No, we shall have to examine Mr. Cooke’s lectures, for some other reason why his career as a Harvard lecturer was so suddenly cut short. Mr. Cooke has printed the lectures in pamphlet form under the title “Snapping Cords.” On page 9 I find a statement of the over-valuation of public utilities in Philadelphia, and note that the Philadelphia Electric Company has securities to the amount of over fifty million dollars upon an actual valuation of less than twenty-five million. And this is an Edison concern, allied with Boston Edison and Lee Higginson! I turn to page 12, and learn how the National Electric Light Association, the society of electrical engineers, is being used as a dummy by the electric light interests. I turn to page 14, and find the American Electric Railway Association shown up as planning to corrupt American education, creating a financed Bureau of Public Relations for the self-stated purpose of “influencing the sources of public education particularly by (a) lectures on the Chautauqua circuit and (b) formation of a committee of prominent technical educators to promote the formation and teaching of correct principles on public service questions in technical and economic departments at American colleges, through courses of lectures and otherwise.”
The tactless Mr. Cooke goes on to examine the activities of “prominent technical educators” who have lent themselves to this program. Among the names I find—can such a thing be possible?—George F. Swain, professor of civil engineering in the Graduate School of Applied Science of Harvard University! Professor Swain, it appears, has done “valuation work” for Mr. Morgan’s New Haven Railroad—our interlocking directorate, you perceive! You may not know what “valuation work” consists of; it is the job of determining how much money you shall pay for your water, light, gas and transportation, and needless to say, the utility corporations want the valuation put as high as possible. Mr. Cooke, since the incidents here narrated, put through a rate case whereby the Philadelphia Electric Company collects from the city and the people of that city one million dollars _less_ per year. So you see just what an ornery cuss Mr. Cooke is!