He also owned an immense assortment of the stocks of a large number of trusts. The affairs of these trusts have been shown in court, at some time or other, as overflowing with fraud, the most glaring oppressions, and violations of law. He had $450,000 in stock of the Corn Products Company (the Glucose Trust); $370,000 of the stock of the notorious Harvester Trust, which charges the farmer $75 for a machine that perhaps costs $16 in all to make and market, and which holds a great part of the farming population bound hand and foot; $350,000 of Biscuit Trust stock; $200,000 of American Tin Can Company (Tin Can Trust) stock; and large amounts of stock in other trusts. All of these stocks and bonds Field owned outright; he made it a rule never to buy a share of stock on margin or for speculative purposes. All told, he owned more than $55,000,000 in stocks and bonds. A very considerable part of these were securities of Chicago surface and elevated railway, gas, electric light and telephone companies. In the corruption attending the securing of the franchises of these corporations he was a direct principal. The narrative of this part of his fortune, however, more pertinently belongs to subsequent chapters of this work. FOOTNOTES: [172] Census of 1900. [173] Eighth Annual Report, Illinois Labor Bureau:370. [174] See his work, "If Christ Came to Chicago." Much more specific and reliable is the report of the U. S. Industrial Commission. After giving the low wages paid to women in the different cities, it says: "It is manifest from the figures given that the amount of earnings in many cases is less than the actual cost of the necessities of life. The existence of such a state of affairs must inevitably lead in many cases to the adoption of a life of immorality and, in fact, there is no doubt that the low rate of wages paid to women is one of the most frequent causes of prostitution. The fact that the great mass of working women maintain their virtue in spite of low wages and dangerous environment is highly creditable to them."--Final Report of the Industrial Commission, 1902, xix:927. [175] See an article on this point by the Rev. F. M. Goodchild in the "Arena" Magazine for March, 1896. [176] In the course of inquiries among the Chicago religious missions in 1909, the author was everywhere informed that the great majority of native prostitutes were products of the department stores. Some of the conditions in these department stores, and how their owners have fought every effort to better these conditions, have been revealed in many official reports. The appended description is from the Annual Report of the Factory Inspectors of Illinois, 1903-04, pp. ix and x: