A Corporate Squeeze in Seattle
A stockholder sues to place a local railway and elevator company under receivership, alleging a conspiracy to freeze out investors.
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.
F. F. Shaubut yesterday applied to Judge Langley for a receiver of the Seattle Terminal Railway & Elevator Company, in which he is a considerable stockholder, on the ground that when the trustees leased the property to the Seattle Terminal Railway & Warehouse Company, the lease was not made in good faith, but to defraud creditors and stockholders. Shaubut claims he was denied notice of the meeting, rendering it void. He alleges the goal of this conspiracy is to force the elevator company into insolvency so that the warehouse company can freeze out stockholders and seize valuable property through foreclosure. Shaubut asserts that if a receiver were appointed, the company could easily pay off all obligations, including bonded indebtedness. The petition will be heard by Judge Langley on February 2.
“He claims that although he was one of the trustees he was given no notice of the special meeting called to consider the making of the lease, and that the meeting was therefore illegal and all matters done at it void.”
Corporate maneuvering to acquire land and assets through artificial insolvency is a tactic that persists in Seattle's real estate and development history. This 1894 dispute reflects the perennial tension between minority shareholders and the firms that consolidate control over the city's physical infrastructure.
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