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Show FIFTY YEARS AGO AS SEEN IN A NEWSPAPER CUPPING FOUND IN BIBLE OF AN OGDEN HOME It fs only a newspaper clipping and it has its greatest value In the fact that It Is over fifty years old. Someone cut it out and laid it away more than half a century ago. though why they should place it for safe keeping in the! family Biblo cannot bo explained.) Suroly It was not because It was less likely to be disturbed there. But there it has reposed safely all these yoars. Occasionally someone takes it out, unfolds it, spreads it out and reads anew tho wonderful story of "The Phantom Ship." The author's namo is given as Walter Wal-ter Thornburg. He lived and wrote just about the time when the author of that marvelous series known as "Beadle's Dime Novels" was collect ing his material. "Tho Phantom Ship" was an English man-of-war of the old wooden sailing vessel type that was cruising along the coast of Africa looking for piratos and slaves, and, of course, tho hero is a , mero boy, a midshipman. The captain goes ashore and takes most of the crew with him to follow up a falso report as to a slavedcaler and leaves the ship at anchor in command com-mand of "tho boy captain." Then tho real pirates come suddenly sudden-ly from nowhere in a long, low, rakish craft nnd aided by five or six canoes crammed with shouting negroes, mu-lattoes mu-lattoes and piratical -looking Portuguese Portu-guese 'sailors in Panama hats who rowed fiercely out of the treo-shad-lowed mouth of the lagoon and pulled I straight for the Spitfire. It was a great fight. From the first canoe a dozen rough black-bearded fellows mado a dash up tho sides of the vessol and clambored on deck. But it was not to beV'Powis met them with pike and cutlass and drovo them back over the gunwales after ten minutes hand-to-hand fighting." About this time the excitement be-camo be-camo intense, as a police court reporter re-porter would say. "Twice Kaskett's cutlass saved the boy captain's life." Get that? How is that for class? Then, just In the niche of time, tho captain and the crew came back from their wild-goose chase and the pirates are put to rout and slaughtered with-, with-, out mercy. It is very exciting and a great story, but after all not any more exciting man uiu uAiiuucutu i uwunu .. whale, or than St. Paul's shipwreck on the isle of Malta. Still 50 years is a long time and this clipping leads one to doubt those old timers who are always saying, "In my vounger days we did not spend half our time reading blood and thunder stories." The clipping itself is an interesting relic. The paper is mado of real rags and, after 50 years, is as soft and pliable pli-able as an old banknote, and Is a sharp contrast to the present-day print paper mado of straw and quaking asp pulp. The date line shows that it is taken from "The Weekly Republican, Thursday, Thurs-day, March 15, 1S66." so to bo exact, it was printed nearly 52 years ago. The paper was evidently published In Chicago for the other side from the story of "The Phantom Ship" is devoted devot-ed largely to' reports of the Chicago markets and the union stock yards. A glanco at these reports reveals the fact that not all tho pirates were doing business on tho African coast, Tho civil war closed In April, 1865, but eleven months after that date the war prices still prevailed to a large extent, at least in most lines. Chicago at that timo disputed with Cincinnati for the honor of being the livestock market, but Chicago was In I the lead and still gaining, although the arrivals at the stockyards in Chicago I on some days wero not so much great-' great-' er than the volumo of business some- times done by our local stockyards In I one day. ' Hero Is a schedule showing the arrivals ar-rivals and shipments of beef cattle for the week ending Monday, March 12, 1866: Receipts Shipments March 6 1455 414 March 7 2518 580 March 8 4221 -136 March 9 1288 1776 March 10 810 2292 March 11 and 12 293 828 Total 10,585 6326 Previous week 8168 4264 Increase 2427 2074 Tho arrivals of beef cattle averaged for the week 1513 head daily. In theso recent years Chicago has thought nothing of receiving and handling 20,-000 20,-000 cattlo in a day. Shipmonts of hogs during tho same week were 10,108, which was a re-crease re-crease of 265, from the previous week. Here are some of tho prices paid: Common packing stocrs $5.50 Good straight steers ; 6.60 Good pair steers 5.75 Good smooth steers 6.50 , Sales of hogs were made at following follow-ing prices For hogs averaging 191 pounds. $8.95; averaging 290 pounds, $9.30. At the packing houses a- mess pork was 25 cents a pound; mess boef 16 lo 20 conts; new extra mess. 20 to 24 cents and heavy beef hams, 37 to 39 cents. Verily the pirates of the African Af-rican coast were mere amateurs. Early Railroading. The paper makerB' same display of tho fact that on week days sevon trains were run to tho stockyards ovor the Pittsburgh & FL Wayne, leaving the depot at Mndlson and Canal streets at intervals of two hours. Fare 20 conts each way. 5 cents extra if paid on the train, which shows that tho company thought the conductor was a pirate too On Sunday there wore only four trains. The reporter doing the stockyards has this to say, March 13: "We heard some complaint today of tho quality of tho hay being sold to stockmen. Thoro ought to be no such cause for complaint, especially when the company gets its own price for tho hay. And in this connection we have a word of advice to give to drovers. If tho quality of the hay or grain fur-nlshod fur-nlshod is not good it is best to go direct di-rect to the superintendent of tho yards before advertising the fact elsewhere." Sounds natural, doesn't It? Hay Prices In Chicago. Tho bay market Is given in mucn dotall. Here are some prices at wholesale whole-sale on tho cars: Timothy, baled, $11 to $12.50. Timothy, loose, pressod $10 to $11.50. Prairie, loose. $10 to $11.50. Hay at retail sold as follows: Timothy, baled, $15 to $16. Timothy, looso, $13 to $14. Prairie, baled, $12 to $13. It can bo noted that 52 years ago the uncultivated pralrlc came so close up to Chicago that prairie hay, loose on wagons, was delivered in any part of the city for $9.50 a ton. No Familiar Names. There Is a list of the buyers of cattlo cat-tlo during tho week and tho number purchased by each firm but ono looks in vain for a familiar name. There are no Armours, Swifts or Cudahys among them. But not all the pirates wore in business busi-ness at the stockyards. There wero others. Take sugar for instance. Cuba sugar, common, was 13 cents a pound; Cuba, prime, was 14 cems; rona choico, 15 cents; New York, crushed, 18 cents; New York, white, for coffee, cof-fee, 17 cents; Now York extra C, 14 to 15 cents; Oxnard C, 12 to 13 cents. Syrups wero quoted: New York common, com-mon, 50 to 60 cents a gallon; New York, good, 80 to 90 cents; New York, choice. 1.20 to $1.30 and Chicago Golden Gol-den Drip, 1.00 to $1.10. Flour and Grain. Tho flour market was rated by the barrel of 200 pounds, and tho flour was graded according to whether It was from fall grain or spring grain. Up to that time no one had a patent on flour. Choice St. Louis whito winter flour sold at $14 per barrel or 7 cents a pound and you kept the barrol. Good white winter flour, $11.00. Red winter flour $9.50. Fancy Spring Extra, $8.25. Good Spring Extra, $7.75. Common Spring Extra, $6.75. Spring Superfine, $5.75. Rye Flour, $4.60. Quotations on grain followed the samo plan as flour. On March 13, 12,000 bushels of No. 1 spring wheat sold at $1.24, White No. 2 sold down to 89 cents, and 400 bushels of "rejected" wheat was sold at 70 cents, probably to the same people- who had rejected it No. 1 corn brought 40 cents and No. 2 as low as 35. No. 1 oats sold at 24 cents and some shipper of No. 2 took 21 cents for 1200 bushelB. Rye sold at from 62 to 59 conts and barloy was so dull as to be "entirely nominal. Tho malsters are overstocked overstock-ed and tho sales making are not sufficient suffi-cient to establish fair quotations. Grocery Prices. At that timo very few pirates had gone Into tho grocery business. Some of their prices seem quite reasonable. Hero are somo of them: Rio coffee, common to fair, 28c. Rio, good to prime, 29c. Rio, primo to choice, 30c. Java, old, 42c. Rice, rangoon, lie Rice, Carolina, 13c Salt, fine, per barrel, $2.30. can, iurK.s isiujiu, i..ou. Salt, flno dairy, $4.00. Starch, KingBford, 12c Saloratus, Babbitt's best, 14c Soap, Babbitt's, $15c Soap, Castile, genuine, 24c Soap, Castile, American, 16c Soap, Emory's eraslve, 12c The potato market was "firm at $2.25 per barrel, and on the track sales wero mado at 65 cents per bushel for peach blows." Hamburg cheese sold at 22 cents,! New York factory at 23 cents. Western Wes-tern reserve at 21 cents and Western States only 19 cents. EggG 20 Cents. Eggs wore 20 cents a dozen, in March remember. No cold storage business bus-iness in those day to amount to anything. any-thing. And bulter was hold at 30 to 32 cents, common butter at 24 and very common at 22 conts. New York dried applos sold at 16 cents a pound, Michigan and Ohio dried apples 16 cents. Dried peaches pared, were 35 cents, unpared only 20 cents. Currants were 18 conts. Smoked halibut was IS cents a pound and a half barrel of mackerel was $9. Prime steam rendered lard sold at IS cents. Tea was worth while. Young Hyson Hy-son was $1.15, Young Hyson, extra, ?L60; choice. $1,80 a pound. Imperial Suporior was $1.25, extra $1.70. and choice $2.15. Japan natural leaf, $1.35; colored $1.75 and Oolong, $1.20. Hickory, $15 a cord. You could buy a cord of hickory wood for $15, maple for $14 and bcoch, $11, delivered anywhere In the city. Calicoes or "prints" sold In Chicago at from 14 to 20 cents a yard, ginghams, ging-hams, 22 to 26 cents; denims, 27 to 45 cents; cambric, 20 to 23 cents; brown sheetings, 20 to 26 cents, and bleached sheetings, 25 to 42 cents. Russia Iron was 40 conts, sheet copper, cop-per, 57 conts; sheet zinc, 17 cents; common bar Iron was C cents, and plow steel was IS cents. Ten barrels of "highanlnes" sold at $ 2.25 a gallon and beer was not quoted at all. Hemlock-tanned leather was 40 centB and oak-tanned, 42 cents, while "green butcher's hides" sold at 6 cents a pound. Lumber Prices. Common lumber was $17 for 1000 feet. Common flooring, dresBed, was $30; common siding, dressed, $20; Star shingles, sawed, wero $4.75, and lath, $3.75; common cedar posts, 15 to 25 cents. t Cut nails were 8 cents, shingle nails, 10 cents. Linseed oil, $1.50 per gallon. Coal oil was 63 cents, and "benzale, .70 gravity, deodorized," which must correspond to tho gasoline gaso-line of today, sold at 40 cents. A dozen No. 1 22-lnch wooden v,T,n pr.'M fnr "MS Kft nnd a dozen brooms with "common, plain handles" are quoted at $2.00. The papor containB brief summaries of the markets in other cities. Now York reported cotton at 40 cents for middling; canton flannel at 40 conts, and gave much space, as was quite proper, to prices of hoop skirts. Thoso having 40 to 80 hoops, fastened with 1-Inch tapes, woro 93 cents each, and with 3-Inch tapes, $1.12. Milwaukee at that time had not yet become famous as the place where tho thing that mado it famous was manufactured, manu-factured, and, strange to say, was tho only place from which the paper gets a quotation on wool, 35 cents for coarse and 45 cents for fine. In Philadelphia whiskey was dull at $2.26 a gallon, and good red wheat sold at $2.20 a bushel. Baltimore quoted white corn at 69 conts and yellow at 65 cents, but whiskey was "dull and nominal." Cleveland was the center of the potroleum market, and light sales are notod thoro and at Pittsburg at 36 1 cents. In Cincinnati there was no domand and in Louisville a heavy rain had spoiled business. j Finances Then. A New York financial paper was quotod as saying: "If the prosent state of things continue, tho spring business will be broken up entirely. If tho financial policy of tlho United States treasury could bo determined thero would be moro confidence." This was a frank admission that a "leak" would bo very acceptable. Anothor writer urges that stocks and bondB bo printed In green ink on a "printed background" so that thoy could not, when stolon, bo so easily changed. Big business and little business both had their troublos and plenty of them, and after reading them over carefully, with all their nauseating details, It Is a positive relief to turn the clipping, over again and read about tho real good-onough-for-suro pirates and their "phantom ship." |