Jasper County Democrat, Volume 5, Number 39, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 January 1903 — A PLAY WITHIN A PLAY. [ARTICLE]

A PLAY WITHIN A PLAY.

It is rumored thnt “Honest Abe” is thinking seriously of becoming a professional tax-ferret, a la the exauditor of Owen county.

No fair-minded man objects to every public officer having every penny that the law says he shall have for his services, but they want it to stop there. There have been too many “grafts” worked in Jasper county.

“Harbor” Knotts, Mayor of Hammond, says that he will father a biN in the coming legislature to combine Hammond, East Chicago, Whiting and Indiana Harbor into one city. The combined city would have a population of over 80,000.

We missed this week that peculiar effluvium, always present in our sanctum when the Wheatfield Telephone is about. Don’t know whether the editor has run short of “ram-rod” hay or fallen into the hands of the postal authorities. >

Come, Messrs. Murray and Gwin, it is up to you to disgorge the several hundred dollars allowed you by “Honest Abe” for services on the county board of review. The supreme court has decided time nml again that the fixed salaries v of your respective offices covers payment for all duties which you were by law required to perform, and sitting on the county board of review is one of those duties. Refund, and avoid suit brought.

The Lafayette Democrat is making a valiant tight against never closed saloons, wide open houses of ill fame, etc. It charges the metropolitan police board of that city with being responsible for the deplorable condition of affairs and says that the keepers of resorts claim to pay for the protecion they receive. The president of the police board is said to be the owner of one or two buildings in which all night saloons and resorts are run.

The saloon-keepers of Benton and Newton counties have formed a lodge of Knights of Fidelity, an order founded to resist temperance movements, it is said, and other matters. Amongthe matters alleged to have been decided upon at their first meeting was to let the publishing of license notices to the lowest bidder in the county. These notices have been costing them !?S to§lo each. Now the newspapers over there talk of organizing and charging full legal rates hereafter, which would amount to §ls to §2O for each notice

One measure that it is said will come un before the coming legislature asTThat ~providing for the publication in the leading papers of the respective coufities of all claims filed with the county auditor for allowance by the board of commissioners, before allowances can be made. This would give notice to the public of the claims to be acted upon and gives any taxpayer an opportunity to file a protest against the allowance of such as he knows or believes to be illegal or excessive. Taxpayers have this right now, but they must go to the auditor’s office and look over each individual cluim,, and if, as alleged, in the case of Tax-Ferret Workman’s recent claim, the acting auditor “forgets” to put n claim on the docket or holds it back from public view, the tax-payer must wait until allowance is made and then put up a bond to appenl from the allowance. The protesting against the allowance of a claim is notice to the commissioners that there is a question about its correctness or legality, and it is then up to them to investigate it thoroughly before acting upon the same. No doubt such a law would save many thousands of dollars each year.

7 Not a Problem Affair, Either.

A play within a play. This sounds rather jobsenish in fact, though it is not; on the contrary, it is a good, wholesome, humorous story of American life, without a single weird situation or enigmatic line. To satisfactorily explain, one must tell the story of the play: An actor who had taken to drink, on account of the opposition made to him by the parents of his fiance, goes to the bad, is no longer able to hold an engagement, and eventually becomes a tramp. One day he drifts into a little Indiana town, on the front end of a passenger train. Further back, but on the inside of the coaches, there is a small theatrical company. Tramp and company get off at the same town, the latter from choice, the former by the aid of the brakeman’s boot. The company is billed to play in the town a week. The second night of the engagement the leading man is called home by the death of his wife, there is no one to fill his place and consternation reigns in the little band of actors and actresses; finally it is learned that the tramp has been an actor, and furthermore, has played the leading part of the “Two Orphans” with Kate Claxton. This is the play they are to put on Hub night. The tramp plays the part, meets the leading woman of the company, his former sweetheart. The complications that arise form the ground work to the plot of the greatest scenic comedy drama of recent years, Elmer Walters’ “A Millionaire tramp.” The third act shows not alone the exterior of a country theatre, but the interior as well, with the audience seated, - curtain up and performance in progress, and the effect has never been accomplished heretofore. At Ellis opera house, Thursday, January Bth.