighting as advertised for,
called for a deposit of a certified check equal in amount
to five per cent of the total cost of power to be
CHARLES H. BAKER'S
GRAND HYPNOTIC EXHIBITION AT CITY HALL

Tacoma Ledger cartoon, representing President C. H. Baker's supposed
hypnotic power over Mayor Campbell and other city officials
of Tacoma, during the power contract fight. The
mayor occupies the center of the stage.
furnished for the five year term of the contract, based
upon an arbitrary estimate furnished by the Com
missioner of Public Works, and at the rate bid. I

254 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
therefore secured our certified check at a bank in
which one of A.'s lieutenants was a director, knowing
that in this way the information as to the size of our
check, and consequently our bid, would get around
to A.; but this is where A.'s unusual credulity caused
him to fall down, for I had our check made for a sum
indicating a larger bid than the one we actually sub
mitted. The result was that A. bid just under what
our bid would have been as purported by the check,
and just over what our real bid was, so we secured
that business for the next five years, by the narrow
margin of a fraction of a cent per kilowatt hour.
Chagrined at this defeat, A. was then determined to
secure for his company a smaller contract for power
for driving some of the city's pumping machinery.
I put up a very strong talk indicating our desperate
desire to get this business also, and we made our
talk in such a way as to proclaim a very low bid as
likely to come from us, which reached A. through
an apparent breach of confidence on the part of some
of our friends whom I had instructed to breach. In
this way he put in an absurdly low bid which meant
a considerable loss to his company, being about one-
third of the bid which we submitted without any idea
of being successful. A.'s company is still lugging
along the business at that unprofitable figure, while
we are still carrying ours at a good profit, and with
credit to our Company. Mayor Campbell in an
autograph letter to me written during the first
year of our service, said: "You are furnishing

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 255
Tacoma with the best pozver the city has ever had."
There were other good contracts which we secured,
although with much trouble, on account of the oppo
sition setting pole lines to conflict with our own, as
strategetical measures. They also sought to raise a
hue and cry in the city government against our high
voltage, and in that way to secure legislation against
our running lines to connect with certain desirable
customers. This, however, did not work very well as
it was conceded that our high voltage was no more
dangerous than their high voltage, although one was
produced by water and the other by steam.
In looking back over our troubled career, the fact
is notable that we have always been victorious in our
brushes with the enemy and our Snoqualmie Company
still lives, while the thousands of dollars which have
been spent to annihilate us has resulted more to their
undoing than our own. It is a comforting thought
also to reflect that we have not spent one cent in cor
ruption. Can our opponents truthfully say this much
or this little of themselves — allowing even a margin
of $100,000? IV.
Two weeks before Father's death a disastrous fire
at the Snoqualmie Falls works destroyed the entire
transforming plant, and put the plant entirely out of
business for thirty-six hours, and partially so for
three weeks. Our enemy refused to sell us any of their
surplus power during this period, but they circulated
amoner our customers instead and tried to contract our

256 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
business away from us under long term contracts.
Citizens of Tacoma had to burn candles and oil lamps
unless connected to gas mains, but they did this glee
fully rather than desert us in our extremity. This
was doubtless an incendiary fire, and there has been
considerable ground to believe that the fire was
inspired by the enemies who have sought in one way
or another to discredit and destroy our enterprise
from its inception. This incident weighed very
heavily upon my father's mind, and gave him distress
of mind in his last days.
The shining lights in this enterprise have died in
harness. Among them is numbered Col. Lyon, the
able and efficient first Secretary and Treasurer ; Paul
Hoffman, an illustrious foreman of construction who
was electrocuted; Knight, a college trained superin
tendent, who lost both hands by electrical contact in
heroically attempting to save Hoffman; a station
attendant who was killed, and a lineman who was
killed, all of which casualties occurred after the plant
was completed and without any apparent reason there
for, and through the individual carelessness of the
victims. The writer escaped by a second the fate of
Hoffman and Knight in going to their assistance.
Then just before the final completion of our project,
on October 6, 1903, came Father's death in the midst
of a peaceful sleep without any previous illness, and
then a period of over a year of doubt and anxiety,
and then I, the father of the enterprise, its inventor
and the one who inch by inch, in the face of such

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 257
formidable opposition had brought it to the zenith of
its financial and mechanical success, after I had suc
cessfully negotiated with N. W. Harris & Company
for the sale of our bonds for refunding our indebted
ness, was driven from it with no reason ever having
been given, but apparently as a result of the oppor
tunity given by Father's death for the display of
resentment coming from those who were jealous of
my success, and for the manipulation of the company
by speculators which our "financing" had let in upon
us. Father in his lifetime had warned me against the
Harris firm as one not to be trusted, but I thought I
knew better and so paid dearly for my disregard of his
advice and putting myself in their power. Father's
letters contain the following references to them : —
Dec. 14, 1897. "It is my belief and has been all the time,
that it is a tricky hypocritical outfit,  "
Jan. 13, 1898. "I always have the feeling that whatever
they tell me in that office is a lie."
My going from the company as I did was the signal
for a spontaneous expression of affection from every
one in its employ which crystalized in the gift to me of
a superb three-stone diamond ring, accompanied by a
testimonial of esteem engraved on a plate of silver,
containing as well the names of the forty-five donors.
Of course these trials and discouragements drew
Father and myself into closer relation and more
mutual sympathy than would otherwise have been
the case. We exchanged letters almost daily for five
years, and if there wasn't anything to write about

258 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
we would write just to state the fact. He was ever
solicitous of me least my health break down under the
strain, as it did two or three times, and notably so
when I had appendicitis and had to be operated upon.
In a letter of October 10, 1899, he wrote to me: —
"I do not want you to take any risks for the sake of the
work. Let that take care of itself ; your health is the first and
only consideration."
We not only in our letters dwelt upon the progress of
the work and of how to keep the enemy from downing
us, but he gave me all his confidences, on all subjects,
even the most personal and private. He came to me
alone, as he did to no one else in the world. On April
6, 1903, just six months before his death he wrote: —
"There is actually no one else in the world I can talk to
confidentially since Mamma got too ill to comprehend."
The greatest ambition I had in connection with
the conception and upbuilding of this project was as
already stated, to be the means thereby of delivering
my father from the uncertainties of business life upon
the Board of Trade in Chicago. I looked forward to
the time when our work would be finished and when
we could each draw dividends so that we might retire
to a comfortable and happy life, free from daily wor
ries and perplexities, and when I at the same time
would be in a situation where I would be independent
in the matter of income, and where I would preside
over a business which would be profitable and con
genial and which I could expand during my remaining
days as a business compatible with my ability, taste
and experience. Father died six months too soon to

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 259
realize this dream. We were in the midst of putting
our principal and subsidiary companies together and
financing their consolidation when this deplorable
event occurred. The plant had already proved a pro
nounced mechanical success, the earnings had ex
ceeded my promises, and all that remained was to com
plete the refunding, when he would have his money out
with interest, and our stock would be clear. It was a
question of only a couple of months when this would be
done and we would have income securities worth two
million dollars to divide equally between us as the net
profit from the enterprise. The refunding would have
been accomplished nearly a year previous and our ex
pectations then realized except that the bedevilling of
us on White River by our opponents compelled a radi
cal change in our financial plans and the institution of
legal proceedings against them, which consumed much
time. However I was glad to realize that Father saw
that we had achieved success, and if he could only have
stayed to enjoy it, I would willingly give him my place
here to do so.
Then came the aftermath. Then happened things
only made possible by his death, and for this reason
they must be added to his story. Then again came the
opportunity to our enemies to whom the gates were
opened to come at me alone upon whom my father's
mantle had fallen, and then followed a record of per
fidy, and misconduct which would more than fill this
book if all were to be told. It would be told how our
ancient enemy C. showed his head again almost before

260 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
my father's grave was covered, how he came into the
councils of the estate and of the Company as
mischief maker, and in collusion with A. and
the administrators tried again to surrender our
Company to the opposition. It would be told how
I negotiated a contract with N. W. Harris & Com
pany to finance the Company, although Father
in his lifetime had warned me against them as unre
liable, but I thought differently until I got wiser by
later experience; how they sent two engineer experts
and two accounting experts to investigate the prop
erty; how they all reported of it in highest terms;
how we then depended upon Harris & Company to
fulfill their contract and in that faith went on with
our construction operations ; how in the eleventh hour
they repudiated their contract for no reason given;
how as a part of this contract Mr. Latimer, of Seattle,
Harris' correspondent (he only would do for this pur
pose) had secured an option to buy a third of the
Company for the low price of $350,000 for the purpose
of syndicating it locally and how he in concert with
Harris threw down his end of the business ; how panic
then reigned in our affairs until we had sweat suf
ficiently, and then Latimer re-agreed upon the syndi
cate matter at $265,000 or a saving to him of $85,000;
how to this syndicate all persons interested in the Com
pany were invited to subscribe, myself included, which
I did to the extent of $25,000 and as the first one to
do so; how when the list was full, I was told that
there was no stock left for me as Harris would not

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 261
consent to my taking any as he did not want me in
the Company, although the syndicate idea was my own
and one half the syndicate subscription I secured my
self, and nearly all who went in did so because of my
connection with the Company ; how among other sub
scribers I secured the Westinghouse Company for
$50,000, which company had always been our staunch
friend, and how after they had paid their subscription
to Latimer, he allotted to them $66,600 of preferred
stock and $66,800 of common stock, while to Harris
who had also subscribed $50,000 he allotted $78,500
of preferred stock and $141,300 of common stock, —
although both were invited in on the same "ground
floor," — thus doing the Westinghouse Company out
of $11,900 preferred and $74,500 common; how
Harris & Company finally made a loan for one year
to the estate of $475,000 by arrangement with the
Administrators, as a substitute for the bond contract
which they had repudiated, with the entire estate as
collateral to it, and a present or bonus of one-seventh
of the Company, or $525,000 of the stock as a "com
mission" was exacted, although other bankers in New
York and elsewhere were ready and willing to do the
business without any presents, and previous issues
of our bonds had been sold without sweetening and at
a higher price, and at a time before the Company had
developed any earning power ; how shortly before the
year expired, Harris & Company finally bought the
bonds at the original price agreed upon, after com
pelling the estate to cancel and lose to it $165,000

262 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
securities in the Company ; how as a part of the deal I
was euchred out of the use of my securities, and of
all my honors and positions in the Company, which
were President, Manager, Director, and Chief Engi
neer, — and that without my knowledge until a sub
ordinate in Seattle unmasked the administrators,
Harris & Latimer and told me of it; how as
a sugar coated pill I was at first asked to give up
the Presidency only, in favor of Latimer who
desired the distinction and salary, and to retain
my other responsibilities and salary, and to be
the Vice-President because they said I was the only
one who knew about the business and therefore should
be kept at the helm ; how this pill was next changed for
one cutting out the Vice-Presidency, and then for
other pills denying me all things else successively
including salary, thus casting me out empty handed
to hunt for a new prospect, while others were enabled
to enjoy the fruits of my success and the company
became a training school for beginners; how Harris
& Company compelled a five year pool of the estate
stock including mine in favor of themselves and Lati
mer as a rider to the revised bond deal; how under
this pool the Company was more numerously officered
than before, with favored friends and relatives at
fat salaries, who by their arrogance and incompe
tency immediately drove many of the Company's
largest customers away from it, and who by their
inability to comprehend the true scope of the enter
prise as I had conceived it, have permitted the oppo-

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 263
sition to reach out in every direction and strengthen
their position while they have been asleep and per
mitted the company to lose ground and become fenced
in and thus depreciated in value ; how under this pool
the Company was compelled to buy an ice factory and
a diminutive steam heat and light plant for $380,000
upon which Latimer's bank had a mortgage of about
$100,000 which but for this bit of "frenzied finance,"
would have remained much longer overdue and un
paid than it was ; how as a feature of this ice factory
job when it had been fixed up to load it on the Com
pany, Latimer and some of his Directors made up a
little pool among themselves and got an option on the
property, "to save it from being secured by the oppo
sition" which had previously turned it down at less
than half the price, and then turned it into the Com
pany at a profit of many thousand dollars to them
selves, and voted my stock for this nefarious purpose ;
how when I raised my voice and filed a written protest
against this swindle, Harris promptly threatened to
repudiate his second bond contract and confiscate the
whole estate under the note they held unless I con
sented; how I have since brought these gentlemen
into court to compell an accounting to the stockholders,
which suit is still pending and has already prompted
one of the offenders to disgorge his share of the
plunder without waiting for the trial ; how also as an
afterthought the estate was compelled to loan the
Company $100,000 for working capital or take the
consequences of refusing my being closed out; how

264 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
over $42,000 fees were charged against the estate
during the first year by C. and numerous other law
yers and friends constituting the extensive "Legal
Cabinet" of the administrators when $3,000 would
have been sufficient, as their services were simple
and involved no litigation and were generally un
necessary and other fees are still piling up uncurbed
with no one to oppose them except myself; how the
administrators are endeavoring to get something like
$35,000 fees for "services" which the attorneys drew
pay for, thus ranking the administrators with leading
bank and railroad presidents, although their principal
effort was trying to manage a business which so far
I have received only $400 for creating and establish
ing ; how the new management, inheriting the profitable
business and ten thousand horse power increased plant
capacity which I had established, has never until last
winter paid a dividend, — not because an ample sur
plus was not earned, but apparently because Latimer
& Harris were "long" on common stock which would
thus be benefited at the expense of the preferred, and
for the purpose of shaking out the outside stockholders
and buying in the shares which they have been
patiently holding under the promise of dividends
which always proved to be wil o'-the-wisps, and in
the knowledge that the dividends were being much
more than earned; and how, after being banished
from my kingdom and humiliated to the last degree,
it was proclaimed by those who claimed my property
that "I did not do it, that it was Father's idea and

POWER DEVELOPMENTS 265
that he hired me to carry it out, that he hired me
because I could be had cheap, and in fact would work
for nothing," that the "fame" I had achieved by my
success was ample return for me, that my personal
endorsement of the company's notes for thousands of
dollars meant nothing, that the $15,000 I had invested
in the project gave me no interest in it, as that was
one of the attributes of a free job, and that the only
interest I could expect in this property which I had
created and which had paid back all the money Father
had in it, would be my share as one of the numerous
heirs of my father, for no one as yet has contended
that I am not his son and heir, although serious con
sideration was given to the idea of challenging my
right to even inherit, because of the alleged miscon
duct on my part in having created this property and
then claiming my half of it, instead of giving it grace
fully to others who had contributed nothing to it,
knew nothing about it, and in some cases had not even
seen it. These things happened because I claimed
what was mine already.
But there is a limit and an end to all things and
Justice is not for all time blind. Our work is done,
at least as far as we can do it together. It was well
done. It has not been anywhere excelled. It speaks
for itself in mockery of our def amers, while they have
been silenced and our enemies have been routed. His
tory cannot be unmade by any manner of perversion
or crushing to earth of truth, although the dead can
not come back to proclaim the truth as the avenger of

266 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
the wrong. Snoqualmie still stands an accomplished
fact, and perhaps in more or less changed form as
future science may suggest, it will still stand for cen
turies; and for centuries to come it will still have the
same duty to perform, and perform it equally faith
fully. The same rock chamber will be there —
although larger, and will contain generation after
generation of new water wheels and generators, each
better and more extensive than their predecessors,
with the same never ceasing din of industry still con
verting the waste energy of Nature to the uses of
mankind ; and White River likewise, in the companion
ship of Snoqualmie, will serve the same ends equally
well for probably all time to come. This is a project
that would before this have been annihilated by the
manipulation and jobbing it has run the gauntlet of
since my father and I went out of it, had it not been
for its unusual merit and the ingredient honesty which
we incorporated in it. It is a situation from which
history will not divorce us. Even as I close this
chapter a letter has come from a gentleman in Seattle
who voices that community as he writes :
"I am pleased to know that your prospects in your new
enterprises are good, but I would much rather see you make
your fortune out of Snoqualmie and White River. Time has
proven this much, that whenever Snoqualmie Falls is men
tioned, your name is found linked with it and mentioned in
the same breath. Business men here who honestly differed
with you now acknowledge that you paved the way towards
furnishing the power that has built up the factories of this
and other nearby cities."

The Art Institute of Chicago.

T

Chapter IX
ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO
1878-1903
HE different sides of Father's nature found
natural expression in the different things with
which he chose to be identified. The Board of
Trade reflected his commercial instinct. The Civic
Federation and the World's Fair reflected his courage,
his great business and executive ability, and his fight
ing qualities. The Art Institute reflected a different
temperament, of gentler and loftier attributes with
which he was endowed.
This Art Institute stands today among the three
or four great museums of the country. It is remark
able that it had its first beginning as early as 1866 and
earlier than any other similar institution anywhere
else in the country except New York and Philadelphia.
The nucleus of the present organization was known
as the Chicago Academy of Design, which was merely
an association of artists which continued in more or
less active form until 1882. It did not amount to
much, but such as it was it was the only art centre
of importance in the city.
In 1878 it was attempted to improve the condition
of the organization by introducing a board of trus
tees composed of business men, but this met with many

268 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
difficulties and resulted in the formation of a new
organization which was called The Chicago Academy
of Fine Arts. My father's connection with this school
of art began May, 1878. It then had rooms in Pike's
Building at the southwest corner of State and Monroe
Streets. The school roll at the time had less than
twenty pupils, and as income was almost entirely lack
ing, the rent had to be paid by certain gentlemen who
had guaranteed it, and who rather unwillingly had
to make good their guarantees. When it was decided
to introduce a board of trustees of business men, my
father was chosen one of the board, which position he
accepted, and thereafter became one of the most
active and useful members. Among the trustees in
addition to himself were D. W. Irwin, N. K. Fair-
bank, J. H. Dole, Murray Nelson, and Charles L.
Hutchinson, and it is a notable fact that the Board of
Trade was the chief strength of this society at that
time, with hardly any representation among profes
sional men.
The newly organized Academy selected Mr. Dole
for President and my father for Vice-President.
They personally contributed money to put the rooms
in order, and the school took on renewed life,
and gave exhibitions occasionally during the year.
The total number of pupils for the year was about
300. Then it was found that the Academy was encum
bered by debts that were unknown to the trustees,
and this resulted in unfriendly feeling between them
and the artists. As a result of this my father and

ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO 269
others of the trustees who were acting solely for the
public good and out of no particular liking for the old
Academy of Design, grew weary of the contentions
and resigned in a body in the spring of 1879. Father's
argument was that "there was no need of paying for
dead horses." Then through him and Mr. Murray
Nelson began the movement for the new institution.
The property of the old Academy of Design was taken
by its creditors, but was later on redeemed by the
Art Institute which was organized later. My father
and a few of his associates issued a call for a meeting
at the Palmer House for the purpose of organizing
the new Art Institute. As a result of this and the
many meetings which followed in which he was most
active, the Art Institute of Chicago was organized and
a charter procured therefor on March 24, 1879 and
and in this organization Father became one of the
original trustees and so continued until his death.
During the whole period of more than twenty-five
years he was a member of the executive committee and
took an active part in every important movement of
the institution. Although a very active worker for
this organization, of which he early became very fond,
he nevertheless did not allow his name to appear to
any extent. Mr. George Armour was the first Presi
dent of the Art Institute and Mr. L. Z. Leiter the
second. Great progress, however was not effected
until the election of Mr. Hutchinson to the Presi
dency in 1882, although the school was maintained
creditably and some exhibitions were held. During

270 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
these years my father contributed a great deal of
money and time to the institution, and was a faithful
friend to it at all times when it had need of friends.
He was consistent and firm in his attitude at the
meetings, as he was at the meetings of the other
organizations to which he belonged, and as usual he
continually rebuked those who came late and caused
him to lose time in consequence. For many years he
was the auditor of the Art Institute.
From the early beginning in rented quarters, the
Institute in 1885 acquired and moved to the corner
of Michigan Avenue and Van Buren Street and built
thereon a handsome brownstone building, which it
occupied for a number of years, and afterwards sold
it to the Chicago Club at a considerable profit for
$425,000. It soon outgrew these quarters, however,
which at first were thought to be more than ample,
as the result of which an arrangement was effected
with the World's Columbian Exposition to contribute
$200,000 towards the erection of a palatial building
upon the lake front at the foot of Adams Street, the
use of which the exposition had during the Fair. To
this contribution was added the proceeds from the
sale of its former quarters, which completed the pay
ment for the new building that the Institute is now
occupying. This building has been added to from
time to time through different endowments, and at
the same time the institution has grown into having
national fame and importance, and is probably the
largest fine art school in the United States. As a

ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO 271
result of its progressiveness and establishing itself
in such well designed and permanent quarters, it has
become the recipient of many valuable bequests of
pictures, statuary and other works, all representing
the fine arts.
The annual report of the Institute for 1904 con
tains this paragraph in reference to my father: —
"The Art Institute has been fortunate in having closely
connected with its management, a man who in many respects
represented the best type of Chicago citizenship, public spirited
without ostentation, of fearless integrity, sagacious in business,
and simple and unaffected in private intercourse."
As a testimonial to my father's love of art and his
devotion to this institution, we, his children, have
given to the Art Institute one of Van Dyck's best
paintings entitled "Portrait of Helena, wife of Hen-
drick Du Bois," a painting that is about 300 years
old. It was little enough to do for him, for undoubt
edly had he lived, he would have done manyfold more
for the Institute in a material way than our slight tri
bute amounted to. I am proud of the fact that my
father constituted one of the small group of men who
did the real work of forming and carrying on the
great Art Institute.

Glimpses of My Father in the Summer Time at Exmoor,
highland park, ills.

Chapter X.
HOME LIFE AND CHARACTER.
"Formed on the good old plan,
A true and brave and downright honest man;
He blew no trumpet in the market place,
Nor in the church with hypocritical face
Supplied with cant the lack of Christian grace ;
Loathing pretence, he did with cheerful will
What others talked of, while their hands were still."
— Whittier.
A STRANGER to my father who might read the
preceding narrative would be able to write this
chapter and give a correct analysis of his
character, but few strangers ever saw him as we
knew him in his home. Never has fiction nor poetry
conjured up and painted a sublimer picture than
Father's tender love and solicitude for his invalid
wife, — my step-mother, as it was enacted in his daily
.life at home during his last years. From a most beau
tiful and gifted woman, such as she was when he
took her for his wife, she became transformed through
a period of years by the curse of her affliction, until
she was but a living body from which the mind, had
fled, and which had moulded itself into but a mockery
of what her former self had been. She was dead to
herself and to most of the world, but not so to him, —
she was his sweetheart still. The last ten years of her

274 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
life found her in this dreadful plight. He was dur
ing this period more gallant, thoughtful, and atten
tive to her than the young lover of twenty-one would
be to his fiance. From downtown he would telephone
the house once or twice each day to "see how mamma
is." He gave up the pleasures that men usually
have in order to be at her side. He never took a
needed outing nor a hunting trip such as he used to
be so fond of, because it meant a night or more away
from her. -If the extreme necessities of business com
pelled him to be away, as happened only infrequently,
he telegraphed from his heart to her, morning, noon
and night, and if the replies edited by his daughter
did not come exactly at the hour and minute he had
calculated for their reception, he would begin to stew
and fret and chafe until he became quite beside him
self with misgivings and worry. And then when the
telegram would finally come, he would read it and
re-read it and be himself again, unless he would won
der if between the lines it forbode more than its face
implied, and then he would stew and fret again. He
believed himself to be entirely indispensable to her, for
he thought no one understood her as he did, and no
one could do for her as he could, notwithstanding that
she had the best of care and attention night and day
from my sister Bertha and from regularly retained
trained nurses. He worried his strength and nerves
away without its helping her. He wrote me three
years before he died, — "Mamma is growing weaker
day by day, and I hardly think we will have her with

HOME LIFE AND CHARACTER 275
us Christmas." And yet she lived six years after
that, and three years after he was gone, during which
time she did not know that he was dead nor did she
miss him. Was there anything more beautifully piti
ful? In the almost daily letters I had from Father
during the last several years of his life he never failed
to close without a thoughtful reference to her, to the
effect that "Mamma is some better today," "Mamma
seems more cheerful than yesterday," or "Mamma had
a sinking spell this morning which has made me very
blue all day."
Although with him the sun rose and set upon the
shrine where he worshipped, — his wife, yet he was
a father too, and this fact he did not overlook nor did
we fail to appreciate it. But he was nevertheless a
puzzle to his children. He was demonstrative towards
his wife in his affection for her, but not so towards
them, not even to his daughter. But we could read the
very soul of him and see that love was there in full
measure. He never told it by word of mouth, never
in his life, but he showed it in look, in actions, and
particularly in what he said to other people. It was
a noticeable peculiarity of his that he seldom com
mended anyone either in or out of the family to their
face, but to others he would speak of them in proud
terms of unstinted praise and affection. This I could
never understand, for a well deserved compliment
from him now and then would have added an inch
to the growth of any of us. As children we seldom
confided our troubles and secrets to him and he

276 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
did not seem to care for our confidences, but this all
changed when we grew up and grew older and found
in him our best friend and chum. There was in him
a kind of selfishness, or better perhaps should it be
called thoughtlessness. I do not think for instance
that it ever occurred to him that his young daughter
did not have the same freedom and enjoyment that
other girls did, and that she was giving up all this for
his sick wife, — which was for him. Towards the end
however, he softened up and fully realized what his
daughter had been to him, and then he began to show
his appreciation of it. As he grew older he became
a most charming companion for anyone, man, woman
or child. He liked to talk, small talk and big talk,
reminisce and argue in a most agreeable fashion, and
tell stories. And yet it can be remembered in his
early prime how quick tempered he was, how like a
tempest he was if things went wrong or displeased him,
and how unforgiving he was with stupidity. He could
not understand why anyone could be born stupid- or
grow that way afterwards, and to him it was quite
unpardonable. But in that period of his life he was
engaged in a strenuous business of great excitement
and uncertainties, so it is not to be wondered at if his
nerves got on edge and his disposition spoiled a little,
making him at times disagreeable and hard to get
along with. It seemed as if his whole mind and ner
vous system were reflected in his face, in which happi
ness, worry, unrest, contempt, discouragement or
determination were all in turn depicted according to

HOME LIFE AND CHARACTER 277
his mood. His face was an accurate thermometer
of the wheat market, and his family grew to under
stand him so well that when he came home at night,
they could almost tell the price of wheat within half
a cent by a glance at his face.
His life spelled out honor and truth. He was so
inherently honest and true by the grace of God that he
could not even think dishonestly, much less be so.
Upon this trait my pen most surely cannot over reach
itself for he was the exemplar of these virtues. There
was not the slightest taint of anything to the con
trary in his nature from his boyhood to his grave.
I remember when I was in College and was manager
of the Alpha Delta Phi chapter house there where
about twenty of the boys lived together. I was cus
todian of the funds. It happened that our remittance
from home one month had not arrived with the cus
tomary promptness, so that our board and tuition were
overdue. I therefore wrote Father a jacking up letter
telling him that because of his being so slow I had bor
rowed from the chapter funds to pay our bills, and so
he had better hurry and remit so that I could pay
back. And he did hurry, and with the remittance
came such a letter ! It was not only like a ton of
bricks, but a fatherly letter as well, telling how such
innocent borrowing of trust funds was almost always
the underlying cause of great defalcations and crimes
committed without original criminal intent. I saw it
as I had not seen before, and I saw it so well that
thereafter I would not let my postage stamps or my

278 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
personal pennies get physically mixed with those of
the chapter house.
And again, I recall when we were in the midst of
our franchise fights in Seattle, when we were in the
position of having spent already over $100,000 as a
display of our good faith in building the works, — how
at this point we were threatened with the prospect of
not being able to get any franchises at all, — which
would have made valueless our investment, — how then
the road to glory was pointed out to me and would
be open to me if I would but bribe certain of the coun
cilmen as related in a previous chapter, and how when
asked for my reply to the proposal to that end I told
their agent to say for me, — "Tell the gentlemen to go
to hell." This occurrence I reported to Father and
asked his views upon it. He answered, "You did
right; I would rather see you demolish the plant and
throw it into the river and count it entirely lost to us
than to do a thing so dishonorable." And then he
added a story of his own experience with an invest
ment in St. Louis street car stock. He told how in
accordance with his usual care he scrutinized the
reports of the street railway company there, how he
saw where large sums had been paid out for "attor
neys' fees" when there had been no litigation nor legal
services rendered, how contemporaneously with these
unprecedently large and mysterious disbursements
the Company had reecived extraordinary municipal
favors, how they could give him no satisfactory expla
nation in answer to his demand, and how in his arith-

HOME LIFE AND CHARACTER 279
metic two and two made four, and it smelled bad
to him. So he then gave notice to his associates that
he believed there was fraud somewhere, that he did
not feel at home in their company in consequence, and
that he would sell out and get out. And this he did,
and was thus the first to scent the great scandal which
later on sent a number of "respectable" citizens of St.
Louis to the penitentiary at the time when Mr. Folk
was prosecuting Attorney.
In the ups and downs of business, my father was a
wealthy man in fluctuating degrees. He had no ambi
tion to be a modern Croesus or the product of latter
day "frenzied finance," but only to have enough to
insure the comforts and pleasures of life compatible
with his tastes and position, and to enable him to do
something for those who were to follow him, and also
for his fellow men, to whom he felt that everyone owed
an individual duty measured according to his
ability. He often said to me when we would
discuss the fabulous tainted fortunes of the pres
ent day, "I would rather keep a good name to leave to
you children than to pile up a big fortune by ques
tionable methods." He felt that when a man had more
than enough it was bad for him and injurious to
society, and he felt that the real sturdy manhood of
each generation was best developed by making its
own way rather than by being lifted and coddled along
by heritages from the one preceding.
Father was not cut out for a politician. He could
not trim himself to suit the varying winds. He could

280 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
not go astraddle of any issue; he was either on one
side or the other, and with all the positiveness of clear
conviction and sustaining courage. His percep
tive faculties were clear and sound, and with an
honest nature behind him his views were radical and
advanced. He was tenacious and combative in argu
ment. He believed in fair play and the rule of the
majority, accepting defeat gracefully when it came to
him. He was reasonable and open to conviction, but
unless convinced, the whole world might hold to one
opinion, and it would not alter his, although willing
to accept the law "if all the world is wrong, then all
the world is right." He used to be impolitic and un-
suave in a way that worked to his disadvantage. He
was curt to reporters and frequently turned them away
abusively so that he was often depicted in the public
press not as fairly as he should have been, and he was
not "written up" in the frequent and complimentary
style that those who courted reporters were wont to
be fav'ored. If he despised a man or his methods he
would publicly snub him without hesitation. I have
seen him politely greeted by one of our adversaries
in the power fight, upon whom he turned his back so
completely and abruptly as though he never existed.
The bluntness which often characterizes an honest
man is well illustrated in his case by an incident occur
ring at the official celebration of the track-raising of
the Illinois Central Railroad. A party of prominent
citizens, including the Mayor, members of the city
council, certain business men and world's fair direc-

HOME LIFE AND CHARACTER 281
tors went out on the railroad to the scene of the for
malities. As President of the World's Fair, Father
was called upon for a speech, in the course of which
he referred to the final success of the track-raising
movement of which he had been such a constant advo
cate, and remarked in this connection that "the
improvement would have been brought about years
before had it not been for the corruption in the city
council." At the close of the exercises the Mayor
spoke to him and protested against his allusions, which
he stated had hurt the feelings of the honorable mem
bers of the city council; to which Father made the
curt reply, "No one was hurt who was not hit."
If he did not like a man or disapproved of his
methods he had no use for him, and that man could
read it in his face and manner as well as hear it from
his lips. Then too he lacked at times discretion in
dealing with men in business matters. As illustrating
this, it may be mentioned how as bank director he dis
covered one day that the collateral of a certain large
borrower in apparently good standing was spurious ;
how he insisted that the note be at once called although
only within about ten days of maturity ; how the Presi
dent of the bank stood off his persistency until the
note was due, not sleeping nights the while, and then
at maturity politely declined to renew for the reason
that other customers needed and were entitled to the
accommodation, and suggesting that the loan be made
elsewhere; and how the debtor actually did borrow
from another bank in order to pay the first one, — but

282 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
the other bank was never paid its money again. Then
too there was a measure of carelessness about Father
and the taking of long chances which displayed a lack
of conservatism and a disregard for the uncontrollable
future. No better evidence of this can be found than
the fact that he left no will. Why this precaution was
overlooked and one-third of the inheritance to his chil
dren placed in jeopardy of filtering out to a horde of
unknown and impecunious relatives of our step
mother, — his heir, can only be conjectured, but
it may perhaps be charged to the natural optimism
which characterized his life, for he was well and vig
orous and had no thought of dying, and probably in
tended to distribute his estate during his lifetime. He
was indeed an optimist and believed in the world
growing better, with the millenium ahead and rapidly
getting nearer all the time. It is that quality in a
life which helps to move the world onward, acting
as an antidote to the ultra cautious and narrow man
who will ever hold it back. His optimism attached
even to wheat on which he was always a "bull," for he
believed that high prices meant more money to the
farmers and therefore more prosperity for the whole
country, and so he believed in high prices.
He was a scholar both by nature and by his own
making. Although all his schooling could be boiled
down into one solid year, yet he learned afterwards
from books and by observation as few men do. Being
deep himself, he read deep books and no one could
be with him an hour and not learn something. He

HOME LIFE AND CHARACTER 283
understood finance, social and political science, and
international trade, to a degree which would rank him
among the Statesmen of our time, and he frequently
spoke and wrote upon these subjects. He understood
the French language, and learned it as late as when
I was a grown boy, and I remember his learning his
lessons at home at night even as I did mine, or tried
to do. He was familiar with mechanics and the
natural sciences.
My father had a sacred regard for his credit, which
he held more dearly than his life, and he maintained
it always at the highest level. No man in Chicago
had a higher personal credit than he. Pie believed
more in credit founded upon personal character than
upon accumulation. As a bank director he would rather
loan $50,000 to a man not worth $25,000 but whose
character was high class, than to loan $25,000 to a
man worth $50,000 whose integrity was questionable,
for he felt that the element of honor vouchsafed
greater security to the paper of the one, than did the
collateral which was wholly material, to that of the
other. He was one of the really great business men
that Chicago has produced, and his influence and
reputation as such, founded upon rigid honesty, ability
and good judgment, has extended to all the great
grain growing districts of the West, and the com
mercial marts of this country and of England.
My father was a man of most tremendous energy,
backed by a nerve and will of iron against which noth
ing could prevail. Then coupled with this was a great

284 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
mentality and an ambition which never grew less while
he lived, together with a cool head, and self possession,
poise and level headedness. No wonder that such a
combination of endowments made him the largest
grain merchant in the world. No wonder that out of
these came the man who was destined to destroy the
pernicious bucket-shops, to be the World's Fair Presi
dent, and to fight the vicious element of Chicago at
the head of the Civic Federation in that City. Great
executive capacity and courage and shrewdness was
called for to do these things, and he had them. He
loomed up in any situation where he happened to be
thrown and generally dominated it. He was high-
strung and nervous. The town clock could be cor
rectly set by observance of his habits. At any appoint
ment or board meeting he would arrive on the hour,
minute and second, like Phineas Fogg, and it is said
that bank directors would set their watches by his
coming. He often said of himself that "he lost more
time by being prompt than in any other way," for he
very often had to lose time while waiting for the others
to come. This father of mine would have reached the top
in any path in life, where chance might have thrown
him in the beginning. I have often thought that with
such splendid material at her disposal, Fate should
have pointed out to him a different trail than that
which led to the Board of Trade. How incomparably
grand would he have been as a lawyer with all his
indomitable will and fighting qualities, his gift of

HOME LIFE AND CHARACTER 285
language and debate, his high sense of justice and his
power of mind ! I know he would have made a great
engineer, for while associated with me, I saw it in
his quick comprehension of natural laws and of their
application to engineering problems. His power of
imagination was full, complete and vivid, and he had
only to glance at a plan on paper to have it at once
loom up and take form in his mind, and he could then
discuss the features of the thing to be accomplished
as well as though it stood before him in its final and
completed physical shape. He could have managed
a great railroad system, and done it with a master
hand. He would have known where to build in order to
entice the traffic. His instinct would have pointed out
to him where the country was to grow and where
the trade and commerce conditions were such as to
induce cities and towns to rise. In this way, he was
a veritable prophet, as demonstrated by what he fore
told of Seattle when I first went there, many years
before she came to her present prestige and import
ance. And then he would have known how to serve
these towns best, and how to be just and fair in dealing
with his patrons in them. And he would never have
juggled the property under his direction for his pri
vate interest or that of his particular friends, nor
would he have kept his stockholders in ignorance of
their road's performances and possibilities, nor would
he have turned official information to his private
account, nor made money out of any property sold
to any railroad in his charge nor fleeced his stock-

286 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
holders by any other modern method. No, not he!
That would to him have been dishonorable and un
thinkable. He would have made a soldier, and in a crisis a
Napoleon. He was brave, — he had no fear of any
thing. Military tactics and strategy were to his lik
ing, which facts his early life demonstrated in his
study of Napoleon. He would rather fight than eat.
He was a natural leader and commander, and as I
know to my boyhood sorrow, a rigid disciplinarian.
He possessed intense patriotism. No compromise
would he have given nor asked, and surrender he
would not have known the meaning of. And then
withal, he was engineer enough to comprehend the
relation between topographical features, the mathe
matics of projectiles and distances, and the construc
tions incidental to warfare. He believed in obedience
to duly constituted authority and to the law, and he
was a stickler upon rules and regulations as accepted
and applied to business, household matters or to play.
In our home there never rang a bell to call the family
to their meals, but when the crimes clock began to
toll the hour prescribed for each meal, the family
would then begin to move from all corners of the house
and would take their seats at the table just as the last
note struck. He was a slave to golf and did it accord
ing to the "rules." He gave me my first lesson at the
Highland Park links, by first dissertating at length
upon the science of the game, and the proper form of
playing it. Then he proceeded to demonstrate how

HOME LIFE AND CHARACTER 287
it was done as an artist would do it, by holding the
club just so, standing just here or there with feet
mathematically placed just so, with eyes on the ball,
and with club gracefully poised high in the air, then
sweeping it downward and towards the ball in a true
cycloidal curve with the aim and precision of a genius,
and — tearing up a clod of turf instead of striking the
ball. "Darn it," he said, "it don't do me any good to
play golf, — I get so mad." And then with a clear
explanation of how to do it "in form" in my mind, and
an actual and partial demonstration of its execution,
I took my place at the first tee of my life, quickly
swung the club in the true wildwest fashion of Puget
Sound, while Father hastened to interrupt by calling to
me to correct my lack of style and disobedience to the
rules : — but the ball had taken flight and sailed like an
arrow shot from a bow, almost to the border of tlie
distant green. "Well," he said "you did it all right,
but you didn't do it right." And I have never again
done that trick since.
An admirer of his in telling me of what he could
do, said, "He could do anything that any man could
do," and that "he would have made an abler and bet
ter President of the United States than many who
have held that high office," — and those who know his
true measure will I think endorse that statement. I
had not thought of him as of presidential size, but I
do now. But he had no political ambition. Some there
are who say he did have, but that it was set aside to
meet the requirements of his invalid wife. He was,

288 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
however, an impossible man to fit into modern political
machinery and methods. The Board of Trade element
recognized his fitness for high public service, and
strongly urged him for Secretary of the Treasury at
one time, but he discouraged it. At another time also,
a movement was growing to make him Mayor of
Chicago in order to stop the public thieving and cor
ruption, and this he also vetoed. What a houseclean-
ing there would have been, had he been turned loose
upon such a situation ! It is just as well for him that
it was not done for he probably would have been shot.
He brought with him to each new field of duty the
same ability, fidelity, honesty, and hard work that
always characterized him in any other field of duty
which he may have previously taken upon him
self. For work he had an unlimited capacity. It was
work, work, strenuous work, which laid the founda
tion of his success in life. It was work with him, not
solely to obtain a given objective, but to attain that
objective in a manner above reproach and such as his
conscience would approve of. To him, success in life
meant nothing, unless the means of that end had been
at all times honorable, honest and above reproach.
He was the living expression of persistency. There
was no let up in his mind in anything that he started
out to do. He showed this well in our fight with the
E. Company and M. & N. when they sought to destroy
us in the West. It was because of this element of his
character largely that he was installed in the Presi
dency of the World's Fair. It was because of this

HOME LIFE AND CHARACTER 289
attribute and his constant belief in high prices of farm
products as being helpful to the farmer and as the basis
of national prosperity that he was always an invari
able bull on wheat. He never could see the opposite
side of the situation and never took that stand. He
characterized the bear operator as a "Pirate of com
merce." Then there was the gentle side to Father's charac
ter, and the true nobility that often goes with the
rugged and determined front which strong men like
him present to the world. He loved tenderly those
who were near and dear to him, and he radiated with
it in his last years a sweetness of temperament more
often found in a woman. He was deeply religious,
and God fearing and he grew more so as he
came into the evening of his life. He believed
in acting out his religion and Christian spirit
in his everyday business and home life, for it
would have been mockery and sham and a lie
as he viewed things to be a regular churchman
wearing the cloak of one who professes Christian
principles under which to show himself on Sundays,
and to forget the golden rule and ten commandments
during the rest of the time. So he went to Church, not
as a confirmed member of any, although a contri
buting supporter, but to hear good music and a
scholarly sermon, which to him was simply a lecture
on a biblical topic by a recognized authority upon the
subject. He was the opposite of being a hypocrite in
all things. He was good and pure in living, thought

290 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
and speech. He never indulged in profane language,
not even when his temper got well heated, — and even
when he said "darn," he always looked as though he
wished he hadn't said it, or as if he thought he might
as well have said the real thing.
He was impulsive — romantic, and out of business
hours could be playful as a boy when the environments
warranted it. He loved flowers and birds and he
breathed inspiration from the mountains and trees,
and all the things of beauty and wonder that Nature
has afforded us. He was a handsome man and
immaculate in his dress and personal appearance. His
face beamed in his happier moods and even in repose
it radiated light. His personality was magnetic to
his friends and forbidding to his enemies. He pos
sessed unusual wit. He had the artistic temperament
strongly developed and showed it in his fondness for
beautiful things in general but more particularly for
fine pictures, noble architecture and good books, and
in his keen love for music. He was altruistic, humane,
and charitable, and prodigal in his generosity without
being ostentatious about it. Like many great natures
he was a modest gentleman with poise and dignity.
He was a man who did things, and in world building
did more than his part. He had strong friends and of
course bitter enemies, for such a nature necessarily
attracts both. But his enemies respected him as much
as did his friends. He was positively loyal, true, and
steadfast to his friends whether up or down, and he
was pronounced against his enemies. In the great

HOME LIFE AND CHARACTER 291
church where there assembled those who had come
to pay their last tribute before his lifeless form, there
were those also assembled there who in bitterness had
crossed swords with him in life and been worsted in
the doing so. The monument that we reared for him
in Graceland Cemetery, tells in itself to the stranger
passing by the character of the man whose memory
it honors, for it is a single solid block of granite,
rugged and simple in outline, without display, but
strong and imposing in aspect, and speaking only a
single word, — the name which he has made it an
honor to bear.
It is true of mankind, that all come into the world
destined to meet the eternal warfare which Nature
and Mankind itself impose upon them. As soon as we
are born the forces of nature begin to destroy through
the agencies of disease, exposure and accident, the
mortal part of us, and man himself begins to tear
down and destroy the perfect soul with which each
child has been endowed at its creation. It is only
the fittest who survive in body, mind and character,
for as we go onward in our lives, that which is mortal
in us begins to depreciate after the meridian of life
has been passed, and the final end of it is death and
dissolution. But the immortal feature of our being
lives on in a greater or lesser sphere as we determine
it for ourselves, there being no termination of it, but
rather a process beginning with life itself, of evolution,
growth and transformation, and then transition.
Good natures therefore as the years glide by, come

292 LIFE OF WILLIAM TAYLOR BAKER
nearer to their final goal of glory. They are better than
their original elements, and rising higher than they
have stood, become grander and more magnificent,
like a tall and stately tree, which from a seedling in
poor soil comes finally into a tower of beauty, strength
and inspiration, reaching heavenwards as it grows.
Even so it may be told of my father, that he sprang
from the soil of poverty, that he grew in broader and
higher manhood and soul character through the years
of strife, until coming into the autumn of his life,
transformed from the less perfect being of the past,
he had only to do as he did, — lie down in a peaceful
sleep on earth in the evening of a happy day, from
which the awakening came in immortality in the life
beyond. Thus lived and died William Taylor Baker. Who
can say how far reaching has been his influence, or
in what measure he has left his impress upon the
world? There may be those who never knew him
except at long range, but, who knowing him to the
degree that such a public character is likely to be
known, took their inspiration from him, and made him
their guide for better living and for greater achieve
ment. We, unconsciously, in our youth particularly,
look up to such a man, and accept him as our model
to pattern after and grow up to. So strong a manhood
as his, therefore, undoubtedly drew unto itself the
approbative attention of many who saw in him the
true ideals to which their better and more ambitious
natures would lead them; and so all unconsciously,

The Baker Lot in Graceland.

HOME LIFE AND CHARACTER 293
he, like other men of equally sterling caliber, radi
ated the strength and virtue within him, to be absorbed
and expanded again by those whose natures he thus
touched. The good that he may thus have done shall
never be known perhaps, but we, who were close to
him and knew him through and through, found there
an able, honest, upright, brave and conscientious man,
who did his duty as he knew it, and with all the
strength and purpose at his command. What more
could be asked of any man ?
THE END.

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