A Chicago Syndicate Wants a Refrigerator-Car Factory — and It Wants the Land for Free
A Chicago car builder tours Tacoma and Seattle touting a plant that could turn out up to sixty refrigerator cars a day, weighing Puget Sound lumber against Eastern iron — and letting it be known the syndicate is open to "propositions for donated sites."
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.
TACOMA, Aug. 30. — [Special.] — J. E. Fortneir, of Chicago, was here today in the interest of a car-building establishment, which he and Chicago men are figuring on establishing somewhere in the Northwest. It is proposed to build refrigerator cars, and an establishment that can turn out from ten to sixty cars a day is talked of. Mr. Fortneir has discussed the matter with Seattle men, and he is confident there is an opening here for the manufacture of these cars on an extensive scale. While most of the necessary iron for the cars could, it is claimed, be secured in the East more cheaply than in this section, the cheapness of lumber here far overbalances the slight additional cost of iron parts laid down here. Mr. Fortneir has gone to Gray's Harbor, and will go East via Portland, and will report to his people in the East, and then the syndicate will be open to propositions for donated sites. It is estimated that $60 can be saved in lumber alone on each refrigerator car by building here. This is on account of the cheapness in lumber.
“Then the syndicate will be open to propositions for donated sites.”
In 1894 the ask was a free site for a boxcar plant; today it is a tax abatement, a utility discount and an environmental review fast-track. The reflex is identical — a visiting promoter shops several Puget Sound towns against each other, praises the cheap timber, and lets the bidding begin before he has even bought a ticket home.
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