Ail t& a.' 1 I'crsonal Characteristics ana liusincss Metiioas or tno
iipilCUS JL. OllCKIlCj Chicago Great Western. Kailroad Magnate
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BCRNR AT THR BANQI'KT GIVEN BY TltK COMMBHriAI, Cl-im Or OMAHA IN HONOR OI"" PUESliJiiNT 6TICKNET OP THE CHICAGO OTiB.'.T WESTERN
IlAll.KOAK, ON KA'I'l'Hl )A Y. EVENING, SEPTEMBER 12. Iit03-Photo Ly u Start Artist.
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II AT do you think of hlinV" asked
one Onialm bunineHs iti:iii of an
other last week ut the Com
mercial club after HstenltiK to
the aUUreis of I'rtldent Siickncy
Of the 'lilc;io Urcut W'slern.
"llo'i a sbiHhpr," wag the ;'.tlck rrpion.
Dr. Noah Webster, In upeuklntf of
Bluaher," lulls it "a machine for applying
Jze to warp yarn."
Now Mr. Stlckney certainly Is not that,
and yet he Is a "ulanher," or nt least he
baa warped a good many yarns of defiant
railroad competitors and plashed a good
many arbitrary freight rates, so th-it he
bos come to be known to Much men as head
the great railroada of the middle west with
which the Great Western competes as
pretty much of a slaphrr. The Omaha bus
iness man, therefore, was not so far off
after ull.
The railroad world takes l.ue with Dr.
Webster on the definition of "slasher" and
coins one which it contends Is more adapted
to the uses of the twentieth century, espe
cially since Alphc-us II. Stlckney happens
to live In that century.
"A slasher Is a railroad president who,
when rates, freight or parsengcr, urc higher
than he thinks they ought to be, or i:re ro
high as to prevent him from citing ns big
a slice of business as he thinks he ought
to have, Jumps In and whittles s ild rules,
freight or passenger, Into shoestrings."
This definition, It Is understood, was
evolved after months of careful thought on
the part of a number of the railroad kings
of the west and finally approved by n unan
imous vote ut one of their secret meetings.,
It Is said that the president of the Chicago
Great Western was not present at this
meeting.
Mr. Stlckney's success as a slasher was
Strikingly reflected in the circumstances at
tending the recent entrance of his road Into
Omaha. The city stood with open arms
anxious to receive him. The only Influence
that opposed his coming was that of a rail
road rlvnl-to-be whope managers saw In
the advent of the "slasher" the possibility
of having to share profits with him. It was
Ignlflcant that every commercial Interest
In Omaha joined In tho cordial welcome,
In the rousing reception given to President
Stlckney and his railroad. It was u token
of the popularity of "slashers" In general
and of tills "plasher" in particular. Hy
that demonstration Omaha has taken Mr.
Stlckney on probation and believes in him,
becaupe of his past record and his pledges
for the future.
President Stlckney is n. man to nrouse
enthusiasm and Inspire confidence. No one
who her.rd 1:1m speak at the Commercial
dub. whether lie had ever Been or heard
him before, could doubt this. That is one
of the dominant characteristics of the man
one which has contributed materially to
his remarkable success as a business man.
Quiet, calm and conservative, unassuming
but attractive and Interesting In appear
ance as well ns In speech, he possesses nat
ural advantages whether facing two or
three men In conversation or as many hun
dreds or thousands In making an address.
He Impresses his audience, large or small,
with the fact that ho knows what he Is
talking about. lie Is a voluminous reader,
a profound thinker and a close and con
scientious student, possessing, therefore,
with his faculty of ready, graceful speec'.i,
the prime requisites of a good orator.
Mr. Stlckney is a native of Muine. His
father was a minister of unusual power
and influence, und was also a prominent
contributor to tho public press. Rut ho
was not rich. His son Is, but might not
have been If his father was, for under the
conditions which existed the boy was called
on nt a tender age to get out and learn
how to make u living. . He Is said to
have been a very apt pupil. By tho time
he was 17 years of age he had all the boys
In bis native town of Wilton, county of
Franklin, green-eyed with envy over his
success as a school "marm," and he had
plunged headlong Into society as tho most
popular young man among the young
women In that portion of the pines. Mr.
Slkkney'd education up to this time con
sisted of a public school career. But he
was a sort of teacher to himself, devouring
all tho books and mastering all the sub
jects he had time to take up
School teaching In the tall pines of Maine
was too tame for young Stlckney, so he de
termined to be a lawyer. At 18, therefore,
he entered the law office of Joseph Crosby,
at Dexter, Me. Three years later. In 1.W1,
at the age of 21, he drifted west, landing
finally in Minnesota, where he was ad
mitted to the bar. He stuck out his flrst
fchlngle in Stillwater, the picturesque little
city, now of 12,000 population, where tho
famous state penitentiary is situated. It
didn't take young Stlckney a long time to
erect a pretty good-slsed practice. He soon
became known for his force and eloquence
as a "pleader," and was a "Jonah" to op
ponents. Born with an insatiable thirst for better
things. Attorney Stlckney founJ ut the end
of eight years' practice that he was con
fined within the limits of a profession
whose pecuniary resources were Insufficient
to satisfy him. So he branched out.
In 1869 he went over to St. Paul, fifteen
miles away, and became a railroad man,
his Initiatory occupation bring that of a
railroad contractor. And ho proved him
self a mighty good hand at the buidiusj.
His first line of road was built from Hud
son, Wis., to New Richmond, which lino
is now a part of the .'Omaha system. In
1S72 ho did his first work as an operator of
a railroad by assuming charge of a small
road running eastward from St. Paul into
Wisconsin, built by him. He was a sub
contractor on about 400 miles of the St.
Paul, Minneapolis & Manitoba road in
1880. Two years later he built a short line
of eighty miles in Minnesota and In 1883
he b gan tho censtruction of the Ch'cig),
St. Paul & Kansas City railroad, now the
Chicago Great Western, which has borne
In succession the names of the Diagonal
railroad. Maple Leaf of the Webt anl the
Chicago & Great Northwestern.
Of late years one of Mr. Stlckney's most
common avocations has b?en to deny that'
his road was for sale. He has done this
with the same vim and tenacity with which
ho fought his way over bridges and rivers
and lawyers and courts and trains of l?gal
technicalities into Omaha. And if he h is
succeeded u well in tho former occupa
tion as In the latter he certainly muat
have the speculative world lid of "Doubt
inK Thomases" once In Its life.
Mr. Stlckney has been called a "fighter.
Men who never saw him In the ring have
accused him of being a hard man to whip,
and it is raid to be some such conviction as
this in the minds of a certain class of mag
nates with an obvious dislike for "the ln
d pendent railroad" which leads to so many
rumors of "the Great Western's" for sale.
But the president of the road insists that
It Is not for sale and that before he tears
up his tracks he means to convince soma
people down Omaha way that It is not.
People who do thonsands of dollars worth
of shipping every year and who have been
of the opinion for several years that they
were not getting quite the concessions they
should, are looking on with great Interest
waiting to see the result of the Great
Western's advent Into Omaha. Will Mr.
Stlckney find it possible to remove the dis
crimination against Omaha that prevents
it from becoming the grain market he says
It should be? Will he Jump in and cut livo
stock rates In two. If he can be made to
see that they are too high? Will .he do
something as he did down at Kansas City
and contract to put packing house products
on the market for less than other roads
have been doing?
Those are Interesting questions which tho
business men of Omaha are asking them
selves and over which doubtless certain
other powers are mora than casually con
cerned. While not a politician in any sense of tho
term, the president of thu Great Western
figured quite prominently a few times In
the presidential campaign of 1900. On sev
eral Important occasions he addrer.scd large
assemblies on tho money question a favor
ite ono with him always attracting wido
attention for his profound utterances In de
fense of sound money und a stable cur
rency. His addresses before national gath
erings of bankers and business men brought
him into the front ranks of the nation as
a student and exponent of safe and con
servative policies.
(Continued on Pago Fifteen.)
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PRESIDENT 8TICKNET AND PARTT LEAVING THE HOTEL. rOR TOTB BANQUET HALL Photo by
a Staff Artist.