Democratic Sentinel, Volume 8, Number 7, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 March 1884 — The First Pass. [ARTICLE]

The First Pass.

If a man never has a pass on a railroad he goes through life paying his fare, and never thinks of its being a hardship, -but when once the free pass enters the system he is no good to a railroad forever after, and he looks upon the paying of fare on a railroad as a wicked scheme, an outrage, as it were. Up to 1860 the writer had always paid fare on railroads, and probably had expended as much as $7, all told, in riding from one town to another on the cars, and he never missed the money, feeling that it was the duty of every citizen to support the great highways of commerce. In an evil hour the writer became interested in a newspaper at Jefferson, and one day there came in the mail a pass for himself and h s partner, on the Northwestern Railroad. It was a great event in the history of that road. After the recipient of the pass had recovered from his astonishment, and had begun to realize that he was entitled to ride free between Jefferson and Chicago, and had shown the pass to nearly all the populace who were at the Postoffice waiting for the mail to be distributed, he began to inquire of the depot agent what time the first train passed the station, going either way. It did not make much difference to the editor which way th& train was going, as long as it went. It was found that a freight train would go along in about five hours, bound south, and the holder of the new pass was compelled to pfit in those five hours waitin’g for the train. It seemed a month, and the pass seemed to burn a hole in the pocket, and it was taken out a dozen times to cool off, and to show to different persons who had heard of its arrival anctahad come down town to see it. Finally, the train pulled up to the depot, and the editor took his seat in the caboose, and it seemed as though the people on the depot-steps were talking over the new era in railroading. It seemed as though the train never would start, and after it started it seemed as though the conductor never would come through to look at the pass. A lady had a crying baby, and the editor in his kind-heartedness attempted to quiet the baby bj showing it the pass, and was nearly paralyzed when the child put a corner of the pass in its mouth and began to chew it. By prompt measures of chocking the infant the pass was recovered, and |he conductor came along, and the editor handed up his pass with an air of one who always rode on a pass. The conductor looked at the date of the pass, and it did not take efiect till the next day, and he said tho editor would have to put up twenty cents, the fare between Jefferson and Fort Atkinson. It was cruel, but no argument would convince that freight conductor that the pass ought to be good until the day after, and it was necessary to pay good money for a ride down and back, forty cents, a ride that was taken for no other purpose on earth except to try the pass. That night the editor 'took a solemn obligation to make 'that railroad sorry for the o'utragejand for a year afterward it was a cole] day when the railroad did not have to carry the writer or his partner somewhere. They divided themselves up into reliefs, and it was the duty of one of them to go somewhere every day. They were both too lazy to work, and riding on the cars was just about exercise enough. They would go to Milton Junction, or Janesville, and back, and conductors got so that if one of the Jefferson editors did not show up at the depot when the train stopped they would hold the train. The pass became so worn that it had to be renewed the first six months. It was a proud day for the writer when his face became so well known to the conductors that it was not necessary to show the pass. The of pulling out the pass'*before a carload of passengers gradually wore off, and there was more pleasure in having the conductor come along and smile and pass on, because passengers would think the man’so favored by the conductor must be at least one of the owners of the road. Since then the writer has'ridden on passes across the continent, and up and down it, and has been offered a pass to Europe, but in all the free rides of thousands of miles he has never felt so much as though he owned the earth, and had a fence around it, as he did when he got that first pass on the old Northwestern, and put in a solid year trying to make the pass pay for its keeping.—Peet’s Sun