Exchange Bark of H. A. Tucker & Co...... Bills in circulation $50,000 Chicago Bank.... Commercial Bank............... .215,000 50,000 ..150,000 55,000 50,000 75,000 54,700 60,000 The capital of these Banks is in some instances half a dozen times the amount of their circulation. The banking capital actually employed to do the business of the city, must amount to several millions, and yet so rapid is the increase of trade, that money within the last six years has never borne less than ten per cent. interest. This is the legal rate established by the laws of Illinois. Most of the time money can be loaned from one to two per cent. per month, by those who are willing to take advantage of the opportunities which are constantly offering. We presume that hundreds of thousands of dollars could be safely invested at any time within a week or two, at the legal rate of interest. We have never seen the money market of Chicago fully supplied at the regular legal rate, viz: ten per cent. per annum. The following is a list of the private bankers and brokers doing business in Chicago: R. K. Swift, Jones & Patrick, Sheldon & Co., J. M. Adsit, F. G. Adams & Co., N. C. Roe & Co., Davisson, McCalla & Co. Several of these firms are doing a large business. R. K. Swift is doing a very extensive business in foreign exchange, and has arrangements to draw on every principal city in this country and Europe. We have tried to obtain the figures showing the actual amount of exchange drawn on New York and other American cities, and the cities of Europe; but some of our bankers, like a portion of our business men, are unwilling to furnish such facts lest, as we infer, other capitalists should send their money here for investment. Their narrow policy we trust will be of no avail in that regard, for they will always have as much business as they can possibly do, and the fact that the legal rate of interest is ten per cent., and that the money market has never yet been fully supplied, together with the certainty that Chicago will not be "finished" for the next century at least, will induce a still larger number of eastern capitalists to invest their money in Chicago. There is not in the wide world, a city that furnishes opportunities for safer investments than Chicago; whether the money is employed in banking operations or is loaned on real estate security. PRICE OF LABOR. In a city growing as rapidly as Chicago, labor is always in demand. Especially is this true where every department of business is equally active and increasing. In dull times, and in cities which have passed the culminating point of their prosperity, master mechanics can select their journeymen, and do somewhat as they wish. For the last year or two, so great has been the demand for labor, that those who worked by the day or week were the real masters, for good mechanics could command almost any price they chose to ask. The following table, carefully prepared, shows the price now usually paid to journeymen in this city. The range is large, but it is not wider than the difference in the skill and capacity of differrent men in every occupation: Wire Workers and Weavers..... 1.00 1.50 14.00 15.00 Wagen and Carriage Painters.... 1.25 2.00 CHICAGO WATER WORKS Occupy more than three columns of the pamphlet in their description, of which we quote two of the most important paragraphs: The cost of work will be $360,000. The same work would now cost $420,000. The Works are now calculated to supply a population of 50,000 persons with 30 gallons of water each every 24 hours, which is equal to 1,500,000 gallons daily. The work is so planned as to be easily extended to meet the wants of 100,000 population by laying more pipe, and building more Reservoirs. MANUFACTURES.-This branch of business is treated of specifically. We have space to quote little more than the names of the subjects. CHICAGO LOCOMOTIVE COMPANY was formed last September with a capital stock of $150,000. They have built two locomotives, are completing the third, and expect, in a short time to "employ about 200 men at their works, and will be able to turn out two engines per month." AMERICAN CAR Co. commenced business in the fall of 1852, have built about 700 cars of all kinds. The number of men employed at the works varies from 250 to 300. The value of finished work sent out from the factory up to the 1st January, 1854, is a little beyond $450,000. Their They UNION CAR WORKS were commenced in September, 1852. Last year they furnished 250 freight, 20 first class passenger, 10 second class passenger, and 10 baggage and post-office cars. machinery is driven by a 75 horse power steam engine. have consumed in the past year about one and a half million feet of timber; 600 tons of wrought iron; 1000 tons of cast iron; 200 tons of coal, and employed 150 men. Messrs. STONE & BOOMER, builders of bridges, turn-tables, &c., have had contracts the past year on 24 different roads in Illinois, Missouri and Wisconsin. This company has a capital invested of $150,000, and employ, upon an average 300 men. They have used 2,000 tons of iron, and 5 million feet of lumber. Bridges completed, 10,000 linear feet; bridges not completed, 27,000 linear feet. Turn-tables completed, 19; not completed, 12. Cubic yards of masonry-completed and not completed, 9,000 Gross earnings, $800,000. The other subjects treated of in this article are, Illinois Stone and Lime Co.-Marble Works-Brick Yards-Coaches, Carriages and Wagons-Furniture-Chicago Oil mill-Soap and Candles -Machinery-Leather Manufacture-Stoves-Agricultural Implements-Break-Water and Depot Buildings of the Illinois Central R. R. Michigan Southern & Rock Island R. R. Depot Galena & Chicago Union R. R. Depot-Cook County Court House -Telegraphs-Omnibus Routes-Bridges, Sidewalks, &c.-Chicago Gas Co.-Health of Chicago-Plank Roads-Cook County Drainage Commission. JOURNAL OF MANUFACTURES. [From the Mining Magazine.] The Cleveland Iron Company. The Cleveland Iron Mining Company have expended about $120,000 for various purposes; buying a town site, (Marquette,) building piers, warehouses, furnaces, &c. Their furnace was destroyed by fire in December last, and now they abandon the manufacture of iron on Lake Superior, and sell all the ore they can get down. All the ore they deliver comes from the Jackson mine. With present facilities, it costs $5 to bring the ore from Marquette to Cleveland. When the S. Ste. Marie Canal, and the railroad from Lake Superior to the iron mines are finished, there will be no difficulty in furnishing Cleveland thousands of tons of ore per year, from the Lake Superior country. The Cleveland mine is about twelve miles, and the Jackson mine nine miles from the Marquette landing. The line of railroad is now partially graded for a plank road, and will be about sixteen miles long, to the Cleveland mine. THE FOREST IRON COMPANY. The Forest City Iron Company of Cleveland are pushing ahead their works as fast as the weather will permit. They will probably commence manufacturing about the first of April. They are a very energetic Company, and if the Renton process is what it is claimed to be, they will make a great deal of money out of it. This Company have contracted with the Cleveland Iron Mining Company for one thousand tons of ore delivered at Cleveland for $12 per ton, which they intend to mix with ore from their mine at Salineville, on the Cleveland and Pittsburg Railroad. PRICES OF IRON. The Secretary of the Treasury of Virginia, in reply to a resolution of the State Senate adopted a year ago, has reported the average price of iron for the last ten years preceding 1853, at markets of production abroad and at home, as follows: Average of merchantable bar iron at Liverpool............$31 78 66 56 52 merchantable bar iron at New York.... 66 best refined iron in Liverpool.. 55 45 47 641 best refined iron at N. York, 6 months credit 75 50 THE IRON TRADE OF GREAT BRITAIN. Retrospect since 1806; and the increased proportion which Scotland bears to the whole. FURNACES IN BLAST, AND PRODUCTION IN GREAT BRITAIN. ...... ...... .... AVERAGE PRICES OF PIG AND BAR IRON FOR THE LAST TWENTY YEARS. Bar Iron. £6 26 10 12 0 1846**** 15 @ 3 11 8 940 9 18 0 9 12 6 1838 0 0 950 1848 222223 |