Page:The History of the Standard Oil Company Vol 1.djvu/282

Rh a verdict that the charges of the oil producers had not been substantiated in any way that demanded action.

The indignation which followed this report was intense. It found a vent in the hanging in effigy of McCandless, who was universally known in the state as "Buck." In the oil exchange at Parker, on the morning of October 19, the figure of a man was found hanged by the neck to a gallows, and the producers left it hanging there all day, so that they might jeer and curse it. Across the forehead of the effigy in large blood-red letters were the words:

Pinned to the gallows there was a card bearing a quotation from Secretary McCandless's report:

In Bradford a huge effigy hung in the streets all day, and in the village of Tarport, near by, another swayed on the gallows. They pulled down the effigy at Bradford, and drew from a pocket what purported to be a check signed by John D. Rockefeller, president of the Standard Oil Company, in favour of "Buck" McCandless, for $20,000, and endorsed by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company. That represented the price, they said, that McCandless got for signing the report. Throughout the oil country there was hardly an oil producer to be found not associated with the Standard Oil Company who did not believe that McCandless had sold himself and his office to the Standard Oil Combination for $20,000, and used the money to help in his Congressional canvass.

The excitement in the Oil Regions spread all over the