Jasper County Democrat, Volume 3, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 February 1901 — BIG RAILROAD DEAL. [ARTICLE]

BIG RAILROAD DEAL.

union Pacific Acquire* Control of tl>« Southern Pacific. The Southern Pacific has been absorbed by the Union Pacific. Notice of th# consummation of the deal was made public In New York Friday and it startled the railroad and financial world. Union Pacific interests obtain more than two* fifths of the entire capital stock of $20,000,000. The gigantic deal is but a preliminary to the ocean-to-oceon Vanderbilt line that is ultimately to link New York and San Francisco with a band of ateel rails owned or controlled by one company. The present owners of the Union Pacific represent the Vanderbilt, Standard Oil and kindred interests. The vast transaction, the consummation of which changes the Railroad map of tha United States and calls into existence the largest railway system in the world, was carried out by private negotiation. Upward of $80,000,000, par value, of Southern Pacific stock has been acquired and the original dreams of the promoters of the first Pacific enterprises —a thorough route under one ownership from the Missouri river to the Golden Gate—has at last been accomplished. No details were forthcoming as to ths price paid for the stock or the method of financing the purchase or the future management of the Southern Pacific company. All that is definitely known Is that the Speyer and Uuntington interests In Southern Pacific have been acquired by the Ilarriman party in Union and that the 8,157 miles of road owned, operated or leased by the Union Pacifio road, added to the 7,014 miles similarly controlled by the Southern Pacific company, making a total of 15,771 miles, will in the future be operated in the closest possible harmony. To the Uhion Pacific the acquisition is of the greatest possible value, as it assures for all time the transcontinental character of that property, nor is it without similar import to the Southern Pacific company, which is definitely assured of two permanent routes to tho East, the direct line via the Central Pacific to Ogden and another southern line to eastern tidewater at New Orleans, on the Gulf of Mexico.