Frenzied Finance, Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated

by Thomas William Lawson

It was in Providence, during the heyday of the Waldron-Lawson enterprise, that Lawson ... first met "Jack" Roach, whose apparent employment now is selling diamonds on commission to the so-called "sporting element" of New York, but who is acknowledged to be Lawson's personal representative in this city. It was there, too, that he made the acquaintance of Herbert Gray, who subsequently conducted a gambling-house in Boston, and who recently served as one of Lawson's captains and managed his trotting stable. Ben Palmer, a well-known character in State Street, who is one of the main cog-wheels of Lawson's machine, first made Lawson's acquaintance during this period of his career.

I do know the Waldron Brothers, of Providence, who are among the oldest residents of Rhode Island, and who, with the present United States Senator Nelson A. Aldrich, composed the great wholesale grocery house of Waldron, Wightman & Co. They did not graduate from a gambling-house on Broadway. I knew the brother referred to familiarly throughout Rhode Island as "Honest Bill," and a royal old fellow he was. I did business with him in those days, and to any connection I ever had with him I look back with pleasure. He was then conducting a farm in the suburbs of Providence, and in a straightforward, old-fashioned way supplying that city with produce and poultry, and had, to the best of my knowledge, the respect and confidence of all who knew him. I never knew of his having been a gambler, and had no means of knowing, as such matters were then an unknown world to me.

I never, up to reading it in Donohoe's story the other day, heard of 818 Broadway, curious as it may seem for a man of my experience. My knowledge of gambling has always been confined to that kind which comes under the head of stock gambling. I had not met my present friend, John J. Roche, of New York, at the time mentioned. I never heard of Herbert Gray, of Boston, until I employed him to manage my stable in 1899. I have known J. Benjamin Palmer all my life. We were boys together on State Street. Afterward he was the Stock-Exchange member of one of the oldest banking-houses in Boston. He is still a broker on State Street.

Nothing of certainty can be learned of his career during this period. That he sold "base-ball" cards (a unique kind of playing-cards) at the Providence railroad station is stated on credible authority; that he "worked the trains" between New York and Providence; that he sold books; that he was a hanger-on at race-tracks, has been alleged. Any or all of these rumors may be true—or false—for whatever may be said of Lawson, his career has undoubtedly been one of marvellous activity in many diversified lines.

I have never sold baseball playing-cards at the Providence station, nor anywhere, at this time nor any time, but I did invent the Lawson Baseball Playing-Cards, and was president of the Lawson Playing-Card Company. I never sold books at this time nor any time, and never "worked trains" at this time nor any time, although I fail to see any disgrace in such honest employment; nor had anything to do with trains in any way whatever at this time nor any time except to ride in them. I have never been a hanger-on at race-tracks, and have never had anything to do with a race-track of any kind other than visiting one for the first time in 1899 to see my own horse, Boralma, race, and four or five times since to see my own horses run. I desire to dwell on this especial accusation because these character thugs have caused it to be published throughout the country that I am and have always been a habitué of race-tracks and a plunging bettor upon races. I regret that it is my misfortune never to have seen a horse-race until 1899, but if it can be shown that I was ever upon a race-track before that time, I will agree to stop writing this story of "Frenzied Finance."

In 1882, a concern known as the Briggs Printing Machine Company was incorporated in Rhode Island ... to manufacture a machine that was advertised to "print, cut, pack, and fasten with twine 100,000 tags per hour." Thomas W. Lawson secured the job of selling agent of this company, and he proved so successful and the advertising matter which he wrote brought such handsome returns, that we find him in 1884 promoted to the position of manager and enjoying a salary of $150 per month. Later he became the secretary of the company, and very shortly thereafter, in 1887, the enterprise collapsed, was sold out by the sheriff, and realized little or nothing for the numerous creditors....

It is true that I was the vice-president of the Briggs Printing Machine Company, which was organized and owned by others before I had aught to do with it. I was induced to invest considerable money in it and to take charge of its affairs. The Briggs Company was a close corporation. Its stock was never sold to the public, and after I left it it met with failure.

In December, 1888, the Lamson Consolidated Store-Service Company was incorporated at Boston. Its purpose was to exploit an invention of W. S. Lamson ... the overhead trolley system used in department-stores for carrying cash and parcels.... The capital stock at the beginning was $250,000—par value of shares, $50. The company was doing business and declaring two and a half per cent. dividends quarterly, when Mr. Lawson stepped in and began to manipulate the stock. The price of shares rose steadily to 122. Under the influence of speculative excitement the directors increased the capital stock to $1,000,000, then to $4,000,000. Mr. Lawson boomed the stock on the basis of a report, totally destitute of truth, that an English syndicate was about to purchase a controlling interest in the company. Having unloaded all the shares at his disposal on the uproad to 122, Mr. Lawson suddenly one morning awoke to a realization of the fact that Lamson Store-Service shares possessed absolutely no value, and he at once took the public, as is his custom, into his confidence. In circulars, by advertisements, and by cunningly contrived "news" items he insistently dinned into the public ear that Lamson shares were valueless. The result was as well might be imagined. The stock declined to 30, whereupon Lawson bought it back and then and there made his first grand coup. It is said that first and last he realized $250,000 from the Lamson shareholders.

I did "Lawsonize" the Lamson Store-Service Company, just as I am at the present time "Lawsonizing" the "Standard-Oil"-Amalgamated-City-Bank crowd. The Lamson Store-Service Company, with $4,000,000 capital, was blunderbussing all who dared oppose it—all who refused to be bulldozed into consolidating with it. It was the most vicious exponent of the "Trust" methods I had ever met up to that time. Its arrogance, audacity, and crimes were the themes of the newspapers and courts of the day. A most casual investigation of the newspaper files, particularly in Osgood vs. Lamson, and The New York Store-Service Company vs. Lamson, will show a state of corporation assassination equal to that of the "Standard Oil," only on a smaller scale, of course. Perjury, bribery, and even murder will be found openly charged and in some cases proved. At the height of the sensational career of the Lamson Company it ran into one of my corporations, The Lawson Manufacturing Company, and started in to "do me up" or compel a consolidation, and—well, I gave it battle. The following circular to the stockholders will show how the battle started: