If we take the cash payments at par and the bonds at 75, this would make the tidy sum of $69,210 per mile on 129 miles. When we bear in mind that Crocker accepted the contract for the first 18 miles out of Sacramento at a price including a cash payment of only $13,800 per mile, and that the arrangements with the small contractors who followed him were distinctly less favorable, it is possible to say with some confidence that the profits on the Crocker contracts were considerable. Whatever they were, Mr. Crocker shared them with his associates by depositing at a later date $14,000,000 in Central Pacific stock in the treasury of the Contract and Finance Company, (discussed in the next section) for the benefit of the stockholders of that organization. Inasmuch as Stanford was one of the principal stockholders in the Contract and Finance Company, his later categorical denial before the United States Pacific Railway Commission that he had participated in the profits of the Crocker contracts makes interesting reading.[112] “Contract and Finance Company” When the Central Pacific approached the state line of California in the latter part of 1867, the associates told Mr. Crocker that they did not think it best for him to go any further. They said they wanted more capital—they wanted to engage heavy men in the enterprise.[113] Crocker had not been successful in persuading capitalists to go in with him, while it was believed that investors were deterred from taking stock in the Central Pacific by reason of the liability which would be thereby incurred under California law. Either Huntington or Stanford—both claim the credit—conceived the idea that there would be an advantage in organizing a corporation to undertake the construction work. The subject was mentioned on the occasion of one of Huntington’s visits to California, although the company was formed while Huntington was in the East.[114] The name finally decided upon for the new corporation was that of “Contract and Finance Company.” Articles of association were filed in October, 1867. W. E. Brown, Theodore J. Milliken, and B. R. Crocker attended to the details. Milliken was a merchant in Sacramento, and the other two were connected with the Central Pacific.