Prospectus of the American Guano Company [BRARY THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES PROSPECTUS ANO COMPANY. N1-:\V YORK: IS F. TROW PRINTER, 53 ANN STREET. 1855. PROSPECTUS OF THE AMERICAN GUANO COMPANY. NEW YORK: JOHN F. TROW PRINTER, 53 ANN STREET. 1855, American (Stoaiur President. Vice-president. A. G. BENSON. BEETRAM IT. HOWELL. Trustees. GEORGE W. BEEBEE, Tiros. G. TALMAGE, WILLIAM E. MORRIS, SAMUEL A. ROLLO, GEORGE HALL, BERTRAM H. HOWELL, and ALFRED G. BENSON. Treasurer and Secretary JAS. S. WYOKOFF. PROSPECTUS, The American Guano Company is organized under certain articles of agreement and asso- ciation, dated New York, the first day of Sep- tember, 1855. THIS Company own an island in the Pacific Ocean, covered with a deposit of more than two hundred million tons of ammoniated guano, and 'have de- spatched a ship, agent, and men, to maintain possession thereof. The capital stock of said company is tenV; millions of dollars, and is represented by one hundred/f thousand shares, at one hundred dollars a share. Sixty thousand shares of said stock have been expended to purchase the island, and to despatch the ship before mentioned ; and forty thousand shares are appropriated as the working capital of the Company, and are placed in the hands of Trustees to be sold for the further pro- motion of the enterprise. 6y*.<^ 88934.3 The Trustees now offer for sale twenty thousand shares of this stock, at ten dollars ($10) per share, on terms made known at the office of the Company. The island is described by the discoverer as follows : " Its size is about eight miles long, by four miles broad. Its shape is crescent, and is quite low and level. It has a very good harbor on the westerly side, where fifty to one hundred ships of the largest class can safely lie and load within fifty feet of the shore. Its forma- tion is coral, and it is covered with a deposit, from ten to thirty feet deep, the surface of which presents a lightish crust in some places, and porous in others. There being found thereon no trace of tree, shrub, or verdure of any sort, said deposit cannot have arisen from any vegetable substance ; while the innumerable multitude of birds found there, coupled with the pungent smell evolved from their ordure, its color, its ashy, impalpable nature, its location in a dry and warm latitude, one and all unite to confirm the convic- tion that said deposit can fce nothing but one vast bed of ammoniated guano." Excepting this one, no Guano Island hitherto dis- covered possesses the natural advantages of a good harbor, safe anchorage, and conveniences to load a large number of ships at once. At the Chincha Islands there is no harbor, and one vessel only can load at a time under the Manguera (though lately some have loaded in launches), and yet there were exported from that place over four hun- dred thousand tons of guano during the past year. From the past and present demand for Peruvian guano, now selling at fifty-five dollars per ton, it is safe to presume that there will be no difficulty when under a full and complete business organization, in disposing of at least two million tons per annum, at thirty dol- lars per ton from the island belonging to this Company, because they can load ten ships in the time one is load- ed at the Chincha Islands, but not to appear extrava- gant, it is proposed to estimate the sales of this com- pany the first year after being in full operation at only four hundred thousand tons, which sold at thirty (not fifty-five) dollars a ton, presents the following result : 400,000 tons at $30 per ton, is, - $12,000,000 Shipping expenses per ton, - $2 00 Freight, - - " " - 18 00 Insurance, - " " 30 Commission on sale and in- i . . I And storage, - - - 2 00 cidental expenses, $24 00 9,600,000 Leaving a profit for dividend of $2,400,000 In case the Government of the United States, or any other government, should purchase the said island and pay for the same, a fixed sum in cash or govern- ment stock or agree to pay a specified sum per ton as the guano should be mined and shipped then in the former case a final dividend would be made pro rata to the Stockholders, and the concern wound up ; or in the latter case dividends would be made from time to time until the entire deposit shall have been exhausted. THE ANNEXED EXTRACTS SHOW THE GREAT IMPORTANCE ATTACHED TO THIS SUBJECT. The following Preamble and Kesolutions were una- nimously adopted on the 22d June, 1855, at the regular meeting of the Farmers' Club of the American Insti- tute, of the City of New York, held at the Repository, No. 531 Broadway : WHEREAS the Peruvian Government has monopolized the supply of Guano throughout the United States ; and WflEREas, on account of said monopoly, the Farmers of this country have heretofore been obliged to pay for said article about $50 a ton, and by a recent announcement of that Government there is no^prospect hereafter of any re- duction, and WHEREAS there is reason to believe that islands contain- ing large and valuable deposits of ammoniated guano have recently been discovered by citizens of the United States, who have made application to the Government at Wash- ington for protection therein ; and WHEREAS, if said protection shall be afforded, the Farm- ers of this country will reap the benefit of said fertilizer at an advance of but $1 on the freight of the same to our shores, instead of an onerous tax of more than $25 per ton now paid Peru ; therefore, RESOLVED, That it is the duty of the American Govern- ment to assert its sovereignty over any and all barren and uninhabitable guano islands of the ocean which have been or hereafter may be discovered by citizens of the United States, and which are situated so far from any continent that, according to the laws which govern nations, no other power can rightfully exercise jurisdiction over them, and to guarantee the right of property therein to the discoverer, his successors or assigns, RESOLVED, That the Agricultural Societies of the several States be invited to concur in the foregoing, and to unite in calling upon our Government at Washington and the distinguished public men now before the country, for their views on this important question. RESOLVED, That Bread being the staff of life, its abund- ance furnishes the basis of national prosperity. RESOLVED, That the foregoing resolutions be printed in the form of a circular, signed by the President and Secre- tary, and transmitted to the County and State Agricultural Societies of the several States, to the President of the United States, and heads of departments at Washington. ROBERT S. LIVINGSTON, Chairman. HENRY MEIGS, Secretary. 8 A LATE WRITER SAYS : " The commercial enterprise of our country is seek- ing out and bringing the treasures of the waters to our farms and orchards, in the form of guano perhaps the antediluvian remains of the countless myriads that lived before the flood. Treasures, indeed rich in the one needful thing, without which our labor would be vain, our fertile soils a barren waste." " The real and only value of all manures, be they bones, guano, or barn-yard manure, ashes or city sweepings, can be easily estimated, by the percentage of ingredients they contain, which the atmosphere or soil do not furnish of themselves ; by the quantity of sub- stances which the land wants, and not by the quantity it does not want, or which it does not receive gratui- tously from the atmosphere above it, the cost of labor necessary to transport the manure to the land, and to make it available." FROM A REPORT OJT GUANO, BY DR. URE : "Guano, therefore, is found to contain such sub- stances, in such proportions, as to surpass very far all other species of manure, whether natural or artificial, both in the permanency of its action upon the roots of plants, and also in giving immediate vigor to vegetation." PROFESSOR LIEBIG BELIEVES : " That the importation of one hundredweight of guano is equivalent to the importation of eight hun- dredweight of wheat ; so that one hundredweight of guano assumes, with due culture, the form of eight hundredweight of substantial food for man." t/ ^-E^^ <J,st _/ / * y ^^^ (Zfa^pf^ d&*^^ Or University of California SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 405 Hilgard Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90024-1388 Return this material to the library from which it was borrowed. NON-RENEWABLE 1992 tJ TE RECEIVED CjcivjLrJ = UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY A 000 941 204 o Universi South Libr