Loree Merger Quashed

The Interstate Commerce Commission last week rejected Leonor Fresnel Loree's proposal to create the Kansas City Southern System in the southwestern states, by having the Kansas City Southern Railway buy up the Missouri-Kansas-Texas (the "Katie") and the St. Louis Southwestern (the "Cotton Belt").

The K. C. Southern runs due south from Kansas City, Mo., through Pittsburg, Kan., Joplin, Mo., Fort Smith, Ark., Shreveport, La., to Port Arthur, Tex.,* on the Gulf of Mexico. It carries grain, livestock, minerals, cotton, oil.

The "Katie" runs from St. Louis to Kansas City, Mo., then due south, parallel to the. K. C. Southern, through Parsons, Kan., Muskogee, Okla., Dallas, Fort Worth, San Antonio and Houston, Tex., to Galveston, Tex., on the Gulf of Mexico. Its commodities are those of the K. C. Southern, plus merchandise transshipped from the East at St. Louis.

The "Cotton Belt" loops southwest from St. Louis, east of the Ozark Mountains, through Cairo, Ill., Memphis, Tenn., Little Rock, Ark., Shreveport, La., to Fort Worth, Tex., with important lines into the Texas oil and cotton country. Its freight consists of cotton, oil, merchandise.

These three railroads, all serving the same territory, all carrying the same type of goods, would form a compact southwestern system worth half a billion dollars. Mr. Loree, Chairman of both the K. C. Southern and the "Katie" would be enabled to save vast sums in operating costs and in financing. But, were the roads merged, they would lose their apparent and precious competitive aspect. That would be against the public interest and warranted, with other factors, disapproval.

*Not to be confused with Port Arthur, Ontario, Canada, great grain, lumber and iron ore terminal, on Lake Superior, for Grand Trunk and Canadian Pacific railways.