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Show POOR RECORD MADE BY OIL CONCERNS When the glaring prospectus of the "fiy-by-night" or "shoe-string" oil promotion Company with its promise of quick riches arrives at your door, do you stop and ask yourself what are the odds against the successful finding of oil, before you donate your cash toward the furthering of the venture? If you were told that the odds were 195 to 1 that you would lose your money, and that the promised oil well would be a "duster"-which in the language of the oil man means either a dry hole or a water well, but always a failure-would you invest? In California, second in petroleum production only to Oklahoma the statistics of the California state mining bureau recently released for publication indicate that during the last two years the small oil producing companies have drilled 391 wildcat wells and found oil only twice. In 1925 and 1926 California companies drilled 195 wells which were dry to find one producing well. The two discovered in California through the prospecting in 391 borings were actually uncovered by v the larger major companies, ten of which drilled 122 wells to find two oil fields. The remaining smaller operators drilled 269 wells and their percentage of success was zero-not a drop of oil. The infer- erence here is that success goes with the big organizations having both capital and experience and not to the under-financed, inexperienced, "shoe-string" operators who borrows his money from the general public and, in 195 cases to 1, returns nothing. In the eleven years previous to 1925 there were 1070 wildcat, wells drilled in California and 15 new fields opened-which means that for each field opened by striking v oil there were 71.3 failures. Of the 15 fields opened during that time, 13 were credited to 9 of the larger companies. Smaller companies drilled 818 wildcats to obtain two fields. This was 409 wells drilled to secure one field. Are those good betting odds? The history of the wildcatter who depends upon the public money of the small investor in California is virtually duplicated in other oil producing states, such as Oklahoma and Texas, with odds almost as greatly against success as are shown by the California public records. Such hazards, when reduced to cold figures may be uninteresting to read, but should be sufficiently startling in the nature of the disclosed betting odds, that the small investor known as "the public" should be exceedingly wary of gambling. eieiv rnusi linu a way to maKe me going for the inefficient less difficult. How to do that without encouraging the improvident is a problem. SHOULD SELECT OUR IMMIGRANTS There has been organized with headquarters in Sacramento, Calif., what is known as the "immigration study commission," having for its object the maintaining of a strong American stock in this nation. The president of the commission writing to The Standard-Examiner says: "Most interesting is your recent statement that 14 per cent of all immigration is now Mexican and that the big rush from over the Rio Grande may force a new policy by placing Mexico under the quota. "Our country already has an almost crushing color problem. Though we fought a civil war over it even today no one knows whence its real solution will come. It would be a tragedy to add another color problem through a mass movement of eugenically low-powered peons, thus further diluting our American stock. "The real danger lies in the differential birth rates. If Anglo-Saxon families average three children and the low-powered immigrant seven, one American couple will be represented in the fifth generation by only 243 children. One immigrant couple in the same time will be represented by 16,807 children. Thus American culture will disappear. Greece and Rome both decayed through the sane cause. "Our commission feels the only cure for the border smuggling is the Box bill placing the western hemisphere under the quota." The average American does not view with other than a feeling of uncertainly the heavy influx of strangers who are not equally as promising as the American stock. There is much good blood in all countries and if there is to be heavy immigration the people of America should see that in drawing from other lands this country does not draw the dregs. HE DID NOT KNOW It's an old story that one-half of the world does not know how the other half lives. The other day in a London magistrate's court a woman was arraigned for not paying her rent. She gave as an excuse that she was in the bacon business and trade had been very slack. Magistrate (sapiently): "But everybody in England eats bacon. I can't understand slackness in this business." The woman (earnestly): "I don't sell bacon. I scrub it." Magistrate (incredulously): "Do |
