Page:The Wizard of Wall Street and his Wealth.djvu/98

 pay a dividend. For many years it remained in the hands of a receiver.

The testimony of J. W. Guppy before the Hepburn Committee, already referred to, gives some interesting details of Gould's management of the Erie. Among the roads which Erie leased were the Chemung railroad and the Canandaigua and Elmira. These leases were very profitable to Erie, but Gould, as an individual, after quietly purchasing a majority of their capital stocks, as president of Erie refused to pay the rentals, thus abrogating the leases. Then he sold the roads to the Northern Central of Pennsylvania at a big profit. Gould and Fisk organized a number of auxiliary companies whose plant was usually paid for by Erie, but whose stock went into the pockets of Gould, Fisk and their associates. Among these companies was the National Stock Yard Company. The land was purchased and the improvements made by Erie, but the stock was divided as so much spoils, 800 shares finding their way into the pockets of Judge Barnard. The Erie Emigrant Company, the Jefferson Railroad Company, the Blackford Company and the Greenwood Coal Company were the names of some of the companies practically saddled upon Erie, but whose stock was issued to Gould and Fisk without consideration.

August Stein, who made an examination into the records, told the Hepburn Committee that the amount of Gould's wrong-doing in Erie was about $12,000,000. By this was meant the amount which he wrongfully appropriated.