Editing James J. Hill (section)

==Biography==

===Childhood and youth===
James J. Hill was born September 16, 1838, in [[Guelph/Eramosa|Eramosa Township, Upper Canada]] (now [[Ontario]]) to James Hill Jr. and Ann Dunbar. A childhood accident with a bow and arrow blinded him in the right eye. He had nine years of formal schooling. He attended the [[Rockwood Academy (Ontario)|Rockwood Academy]] for a short while, where the head of the academy gave him free tuition.<ref>See [http://www.railserve.com/JJHill.html James J. Hill and the Building of His Railroad Empire] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190930173759/http://www.railserve.com/JJHill.html |date=September 30, 2019 }} [[Railserve]]</ref> He was forced to leave school in 1852 after the death of his father. By that time, he was adept at math, [[land surveying]], and English. His particular talents for English and mathematics were helpful in his career.
[[File:JamesJHill1856.jpg|thumb|upright|Hill c. 1856]]
After working as a clerk in Kentucky (during which he learned [[bookkeeping]]), Hill decided to permanently move to the United States and settled in [[St. Paul, Minnesota]], at the age of 18. His first job in St. Paul was with a [[steamboat]] company, where he worked as a bookkeeper. By 1860, he was working for [[wholesale]] grocers, for whom he handled freight transfers, especially dealing with railroads and steamboats. Through this work, he learned all aspects of the freight and transportation business. During this period, Hill began to work for himself for the first time. During the winter months when the [[Mississippi River]] was frozen and steamboats could not run, Hill started bidding on other contracts and won several.<ref name="Pyle. 1918">Pyle. 1918.</ref>

===Young businessman===
Because of his previous experiences in shipping and fuel supply, Hill was able to enter both the coal and steamboat businesses.  In 1870, he and his partners started the Red River Transportation Company, which offered steam boat transportation between St. Paul and [[Winnipeg]].<ref>{{cite web|title=James J. Hill Biography|url=http://www.oregonhistoryproject.org/articles/biographies/james-j-hill-biography/|work=The Oregon Historical Society|access-date=September 28, 2013|archive-date=July 29, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190729143319/https://oregonhistoryproject.org/articles/biographies/james-j-hill-biography/|url-status=dead}}</ref> By 1879 he had a local [[monopoly]] by merging with [[Norman Kittson]]. In 1867, Hill entered the coal business, and by 1879 it had expanded five times over, giving Hill a local monopoly in the [[anthracite|anthracite coal]] business. During this same period, Hill also entered into banking and quickly managed to become member of several major banks' [[boards of directors]]. He also bought out bankrupt businesses, built them up again, and then resold them—often gaining a substantial profit.  Hill noted that the secret to his success was "work, hard work, intelligent work, and then more work."<ref>{{cite book |title= Highways of Progress |last=Hill |first= James J.|year= 2001 |publisher= Minerva Group |isbn= 0-89499-025-X}}</ref>

===Entry into Gilded Era railroading===
During the [[Panic of 1873]], a number of railroads, including the [[St. Paul and Pacific Railroad]] (StP&P), went bankrupt. The StP&P was caught in an almost hopeless legal muddle.  Hill researched the StP&P for three years and finally concluded that it would be possible to turn a profit off the StP&P, provided that the initial capital could be found. Hill teamed up with [[Norman Kittson]] (the man he had merged steamboat businesses with), [[Donald Smith, 1st Baron Strathcona and Mount Royal|Donald Smith]],<ref name="martin">{{cite journal|last1=Martin|first1=Joseph E.|title=Titans|journal=Canada's History|date=2017|volume=97|issue=5|pages=47–53|issn=1920-9894}}</ref> [[George Stephen, 1st Baron Mount Stephen|George Stephen]] and [[John Stewart Kennedy]]. Together they not only bought the railroad, they also vastly expanded it by bargaining for trackage rights with the [[Northern Pacific Railway]]. In May 1879, the St. Paul, Minneapolis, and Manitoba Railway Co. (StPM&M) formed—with James J. Hill as general manager. His first goal was to expand and upgrade even more.

Hill was a hands-on, detail-obsessed manager. A Canadian of Scotch-Irish Protestant ancestry, he brought in many men with the same background into high management.<ref>Claire Strom, "Among Friends: The Power of Ethnicity in the Great Northern Railway Corporation," ''Journal of the West'' (2009) 48#4 pp 11-17.</ref>  He wanted people to settle along his rail lines, so he sold homesteads to immigrants while transporting them to their new homes using his rail lines. When he was looking for the best path for one of his tracks to take, he went on horseback and scouted it personally. Under his management, StPM&M prospered. In 1880, its net worth was $728,000 (equal to ${{Inflation|US|728000|1880|fmt=c}} today); in 1885 it was $25,000,000, equal to ${{Inflation|US|25000000|1885|fmt=c}} today.

One of his challenges at this point was the avoidance of federal action against railroads. If the [[United States Government|federal government]] believed that the railroads were making too much profit, they might see this as an opportunity to force lowering of the railway tariff rates. Hill avoided this by investing a large portion of the railroad's profit back into the railroad itself—and charged those investments to operating expense.

[[File:James J. Hill.jpg|150px|thumb|Hill c. 1890]]

==="Empire Builder"===
Between 1883 and 1889, Hill built his railroads across [[Minnesota]], into [[Wisconsin]], and across [[North Dakota]] to [[Montana]].

When there was not enough industry in the areas Hill was building, Hill brought the industry in, often by buying out a company and placing plants along his railroad lines. By 1889, Hill decided that his future lay in expanding into a [[transcontinental railroad]].

"What we want," Hill is quoted as saying, "is the best possible line, shortest distance, lowest grades, and least curvature we can build. We do not care enough for [[Rocky Mountains]] scenery to spend a large sum of money developing it."<ref>{{cite book |title= James J. Hill and the opening of the Northwest|last= Marin |first= Albro |year= 1991 |publisher= Minnesota Historical Society Press |isbn= 0-87351-261-8 |page= 366}}</ref> Hill got what he wanted, and in January 1893 his [[Great Northern Railway (U.S.)|Great Northern Railway]], running from St. Paul, Minnesota to Seattle, Washington — a distance of more than {{convert|1700|mi|km}} — was completed. The Great Northern was the first transcontinental built without public money and just a few [[land grant]]s, and was one of the few transcontinental railroads not to go bankrupt.

Hill chose to build his transcontinental railroad north of the competing Northern Pacific line, which had reached the Pacific Northwest over much more difficult terrain with more bridges, steeper grades, and tunnelling. Hill did much of the route planning himself, travelling over proposed routes on horseback. The key to the Great Northern line was Hill's use of the previously unmapped [[Marias Pass]]. The pass had initially been described by Lewis and Clark in 1805, but no one since had been able to find it so Hill hired Santiago Jameson to find it. Jameson discovered the pass 1889 and it shortened the Great Northern's route by almost one hundred miles.{{sfnp|Folsom|2003|p=28}} The pass had been discovered by [[John Frank Stevens]], principal engineer of the Great Northern Railway, in December 1889, and offered an easier route across the Rockies than that taken by the Northern Pacific.

The Great Northern reached Seattle on January 7, 1893.<ref name="ws">{{cite book |last1=Speidel |first1=William |title=Sons of the Profits |date=1967 |publisher=Nettle Creek Publishing Company |location=Seattle |pages=182, 203–209}}</ref>

In 1898 Hill purchased control of large parts of the [[Mesabi Range]] iron mining district in Minnesota, along with its rail lines. The Great Northern began large-scale shipment of ore to the steel mills of the Midwest.<ref>Don L. Hofsommer, "Ore Docks and Trains: The Great Northern Railway and the Mesabi Range," ''Railroad History'' (1996) Issue 174, pp 5-25</ref>

====Settlements====
The Great Northern energetically promoted settlement along its lines in North Dakota and Montana, especially by Germans and Scandinavians from Europe. The Great Northern bought its lands from the federal government—it received no land grants—and resold them to farmers at cheap prices. It operated agencies in Germany and Scandinavia that promoted its lands, and brought families over at low cost. Hill also invested in founding schools and churches for these communities and promoted a variety of progressive techniques to ensure they prospered.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Robber Barons|url=https://archive.org/details/robberbaronsgrea00jose|url-access=registration|last=Josephson|first=Matthew|publisher=Harcourt, Brace and Company|year=1934|location=New York|pages=[https://archive.org/details/robberbaronsgrea00jose/page/237 237]}}</ref> This "Dakota Boom" peaked in 1882 as 42,000 immigrants, largely from northern Europe, poured into the Red River Valley running through the region.<ref>{{Cite book|title=James J. Hill: Empire Builder of the Northwest|last=Malone|first=Michael|publisher=University of Oklahoma|year=1996|isbn=0-8061-2860-7|location=Norman|pages=[https://archive.org/details/jamesjhill00mich/page/27 27]|url=https://archive.org/details/jamesjhill00mich/page/27}}</ref> The rapidly increasing settlement in North Dakota's [[Red River Valley]] along the Minnesota border between 1871 and 1890 was a major example of large-scale "bonanza" farming.<sup>[8][9][10]</sup>

===Hill Lines in the 1890s===
Six months after the railroad reached Seattle came the deep nationwide depression called the [[Panic of 1893]].{{sfnp|Martin|1976|ps=&nbsp;Chap.14}} Hill's leadership became a case study in the successful management of a capital-intensive business during the economic downturn. In order to ensure that he did not lose his patronage during the crisis, Hill lowered rail tariff shipping rates for farmers, gave credit to many of the businesses he owned so they could continue paying their workers, and started a "10 dollar trip" (equal to ${{Inflation|US|10|1893|r=2}} today) for immigrants. He also took strong measures to economize—in just one year, Hill cut the railway's expense of carrying a ton of freight by 13%. Because of these measures, Hill not only stayed in business, but also increased the net worth of his railroad by nearly $10,000,000 (equal to ${{Inflation|US|10000000|1893|fmt=c}} today). Meanwhile, nearly every other transcontinental railroad went bankrupt. His ability to ride out the depression garnered him fame and admiration.  Hill saved money by repeatedly cutting wages, made possible by a time of deflation when prices were falling generally.{{sfnp|Martin|1976|p=414-415}}

In 1893, Hill began the process of looking for a source of labor other than Chinese workers. For a brief period of time, he hired Italian and Greek laborers, but company officials were not satisfied with their performance. Hill sent emissaries to the Pacific who found that Japan had the most potential in the market of "Oriental Trade," and he decided to capitalize on this opportunity.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Pacific Connections|last=Chang|first=Kornel|publisher=University of California Press|year=2012|isbn=9780520271685|pages=59}}</ref>

In this time he also began to focus his energies on securing trade with Asian countries. He offered Japanese Industrialists Southern cotton and would even ship it for free if they would compare it with the short staple cotton they were using with the promise of a refund if they were dissatisfied, which they were not. With these friendly relations established, Hill managed to secure the industrializing Japanese order for 15,000 tons of rails against competition from England and Belgium. From 1886 to 1905, American exports to Japan leapt from $7.7 million a year (equal to ${{Inflation|US|7700000|1886|fmt=c}} today) to $51.7 million, equal to ${{Inflation|US|51700000|1905|fmt=c}} today.{{sfnp|Folsom|2003|p=35}}

Leonard says that after 1900 Hill exhibited poor business judgment regarding one Canadian subsidiary,  the Vancouver, Westminster and Yukon Railway Company (VW&Y). He ousted its president John Hendry, thereby worsening the problems, prolonging the delays, and adding to the costs of taking over the VW&Y. Hill's top aides were careless about details, bookkeeping, correspondence, and reports.<ref>Frank Leonard, "Railroading a Renegade: Great Northern Ousts John Hendry in Vancouver," ''BC Studies'' (2007), Issue 155, pp 69-92.</ref>

===The Northern Pacific and the "short squeeze" of 1901===
With 1901 and the start of the new century, James Hill now had control of both the Great Northern Railway, and the [[Northern Pacific Railway|Northern Pacific]] (which he had obtained with the help of his friend [[J. P. Morgan]], when that railroad went bankrupt in the depression of the mid-1890s).<ref name="Pyle. 1918"/>  Hill also wanted control of the [[Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad|Chicago, Burlington and Quincy railroad]] because of its Midwestern lines and access to Chicago. The [[Union Pacific Railroad]] was the biggest competitor of Great Northern and Northern Pacific Railroads. Although Great Northern and Northern Pacific were backed by J. P. Morgan and James J. Hill, the Union Pacific was backed not only by its president, [[Edward H. Harriman]], but by the extremely powerful [[William Rockefeller]] and [[Jacob Schiff]].

Quietly, Harriman began buying stock in Northern Pacific with the intention of gaining control of Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy. He was within 40,000 shares of control when Hill learned of Harriman's activities and quickly contacted J. P. Morgan, who ordered his men to buy everything they could get their hands on.

The result was chaos on Wall Street. Northern Pacific stock was forced up to $1,000 per share. Many speculators, who had sold Northern Pacific "[[short selling|short]]" in the anticipation of a drop in the railroad's price, faced ruin. The threat of a real economic panic loomed. Neither side could win a distinct advantage, and the parties soon realized that a truce would have to be called. The winners of that truce were Hill and Morgan, who immediately formed the [[Northern Securities Company]] with the aim of tying together their three major rail lines. As the Hill-Morgan alliance formed the Northern Securities Company, [[Theodore Roosevelt]] became president and turned his energies against the great trusts that were monopolizing trade.

===The Hill Lines survive the trust-busting era===
Roosevelt sent his Justice Department to sue the Northern Securities Company in 1902. The Supreme Court [[Northern Securities Co. v. United States|in 1904 ordered it to be dissolved]] as a monopoly. (Ironically, the Burlington Route, Northern Pacific, and Great Northern would later merge in 1970 to form the [[Burlington Northern Railroad]].) This ended Hill's ability to maintain competitive rates in Asian countries and in the subsequent two years American trade with Japan and China dropped 40% (or $41 million).{{sfnp|Folsom|2003|p=28}} Hill moved on without the benefit of a central company, and acquired the [[Colorado and Southern Railway]] lines into Texas. He also built the [[Spokane, Portland and Seattle Railway]]. By the time of his death in 1916, James J. Hill was worth more than $63 million, equivalent to ${{Inflation|US|63000000|1916|fmt=c}} today, and over $200 million in related assets.<ref name="mnhs.org"/> When his estate was divided his widow received over $16 million, and each of his children received almost $4 million; $1.5 million was paid in income and inheritance taxes.<ref name=":02">{{Cite book|title=James J. Hill: Empire Builder of the Northwest|last=Malone|first=Michael|publisher=University of Oklahoma Press|year=1996|isbn=0-8061-2860-7|location=Norman|pages=[https://archive.org/details/jamesjhill00mich/page/271 271–272]|url=https://archive.org/details/jamesjhill00mich/page/271}}</ref>

The [[Great Northern Railway (U.S.)|Great Northern Railway]] and the [[Northern Pacific Railway|Northern Pacific]] tried to merge four times, in 1896, 1901, 1927, and 1955. This last attempt lasted from 1955 until final Supreme Court approval and merger in March 1970, which created the [[Burlington Northern Railroad]]. In 1995, Burlington Northern merged with the [[Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway]] to become the [[Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway]].

===Family life===
In 1867, James J. Hill married Mary Theresa Mehegan, a Roman Catholic (born 1846, New York City); they had ten children:

# Mary Frances "Mamie" (Hill) Hill (1869–1947), who married [[Samuel Hill]] of Washington D.C. and Seattle. Samuel Hill was an executive at the Great Northern Railway when he married Mary Hill.
# James Norman "Jimmy" Hill (1870–1932) of New York City, married socialite [[Marguerite Sawyer Davis|Marguerite Sawyer]]. His family did not attend the wedding reportedly owing to Marguerite's status as a divorcee.
# [[Louis W. Hill|Louis Warren Hill]] (1872–1948) of St. Paul, Minnesota, who was named president of the GN in 1907 and board chairman in 1912. He married Maud Van Cortlandt Taylor.
# Clara Anne (Hill) Lindley (1873–1947), who married E. C. Lindley of St. Paul, Minnesota, who was vice-president, counsel general, and a member of the board of directors of the Great Northern Railway.
# Katherine Theresa Hill (1875–1876; died in infancy)
# Charlotte Elizabeth (Hill) Slade (1877–1923), who married George T. Slade of New York City and St. Paul, Minnesota. George T. Slade was an executive at The Great Northern Railway and Yale classmate of Louis W. Hill.
# Ruth (Hill) Beard (1879–1959), who married Anson McCook Beard of New York City.
# Rachel (Hill) Boeckmann (1881–1967), who married Egil Boeckmann of St. Paul, Minnesota.
# Gertrude (Hill) Gavin (1883–1961), who married Michael Gavin of New York City.
# Walter Jerome Hill (1885–1944) of St. Paul, Minnesota. [[Walthill, Nebraska]], was named for Walter.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.casde.unl.edu/history/counties/thurston/walthill/ | title=Walthill, Thurston County | publisher=University of Nebraska | work=Center for Advanced Land Management Information Technologies | access-date=August 23, 2014 | archive-date=August 2, 2015 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150802222050/http://www.casde.unl.edu/history/counties/thurston/walthill/ | url-status=dead }}</ref>