on the market that it was rarely traded. Indeed, no stock was traded on the open market between July 1896 and November 1910. But the railroad made a great deal of money. According to historian Thomas W. Sanderson, the MCR was the most profitable of the LS&MS' lines as of 1907 due to the immense amount of freight moving in and out of Youngstown and its nearby coal fields and mills. The MCR was also the LS&MS' only link to the rich coal fields and iron foundries of Pittsburgh and Youngstown. It routinely paid dividends of 100 percent of market value for nearly 30 years at the start of the 20th century. By November 1926, $50 par value MCR stock was trading at $805 a share. When stock did come on the market, wide swings in price occurred. It was trading at $1,000 a share in March 1927, and remained at that level until August 1927. The New York Times called MCR "the outstanding 'blue chip' of the stock market". It continued to be only rarely traded in the 1930s and early 1940s, with the Times declaring it a "stranger to the ticker tape of the New York Stock Exchange" in 1942 and subject to only "infrequent transactions" in 1944. Even as late as 1951, the stock was "infrequently traded". New York Central ownership The New York Central and Hudson River Railroad acquired a controlling majority in the LS&MS in 1877. In 1914, an asset restructuring and refinancing of the New York Central led to the abolishment of all subsidiary corporations and their consolidation into a new New York Central Railroad. The New York Central (NYC) assumed the lease of the MCR in December 1914. The NYC began buying up MCR stock. By 1920, the New York Central outright controlled the road, owning 7,990 of its 13,227 outstanding shares (60.4 percent) of preferred stock and 17,893 of its 30,0000 shares (59.6 percent) of its common stock. By 1947, NYC's common stock ownership had risen to 19,440 shares (64.8 percent) of MCR's common stock. In 1958, the New York Central increased its ownership of MCR stock even more to 24,000 shares (80 percent) of outstanding common stock. Once the NYC owned 80 percent of the company, it could pool the MCR's taxes with those of other NYCRR subsidiaries. Now, profits in one subsidiary could be offset by losses in another. This