Source: Wikimedia When I read that Jack Ma, a billionaire from China had purchased 28,000 acres of land in the Adirondacks, land once owned by a Rockefeller, I thought of Collis P. Huntington. Huntington, while the head of the Central Pacific Railroad in the mid 1800s, exploited Chinese labor to build the transcontinental line. It would have been unthinkable, if not impossible, for a Chinese immigrant to buy land at that scale during Huntington's lifetime. Indeed, after the transcontinental was built, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 barred Chinese from entering the country to work. Those that stayed faced deportation.
Dr. Durant, the VP of the Union Pacific and Huntington's competitor in the race to build the transcontinental, was also taking advantage of cheap labor. While doing so he was gobbling up land in New York State for his next venture. Durant owned half a million acres in the Adirondacks by 1873. Throughout the 1860s and 70s Durant had his lawyers buy up abandoned Adirondack land at New York State tax sales for a pittance, eventually building a railroad into the interior.
Collis P. Huntington died in 1900 at the great camp in the Adirondacks he had bought from Dr. Durant's son: William West Durant. I've read Huntington loved his camp and spent as much time as he could there. I always wonder if he took pleasure in the fact that he bilked his nemesis' son William out of any profit when he purchased the camp compound. Although the correspondence I've read between the men appears cordial, Huntington must have known he had gotten a good deal buying this great camp from William at half the cost it took to build.
After researching Huntington and sifting through his papers at Syracuse University I have grudgingly come to admire the man. I read an interesting diary, written by a guide who worked for Huntington. Huntington told him how his entrepreneurship got started as a boy. The circus came to town one day and the owner asked Huntington to pick up the apples in the orchard so they could set up their tents. Huntington spent the day doing so and the owner gave him a dollar and said, "Come to the circus tonight with the money you earned." Huntington wouldn't do it; he wanted to save his hard earned cash. He said, "I may have missed some fun, but I've had a hell of a lot of fun since." When he died Huntington was worth over $180 million.
Dr. Durant, the VP of the Union Pacific and Huntington's competitor in the race to build the transcontinental, was also taking advantage of cheap labor. While doing so he was gobbling up land in New York State for his next venture. Durant owned half a million acres in the Adirondacks by 1873. Throughout the 1860s and 70s Durant had his lawyers buy up abandoned Adirondack land at New York State tax sales for a pittance, eventually building a railroad into the interior.
Collis P. Huntington died in 1900 at the great camp in the Adirondacks he had bought from Dr. Durant's son: William West Durant. I've read Huntington loved his camp and spent as much time as he could there. I always wonder if he took pleasure in the fact that he bilked his nemesis' son William out of any profit when he purchased the camp compound. Although the correspondence I've read between the men appears cordial, Huntington must have known he had gotten a good deal buying this great camp from William at half the cost it took to build.
After researching Huntington and sifting through his papers at Syracuse University I have grudgingly come to admire the man. I read an interesting diary, written by a guide who worked for Huntington. Huntington told him how his entrepreneurship got started as a boy. The circus came to town one day and the owner asked Huntington to pick up the apples in the orchard so they could set up their tents. Huntington spent the day doing so and the owner gave him a dollar and said, "Come to the circus tonight with the money you earned." Huntington wouldn't do it; he wanted to save his hard earned cash. He said, "I may have missed some fun, but I've had a hell of a lot of fun since." When he died Huntington was worth over $180 million.
When I read about Jack Ma's purchase, I mailed him my novel. I thought he might appreciate the irony of his place in history, alongside entrepreneurs such as Huntington and Durant, and now, like them, an owner of a large estate in the Adirondack wilderness.
A building at Camp Huntington, Raquette Lake, NY. William West Durant's first great camp.
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