I decided that I ought not vote for the increase of stock—and, without leave, came home on Sunday. One of our group, an ex-businessman, attended the meeting on his own hook to get first hand knowledge of the situation. He wired Joe Searles Monday afternoon, saying, “Bristow absent; could I vote the proxies?” I told Joe to wire him, “Yes—if you have them.” I had just turned them in to Joe. In a couple of days Searles got a long letter from him—written by a stenographer in Kansas City—berating me for running out on them, and boasting of the business-like interest he himself had taken in the meeting, saying, “I stayed with them until we got in proxies enough the next day to get the money—and I bought $250 worth more of the stock.” He did not say—probably didn’t know—if his purchase was of the newly voted stock, or from the old issue. I had a strong suspicion that we had all ready bought and paid for a generous take of the newly voted stock—and got short changed as well.
I had called on that “stick-in-the-eye” banker a short while before, and obtained from him the log of a producing well recently brought in by Frank Letson and associates in the Enid field—and this, I think, might have been what had alerted the banker; or, maybe, the president had sent his partner scurrying in to forestall an admission of their questionable finagling. I wanted that log to compare with the log of “our” drilling, which I had obtained from “our” president. Then, too, Frank Letson was a younger brother of Ed and Ella Letson who were my schoolmates in Wetmore, when their father, Bill Letson, owned a general store here; before going to Netawaka to engage in like business. I had called at the Fleming and Letson bank in Enid two days before, but did not get to see either of my old acquaintances.
The Fleming bank, now an imposing brick structure having tall columns, on the east side of the square, was started on the south side, opposite the land office, in a small frame building in the new town after the opening of the Cherokee strip, in 1893. I also had occasion to call at the old bank about six months after the opening, to get a paper notarized.
Attorney Elwin Campfield, in the law office of John Curran, formerly of Seneca, on the west side of the Enid square, filled out relinquishing papers for me, without charge—we had been neighbors in the Bleisener building in Wetmore—and suggested that I wait in the Curran office a few minutes when he would have one of the office force notarize it for me, presumedly also without charge—a small matter hardly worth waiting for. Up here the fee for such service was then, and still is, twenty-five cents. I told Elwin I would go over to the Fleming bank and get it notarized, that I wanted to pay my respects to Ollie, anyway. 01 had grabbed off, at Netawaka, a red headed girl (Ella Letson) whom I had thought pretty nice when we were care-free kids running wild on the streets of Wetmore in the early days.
Well, 01 was sure glad to see me—and he would gladly remember me to Ella. When he had returned the notarized paper to me, I said, “How much, 01?” He said, “Five dollars!” I shot him a wordless blank look. He laughed, and said, “Oh, give me two-and-a-half.” There had been a time in that frontier town when one could get most anything asked for services, but that time was now over and passed—half-over, anyway.
That officious Wetmore man was in Dr. Lapham’s office when I reported my findings. I told the group that I had spoken only for myself when I gave those finaglers my word that I was not there to make trouble—that I had to do this to get them to open up. I told the group that I had no desire to pursue the matter further, but that they themselves were not barred; that any one of them who might wish to, could notify the Blue Sky Board in Topeka—and the Board would do the rest.
The man who had taken matters in his own hands and helped put over the vote for the increase of capital stock without the formality of first finding out what it was all about, popped up and said, “You had no right to tell them that.” He insisted that I should make the complaint. And the surprising thing is, he had some supporters. There were some hard losers in the group. I had not made the investigation with the intention of filing a complaint—wouldn’t have accepted the assignment had it carried any such provision. I don’t like fussing.
Then, too, the president and the land owner had not solicited me to buy stock, nor made promise to me that the fund would be used to complete the well. Their contact had been with Dr. Lapham and other members of the group. I went in with them solely because my neighbors had invited me to join them, and because I didn’t want to stand idly by—and watch them make a “killing.” However, on invitation, I went up to Dr. Lapham’s office at the virtual close of a “pep” meeting, after the check-writing had begun. I asked for information as to how the company was organized—particularly as to whether or not the stock was non-assessable? The president and the land-owner really didn’t know. But they went to Topeka the next day and secured a transcript of the incorporation papers, which were acceptable. And I was invited to go before the adjourned meeting the following evening, and voice my approval. Then the check writing was resumed.
Also, my conscience told me, in a flash, that it would be a rather poor spirited person who should wish to send his neighbor “up” for the mistake of keeping bad company. It looked as if our old farmer-neighbor had been caught in between two fires, and didn’t know which way to “jump”—or worse still, that there was now no open way out. Thus, it may be said, that our old Bancroft farmer-friend, in his most uncomfortable position, was comparable to the banker held as hostage by a bold gang of robbers who had just looted his bank. I know. I spent two days with the dispirited old man in the oil field.
The Blue Sky Board was fostered to check on promotions whose stocks were strongly, if not wholly, tinctured with the azure blue. Along about 1905-06-07 questionable promotions—mostly mining—sprang up all over the country. Kansas City had several going full blast at one time. I had occasion to call on one of them; had arranged the meeting through correspondence. I entered a very large room where perhaps thirty or forty girl-typists were busily preparing literature to be sent out by mail to inquirers secured through newspaper advertisements. The printed portion of the literature had been prepared by “experts” copy-writers—and it is surprising how those fellows could make an inferior proposition appeal to the gullible.