Well, sorry for the Rule 10 violation. Did not realize that posting an excerpt of an old BT book could be a violation. Will be more carefull next time.
Now, the excerpt was from the old MW RPG 1ed. I found it thanks to Mendrugo`s thread in Novel and Sourcebook Reviews and Skiltao`s blog. It was from page 136 of the book. The book talks about the Marian hegemony without naming it that way. In fact, talks about how O`Reilly is the overlord of Alphard, the ATC, and have economic hegemony over 8 worlds. Now, point by point.
*ATC was once one of the greatest concerns in the Periphery.
*Its Board of Directors like to dabble in politics (it caused to be hit hard during the Amaris Civil War and SWs).
*Amaris was one of their main clients, and they produced 30 mechs/month in mid-28Th century. Now, we know that in the early 2700`s the ATC created a number of "baby ATCs" all around the Sphere and Periphery, but so far all leads that the Alphard ATC was the main one. Could this mean that the Alphard installations manufactured mechs for Amaris? Or it refers to the ATC-KY of Kendall? Or another unknown facility?
*When Sebastian O`Reilly found the refining facility in planet IV (which is the current MH capital), it holded 50 millon C-Bills in Germanium, enough to "several hundred drive cores". In my own opinion, 50 millon is a little..."anemic". I think they really meant to add one or two zeros to that number, at least.
*The rest continues with what we know, he hired mercs, and secured his realm. What is interesting is that apparently the surrounding zone was already inhabitated. It describes it with "other savaged planets in the area in cooperation with the petty governments and populacesthat remainded. Was the zone colonized during the Star League era? By whom? We know of worlds like Comstock IV and Francas in the area being during the SL era, so it is a possibility that there are more inhabitated worlds around.
*Its curious that describe that Johann and Marius have created a national entity that "presently enjoys a standard of living rivaling of any Successor State". That means that they did a very good job, or that life in the Inner Sphere was crappier that we know.
*Finally, it addressed that Marius, by 3025, have around 1 regiment of mechs, have secured a reliable source of spare parts (raiding?, some Spheroid corporation?, Comstar?) and have a growing industrial base, but lacks in the technical expertise department to "make rediscoveries of lost technology".
*Final note: In the background we see a symbol that apparently is a "O" over a "R". Could this be the House O`Reilly family crest?.