Rensselaer Republican, Volume 22, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 February 1890 — THOSE “GOOD OLD TIMES.” [ARTICLE]

THOSE “GOOD OLD TIMES.”

Delphi Journal. To the Old Man on the Corner: My dear old friend: I have no doubt but that you would like to have a few lines from an ‘old timer,’ one of the boys that was with you in the palmy days of Democracy, in the years of 1836 to ’4U, when we had plenty of corn at from eight to ten CBnts per busbel, and wheat twenty-five to thirty cents; pork at $1.25 per hundred net, and salt, without a tariff on it, at six dollars per barrel: eggs three cents per dozen, butter four cents per pound. Oh, how nice we could live then with our buckwheat cakes and maple molasses. Oh my, how we did smack our lips, over the good things we had to eat.

Everything was free, even whis- j key was only twelve and a half ; cents per gallon, but there was not j many of us boys who drank it. England and other foreign countries sent us our calicoes, ginghams, muslins, ere. They were free also, but we had to pay for : them - thirty-seven and a half r cents a yard for calico, thirty-one »<nd one-fourth cents for muslins unbleached, and thirty-seven to fifty cents for bleached muslins. I W e had free coffee at thirty-seven and one half cents per pound. We only used it on Sunday mornings and then it was mixed with parched rye. When we received a letter, if it was from Pennsylvania,j it was twenty-five cents postage at the office where it was received.; That was nothing, however, for we ; could get the twenty-five cents for a day’s work, or for cutting and ; splitting a hundred rails. it took a day’s work to buy a yard of calico or a pound of coffee, j By the month, we could get eight dollars for work. We did not wear m«Dy fine clothes then. Broad Cloths were out of the question. , Nearly -all the woolen goods were manufactured by our wives and daughters at home on the spinning wheel and hand loom. These were the good old Democratic times of free trade that we hear so much about. At the conclusion of this letter you will naturally inquire, “Who are you, and what is your name?” You will certainly recollect me as one of the stalwart young men who hurrahed for “Tippecanoe and j Tvler too” in 1840.

Tours,

J. M. J.