Rensselaer Republican, Volume 26, Number 45, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 July 1894 — “Doing” a Ticket Agent. [ARTICLE]

“Doing” a Ticket Agent.

One of the ticket agents of the Michigan Central railroad, at a certain town in Canada, was an airy, independent young man, who began work with the idea that he ran the whole line. “The boys” had numerous complaints against him, and mpre than once he would have caught it in the ear had he not beon fenced in where he could not be got at. One evening five or six of us happened to meet there as we came in on cross roads, and we soon got on to the fact that the general manager and two or three other officials pf the road were in the ticket office. We laid our heads together and put up a job. We all had thousand-mile tickets, but each of the six went to the window in turn and bought a ticket for the nearest station east or west. When all had been served the first went back to" the window and said: “Young man, I think you made a mistake.” “1 guess not.” . _ “I’ve got a ticket to C—. That’s thirty cents. I gave you and you gave me ninety-two cents back.” “Humph! That’s funny!” muttered the young man, as he took in the change and corrected the alleged error. Then the second went up and said: -j~ .“Young man, I don’t, want to beat this railroad, I bought a ticket to R—, which is twenty-five cents; gave you half a dollar, and you handed me out sixty cents.” “1 did, eh?” queried the agent, as ho flushed up and took in the change. Then the third, fourth, fifth and sixth man went up ‘ with a similar story. The big officials were taking it all in, and they got very nervous. -The young man was whiter than chalk at the end of it, and he was not wrong in believing that he was doomed. Nextday he was replaced, and 1 learned a few weeks later that he had quit running a railroad and gone into a woolen mill. It cost each of us a small sum out of his own pocket to work the snap, but it was pro bono publico and worth double the amount. Exchange.