Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 91, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 April 1913 — Article Misstated the Rates Charged by Hitch Barns. [ARTICLE]

Article Misstated the Rates Charged by Hitch Barns.

A country correspondent assailed the street hitching order a few days ago and made an appeal for an 'outdoor hitch rack. The Republican published the article because it seemed of yery great importance as affecting the business relations of the merchants and the country people. We were personally ignorant of the rates charged by the hitch barn proprietors and did not know until our attention was called to it that there was a misrepresentation in this respect. The hitch barn men all have the same charge, namely, 10 cents for a “hitch,” whether of a single horse or a team, and not 20 cents as the article stated. In justice to them the correction is made. The hitch barn men, by the way, are in no sense responsible fbr the ord’er not to tie on the main business streets of the town and we have it from the city marshal that there is 'no intention of stopping the hitching on the back streets unless in cases where the horses are neglected or are causing damage to property.

A farmer from Bafkley township called at The Republican office this week to say that he heartily approved the position tken by another farmer and had heard it talked among many farmers. He suggested that a public hitching rack could be established just south of the mill, and that businessmen would make a good investment to rent the ground, put up a hitchrack and -bear the expense of having it cleaned whenever it wgs needed. He suggested another thing and one? that would be much more acceptable, doubtless, and that was that the businessmen form an association and issue checks good for hitching privileges based upon a certain amount of trade. The hitch barn proprietors would accept the checks and the merchants that issue them woyld redeem them. This would doubtless be a very good measure to carry out, not for purposes of business competition, but adopted by all merchants and employed as an inducement to trade in Rensselaer. A businessmen’s organization could accomplish much to head off the eycr-growing mail order business.