African Entrepreneurship Record

Chapter 375: Chapter 54 Burning

October 8, 1873.

On the distant west coast of the Atlantic, the southwest shore of Lake Michigan, one of the Great Lakes, it is now late at night, but unusually, the entire city is wide awake.

Under the watchful eyes of Odyssey, the branch manager of Heixinggen Bank Chicago branch, and a group of employees, along with the citizens of Chicago’s West District.

Chicago, known as the ”Windy City,” at this moment, everywhere except the West District has turned into a sea of fire. The fire lit up the sky, and every now and then, entire buildings collapse in the blazing flames, the fire shooting skyward, billows of smoke rolling.

Countless Chicago residents are pouring into the West District from other areas, cries, shouts, and sounds of looting fill the air.

So much so that Heixinggen Bank Chicago branch had to strengthen its security, with security teams carrying guns patrolling around the bank.

Standing on the third floor of the bank, looking towards the city center, now completely engulfed in flames, including Chicago’s business center, where financial institutions from all over America congregated.

The misfortune of his peers made Odyssey, the branch manager of Heixinggen Bank Chicago branch, exclaim, ”Oh, God bless! Fortunately, Chicago’s property prices saved us.”

Heixinggen Bank’s Chicago branch is somewhat special, built in a relatively underdeveloped area of Chicago, so the main building of Heixinggen Chicago branch stands out like a crane among chickens amidst a bunch of shanties not exceeding two floors, making it exceptionally conspicuous, allowing Manager Odyssey to leisurely observe the fire situation in downtown Chicago.

Chicago city, on the southern shore of Lake Michigan, located on the Great Lakes Plains, was originally an Indian hunting ground, when it was established as a city in 1834, its population was less than 1,000. Due to the westward expansion of America, Chicago, once a remote small town, rapidly developed after the Civil War.

With the development of agriculture and animal husbandry, the extraction of forests and iron mines, and the connection of canals and railways, within just a few decades, Chicago’s population reached 350,000 and became the largest meat trading market in America and indeed the world, earning the title ”World’s Butcher.”

Chicago’s development was enough to make the cities of the East African Kingdom feel ashamed, the combined population of the three cities in Central Province (First Town, Dar es Salaam, Bajamojo) barely reached half of Chicago’s. As the top choice for immigrants worldwide, America indeed had such appeal, gathering immigrants from all over the world, Britain, Ireland, Poland, Sweden, Germany... including Italians, Chinese, Indians, and at this time, the lowliest Black people.

As early as 1865, Heixinggen Bank had already commenced business in Chicago city, but the development of Heixinggen’s Chicago branch could only be described as ordinary. It was far from Chicago’s central business district, which was very unfavorable for staff to conduct business operations.

Many businessmen and Chicago residents would choose to go downtown for banking services, but as Heixinggen Bank thrived in Europe, the bank’s reputation in North America also greatly enhanced, and even though the location was somewhat disadvantageous, more people began opting for loans at the Chicago branch.

For this unfavorable location, the Chicago branch once considered relocating, but it was vetoed by the New York North America headquarters.

The reasoning given by the New York North America headquarters was simple, the land prices in the West District were much cheaper compared to the city center, so they could cut costs without spending more money here.

However, this reasoning was clearly untenable. After purchasing a large swath of land in the West District, Heixinggen Bank carried out large-scale renovations, the incurred costs were enough to have bought a sufficiently good spot in the city center.

Moreover, Heixinggen Bank North America headquarters was not short of money, as North America was economically second only to Europe. The bank’s expansion here was swift, possibly even more successful than in Europe, fully exploiting its financial attributes as a bank.

To display financial prowess and gain customer trust, the New York North America headquarters built an extremely luxurious seven-story reinforced concrete structure with an elevator in Manhattan.

Heixinggen Bank’s North American operations mainly focused on the German community. Germans in America formed a vast group, and with their generally high educational level and entrepreneurial enthusiasm, much like the pervasive fraud industry across America, involving counterfeiting money, forging accounts, making fake documents, high-end financial fraud, etc., one could almost be sure that most were Germans.

These industries naturally preferred those with some culture or technical skills, and German immigrants, supported by the popularized compulsory education, held a natural advantage. While Italians could only engage in rougher activities like gang work.

Additionally, Germans had a trait of wanting to return home to show off once they made it even slightly, which led many wealthy German businessmen and affluent individuals to favor depositing their money in Heixinggen Bank, not only for the friendliness but also for the convenience of returning to Germany and cashing Heixinggen Bank’s checks directly in Europe. Ordinary Germans did the same; when sending remittances back home, they would directly choose Heixinggen Bank, saving quite a bit of trouble, such as language barriers.

Just relying on Germans in America, Heixinggen Bank had a significant advantage, especially in the German-speaking community. In the 1860s, there were over 250 German-language newspapers and magazines in America, available wherever there were German populations, whether cities or communities. By 1871, eighty percent of non-English publications in America were German-language.

Therefore, during this period, Germans in America were quite powerful, especially after Germany’s unification, even if America wanted to promote assimilation policies, they had to think twice.

In short, Heixinggen Bank was not short of funds, and the other city banks built in the same era as the Chicago branch were in luxurious business districts, making the Chicago branch an exception.

This unorthodox decision initially aggravated Odyssey greatly, arguing that high property prices were just an excuse, surely the people at the New York headquarters had been kicked in the head by a donkey.

Today, contrary to his past sentiments, Odyssey praised the New York headquarters and sympathized with the miserable circumstances of his usually arrogant Chicago peers, to the point that he drank a few extra glasses tonight.

From the moment construction of the Chicago branch commenced, the first move was to replace nearby wooden plank roads with brick and stone structures. Most of Chicago’s buildings were constructed using lumber from Wisconsin forests, and even its roads and sidewalks were built with wooden planks. The cheap timber encouraged Chicagoans to squander, and much of the city accommodated poor immigrants in dilapidated shacks, with even the homes of wealthier citizens often built with wood. As a result, during the construction of the Chicago branch, the price of brick and stone building materials was significantly higher compared to other cities, given the limited demand and lack of large-scale production.

From July this year, Chicago hadn’t seen a drop of rain, and in early September, the city’s most famous newspaper, the Chicago Tribune, criticized the city for being a ”fire trap,” adding that many buildings were ”shams and shingles,” yet it still didn’t raise alarm.

By today, Chicago suddenly ignited, and at the same time, forest fires broke out in many places around Chicago. The cause of the fire is already unknown.