John warne gates biography of abraham

After the Louisville and Nashville Railroad incident, Gates found that public opinion had turned against him as a result of it. When young Gates' name was brought up for a vote, the members of the admissions committee were unanimous in their "no" decision. Gates threatened to sue the club and the members denied his charges of Morgan being behind Charlie Gates' refusal.

Gates withdrew Charlie's Yacht Club and Union League Club applications, apparently resigned that his son would not be a member of either society. Claridge's refused to accept their registration as Gates was now on the hotel's list of undesirables. Pattillo Higgins had begun a well on Spindletop in , but ran out of money to continue drilling for oil.

Higgins went to Gates for funds to continue; [ 43 ] Gates obliged. Cullinan, [ 44 ] had little experience in drilling wells and producing crude oil. His investment entitled Gates to 46 percent of the company's stock. Gates became influential in the development of the city of Port Arthur, Texas , when he took over the Kansas City, Pittsburgh and Gulf Railroad in December after he forced it into bankruptcy along with its previous owner and Port Arthur founder Arthur Edward Stilwell.

After Gates became the owner of the Port Arthur Canal and Dock Company, he held the asset for a time; in he gave the canal to the US government under the condition that Port Arthur would be named an international port of entry. When he decided to make Port Arthur his permanent residence in , the town held a celebration. After Port Arthur's Hotel Sabine burned to the ground in , Gates decided that the city needed a good hotel to replace it.

In , he proposed to build another, called the Plaza, on the site the Hotel Sabine had once occupied. Gates could have easily afforded to finance the entire cost of the new hotel, but he wanted Port Arthur's residents to have an equal share in the venture. Gates held local meetings and was happy to discuss the project or take pledges for the building fund at any time.

Gates took great pleasure in watching the Plaza Hotel take shape. He was a daily visitor to the construction site as the Spanish mission style building was erected. When the hotel was opened, Gates held a special "billion dollar banquet" on November 15, ; his guests were men who owned railroads, Texas Company board members, and other successful men in business.

Port Arthur had never seen so many wealthy and powerful men and residents were impressed by the sight of them. Gates served as the hotel's manager in the first few weeks it was in operation. He hired African-Americans as waiters; this was considered to be very bold, as African-Americans were barred from living and working in the city at the time.

Gates continued to have hopes of being able to take on J. Morgan again-this time with a rival steel trust. He and his associates easily owned more than 50 percent of the company's stock shares, but the company's owner and founder, John C. Osgood , claimed the shares were not valid. Osgood said that while the company was listed on the New York Stock Exchange, any transfer of the shares without his signature and approval, made them invalid.

He went on to say that because of their invalidity, those who held shares of the company's stock without them, were not eligible to attend the annual stockholders' meeting. Osgood was upheld in this opinion by the company's board of directors. Determined to attend the meeting, Gates hired a special train to get to the meeting in Denver.

John Osgood was prepared for Gates' arrival. He had obtained a Circuit Court injunction barring Gates and his associates from attending the meeting; the doors of Colorado Fuel and Iron were guarded by sheriff's deputies armed with shotguns. Gates was angry about being refused entry to the meeting, but he became enraged when he learned he was described in the local Circuit Court as a "high roller and a gambler".

Gates returned to New York to try utilizing the Federal Court system there. Osgood announced he was willing to meet Gates halfway, but Gates declined the offer. He accused Osgood of tampering with the courts and claimed that he would receive the legal ownership of the company he was due. Apparently feeling that a long battle was not worth it, Gates gave up the fight some weeks later and sold the shares, which eventually wound up with the Rockefeller family.

Once more, Gates planned to get back into the steel industry. In , he began buying shares of Republic Steel. All three were able to use inexpensive Southern iron ore to produce quality steel with the open hearth process , making the price of the steel produced with it cheaper. The minerals needed for the open hearth process were readily found in Alabama.

Morgan's U. When August Belmont Jr. Gates found two like-minded members of the board when he began talking about consolidating the three steel companies. One was L. Gates now began purchasing shares of Tennessee Coal and Iron in preparation of the consolidation. In January he was ready to outline his plan to potential members of the trust, with the exception of Republic's president, A.

When Thompson was advised of the scheme, he declared there would be no such trust with Republic as a member; when put to a formal vote, Republic's board members voted down the idea of joining a trust. During this time, Gates was able to purchase enough shares of Tennessee Coal and Iron to give him a controlling interest in the company. Gates was riding high with both Republic and Tennessee Coal and Iron doing well with more orders that both could fill.

His assessment of the open-hearth process for steel production was confirmed by a report from the US Bureau of Corporations. The report stated that an agent for U. Steel and a large railroad affiliated with J. Morgan pronounced the rails produced by the open-hearth process to be twice as good at those made by the Bessemer process , which was used by U.

The report went on to praise Gates and his competitiveness. In , Gates took his usual summer holiday in Europe. Upon arriving in Paris, he was met with an urgent cablegram from Grant Schley. Schley, the owner of a brokerage and a board member of Republic Steel and Tennessee Coal and Iron, advised Gates of serious business trouble and asked him to return to the US at once.

As the Panic of began, Schley's brokerage had become short of money and it was necessary for him to obtain large loans to try to keep the brokerage solvent.

John warne gates biography of abraham

Thorne believed his bank was in sound financial condition until a New York Times article stated otherwise. When the clearing house run by J. Morgan audited the bank's books, they found the bank was sound, but were quite interested in the Tennessee Coal and Iron Company stock they found and indicated that the stock was not acceptable to them as security.

Morgan proposed to buy Tennessee Coal and Iron to "rescue" all involved with the company. Steel would change its second mortgage bonds for Tennessee Coal and Iron stock. Steel bonds were acceptable to the clearing house, they would be able to be used for the debts. It was suggested that President Theodore Roosevelt be consulted before such action was taken.

Roosevelt was given only an outline of the issue; he was never told which institution would fail without U. Steel's takeover of Tennessee Coal and Iron. Roosevelt wrote a note to his Attorney General stating he had not learned the name of the troubled business, but felt that he should not object to this occurrence. The New York Times , however, printed its amazement that Tennessee Coal and Iron stocks were not acceptable to the clearing house and that the Trust Company of America was deemed insolvent when it had more than enough assets to cover all deposits.

The newspaper concluded that U. Steel wanted to take over a serious business competitor and the company was only worried about the Sherman Antitrust Act. Though this was promised, those holding smaller amounts of stock were said to have received less compensation for them. He was suffering from a kidney ailment and diabetes and needed to take time away from the town's business when either flared up.

He still had control of the Texas Company and was able to successfully battle Rockefeller's Standard Oil, who would have liked to take over his company's land. He wired the convention to refuse the nomination, saying that he preferred to participate through his financial contributions. The growth was malignant and there were times Gates was hardly able to speak.

The US Congress was beset with requests to deal with the U. Congressman Augustus Owsley Stanley of Kentucky, was named chairman of the committee; in his long list of persons to subpoena for their testimony the first was John Gates. Gates appeared to give his testimony on May 28, ; [ 75 ] he was seriously ill and this was evident by how thin and pale he had become.

He planned a trip to Paris to consult with doctors there after his testimony. Gates spoke of all of his dealings with J. He left for Paris while the committee was still in session. The result of the hearings was an investigation of U. Steel and its practices which would last for almost ten years. Morgan, who held the belief that he had "saved" the country from the Panic of , was disgusted at the "ingratitude" of both the government and the nation's citizens.

Gates and his guests were often loud and boisterous. Boldt instructed his elevator operators to take their time when serving his floor, as it allowed Gates to make as much noise as he wished for a few minutes. Many poker games began on the train from Chicago to New York and were continued at the Waldorf. Gates made it a practice to keep some unset diamonds in his vest pocket for the times when Dellora became angry about the late hours at cards.

He would then present a gem to his wife, who would suddenly forget her anger with him. Oscar recalled a rainy afternoon in the Waldorf's Oak Room as Gates and two associates watched raindrops trickle down the windows. Gates remarked that the drops did not move down the window at the same speed. One of Gates' associates spotted two raindrops that were moving at the same rate and pointed them out to him.

Gates selected a raindrop and bet his associate that it would reach the bottom of the window first. His associate took him up on the bet and before Gates' raindrop had won the race, the bets had changed from hundreds of dollars to thousands. Gates continued his heavy betting on horse races when in the United States. Delmonico's was next door and provided catering to the club's guests.

When there or at Canfield's Saratoga clubhouse, Gates' favored game was faro which he had learned while selling barbed wire in Texas. Gates set up a brokerage office in the hotel's main lobby for his son, Charlie, and an experienced stockbroker. In early , when Gates realized that the market would be headed for a sharp downturn, he closed the offices of Charles G.

Gates and Company, announcing he was done with Wall Street for good. He had purchased a substantial number of shares in the United States Realty Company, which had built New York's Plaza Hotel and was able to design his own 16 room apartment at the Plaza. Gates died in Paris, France , on August 9, , following an unsuccessful operation to remove a throat tumor.

A large delegation arrived from Texas, where Gates had done much for the city of Port Arthur. The city of Port Arthur held its own memorial service on the same day Gates was buried. Flags were lowered to half staff and from noon until 6 pm all businesses in Port Arthur were closed; the city's docks and refineries also stopped their operations during this time to honor Port Arthur's benefactor.

Gates is said to have included the clause in his will to protect friends who had invested with him from these securities being sold soon after his death. It was entered into the National Register of Historic Places in In , as a gift to the city of Port Arthur, TX, and to improve the educational training and opportunities of the community, John Gates founded Port Arthur College, a private institution.

Contents move to sidebar hide. Article Talk. Read Edit View history. Tools Tools. Download as PDF Printable version. In other projects. Wikimedia Commons Wikidata item. American industrialist — Gates" redirects here. Gates New York politician. For example was the incident where he shut down a plant and throwing out workers just to get stock prices down.

Using the situation, he bought more stocks and then opened the closed plants, driving the prices up again, giving him a huge profit. Gates also became notorious on using his money in gambling. Besides gambling in poker games or horseracing, he also began to speculate in the New York Stock Exchange. Also, he attempted to take over the titanic Carnegie Steel.

However, he failed. However, on the process, he met an influential financier in Wall Street, J. Gates in , took part on the creation of the first billion-dollar corporation in the world, US Steel. Gates, however, was not made to become part of the US Steel. Nevertheless, Gates continued to be a player in the business world. Gates spent millions in Port Arthur to established banks, roads, railroad, ports, and other basic infrastructure.

He also invested to the newly discovered Spindletop Oil Field nearby. Seeing opportunity from the oil field, Gates invested in oil refining and transport. Ultimately, he became part in the foundation of the Texas Company or Texaco. Wealth continued to flow towards Gates. However, he would not be able to enjoy it for long. Carey, C. American Inventors, Entrepreneurs, and Business Visionaries.

New York: Facts On File, Cohn, G. The New Encyclopedia of American Scandal. New York: Facts on File, Texas Biographical Dictionary. Accessed October 31, Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment. Newer Post Older Post Home. Subscribe to: Post Comments Atom. Popular Posts This Week. When the couple's first child was stillborn, Gates returned to his old pattern of playing poker and thought seriously about leaving town with Dellora.

With this knowledge, Mary Gates told her husband he needed to help his son financially so he could start a new business. Gates' father-in-law, Ed Baker, had already offered to help his daughter and son in law in this way. Asel purchased a two-story brick building and Ed Baker provided the capital for stock to open a hardware store in Turner Junction.

At first the business went well; Gates and Dellora were able to move into their own home. Gates began taking time away from the hardware store and while his partner tried to handle all the business, he was not able to. Gates began to complain of various ailments soon after the baby's birth; at times, he would take to his bed for some days with them.

Business at the hardware store had become so bad, Gates was not able to afford the rent on the family's home. They had to move into two rooms above the hardware store, with Gates saying he was too ill to help with the moving and packing. While at the hardware store, Gates met a salesman who was in the barbed wire business. As a result, Gates became interested in the relatively new product.

When he announced his intentions to sell his interest in the hardware store and become a traveling salesman for the product, his wife and mother were both in favor of the plan. After watching a medicine show proprietor stage an elaborate presentation for his wires and noting that people fought to buy the products sold, Gates decided to have a similar production to demonstrate the merits of barbed wire.

In San Antonio's Military Plaza, Gates provoked cattle into charging into a barbed wire fence which did not break. Gates went from not being able to sell his product to not being able to fill orders quickly enough after the demonstration. Upon Ellwood's refusal to grant him a partnership in the company. Gates traveled to St. Clifford's equipment to manufacture barbed wire had come from George C.

Baker, who had invented a machine for producing barbed wire which was similar but not identical to the one made by Isaac Ellwood. Baker had resisted all attempts by Ellwood and Washburn-Moen to buy him out. Gates and Clifford sold their product at a cheaper price than Washburn-Moen. In an effort to stop the success of the former company salesman, Ellwood and Washburn-Moen filed for an injunction to stop the business of Southern Wire Company.

The suit, filed in U. District Court, claimed the machines Gates and Clifford used in the production of their product were a direct copy of those used by Washburn-Moen. As they avoided process servers, Gates and Clifford made a plan to save their company. They were able to rent a building in East St. Louis, Illinois, and moved their equipment out of the factory and onto a ferryboat after dark.

After they crossed the Mississippi River, the machines were out of the jurisdiction of the St. Louis U. District Court and were back in business the next day. When Clifford and Gates hired an attorney to answer the charges made against them in court, the judge ruled that the manufacturing process used by Southern Wire Company was not an infringement on any patents or machinery owned by Ellwood and Washburn-Moen.

Edenborn had not heard the news and approached him for a merger with the idea that Southern Wire would manufacture in Edenborn's now idle barbed wire plant. The new company was known as St. Louis Wire Mill Company. They continued to buy other wire companies and had strong sales. Washburn-Moen went back into court, this time in Des Moines, Iowa, where a federal judge ruled that the machinery created by Baker was an infringement of Washburn-Moen's patents.

By this time, Gates had created a syndicate of barbed wire manufacturers who did not produce their wires using Washburn-Moen's methods; the ruling in favor of Washburn-Moen only applied to areas in the jurisdiction of the U. Federal Court in Des Moines. Washburn-Moen continued to falter; Isaac Ellwood sent word asking for a meeting with Gates.

The barbed wire legal issues ended with Washburn-Moen selling their patent rights to Gates and his syndicate of wire manufacturers. Through a series of mergers and acquisitions the company went through various name changes, finally settling on American Steel and Wire Company. Gates and his family moved to Chicago, where they lived for a period of ten years.

Gary was called on again in to negotiate a merger with J. Though he had provided Gates with some loans and advice in the past, Morgan did not want Gates to be a part of the merged company, saying that there was only a deal without Gates. Morgan made an offer to Gates for the American Steel and Wire Company, telling him that he was not welcome to take part in the business of U.

Steel-either as part of management or on the company's board of directors. Morgan continued by saying that if Gates did not accept his offer, U. Steel intended to build its own wire production plant. Gates never forgot J. Morgan's snub at the U. Steel merger. One month after the deal was completed, he became involved in a struggle between E. Hill of the Northern Pacific Railway.

Both men sought control of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad. Hill, who was financed by J. Morgan, needed access to Chicago; Harriman was interested in stopping Hill from obtaining it. Gates saw this as an opportunity to get back at Morgan for his refusal to seat him on the board of U. Along with Harriman, he began buying shares of Northern Pacific stock.

Morgan and Hill stopped the sales of the Northern Pacific stock, which remained high while other stocks took steep drops. Those who had been selling short could not obtain enough stock to cover themselves and were faced with large financial losses. It was rumored that Gates was short 60, shares of Northern Pacific stock. Gates did not confirm or deny any of the rumors about the railroad stock and would only say that he was doing well.

As Gates continued to search for a way to get back at Morgan for cutting him out of U. Steel, he found a vulnerability in Morgan's railroad holdings in and began buying large numbers of shares in Morgan's Louisville and Nashville Railroad. A clerical error offered the stock for sale before it could be listed on the New York Stock Exchange.

Gates saw the offering and purchased the shares prior to their listing; he also continued buying all the Louisville and Nashville stock he was able to. Gates had enough shares of the railroad to duplicate the panic that ensued the year before with the Great Northern Railway shares. Morgan learned of the events in April and found that Gates now owned more than 51 percent of the Louisville and Nashville's stock.

Morgan decided to act to stop another Wall Street panic, and asked what Gates' terms of sale would be. He then dispatched his aide, George Walbridge Perkins, to talk to Gates and make the best possible arrangements. Perkins called on Gates in his Waldorf-Astoria suite at am. After the Louisville and Nashville Railroad incident, Gates found that public opinion had turned against him as a result of it.

The application for Charlie Gates went from one desk to another for a number of weeks. When young Gates' name was brought up for a vote, the members of the admissions committee were unanimous in their "no" decision. Gates threatened to sue the club and the members denied his charges of Morgan being behind Charlie Gates' refusal. Gates withdrew Charlie's Yacht Club and Union League Club applications, apparently resigned that his son would not be a member of either society.

When he and Dellora traveled to England, the couple wanted to stay at Claridge's, as they had done in