Jasper County Democrat, Volume 21, Number 103, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 March 1919 — BEWARE OF STOCK SALESMEN [ARTICLE]

BEWARE OF STOCK SALESMEN

Don’t Invest Your Money or Liberty Bonds in Fly by Night Schemes. . There probably never was a time in the history of the country, especially off Indiana, when so many to purchase stock in gold brick enterprises were offered the people .as the present. Many of the agents of these stocks offer to accept Liberty bonds at face value in payment for handsomely printed certificates of stock (to their •’company.’’ The Democrat’s advice to .s readers is "don't bite.” Hang on to your cash and also your Liberty bonds. The latter are- the best security ffn e& 'th and will return you real money as dividends, while, in 99 cases out of 100 in these stock promotion schemes, all you- will eve*''receive is. the pretty certificate beC >ng your nume and the number of shares "owned” by you, which, translated Into plain English means "a fool and his money are soon ■parted." ~ Remember, that U one-fourth

what the smooth stock salesman £ells you was true, his "company” would not have to go away from home to sell every dollars’ worth of its stock. There are men with money looking for just such snaps and the fact that it is necessary to go out throiugh the country and wheedle the Marine and small town business man into buying the stock is, generally speaking, evidence that it is of doubtful value. It is probably that hundreds of thousands of dollars have been invested by Rensselaer and Jasper county people during the past 20 years in these hot air companies that have not yielded one penny in dividends to the purchasers, and never will do so. If Indiana had a good “blue sky" law, such as many other states have but which interested parties have so far been able to keep from passing our legislature, enough money vould be saved its citizens each year to build a battleship, for nearly every dollar invested in these get-rich-quick schemes is absolutely lost forever.