The Consumers’ Mutual Coal Company. Capital Stock: 50,000 shares, at $10 per Share, $500,000. President, James Lynd. Treasurer, Josiah Kisterbock, No. 1231 Market Street [...]. Office, No. 5 1/2 South Sixth Street.

1864 Prospectus Pamphlet and Circular Letter + 1865 Resolutions and Updated Subscription Circular

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Scarce, immediate post-Civil War-era coal mining prospectus, with only four institutional holdings, for The Consumers’ Mutual Coal Company. It is accompanied by two contemporary circulars from the company promoting investment in its Pennsylvania coal.

This group, including the 1864 pamphlet with a tipped-on, printed cover-title “cancel,” relates to a January 1865 attempt to attract new investors by offering stock at par for a limited time. The pamphlet prospectus might, therefore, be considered a variant issue, promulgated in early 1865.

The Consumers’ Mutual Coal Company. Capital Stock… prospectus seeks investors to subscribe to the company’s stock:

We most earnestly present this Organization to the public as one eminently claiming their support, it being the desire of the present Stockholders, that the subscriptions to this stock, shall be confined to actual consumers, so that the original object shall be carried out, viz. : supplying a great want in an important department of domestic economy. It is therefore desirable that Consumers of Coal shall speedily come in and take the remaining shares, thereby preventing any portion of the Stock from falling into the hands of speculators—which the directors have been careful so far to avoid. (p2, emphases in original)

The pamphlet explains “The Mutual Principle” and “The Mutual System” of investment. It also reprints two newspaper articles describing the company’s collieries in Berks and Schuylkill Counties, Pennsylvania. Also found are testimonials and a list of names of about 1,000 subscribers. A printed label, appended after-the-fact above the title reads: “Stock at Par Till Feb. 1st, 1865, Only.”

Accompanying it is an undated circular letter from The Consumers’ Mutual Coal Co. president, James Lynd. Internal references within suggest it was created after a meeting of the board of directors which took place (according to the second circular) on January 6, 1865. Lynd’s circular likely served a “cover letter” for the extended stock offer: “There are surely few, if any, investments that pay better; and as to its safety and reliability, the Board invite every test and scrutiny.”

The second circular prints the resolutions enacted at that January 6, 1865 Directors’ meeting and includes a list of approx. 250 additional new stockholders “since last publication.”
An unusually complete collection of printed investment matter, likely mailed out together in a single envelope (based on the folds), relating to a new effort to attract investors.

Price: $350.00