February i, 1902.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER "WORLD 



147 



SKETCH OF CHARLES R. FLINT. 



THE most talked of man in connection with India-rubber 

 interests, in this or any other country, for several years 

 past, undoubtedly has been Charles R. Flint, of New York, long 

 engaged, in addition to other important interests, as a crude 

 rubber merchant, and latterly a director in large manufacturing 

 enterprises. The fact that Mr. Flint has lately disposed of his 

 holdings in several rubber companies suggests the present time 

 for giving in these pages a review of his business career. 



Charles Ranlett Flint was born January 24, 1850, at Thomas- 

 ton, Maine, being descended from a Welsh family who settled 

 in 1642 near Salem, Massachusetts. His father, Benjamin 

 Flint, began business as a shipbuilder in 1837, removing in time 

 to New York. The education of the son was begun in the 

 Maine schools, and he was graduated from the Brooklyn Poly- 

 technic Institute at the age of 18. Soon afterward, it is related, 

 he was an applicant for a position in the New York shipping 

 house of W. R. Grace. 



" Do you think he can do the work we require ? " some one 

 in the house asked Mr. Grace. 



"A chap with his jaw can do any- 

 thing,'" was Mr. Grace's response, and 

 the young man began his work. 



Mr. Flint in 1871 became a partner 

 in Gilchrist, Flint & Co., engaged in a 

 general commission business with 

 South America. The next year this 

 firm was merged with W. R. Grace & 

 Co. In 1S74 and again in 1876 Mr. 

 Flint visited South America in the in- 

 terest of his firm, in the latter year es- 

 tablishing the house of Grace Brothers 

 & Co., at Callao, Peru, where he re- 

 mained for a year. He retired from 

 connection with Mr.Grace in 1885, and 

 established the firm of Flint & Co., 

 lumber. India-rubber, and general com- 

 mission merchants. In 1895 theirgen- 

 eral shipping business was consolidated 

 with that of Coombs, Crosby & Eddy as 

 Flint, Eddy & Co., a corporation, and 

 in 1900 a combination was made with 

 the American Trading Co. as Flint, 



Eddy and American Trading Co. This firm, with $4,000,000 

 capital, and having connections on every continent, is reputed 

 to have done an import and export business of $25,000,000 in 

 one year. Meanwhile Mr. Flint has been connected with the 

 firm of Flint, Dearborn & Co., in the Pacific shipping trade, in 

 which was employed, at one time at least, the largest fleet of 

 clipper ships under the American flag. 



While still associated with the Grace firm, in 1878, Mr. Flint 

 aided in organizing the Export Lumber Co., of which he has 

 since been a director and vice president. In 1880 he became 

 president of the United States Electric Lighting Co. He is 

 president of the American Ordnance Co., a director in the 

 American Woolen Co., a director and treasurer of the Hastings 

 Pavement Co., and the Manaos (Brazil) Railway Co., besides 

 being a director in other industrial corporations and in six 

 banks and financial institutions in New York. 



But it has been in connection with rubber interests that Mr. 

 Flint's name has come most prominently into public view, and 

 particularly in the consolidation of such interests. For he is 

 preeminently an organizer of capital in industrial affairs. He 

 was one of the first prominent advocates in America of indus- 



CHARLES R. FLINT 



trial combination, achieving his first success in bringing the 

 rubber shoe industry under a single control as the United States 

 Rubber Co., with $50,000,000 capital, which for a time was one 

 of the largest industrial corporations in existence, its plan of 

 organization serving as a model for innumerable later enter- 

 prises. Mr. Flint's services as an organizer thus came into 

 such demand that he has been described by a recent writer as 

 being " distinctively the promoter of the day." 



Besides serving as treasurer of the United Slates Rubber Co. 

 for nearly ten years, Mr. Flint was active, in 1892, in bringing 

 about the combination of interests known as the Mechanical 

 Rubber Co., in which he served a director, and which was 

 merged, in 1899, with a larger consolidation — the Rubber Goods 

 Manufacturing Co. — of which he was, until recently, chairman 

 of the board of directors. He was likewise in the directorate 

 of three or four of the constituent companies of the United 

 States Rubber Co., and of the American Chicle Co. — the $9,000,- 

 000 chewing gum combination. The above list, by the way, 

 does not embrace five new industrial corporations which Mr. 

 Flint is credited with having brought about within the past 

 few months, involving $60,000,000 of capital. 



From the inception of Mr. Flint's 

 business career he has taken an interest 

 in the crude rubber business. During 

 his connection with W. R. Grace & Co. 

 that company engaged actively in the 

 Pard rubber trade. For some years 

 Mr. Flint was treasurer of the New 

 York Commercial Co., Limited, im- 

 porters of crude rubber, and upon dis- 

 posing of his interest in that company 

 he organized the Crude Rubber Co. 



Mr. Flint has been interested in 

 South American aflfairs of other than a 

 business character. In 1877 he was ap- 

 pointed consul general for Chile at New 

 York, resigning that office on the out- 

 break of war between Chile and Peru 

 in 1879. In 1884 he became consul for 

 Nicaragua at New York, and as such 

 represented that republic in negotiat- 

 ing with American capitalists to form 

 a canal construction company. Still 

 later he served as consul general for 

 Costa Rica. In 1893 he fitted out, at New York, at the request 

 of the Brazilian government, an armed fleet to suppress the 

 navy of that republic, then in revolution. 



Those who know him well consider Mr. Flint as much a sports- 

 man as he is man of affairs. In his school days he was fore- 

 most in every kind of athletic sports, and he has lost none of 

 his early love for outdoor exercise. It was long well known 

 that every Saturday was his day of rest, devoted to shooting, 

 fishing, or yachting, no matter what the demands of his busi- 

 ness might be. He is a member of the New York, Sea- 

 wanhaka, Larchmont, and Atlantic yacht clubs, and was 

 one of the syndicate who, with the Vigilant, successfully 

 defended the America's Cup against Lord Dunraven's Val- 

 kyrie. Every New York newspaper has contained references to 

 Mr. Flint's use of an automobile on the streets of this city and his 

 success as a chauffeur. Mr. Flint is square and stocky of figure ; 

 big boned, straight shouldered, and keen eyed ; with closely 

 cropped side whiskers and thin mustache that scarcely veil the 

 suggestion of determination that marks every feature. Mr. Flint 

 was married in 1883 to Miss .Simmons, of Troy, New York, and 

 his home is at No. 4 East Thirty-sixth street, New York city. 



