R "COPPERS"

The plan I had so carefully formulated in connection with "Coppers" was
simple in application yet vast in scope. It was to buy up all the good
producing mines at their market price, or double if necessary, to
organize them into a new corporation and offer its stock to the public
at a capitalization of double the original cost. By advertising the
exceptional merits of the copper industry and the financial power of the
men who were backing it, the public would become educated to a knowledge
of the values of "Coppers." Under this education the world of capital
would invest in copper shares until the price had advanced, because of
so much capital seeking this form of investment, to a point where the
net return was brought down to the going rate of, say, four per cent.
This would mean that the old going prices of good producing Boston
copper-mines would advance 100 to 200 per cent., which in turn meant
that those who risked their money in the first venture (which I figured
would require $100,000,000) would make $100,000,000 to $200,000,000,
while at the same time the public would make $200,000,000 to
$400,000,000. This seems like an "Aladdin-lamp" story when it is told,
but, as a matter of fact, prices afterward did advance in this ratio,
and 100 and 200 per cent. beyond, and many of them, notwithstanding the
tremendous drops that have taken place since, still show from 200 to 300
per cent. advance over the prices then in vogue. _Never in all the
history of business was there afforded capitalists so fair an
opportunity to make honestly and legitimately so vast a sum of money and
at the same time to do so much for the people. Nor was there a more
honorable undertaking nor one which a man could be more justly proud of
carrying to success._

As time went on, this big enterprise was more and more in my thoughts,
and I tested it in every way I knew, going over in my mind and trying
out each successive step and link until I was certain the whole
structure was unassailable. Then it became my purpose in life to launch
the venture. The difficulties of the task were never for a moment
overlooked, for I well knew that much money would be required, but with
strong backing success was sure, and such a success was tremendously
worth attaining. Next to putting in force my financial invention which
would remedy the evils of the "System," this great copper project seemed
the thing--the dollar thing--best worth doing in all th