A MILLIONAIRE'S TREASURE VAULTS.

Inangahua Times, Volume IX, Issue 1441, 8 September 1884, Page 2

A MILLIONAIRE'S TREASURE VAULTS.

A writer in an American paper says : — " I stood the other day in the vault of the formidable fortress of iron and masonary on Forty-second street;, where last year the richest nabob in the world locked up hi8.^40,00q,()00 in stocks, houds, aud other securities; It is one of the most redoubtable works of defence on the American Continent, though you may not be entirely certain of that by surveying the building from the outside. Its foundations were blasted out of the rooft^ the front wall is sft in thickness, and the side and rear walls are,Bft. the materials used being pressed brick, with brownstone trimmings. The beams, girders, and main pillars are iron, encased in tire-proof material. The doors f win-dow-frames, and minor partitions are iron, marble, and glass. No wood is to be found in the structure The great vault is 86ft x 42ft of wrought iron, steel, and Franklinite iron, is ; imposing in strength and proportions, 'Its four outer doors weigh ß,2oo! bs ,' each, and have every effective and j known improvement in defensive de- ! vices. A massive wall of masonary snrrounds the iron work. The vault, which is burglar, fire and waterproof, constitutes a distinct building in itself. The armed watchmen who guard the ! building day and night are under ; the. I strictest discipline, their hourly movements being recorded by an electric clock; connecting with various points on each floor of the structure, and there are also wires running to police headquarters and the offices of the district telegraph. In one corner of this great vault, behind heavy iron bars, are the heavier iron doors of the works, containing the Vanderbilfc ' securities, which can be opened only by skeleton keys, held by the owner alone. I suppose that 100 men in this building with Gatling guns could easily defend it against a mob of 100,000 assailants. It could be reduced by nothing less than the continued play of heavy artillery. It may be a year since Vanderbilt, then ' worth' £40. 000,000, put the larger part of his possessions in the vault. He could not, perhaps, put more than L 40,000, 000 under guard here at that time, but he has added over £2.000,000 to his fortune within the year, though it has been a poor year. Thus rapidly docs the stupendous volume of his unparalleled pile enlarge. Nothing like. such growth of any man's wealth was ever before known in the wbrld. Every year, in the nature of things, the growth increases, so that the estimate of the best-informed men is that by the year 1890 he will be able to pile up not less than £60,000,000 in his q at iron vault behind walls fivd ■c.t Im ick."