Big San Francisco

San Francisco financial circles were last week agitated over the decision of the San Francisco Grain Trade Association to establish a securities trading department. Inasmuch as San Francisco already has a Stock Exchange, a Curb and a Mining Exchange, it might appear that San Franciscans have already ample opportunity to play the market. So rapidly is the main Exchange growing, indeed, that Coast authorities claim it has passed Chicago and ranks as the second largest U. S. board. The Grain Trade Association, nevertheless, despite the opposition of its parent body, the Chamber of Commerce, has decided to organize an additional trading department, presumably modeled along the lines of the New York Produce Exchange.

Easterners know that Los Angeles has outstripped San Francisco in population, in recent fame. They may not know that in 1928 San Francisco bank clearings totaled more than $11,000,000, largest west of Chicago, fifth largest in U. S. Of the 100 largest U. S. banks (1928) there were 30 in New York, 11 in Chicago, 8 in San Francisco. Home of Bank of Italy, central bank of the Giannini system. San Francisco shrugs its shoulders at cinema and citrus, argues that from the standpoint of stable commerce, of sound finance, of industrial prosperity, that the glitter of the Golden Gate is still undimmed.

Two among San Francisco tycoons have been thoroughly publicized. Who does not know that Robert Dollar was born in Scotland, is 85 years old, works from 12 to 16 hours a day, operates the Dollar Line, largest privately owned U. S. fleet? Famed too is Amadeo Peter Giannini, though his banking reputation has not invariably included the facts that he is a Papal Knight, that he suffers from chronic neuritis, that he does not approve of private offices. But with Dollar, with Giannini, the list of San Francisco financiers is only begun.

Fleishhackers. Prominent, for example, are the Fleishhackers--Brothers Mortimer and Herbert. Lean, reserved, relatively unsocial is Mortimer, president of Anglo-California Trust Co. Sharply contrasted is Herbert, stocky, rumpled, good-mixing president of Anglo & London Paris National Bank. A poker-player, a crap-shooter is Herbert; he plays also a talkative game of mediocre and expensive bridge. He unsuccessfully backed local horseracing and doodlebug enterprises. He once raised 600 species of orchids on a bet. The Fleishhackers have wide interests in oil, rails, utilities, industrials.

Kingsbury. A close friend of the Fleishhackers is smooth, dignified, impeccable Kenneth Raleigh Kingsbury, head of Standard Oil Co. of California. He has been mentioned as the Rockefeller candidate for Board Chairmanship of Standard Oil of Indiana. Once (in 1923) Mr. Kingsbury, taking a cross-continental trip, was shocked to discover waiting for him at every station no less strange a present than a bag of onions. The onion-sender was Herbert Fleishhacker. Soon, at the Anglo & London-Paris National Bank, there arrived a return present from Mr. Kingsbury. The Kingsbury gift consisted of two water-buffaloes, several crates of smaller animals, and a liveried bugler to announce the arrival of the menagerie. Buffaloes, animals, bugler were all sent C. O. D.

Crocker. When President Hoover was President-Elect Hoover and rumors of his probable appointments filled the newspapers. Banker William Henry Crocker, Republican National Committeeman, stood well up in the list of those mentioned for Ambassador to St. James's. Son of Charles Crocker, who built the

Southern Pacific, William Crocker inherited the Crocker fortune and the First National Bank of San Francisco. As a second-generation tycoon, he is ultraconservative, correct, distant, cosmopolitan. Traditional even in his recreations, he is an ardent golfer.

Hockenbeamer. More characteristically, western, perhaps, is August Hockenbeamer, president of Pacific Gas & Electric. A onetime newspaper boy, his commercial career includes a period of collecting bad bills for a book store and of filling lamps in Pennsylvania R. R. offices. Mr. Hockenbeamer works incessantly, golfs indifferently, smokes continually (large, strong cigars). He was an originator of the idea that the general public should be invited to hold stocks in utilities. In 1914 Pacific Gas & Electric had 3,000 stockholders. It has some 50,000 today.

A. B. C. Dohrmann. Head of the Dohrmann Commercial Co., coastwide merchants, is A. B. C. Dohrmann, onetime director in San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank, present member of State Industrial Welfare Commission. Mr. Dohrmann has dabbled somewhat in motion-picture producing. He believes in short skirts, in efficiency for women.

Other Tycoons. Incomplete must be any brief list of San Francisco financiers. Thus San Franciscans might well object to the omission of John Drum, head of American Trust Co., now, after many mergers, San Francisco's large independent bank ($273,776,849 in deposits). Like Giannini, Mr. Drum is a Papal Knight. He is most famed for his starry-domed marble bungalow atop the Fairmont Hotel atop Nob Hill. Notable also is able Frank B. Anderson, board chairman of Bank of California; his chief idiosyncrasy, a fondness for donkeys. Paul Shoup, President of Southern Pacific Co. also stands high among the 585,300 citizens who maintain San Francisco's position as first financial city of the West.