People's Pilot, Volume 6, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 October 1896 — Page 2
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Mr. Krueger’s Personal History.
Martin T. Krueger’s parents came from Germany in 1864 and located in Michigan City. At that time Martin was ten years of age. He was one of a family of nine children. The family was very poor, and at 13 Martin was already shifting for himself, working for farmers during the summer months for what small pay he could obtain, and attending district school in the winter, and doing chores for his board. In 1870 he began work in the Haskell & Barker car shops in' Michigan City, and worked there several years; he then learned the art of finishing saddle trees, an industry that then flourished there, but the business soon declined and he sought employment with Orr & Sons, manufac-
MARTIN T. KRUEGER.
turers of sash, doors and blinds, at a salary of 75 cents a day. When the factory closed he took passage in an empty freight car for Chicago, as he supposed, but when he was “fired” by the train crew he found himself in Matteson, 111. He walked to Chicago a distance of 26 miles, and there found an older brother and borrowed $5.00, which paid his fare west as far as Mendota, Ill.; there he found employment at farming, at sl2 per month. He continued farming in LaSalle, Lee and Bureau counties during five years, except part of one summer, when he was -employed by the Michigan Central railroad o clean grates in locomotives. In the fall of 1877 he went home to Michigan City and began reading law in the office of Fred Johnson. Mr. Johnson died five months later, and Krueger, having no money to further pursue his studies at that time, secured the agency of several insurance companies and followed that business. He was elected city clerk of Michigan City in 1879, again in 1881, and again in 1883; representative in the legislature from Laporte county in 1884, and a member of the common council of Michigan City in'lßßs. In 1886 he was nominated by the Democracy for clerk of the Supreme Court of Indiana, but was defeated with the rest of the Democratic State candidates. In 1889 he was elected mayor of Michigan City, and that position he tilled until September, 1894. Since June, 1888, he has been a member and secretary of the school board of Michigan City. If he had not been nominated for Congress so unexpectedly he would have been on the Demo-> cratic ticket in Laporte county this fall as a candidate for State Senator, his nomination for af-’ fice having been conceded and agreed upon by common consent among Democrats of that county.' Mr. Krueger has a large acquaintance all over the district, is a good speaker and a good campaigner generally.
Tom Patterson’s Indiana Dates.
Hon. Thomas H. Patterson, editor of the Rocky Mountain News, will speak in Lafayette Wednesday Sept. 28th. He is the most eloquent orator of Colorado. His full list of future dates in Indiana are as follows: Lebanon, Tuesday, Sept. 29; Lafayette, Wednesday, Sept. 30; Greencastle, Thursday, Oct. 1; Terre Haute, Friday, Oct. 2; Rockville, Saturday, Oct. 3; Meharry’s Grove, Monday, Oct. 5.
A RICH MAN’S REASON.
John S. Baker of Tacoma Writes His Brother in Jasper County His Reasons for Advocating the Free Coinage of Silver. Below is given a private letter to Asa Baker, a prosperous farmer of Milroy township and a republican of long standing, from his brother John S. Baker, of Tacoma, Washington, who is vice-president of the Fidelity Trust Company, a banking institution with $500,000 paid up capital. The brother in Indiana it appears has been undecided as to what he should do politically .this fall, and wrote his brother in the west if he could tell him how the farmer’s interest in Indiana could be identical with the silver mine owner’s in the west. The reply is certainly clear and logical, and has settled any doubt which his brother entertainded as to his duty politically, for he openly declares that Mr. Bryan will receive his vote this fall. • My Dear Brother Asa:—l am very busy today,'but have just received your letter with the one from Uncle Dan enclosed, and must give it immediate answer. All of Dan’s alleged arguments are the thread bare stories told us by all advocates of the single gold standard. The ,banks of the entire west instead of failing would wonderfully strengthened for this reason—that at present, because of the frightful shrinkage in ail property other than gbld coin, the people who owe the banks money cannot pay it, but if we had free silver coinage values would increase and debtors could pay what they owe. Even our most rabid gold men here, such as the rich English grain exporting firm of Balfour, Guthrie & Co., who handle over ten million bushels of grain yearly from this coast, say that free silver would cause all farm products to almost double in price, and what harm if we do have to pay more for everything else. If you get 75c in place of 40c for wheat you can well afford to pay SI.OO per pair more for shoes. It is more than absurd to say that gold will go to a greater premium over silver than now. Free silver would bring them closer together for it would surely increase its demand, for this country owes hundreds of millions of dollars payable in coin or dollars and silver would be as fully legal tender as gold to satisfy these claims and no one would pay in gold dollars if they could get silver ones for 95c. In the west we usually specify that all obligations be paid in gold. In fact while I owe about $300,000, it is every cent payable in gold, and shall be paid in gold, but I want the values of my buildings, lands, and stocks restored to something like their old value of nearly $1,000,000 before I can pay, and that cannot happen until the farmer and producer is enabled to get some profit on what he raises. As for free trade; we are bound to have a tariff for revuene and it is found to be greater thftn the present t ariff and all the devils in hell “could not produce a tariff law as unequal in, its protection as the one we now have, and when it is revised by which ever party is in power it will be a great improvement over the present law. You must bear this also in mind that the present democratic silver platform is not the Cleveland platform by any means, but the McKinley side is the continuance of the Cleveland policy, and all Cleveland democrats are now flocking to McKinley, while the republicans who believe in honest gold and silver are for Bryan, because they were forced out of the republican party by the a’doption of the St. Louis platform. The west and every farmer in the land, and every one except those who have fixed gold incomes will enjoy greater pros-
THE PEOPLE’S PILOT. RENSSELAER, IND., THURSDAY, OCTOBER 1, 1896.
perity under free coinage than if we continue to attempt to do business under a constantly appreciating gold standard. It may be that we will have a panic brought on by creditors demanding immediate payment of all sums due them. But even a panic, however severe, could not last long and the sufferings and losses of the past few years are infinitely greater than what would result in a sharp, short money scare, and under existing financial policy of the Cleveland administration, and which is endorsed by the McKinley republicans, it won’t take more than a year or two to wipe out every man who is in debt for he cannot turn anything into money at a profit. I am not a silver man because I own interests in silver mines, for I own greater interest in gold mines, but because I want the man who owes money and who possesses anything other than gold to have a fair chance in this world. , My mines have paid me over $65,000 during the past 12 months, mostly from the sales of some interests in them, or I should mot have been able to have kept alive up to date. , My silver interests are not one fourth of the value of my mines, but I would give up every cent I have invested in mines if by so doing it would establish free coinage of silver and thereby make valuable once more all the rest of my property. I trust you will work and vote far the cause of silver.
The money loaning class of both parties are all opposed to it for it lessens the value of their gold and it shows how silly their claim is that gold would go to a still further premium over silver for if they thought so do you for one moment think that they would give up the chance of getting more for their money for the sake of paying the farmer or miner more for his products? With best of wishes I Am, Yours affectionately, John S. Baker, Tacoma, Washington. Sept. John S. Baker is a state sena-. tor and one of the leading republicans of Washington state.
Gifford’s 16 Reasons.
Below are given the famous 16 reasons promulgated by Benjamin J. Gifford, Jasper county’s great land lord, Indiana’s imbriotic prototype of Illinois’ Lord Scully. Mr. Gifford is entitled to great credit for his work of redeeming the vast swamps and marshes of the Kankakee and its tributaries, fc-r he has made good lands-of many hundreds of practially valueless acres, but it must not be forgotten that these acres belong to 'Mr. Gifford now, that any advance in their value is his, and under a system allowing private enterprise to enter upon such wholesale- reclaiming projects as are compassed by his great system of ditchers he is justly entitled to them.
He is organizing a gigantic system of tenantry designed to grow in extent and be as permanent as that of the Scully estate in Illinois. He evidently believes that the system thht makes tenants and sends men begging to him for farms to till upon his own ironn clad terms, is the system, best suited to his interests, and below are the sixteen calamaties which he falsely represents will follow the free coinage of silver. These “reasons” he has circulated in printed form among his several hundred tenants and employes; rea sons only inname, for each proposition is but brazen assertion unsupported by any argument whatever. Think of the “reason” that “Free silver will make less money instead of more;” if that be true what becomes of the “flood of silver” that is being so persistently harped about? Or the next that free silver will reduce values instead of making them higher; that being
so a silver dollar would be more valuable than the gold dollar is now, for it would buy more, and our republican friends are telling us just the reverse will be the case, and bemoaning the possibility of the old soldier having h : s living expenses increased. Truly Mr. Gifford must have taken his tenants for the narrow eyed class of people described by S. P. Thompson as silver men. It matters not how narrow may be the margin of their existence under a Gifford contract, they are long nosed enough not to be caught by any such stuff as those “16 reasons.” And though he has notified them that he will not do business with a free silver man, 4hey are too patriotic to allow him to dictate the way thdy shall vote. It is easy enough to keep a man quiet during the campaign by threats of dispossession but it is quite another thing to control his vote in the booth. SIXTEEN REASONS FOR GOLD. Free silver will drive gold out of circulation. Free silver will cut off the supply of foreign capital. Free silver will make less money instead of more. Free silver will reduce values instead of making them higher. Free silver will reduce the loanable funds of America to less than one quarter of the present volume". . Free silver will double if not treble interest rates. Free silver will prevent the extensions of loans. Free silver will result in forced collections. Free silver will cause foreclosure of farm mortgages in a manner unprecdented in America. Free silver will shut off all new enterprises and cripple many old ones. Free silver will reduce wages of all laboring men. Free silver will shut up factories. furnaces and mines wherever borrowed capital may be required to operate. Free silver will take from one man something that belongs to him and give it to another who has no claim upon it. Free silver will tend to* destroy confidenc e in the American people at home and. abroad. Free silver will cause bread riots in every city, Free silver will call into active service the militia of every state in the union. A majority of these propositions are already demonstrated. Respectfully submitted,
BENJ. J. GIFFORD.
Kankakee, Illinois.
• Now is the • $ Time to q ggt Posted || 2 Have You H • Ever Read this J © Great Book • Aw ar S The Price is 2 Onjy 25 cents... 2 ■ ■ • Send Your • $ Orders to q ; The 5 ■ Pilot Office ■ ■•■•■•■•■•■SB THE WHITE HOUSE.-The Populists Will capture It in ’96. Sow the country down with Populist literature. I print your name and address on the People’s Party Exchange List for a Silver dime, and you will receive a large number of leading Populist papers for reading and distribution. Write plainly. J. H. Padgett, Lock Box 416; Ennis, Texas.
State of Ohio, City of Toledo ( Lucas County, \ 88 Frank J, Chenny makes oath that he is the senior partner of the firm os F, J, Chenny & Co doing business in the city of Toledo. County and state aforesaid, and that said firm will pay the sum of ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS for each and every case of Cataerh that cannot be cured by the use of Hall’s Catarrh Cube. FRANK J. CHENNY. Sworn to before me and subscribed in my presence, this 6th day of December A. D. 1896. • (> —*— ' j A. W. Gleason, ■j seal > Notary Public. Hall’s Catarrh Cure is taken internally and acts directly on the blood and mucus surfaces of the system. Send for testimonials free. F. J. Chenny & CO, Toledo, O. Sold by druggists, 75c. Will Vote for a Change “Bryan and free silver”, “McKinley and protection", don’t cut much figure with me in casting my ballot at the coming election. I may say I am for a change And believe in retiring the old-timers of both parties. Things have been going very poorly under both the past administrations. Lately I have seen no wages at
££ THE »■—a I NEW ] 1 STORE I in S. E. Marion will be i eady to supply your wants SATURDAY, OCT. 3d, with a full line of Choice Groceries, Dry Goods, Notions and other Merchandise will x follow soon. Prices as low as anywhere in the County. - Kindly call and examine our Goods and get prices. Respectfully, T. W. DALEY. ' Jasper ® Tile ® Works. - TWO MILES NORTH OF RENSSELAER. BUIANUFACTUREKS of superior -drain tile. Manufacture tile ■ * sizes from 4to 16 inches in diameter. Will duplicate prices of any person handling tile in the county for like amount, and same terms. Works fitted up with latest improvements in machinery and kiln. Those contemplating using sizes from 12 to 16 in. in diameter call at works and get prices and leave order. A. E. & H. A. ALTER. B*B®B®B*B®B*B®l*B®B*B*B*B®B ® - 4b • Warner & Collies, • Three doors south of McCoy’s Bank, Rensselaer. ® ■ ' ■ J South Side ** * ■ • * * * Grocery. 5j Highest Price Paid for Butter and Eggs. \ H ■ ® e , icHAMPION| BINDERS 2 ® MOWERS • ©BUCKEYE \ REAPERS S S and other Farming Implements. * g ■—• gg T y TOS T -r—t Q M U UrUrX xLo, The reputation of these thoroughly Hi A OTTD G 1 n O modern harvesters, Champion and, g ■a O U JlljO, Buckeye, have,won here places J " -r -r T . T , them in the front ranks of favor- H • WAGONS., . • • Have the kindness to yet prices and terms from Warner & Collins before buying. H
all and therefore I can’t get much less. Thus, as Bryan fs a new man and<the silver issue is new and all the old-time politicians are apparently mad over it, I will cast my vote for Bryan and free silver, hoping for a change A Wage-Worker. Chicago, Sept. 27. Non-Resident Notice. The State of Indiana. I QCj Jasper County. f CO. Lowell H. Kenyon, 1 ° CtOber TernK ,h96 ' Mary L Kenyon, f Com No. 5143. Now comes the plaintiff, by Abraham Halleck, his attorney, and files his complaint herein, together with an affidavit the defendant is not a resident of the State of Indiana. Notice is therefore hereby given said defendant, that unless she be and appear on the 18th day of the next Term of the Jasper Circuit Court, to be holden on the third Monday of October, A. D., 1896, at the Court House in Rensselaer, in said County and State, and answer or demur tosaid complaint, the same will be heard and determined in her absence. In Witness Whereof, I hereunto set my hand and affix the Seal of said Court at Rensselaer, Ind., this 17th day of September, A. D., 1896. [seal] Wm. H 7 Coo ver, Clerk Jasper Circuit Court. A. Halleck, Att’y for Plaintiff. *