The great West. [volume], October 18, 1889, Image 1

About The great West. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1889-18??

Image provided by: Minnesota Historical Society; Saint Paul, MN

                
THE WEST Tfll 1 ‘TTT 1 This Republic was fcnted
Thp 1-J-rPflt
Great West Comoany. -X. XX vJ ^ 0 *
SI.OO A YEAR IN ADVANCE.
EDITOR’S SALUTATORY.
CHAP. I.
Farmers, we greet you. Shake.
chap. n.
We’ve come to stay.
CHAP. 11l
This is a radical paper; it fears God
and defies the liars.
Everett W. Fish.
MANAGER'S SALUTE.
CHAP. I.
One dpllar a year in advance.
One year means from now till Jan
uary Ist, 1891.
CHAP. 111.
Come up to the help of the Lord
against the mighty. /
We advise every farmer to turn all
his insurance into the Alliance com
panies.
More Alliances have been organ
ized during the last six months than
in the two previous years.
The great Fire Insurance Combina-
tion was temporarily broken recent
ly. It will Is .patched up again im
mediately.
The Manitoba road must be dread
fully close on when its
watered stock is at a premium of 17
cents on the dollar!
It would be a good plan to com
bine all the farmers’ county and
township fire insurance companies
into a strong Alliance company for
the state.
Immediately after the issuing of
Mr. Hill’s recent consolidation circu
lar, Manitoba stock dropped from
121 % to 117. As a daily paper said:
“The natural effdct of a stock-water
ing scheme!” j t \
How many million acres of land
does the Standard Oil Company own
for oil and gas purposes? This
should be ascertained. They handle
$200,000,000, and havfc been gob
bling land for years. !
From what Alliance wis the appli
cation for charter sent containing
the names of Began, Barr. r , McAuliffe,
Sullivan, Johnston, Naih, Downs,
Aitkin, Byrnes, Conghli i, Morgan,
etc. The Application is iata recent
one, and bears no postofi ce or town
upon it.
When you did would it i ot be well
for that hard Working wife to get a
thousand dollars to clea r off those
debts and send mechildreu to school?
Probate courts Ido not t< >uch life in
surance —and tne National Alliance
Aid Association insures fc r less
tobacco costs a moderate lser. »
Henry Villardl states that the
earnings of the' Northern Pacific
railway have increased s> that by
January 1 they will show a gross in
crease of two million dollars, and
pay dividends on the stack. This
stock represents bo investment to
speak of —the investment came prac
tically from bonds.
There are many farmers in the hard
wheat regions of the northwest who
do not know that the middle-states
farmer sows his wheat in the fall.
■ We don’t get snow enough in this
section for that.
Qn the other hahd middle-states
* farmers generally suppose that the
northern hard wheat is a winter
wheat.
A strong Alliance man once made
an appointment for a Dep. State Lec
turer to address the farmers for the
purpose of organising an Alliance.
It was two days ahead. Before the
lecturer could get there word went
from the County Chairman of a po
litical party to ths township eom
. *nitteemen to stay away from the
‘‘meeting and freeze it out. They
stayed away—but it didn’t “freeze!”
It was hot as capsicum!
The Railway Age informs us that
the seat of activity in railroad build-,
ing is transferred to the south.
The south represents a new field for
corporate greed to exercise genius in.
Not many years hence a net work of
railways will cover that section with
its framework of billions of watered
stock—every thousand dollar block
of which will represent about S3OO
invested. It looks at! though the
northwest had been nicked pretty
dry. T
Inour supplement is A referenceto
the knowing the num
ber VMlniit of mortgages in
each county. And it states that one
loan-broking firm in one city of Da
kota leases 500 farms in that vicin-
ity—secured by foreclosures! A
banker In one of the central counties
of Minnesota gave us his straight
word, repeated, that he jiad on his
books the names of 800 farmers
who had been driven out of the coun
ty by foreclosures due to rapacity of
loan companies and railroad robbers.
T Ws can substantiate this statement.
4
K "
CHAP. II
resenting the Financial and Political Interests of the Farmers of the Northwest
Michigan had a poor wheat crop.
The farmers are not selling readily.
Pennsylvania was under the aver
age.
New York, an unusually poor crop.
Indiana has not marketed, so far,
half a crop.
Ohio will send to market not over
one-half the usual amount.
Missouri will market about two
thirds of a crop.
Illinois will not send in over 40
per cent.
Dakota is short 15 to 20 million
bushels. Yet No. 3 northern wheat
is selling at from 55 to 60 cents in the
northwest.
/ Pressure is already brought to
bear to crush out The Great West.
The Publishing Company went to a
man in St. Paul last week to close a
contract in a business matter. Sat
isfactory propositions were made
and accepted—without the sugges
tion of a difference in terms desired.
Before noon the next day this man
went direct to stalwart politicians in
St. Paul, and office holders, and told
them of the plan of the State Alli-
ance to send out from 50,000 to 100,-
000 supplements containing Mr. Don
nelly’s address. The man was ad
vised in terms which he could not af
ford to slight, to drop the matter at
once.
It was dropped. Nor was that all.
But The Great West bides its time.
and when that time comes will make
a revelation worth revealing.
Within the coming month the ed
itor of the Great West, and the pub
lishers, expect to hear that he and
they are rascals, fools, disturbers of
the peace, miniature insane asylums,
cranks, debauches, liars and anar
chists. Either that, or ominous si
lence and secret machinations.
Within one week from the time of
the first issue the necessary advice
will go forth from the State Central
Committees to the County Chairmen.
From the County Chairmen to the
township committees—what to do
and say on the matter. Many pa
pers in the state, now edited by the
State Committee, will get the usual
instructions from the State Chair
man, or secretary rather, and will
act accordingly. No tyranny ever
existed in this world more thorough
ly organized than the political par
ties of this state. And they are
thoroughly in league with the great
corporations.
The freight on coal from Erie, Pa.,
to Duluth, is rarely over 90c. per ton.
We see it stated recently that it has
been 40c. per ton the past season—
from Buffalo to Duluth. Coal is
worth $2.25 to 2.75 at Buffalo and
Erie. And yet, the consumers of
•oal* in the north west pay from
$8.50 per ton in the Twin Cities to
$10.50 in Dakota.
Lest some one will dispute the pos
ibility of freighting coal from Buffalo
to Duluth at 40c. per ton w*e will give
an estimate which cannot be far
from correct —although 40c. is the
lowest we have ever heard of:
A coal barge can load 1,500 tons of
coal. At 40c. per ton she receives
S6O0 —and from other sources say S2OO,
making SBOO. She may be ten days
on the west bound trip, including
taking cargo. Deck and engine help,
$l5O. Salaries, SIOO. Coal for engines
S2OO. Mess, SIOO. Total $550.
This leaves a balance of $250 to the
west trip. Of course there is no
money at this. But at 75 and 90c.
there is a splendid profit. At 90c.
the cost of coal at Duluth should not
be over $3.25.
Some people don’t believe that pol
iticians and office holders have be
come despotically organized, as we
represent. One day last winter one
of the prominent citizens of a central
county, a popular G. A. R. man, a
staunch republican, and a power in
his neighborhood, came to us to help
him get a postofflce in a village near
him.
“Have you got up your petition?”
“Yes, a big one —and a good one
too.”
“What did you do with it?”
“Sent it to Congressman
“When?”
“A \veek ago.”
“Have you seen the County Chair
man?”
VNo.”
“Well, go and tell him you want
to see your petition a few moments.”
“Oh I sent it to Con
“Never mind. Ask the County
Chairman for it—it’s in his desk. Of
fer him SSO at the same time, as a
campaign contribution. Be sure and
make it a ‘campaign’ contribution—
of course he understands it.”
A few days after the gentleman
called on us again. He grabbed us
4>y the hand.
“Gad, Doc., you’re right]’’
“You got it then?”
“No, by Gee-rusalem—the other
cuss got his money in ahead of me!”
A county chairman not a million
miles from St. Paul, who is also a
Probate Judge, and who is by no
means drunker’n a biled owl all the
time, was asked by a gJbd republi
can if a certain drinking fellow was
ST. PAUL, MINN., FRIDAY, OCT. 18, 1889,
going to be postmaster. “Yes, by
G , he is.”
“But the people don’t want him.”
“Don’t make a blank-blank bit of
difference, By G my word is law,
and I want him postmaster, by G
he is postmaster!” And he shook
his blue fist in the air till his bloated
stomach ached.
A few days ago the difference in
the price of wheat at Webster Dak.,
was 27c., when it should have been
14c. Last year the County and Sub
ordinate Alliances of Pope County,
Minn., 120 miles from Minneapolis,
were writing the Railway Commis
sion that the difference was 23 and
26c. —about 1-5 of a cent a mile! All
the satisfaction they received was
that the “local dealer” made all over
9c. This was too innocent for a
wooden man. Every one knows the
local dealer buys on telegraphic or
ders from Minneapolis.
The Dakota Alliance now enters
the field to loan money. It contracts
Dakota loans at 8)£ per cent straight
—that is without commission or ex
pense of any kind.
• A SOFT SNAP, H
There is a grocer over yonder who has put in a stock of
groceries costing SSOO. He has issued mortgages on it to the
tune of $2,500. How did he do it? Why he made out the
mortgages in hundred dollar lots, attd sold them at ten cents
on the dollar.
“ But I should think that people would be afraid of them at
any price.”
“ Oh no—they draw seven per cent.”
“ But how does he get the seven per cent, to pay ? ”
“Why, he has the only grocery in town, and when he issues
more mortgages he slaps on more price on his tea, sugar,
beans, etc.”
“ But why don’t the people get another grocery in the town?”
“ Because the peculiar laws of this section which apply to
groceries do not admit of one grocery running along the line
of this grocery.”
“ You say the interest on these bogus mortgages are seven
per cent., and that the people who trade there have to pay
enough more for goods to pay the interest? ”
“Yes.”
“ Well, can the grocer issue as many mortgages as he likes?”
“ He does, whether or no.”
“And Goes a mortgage bring seven per cent, on its face—on
one hundred cents to the dollar—or on the ten of fifteen or
more cents paid for them ? ”
“ On the par value, or one hundred cents to the dollar.”
“Then if buyers pay ten cents on the dollar he gets seven
cents a year on the ten cents, seven dollars on ten dollars? ”
“ Now you’ve struck it.”
“Then tf&grocer will issue all the Mortgagee he can—not
only to gefc|nbre interest on more mortgages —but to get in
terest at About 70 per cent, on investment. Does he brag
about his riches ? ”
“ Oh no, he says he is on the verge of bankruptcy.”
“ Well, he is, isn’t he—ought to be? ”
“ Yes—because he sells many of his mortgages, as said above,
and his grocery has to pay the interest, whoever holds them.”
“ How do the people like it—it must keep them poor ? ”
“It does. But you see the grocer works a scheme. He gives
free groceries to some; he buys up the lawyers and the big
papers, and lots o’ little ones, and he elects the town council
in his interest.”
“ But why don ? t people goto the next town to trade? ”
“Well, the next town is in the same boat. And besides they
fix up an association agreeing not to cut prices.”
“And the people don’t kick?”
“ Well, yes, occassionally a few cranks get mad, and then the
hired friends of the grocer shout abroad that the crank wants
to abolish groceries altogether.”
“ Well, your citizens must be lot.”
Forest Lake, Minn., Oct. 7th, 1889.
Hon. Ignatius Donnelly:
Dear Sir: I called the farmers in
my vicinity together to see if they
would not form a subordinate Alli
ance. I succeeded so far that we, on
Saturday last, organized an Alliance,
with A. C. York, for president; A. P.
Noyes, vice president; A. L. Strom
berg, secretary; Aug. Aim, treasurer.
The following persons also signed
the application for a charter: Peter
Lind, Gustaf Engstrom, C. M. Sten,
C. A. Peterson, Ole Aim, F. Yeith.
Joseph Lundin, John Svenson. En
closed please find a list of those, who
will subscribe for the intended Farm
er’s weekly newspaper. I expect to
get more such subscribers. All infor
mation of interest to a new Alliance
will be thankfully received. Very
respectfully yours,
A. L.Stromberg, Secretary.
About the hardest influences to
overcome in organizing alliances are
those of farmers who are appointed
wheat buyers, and farmers with lots
of relatives who become village mer
chants and implement dealers. In
Pope County two hardware mer
chants did their best to break down
a newspaper which sustained the Al
liances. But these men would do
nothing themselves to break down
the twine trust—and dnly broke
their 20 cent prices when the Alliance
got the goods for 16 ceqss.
A Note From A Fellow Sufferer.
To the Editor of The Great West:
“***** When you get to
publishing an alliance organ you will
be in the right kind of water to swim
in. That’s where you ought to be.
That is what I said when you
brought out that wonderful book
keeping of the Minneapolis & Pacific
road over a year ago. I always used
to take your paper home and read it.
Go in, Dr. Pish, and if anybody can
Will editors of our exchanges, or
subscribers, in the west and north
west) please quote for us the price of
hard coal and wheat. A postal card
would suit us better than a newspa
per Ideal.
I ■ 1 :■ - ■ .. '.'aja
It trill encourage every former to
know that subscriptions are coming
in. Monday of this week we received
twenty in the mail before the paper
was out. A good score of royal
friends are at work for us. Go on,
brethren—let the feeling spread over
the entire northwest that “now is
the accepted time” to move on the
enemy. One of the Exec. Com.
write# a glorious letter to a friend of
ours About his feeling towards the
new paper. Another frieftd writes
and sends a list of prospective sub
scribers. We publish his letter with
out permission, but it is full of Alli
ance news, and that is excuse
enough.
We also desire to thank our Daw
son friend for a club, cash, and
name#.
sweat the scales off the railroad alli
gator you can. I for one, will trust
you with the job. You ought to get
harnessed up with
you. I saw a circular from Mr. Don
nelly about starting such a paper,
but it wants the paper itself to do
the pushing. In my judgment you
better let agricultural matters alone.
Stick to the genuine demands of the
hour. * * * * Come up and give
us a talk on “Bonanzas” sometime.
If you do, look up the history of our
branch [railroad] and strike hard;
the truth will be hard enough. * *
* You ask why we editors out in the
provinces don’t make Rome howl?
Well, we do sometimeget excited, but
we are too busy to keep posted all
the time—and then some railway
boodle -free- pass- cross- roads- legisla
tor lawyer comes in and breaks his
heart over us. * * *.
[We would print this letter, but the
writer asked us not to—that’s the
reason we don’t! Don’t we?— Ed.]
A farmer writes a letter from an in
terior county, where there are seven
or eight Alliances, saying that an
“Alliance of farmers, to amount to
anything, is a thing impossible until
99 out of every 100 farmers do not
know their letters.'” Then he adds,
“country schools are the curse of the
farming community in this country.”
Read it in another column. The let
ter is in earnest, and is not satirical,
and of course the writer, who resides
in Pope Co., is a crank.
Speaking about “Wood,” dry ma
ple could be had by the hundred car
loads, or one car load, in Steams
and Todd Counties, last winter, for
$2.50 a cord. Less than a hundred
miles railway transit, and one man’s
profits made it $7.00 a cord.
The public school system is an in
stitution to be guarded with jealous
care.
The Markets.
“The Great West” will give no gen
eral analysis of the markets this
week. Its table of commercial ex
changes and reports is not let cov
ered, nor are our facilities for work
in this field complete. We have se
cured files of reports extending back
twenty-two years, however, and
shall make almost constant use of
them.
The man never yet was bom who
could forecast the changes of the elec
tric dial in the Chicago Board of
Trade. It is unfortunate that the
dial exists—-but it does exist—and
upon its unreasonable and scheme-
haunted machinery depends the for
tunes of the great mass of producers
throughout the country.
The movements of the dial do not
depend upon any legitimate demands
of traffic. The foreign trade has no
general control over it. This is a
bold statement. We will undertake
to prove it hereafter, and incontro
vertibly. Under the vast, boiling
and seething sea of contending
spirits, on the Board, are less than
twenty men, whose deals are so
large that any temporary union of
effort of a half dozen will send the
market in any direction. The ex
periences in the midst of this mael
strom of winners and losers has laid
bare the absolute rottenness of the
concern as a commercial organiza
tion.
Now, it stands clearly to reason
that a buyer of the “real stuff” is
a bear. The “long” dealer, (that is,
the man who is “long” tecause he
has purchases of grain ir. hand) is
temporarily a bull—-because he is
not now a buyer—but a “seller!”
—he wants to sell what he has. No
ordinary or general laws or maxims
govern a speculator—that is, the
nine-tenths of all on the Board who
buy and sell on paper, but never see
a kernel of grain. All laws or max
ims which can be drawn or applied
to the market pertain, and then but
dimly, to the dealer in the actual
grain. Among people at large, in
all the avenues of commerce, the buy
er is a bear. He wants the market
down to buy cheaply. It is so with
groceries, clothing and grain, and
everything else. The buyer is a bear.
Hence, every man who handles the
“stuff” on the Board, like an “hon
est gambler,” is a bear.
“Yes,” you say, “but* having
bought then has the wheat
to sell, and wanting to get more
than he paid, becomes a bull!”
Yes, but such is the case only with
the option man, the “paper” dealer.
The regular buyer of the grain it
self is always a bear because he only
buys to deliver what is already sold.
The “old soldiers” on the Board, the
ancient men who have stood up in
carnage for ten years, are all Bears!
They buy for a market— not to
make it! They buy to fill up
“shorts” —that is, sales where their
wheat on hand is insufficient, or
“short,” for delivery. They may al
so buy for export on a given sale.
They buy also for milling. You may
count on every actual dealer being a
bear. Hence, the helpless farmer,
who drives his load up to the eleva
tor and humbly asks, “How much
may I have to day?”—puts his lone
appeal against the combined bear
pressure of every actual buyer in the
world.
We say, and say it with the em
phasis which comes of a knowledge
of the truth of the above, that an end
MUST be put to this—must be put
to it, or serfhood and universal pov
erty await the farmer.
There is but one way to put the
actual seller, (the natural bull), before
the actual buyer, the natural bear,
and that is for the farmers to yield
the control of the sale of their wheat
to an organization of themselves.
This mean#, in fiat terms, the or
ganization of a “Combine”—a trust
—a pool.
The world is organized against
you. You are without justice and
fair dealing. You must either com
bine against them or go to the wall.
This means the organization of a
wheat trust. The work has been be
gun at Topeka. It must be carried
forward. Mark this prophecy—
within twenty-five years the Alli
ances and the granges, which thus
far have not even spoken of the mat
ter, will have the Board of Trade of
Chicago on its marrow bones! It
will be crying aloud for breadstuff*
—everlasting ruin staring them in
the face—because the Farmers hold
only 50 million bushels back for 48
hours!! .
And then the commercial world
will shout against the unrighteous
ness of the “trust!” And their howls
will find its echo: *
“Yes, but break up your devilish
system of building palaces against
our hovels, robbing us to make for
you a hell’s holiday—creating des
potisms out of onr sweat—and then
we will let go—not one moment be-
fore!” The fact is, the markets are
controlled against the producer. To ,
quote markets is merely tc? give forth
the results of secret schemes—the ef-
feet* of a universal bear pressure^
. Railroad Aid.
On the 18th of this month Roches
ter will be torn up on the question of
voting railroad aid. But, singular
as it may seem, in this year of our
state history, the question is not
whether to bonus or not —but which
of two newly proposed roads to
bonus!
How this issue can exist today
passes our understanding. Lincoln
or Greeley, or some other prominent
genius, said you could fool all the
people part the time and part of the
people all the time—but not all the
people all the time.
Well, we don’t know about it. If
the experience of the last twenty
years is good for nothing, what can
be hoped for the future? Is there an
intelligent man in Minnesota who
don’t know that the bonuses have
nothing to do with the building of
railroads ?
We are honest and earnest in ask
ing this question. If a man does not
know this, can it be said that he is
“posted” on the matters of general
interest to the citizen?
Let it be put straight and fair:
When a company starts out to build
a railroad it first prints a mass of
“stock.” This stock consists of cer
tificates of ownership in the road—
and it is rarely wholly issued at first.
Then, this stock not being paid for
in any degree, (sometimes enough is
raised on it to get surveys, but not
often) the “Company” put their *
names to paper to raise money to
build the actual road. On this pa
per, or note, is an obligation to
transform the security of the note
into mortgage bonds, secured on the
road bed.
Now about the bonuses? as
soon as a Company is in shape they
farm out the bonus business, as an
entirely different issue. They delegate
or farm out the work, divvying on
the proceeds, and each section pock
ets the result. The money so raised
has nothing whatever to do with
the building of the road,...Look at
the L. F. &D. branch of the N. P'.,
for instance. Of the $200,000 and over
raised for that road not a dollar of
it appears among the sworn re
sources of the road! Examine the
sworn reports in the Railway
Com’rs annual for confirmation.
Where do these vast sums, aggre
gated by township votes, turn up ?
They turn up, Mr. Rochester, in
the pockets of the bonus farmers and
railway sharks, right where yours
will appear. It is time the common
sense citizens of a community shook
off this galling yoke of a lot of pur
chased “men of influence,” who are
paid to get up an excitement.
There is a man in Pope County
who has pocketed altogether about
SI,BOO in this way—and yet the gang
keep him on top—as though he were
a most virtuous, sober fellow-citizen.
So secret are these means of skull
duggery that a man knowing the
facts does not dare to “speak out in
meetin’ ” for no one could prove in
court what he knows privately.
Our advice is to vote “No!” to ev
erything on the “bonus racket.”
The cost of operating a kailroad is
something that can only b{ obtained
with some difficulty. The expense is
far below what is generally supposed,
so far as mere movement of trains is
concerned. Of course the immense
salaries, given the principal officers of
the company, run expenses up to ex
travagant proportions.
The wear and tear of rolling stock
can be told by leasage rates of sup
ply and manufacturing companies.
The cost of an equipment is not up
to the amount supposed by one who
looks at a mighty locomotive tear
ing through the forest. For instance,
a road with nearly 300 miles, built
for $3,000,000 (and bonded for $8,000,-
000 —of course) expends only one-half
of one million for rolling stock or
equipment. “Equipment” means all
kinds of cars, even to a hand-car.
The cost of grading is calculated
by figuring on the number of cubic
yards of dirt to be thrown. Some
times it counts in cuts alone—some
times in cuts and fills. When a cut
and fill come close together a con
tract is based on that fact. Con
tracts generally cover a mile. Esti
mates cover given miles. A con
venient method of figuring a gener
ally level grade-i-and the track line
will rise and fall much to secure it—
is by the prism. By this we mean
a cross-section of the grade which
may be supposed to be nine feet on
ground and six feet where the ties lie.
If the grade is three feet high the
lines of bottom and top and sloping
sides will include just 27 feet. Hence,
one foot of such grade equals 27 cubic
feet, or one cubic yard. It costs
about 15c to move earth on contract.
VOL. I, NO. 1.