Yesler Avenue Cable Line Sold to Syndicates
A major transit deal changes hands as the Wilmans brothers exit the Seattle streetcar market to focus on mining interests.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The controlling interest in the Seattle City Railway Company has been sold by C. Wilmans, J. M. Wilmans, and F. W. Wilmans to a syndicate of capitalists represented by Fred E. Sander. The management of the property will be transferred to the new owners on August 1. The transaction involves between $100,000 and $200,000. It carries with it the controlling interest in the Union Navigation Company, which owns the steamers Kirkland and Edith S. on Lake Washington. The Wilmans brothers are anxious to concentrate their interests in their mining property and have disposed of the road. Mr. Sander, already active in the street railway business with the Union Trunk line and the Grant street electric line, will operate the road in connection with those interests. O. S. Buckbee, the secretary and manager, has tendered his resignation effective August 1 and will join the Wilmans Mining Company.
“The Wilmans brothers have found the business of the Yesler avenue cable railway, which is operated by the Seattle City Railway Company, very satisfactory during the period of their control, but they are anxious to concentrate their interests in their mining property.”
The consolidation of independent transit lines was a hallmark of late 19th-century Seattle urban growth, much like the modern regional transit expansion. The sale marks the transition from private streetcar operators to larger, consolidated corporate monopolies that defined the city's early streetcar era.
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