loads of its own to carry and that
its credit was none too high, Huntington might then have attempted to
gain control of the Union Pacific.

Events finally worked to the benefit of Harriman. When Collis P.
Huntington died in 1900, it was in most people's minds only a question
of time as to when the powerful Harriman interests would take over the
Southern Pacific properties. Consequently there was no surprise when
in 1901 announcement was made that the Union Pacific had purchased the
holdings of the Huntington estate in the Southern Pacific Company and
was therefore in virtual control.

By a master stroke the railroad situation in the West had been radically
changed. The Huntington system comprehended many properties of large
and growing value, which were now feeling the full benefit of the
agricultural prosperity at that time spreading throughout the great
Southwest. Aside from this prize, the Union Pacific acquired the main
line to the Pacific coast which it had always coveted and thus added to
its system over nine thousand miles of railroad and over four thousand
miles of water lines, besides obtaining a grip on the railroad empire
of this entire portion of the continent not to be readily loosened by
competitors.

At the same time that Harriman was strengthening his position on the
west and south, the Great Northern and Northern Pacific properties, both
now operated under the definite control of James J. Hill, were following
a policy of expansion fully as gigantic as that of the Union Pacific.
The Great Northern lines operating from Duluth to the Pacific coast had
become powerful elements in the Western railroad situation, and Hill had
devised many plans for diverting to the north the through traffic coming
from the central section of the continent. He had established on the
Great Lakes a line of steamships running from Duluth to Buffalo, and
was also operating on the Pacific Ocean steamship lines which gave him a
connection with Japan, China, and other oriental countries.

After the reorganization of the Northern Pacific Railroad, which fell
under the domination of Morgan, the affiliations of the Hill and Morgan
interests became very close, and in a short time Hill had as secure a
grip on the Northern Pacific as he had always had on the Great Northern.
This powerful combination looked like a menace to the Harriman-Kuhn-Loeb
interests which controlled the territory to the south and radiated
throughout the State o