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SIDNEY L. BROCK
Vol. 3, p. 1000-1002
Book has photo

The kind of public spirit which constantly plans for the community
welfare and is prodigal of personal time, energy and means in getting
the plans carried out, has been the chief characteristic of Sidney L
BROCK's citizenship at Oklahoma City. A little more than ten years
ago he was one of the smaller merchants of the then much smaller
city. He is now president of the Sidney L. Brock Dry Goods Company,
probably the largest department store in the state and one of the
greater commercial institutions of greater Oklahoma City. While for
this reason he is naturally regarded as one of the most successful of
local business men, the frequent words of praise given to this
energetic merchant by his host of loyal and admiring friends are due
in even greater degree to his constant readiness to leave his own
interests and work heart and soul for something he has thought
Oklahoma City ought to have. It is no exaggeration to say that Mr.
Brock is one of the vital forces in the progress of this great
southwestern city, and has done as much as any other individual, if
not more, to maintain and promote the solid prosperity of the
Oklahoma metropolis.

At the outset it is only proper to state that Mr. Brock came into
the world fortunate because of his parentage and ancestry. The Brock
family lineage is traced back to General Brock of colonial days, and
the first American of the name came over about the time of the
Mayflower. Brockville, New York, was named for one member of the
family, and many of them were early settlers about Danville, Vermont,
from which locality they moved into New York State. Sidney Lorenzo
Brock was born at Macon, Missouri, August 3, 1869, a son of Sidney G.
and Louisa Olive (WILLIAMS) Brock. His father, who still lives at
Macon, Missouri, has had a distinguished career. He was born at
Cleveland, Ohio, April 10, 1837, a son of E. A. and M. M. Brock. He
graduated A. B. from Allegheny College at Meadville, Pennsylvania, in
1859, was given the degree A. M. in 1862, and the same institution
honored him with the degree Ph. D. in 1888. Admitted to the bar in
1861, he served throughout the Civil war in an Ohio regiment and
towards the close of the conflict was a major on the staff of General
HOWELL, in the operations before Richmond. After the war he located
at Macon, Missouri, where for more than half a century he has been an
honored member of the local bar. For many years he was also editor of
the Macon Republican, dividing his time between the editorial chair
and his law office. He served as mayor of Macon from 1886 to 1889,
and was republican candidate against William HATCH for the office of
congressman. President HARRISON appointed him chief of the Bureau of
Statistics in the treasury department at Washington, and he held that
place from 1889 to 1893. While in Washington he was a close friend
and advisor of William MCKINLEY in the preparation of his tariff bill
known as the McKinley Bill. During the Harrison administration he was
recognized as the leading statistician of the administration. Leaving
Washington in 1894 he returned to Macon and has since continued the
practice of law. He is also a well known author. His principal works
are: "The Hawaiian Islands, Their History, Products and Commerce,"
1892; "History of the Navigation, Commerce, Tonnage, etc., of the
Great Lakes," 1891; "History of the Pacific States and Alaska-
Acquisition, Wealth, Products, Commerce, etc.," 1890; "Advance of the
United States for a Hundred Years, from 1790 to 1890," published in
1893.

On December 1, 1861, Sidney G. Brock married Louisa Olive Williams,
who was born near Cleveland, Ohio, at Chagrin Falls, and died in
August, 1913. Her father was Prof. Lorenzo Dow Williams, for many
years vice-president of Allegheny College at Meadville, Pennsylvania.
Her mother was a WARREN, a direct descendant of General Warren, who
fell at the Battle of Bunker Hill. Mrs. Brock was a member of the
Daughters of the American Revolution and for many years was
prominently identified with the Woman's Christian Temperance Union,
having been corresponding secretary for Missouri at the time Clara
HOFFMAN was president, and was associated with such notable leaders
in that movement as Frances WILLARD, Mary A. LIVERMORE, J. Ellen
FOSTER and others.

Sidney L. Brock grew up in Macon, Missouri, was educated in the high
school there and by private tutors in Washington, where he lived
during the several years of his father's official connection with the
Government and was prepared for Johns Hopkins University, in which
institution he completed his education by an attendance for three
years. He returned to Macon with his father, and his first regular
employment was in a newspaper office. He filled the various positions
from that vague service known as printer's devil up to the sales
management of the circulation department. His first adventure in
business for himself was in association with J. H. BARCLAY, when they
engaged in the retail dry goods trade at Macon under the style and
name of the Barclay-Brock Dry Goods Company. In 1895 Mr. Brock bought
the Barclay interests and the firm became the Sidney L. Brock Dry
Goods Company. He sold this concern in 1899, and then turned his
attention to the raising of pure bred Hereford cattle, establishing a
large plant for that purpose near Macon. He subsequently moved his
headquarters and his stock to Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, where for ten
years he stood among the leading Hereford breeders in the country.
His stock were prize winners in all the large stock shows, and at the
St. Louis Exposition a member of his herd received the highest award
over all breeds. He sold his stock farm in 1912.

In the meantime, in 1900, Mr. Barclay, his former partner, had
bought a large business at Macon, and Mr. Brock returned to take the
management, which he continued until December, 1904, when he resigned.

It was in January, 1905, that the name Sidney L. Brock first became
familiar in Oklahoma City. At that it had only a limited
significance. On March 4, 1905, he laid the foundation for the
present business of The Sidney L. Brock Dry Goods Company by opening
a stock of goods valued at less than $10,000 in one small room at the
present location. Mr. Brock had already demonstrated the possession
of qualities of executive ability and commercial judgment so
requisite to the success of the merchant, and with his previous
experience, he was not long in establishing a profitable trade for
his Oklahoma City store. Without referring to the progressive stages
in the growth of this business it will be sufficient to say that at
the present time it occupies quarters nine times the actual floor
space occupied by the original stock, and represents an investment
fifteen times as great as that with which he began. The Sidney L.
Brock Dry Goods Company is at 213-219 Main Street, in the heart of
the retail district. The building has a 100-foot frontage on Main
Street, with a basement under all and rising to three and four
stories, and a unique columnated entrance affords 250 feet of glass
frontage for display purposes. The present floor space is 48,000
square feet with a reserve of 10,000 square feet for future growth.
In the active seasons as high as 250 people find employment in this,
the largest department store in the state. During the panic times of
1907 Mr. Brock bought fifty feet of his present location for $65,000,
then the highest price paid for Main Street realty. That purchase was
a stimulating factor in strengthening real estate values at the time,
and did much to insure the future of Oklahoma City as a business
center. For the fifty feet which he bought nine years ago Mr. Brock
has since been offered $200,000.

It is now proper to devote some considerable space to the
achievements of Mr. Brock as a city builder. The Oklahoma City of the
future must not be allowed to forget or in any way minimize the
strenuous efforts put forth by Mr. Brock and his associates in
conclusively and convincingly securing for Oklahoma City a prestige
as a commercial, industrial, and government center beyond all its
rivals in the state. History is full of examples of cities, that with
large natural resources and advantages have been eclipsed in the
struggle for greatness by younger and more progressive rivals. In the
majority of cases the explanation of this can be found not so much in
location or the changing conditions brought about by shifting
population and transportation facilities, but by a superior degree of
push and enterprise on the part of local citizenship. It has been
well said "it is men not buildings, that make a city," and an ancient
philosopher has said that a city is great not in numbers of
population but in the work which it performs. Oklahoma City now has a
large and increasing population and has more than its quota of
skyscraper business houses and streets lined with magnificent homes.
But its chief title to distinction rests upon the fact that it has
become not only the center of state government but also the center of
southwestern commerce and industry, and thus performs a great and
vital service to its tributary territory. In securing these fair
advantages the greater share of the credit on the basis of honest
judgment must be given to the Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce, and
while paying such a tribute to that body it will be proper to refer
to its work while it was under the vigorous and enthusiastic
leadership of Sidney L. Brock.

Soon after coming to Oklahoma Mr. Brock became a member of the
chamber of commerce, and has been a director in that body since 1906.
The chamber did perhaps its greatest work and brought the city
through the most critical periods of its development in the two years
that Mr. Brock was president, in 1909 and 1910. During his
administration he organized committees and instituted an industrial
campaign for the development of manufacturing in Oklahoma City. With
the aid of A. W. MCKEAND, secretary of the chamber, special
literature was compiled and sent out to all the packing plants of the
United States. The result was a visit from Nelson Morris & Co., one
of the largest packers in the United States. The story of the
subsequent negotiations has been well told by Mr. Brock himself in an
article entitled "The Truth About Oklahoma," published in Leslie's
Weekly in October, 1910. With a proper modesty as to his own
participation in that campaign, Mr. Brock writes: "As the result of
the follow-up correspondence campaign of the Chamber of Commerce in
1908 and 1909, placing before the great packers information of the
production, source of origin and destination of livestock shipments
from Oklahoma, and the advantages of Oklahoma as a suitable place for
the establishment of a packing plant, negotiations were opened with
Morris & Company of Chicago. Their representative looked over the
field, quietly secured options on a large tract close to the city and
then called on the writer with a view to closing a deal with our
Chamber of Commerce. In company with one trusted associate, a
tentative agreement was made, guaranteeing on the part of the packers
the establishment of a great livestock market. The citizens of
Oklahoma City, on the other hand, were to pay the packers a cash
bonus of three hundred thousand dollars and grant other reasonable
and necessary specified conditions in relation to sewer connections,
water and gas extensions and exemption from taxation for a five year
term.

"How to get the cash bonus was the question. The writer and his
associate, George B. STONE, hit upon this plan: The packers were
induced to accept half the bonus when the plant should be ready for
operation and the balance a year from that date. Their representative
consented to no publicity till we gave the word. Options on 575 acres
of land were secured, the best land adjoining and overlooking the
packing district from the south, and all within the three mile limit
of the center of Oklahoma City, the cost of the land being $184,000.
Three tedious days saw the options in our hands; then the directors
of the Chamber were called in and needless to say quickly ratified
the tentative agreement. The Oklahoma Industrial Company was planned,
with a capitalization of four hundred thousand dollars, to finance
the proposition and guarantee the bonus. At a mass meeting on the
19th of May at ten o'clock the Assembly Hall could not contain the
multitude. The announcement of the securing of the Morris proposition
was made and the plans were laid before the assemblage for financing
it, and the statement was made, 'it is up to you to make good and
secure this great enterprise.' Did they respond? Four hundred and
twenty-seven thousand dollars were subscribed in an hour and thirty
minutes amid great cheering and enthusiastic addresses, all of one
tone-that of approval and hearty co-operation. The packers began to
build and the land company to plot and to sell. In a year's time
nearly seven hundred thousand dollars worth of lots had been sold and
two thousand out of the original forty-four thousand lots were still
on hand."

In reviewing this achievement which meant so much to the future
welfare and development of Oklahoma City, the Daily Oklahoman paid
Mr. Brock and his associates the following editorial tribute: "Not
everyone knows the tremendous efforts which were put forth by Mr.
Brock and Mr. Stone. Not everybody knows that Sidney Brock rifled the
bank account of his big dry goods store and took out twenty-five
thousand dollars of his own money with which to purchase options
which would be necessary to insure the location of the big plant in
Oklahoma City. He did this without any guarantee that one dollar
would be refunded to him in case he lost and the Morris Company
decided to locate elsewhere. He did it without hope of one cent of
profit to himself other than the indirect benefit of the location of
the packing plant here. One city in a thousand can produce men of the
spirit and caliber of Sidney Brock and George Stone. And any
community which is fortunate enough to claim citizens who are ready
and willing to stake a large part of their fortune on the hazard of
greatly benefiting their town, can never go backward, and on the
contrary it is bound to go forward by leaps and bounds."

Within about a year after this contract was closed with Morris & Co.
their packing plant was ready for use, representing an investment of
about $3,000,000. About that time Mr. Brock went to New York City,
where he interviewed Mr. SULZBERGER of Sulzberger & Sons Company, and
succeeded in interesting him in a proposition later resulting in his
meeting a committee in Chicago, and their bringing him to Oklahoma
City. Here was closed a deal identical with that of the Morris & Co.
As already stated, the Oklahoma Industrial Company was formed to
finance the local obligations to these great packing concerns. Mr.
Brock became president of the company and held that office ever
since. This company disposed altogether of lots to the value of
$750,000, paid the majority of the bonus, paid for the land and still
has valuable assets in the way of real estate contracts and unsold
property. The net investment of these two packing plants is between
$8,000,000 and $10,000,000, while the plants themselves are the most
modern in the world, and together with the Oklahoma City Stock Yards,
covering an area of about sixty acres, have made Oklahoma City one of
the leading packing centers west of the Mississippi River.

While a large part of the future industrial prosperity of Oklahoma
City must follow directly upon the initiation of the packing industry
through the Sulzberger and Morris plants, there were other important
achievements carried out while Mr. Brock was president of the Chamber
of Commerce. Several other industrial plants were located, and a
committee of the Chamber of Commerce secured stock subscriptions to
the amount of $50,000 as a bonus for the El Reno Interurban Railroad.
During that time the fight for the capital location was inaugurated,
the capital was definitely located at Oklahoma City and during the
last six months of his administration as president of the Chamber the
land was secured and given to the state as the site for the capitol,
the magnificent building which is now nearing completion. At the same
time the membership of the Chamber of Commerce was increased to
1,300, and made the Oklahoma City chamber the largest body of its
kind in the United States outside of New York City.

When Mr. Brock retired from the presidency of the Chamber of
Commerce he was presented with a solid gold medallion by the Chamber,
with the following inscription on one side: "Presented to Sidney
Lorenzo Brock on the occasion of his retirement from the presidency
of the Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce, conveying the gratitude of
the members for his sterling achievements and bestowing a life
membership. December 31, 1910." On the reverse side is a quotation
from Act 5, Scene 5, of Julius Caesar: "His life was gentle and the
elements so mixed in him that nations might stand up and say to all
the world, that was a man."

Mr. Brock is a director of the Oklahoma State Fair Association, and
was one of the original committee that helped to organize the state
fair in 1907, and was especially active in having the present stock
pavilion built. He is a director of the Farmers National Bank of
Oklahoma City, a member of the Oklahoma City Golf and Country Club
and of the Oklahoma City Men's Dinner Club. In 1894 he married Miss
Jennie WARDELL, daughter of Thomas Wardell of Macon, Missouri, a
wealthy coal operator of that city. Their two children are named
Elizabeth Brock and Sidney L. Brock, Jr.

It is a source of wonder to the friends of Mr. Brock how he finds
time and energy for his many varied activities. He represents quiet
efficiency in the highest degree and only his intimate friends are
aware of the great dynamo of energy which lies under the surface of
his quiet demeanor. He has been a frequent contributor to magazines,
and being an authority on livestock has contributed articles to the
Breeders' Gazette, and in 1895 and 1896 wrote the Wide Awake
retailing page for the Dry Goods Economist. His article in Leslie's
Weekly entitled "The Truth About Oklahoma" has already been referred
to, and it is an excellent statement of a wide survey of facts about
Oklahoma at the time it was written. Mr. Brock takes much pride in
the fact that during his entire association with the members and
directors of the chamber of commerce for a period of nearly ten years
he has always found them men of clean morals and of a fine practical
idealism in business and citizenship. He is himself outspoken on the
value of education for business men, as he himself has seen and felt
the benefits of college training in his own activity. He always
endeavors to give full credit to the training received from his good
mother, a training that kept him from drink, smoking, profanity and
other things that detracts from man's efficiency in the work of the
world.

Typed for OKGenWeb by: Dorothy Marie Tenaza, Dec. 12, 1998.