| wild cat banking. Debt repudiation by cities, states and other
public bodies in the middle west was widespread, and there was failing
confidence among foreign and eastern investors.Development of the west
was jeopardized, Chicago's credit was questioned, and the future
of the city was darkened. Keenly aware of the possible results of this
condition if it remained unchecked, Chicago's business leaders came together
late in 1856 to perform a duty and take advantage of an opportunity. Among
these leaders were D. R. Holt, William B. Ogden, Cyrus H. McCormick, John
Wentworth, Grant Goodrich, Walter L. Newberry, Solomon A. Smith, Augustus
H. Burley and others. They decided to found a bank of reliability so conservative
that it would revive local confidence and re-establish respect for Chicago
in distant places. That bank was The Merchants Loan & Trust Co., which
opened for business on June 10, 1857, and which in 1922 was merged with
two others to form the Illinois Merchants Bank.
D. R. Holt was the bank's first cashier, and he served until
1862 when he resigned and recommended Lyman J. Gage, a bookkeeper in the
same bank, as his successor. Mr. Gage later attained fame as a financier,
and from the presidency of a Chicago bank became Secretary of the Treasury
under McKinley and Roosevelt.
In 1862 D. R. Holt entered into a partnership with Uri Balcom
and bought the sawmill at Oconto, which was built in 1856 by the Norton
Lumber Company of which George Farnsworth, Sr., was superintendent, and
which has been in use ever since. The business was carried on under the
name of Holt & Balcom until 1888, when D. R. Holt bought out Mr. Balcom
and incorporated the business as the Holt Lumber Co.
D. R. Holt had nine children, two of whom died in infancy. The
others were Leila, George H., Charles S., Anna (Mrs. Arthur D. Wheeler),
Alfred L., William Arthur, and Ellen, of whom Ellen and William Arthur
survive. D. R. Holt and his bride established their first residence on
Washington Street, between Wells and LaSalle, a section long since included
in the Chicago Loop district and given over entirely to office buildings
and stores. Later, they moved to Michigan Avenue, and in 1860 established
their permanent home in Lake Forest, Ill. This home is still occupied by
Miss Ellen Holt. In 1910 members of the family met in reunion at the homestead
to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary ot its founding.
On the death of D. R. Holt, in 1899, George H. Holt became president
and W. A. Holt became vice-president. George Holt was born in 1852 in the
house on Washington Street. He was educated at Lake Forest Academy, and
went to work for Holt & BDICOM in 1870, first in the Chicago office
and later in Oconto. When he was 22, he and his brother Charles took a
trip around the world, a novel undertaking at that time. Upon his return
he went to Colorado to engage in mining, and was manager of the Little
Chief Mine at Leadville in the boom days. Later he moved to Crested Butte,
Colo., where he was engaged in coal and silver mining, operated a large
general store, and owned a sawmill. When his brother Alfred became ill
in 1886, he went with him to San Diego, Calif., and for the next two years
spent most of his time operating a raisin vineyard.
In 1888, when the Holt Lumber Co. was incorporated, George Holt
was made vice -president, a position which he held until the death of his
father in 1899, when he was elected president. He held that office until
1922, when he sold his interest in the company to his brother, W. A. Holt.
Always man of
Sixty-six |
multiple interests, George Holt in 1900 started the American
Lumber Company, which carried on a jobbing business in Duluth and later
in the south, and was discontinued in 1918. In 1912 he bought a tract of
white pine in Canada, but it was damaged by fire, and he had to log it
faster than he had intended, so for a time he carried on a large business
in Canada. Not content with these activities, he went to Florida, and started
the Holt Electric Co., of Jacksonville, which did a large business in electrical
supplies in that city and in Tampa and Miami. He also owned and operated
the Manhattan Building, a large office building in Chicago, and the Policy
Holders' Union, an insurance organization. He was a recognized authority
on insurance matters, and delivered many addresses and wrote many articles
on fire insurance. He addressed various lumber associations on the subject,
and was influential in securing legislation affecting insurance in Wisconsin.
He was in active business in Florida at the time of his death in February,
1924.
W. A. Holt, who was born in Lake Forest, Ill., in 1865 and was educated at Lake Forest Academy, entered the lumber business in 1882 at the age of 17, when the firm name was Holt & Balcom. This he did against the advice of his father who told him that at the rate trees were being cut, the Wisconsin and Michigan forests would be exhausted in ten years. "You will just about learn this business," said the elder Holt, "when it will disappear." Notwithstanding, W. A. Holt, who had been reared in an atmosphere of Wisconsin pine, decided to cast his lot with the lumber business, and during the first six years he divided his time between the Chicago and Oconto offices and the woods north of the latter. That was an interesting and enriching experience. In those offices he grew to know the deans of northern white pine logging-Isaac Stephenson, A. G. Van Schaick, A. A. Carpenter, Jesse Spaulding, Nelson Ludington, George Farnsworth, James C. Brooks and Daniel Wells. Discussions between these men and his father and numerous other lumbermen gave him a wealth of first-hand information about the whole industry from financing through logging, sawing and marketing. "Uncle Ike (Stephenson) was one of the lumbermen who made a fortune out of cheap timber," Mr. Holt recalls. "One day H. Witheck, who was buying choice white pine stumpage on the upper tributaries of the Menominee River for four dollars a thousand, met Uncle Ike who had iust purchased a lot af small Norway and white pihe on the Pike and the Pemene Rivers for two dollars a thousand. Witheck asked him why he wanted to buy such small common timber. Uncle Ike replied that he would get a lot more out of his timber than Witheck would ever get. Witbeck and others logged theirs in a hurry, and averaged 16 dollars a thousand for it. Uncle Ike had more timber and continued to cut it after the others were through with theirs and toward the last sold it for 25 dollars a thousand." "Those were great days," said Mr. Holt. "At times after several days Of brisk north winds which aided the ships coming down from Wisconsin the Chicago River was crammed with lumber cargoes from the Lake Street bridge down to the Clark Street bridge, At such times bidding and buying were very active. On the contrary, after a long period of south wind, the river would be nearly empty. The Wisconsin and Upper Michigan men had to depend on the wind to sail their cargoes down from the loading points. Lower Michigan Sixty-seven |