Mining Syndicate Collapses After Tragedy
A judge appoints a receiver for two local coal mining companies following the death of their president and mounting unpaid wages.
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.
Upon the petition of Henry Hewitt Jr., Judge Huston has appointed Henry Bucey receiver for the Washington Co-operative Mining Syndicate and the Montezuma Mining Company. Henry Hewitt Jr. claims that each of the companies owes him $15,000, and further states that employees working in the coal properties have received no pay since November 30. The crisis was hastened by the death of Captain C. W. Thompson, who was president and manager of both companies and died while en route to negotiate a sale of property interests in British Columbia. While the companies hold coal property valued at approximately $400,000, liabilities total $40,000 against only $24,000 in available assets. Operations at the Fairfax mines will be closed for the present, with plans to reopen in approximately three months.
“I asked for a receiver, he said, Because I believed it was the only thing to do in this case.”
Fairfax was once a bustling coal town, but today it is largely a ghost site near the Carbon River, emblematic of the boom-and-bust cycle that defined early industrial Tacoma. The struggle for back wages remains a recurring echo in labor news, reminding us that workers are often the last to be considered when corporate insolvency hits.
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