Rensselaer Union, Volume 11, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 October 1878 — The Premium Woman. [ARTICLE]

The Premium Woman.

Sunday afternoon, while three or four hundred sight-seers were loafing around the entrance to the State Fair Grounds, a lonesome-looking covered wagon, drawn by a faded old horse and driven by a woman, hove in view on the Holden road. It was plain enough that some family was on the move, and it was soon ascertained that the family consisted of only a woman and two children. The wagon stopped as it reached the crowd, and, bending forward to look on every side, the woman briefly inquired: 1 HZH “ Bin a fout here?*’ A boy answered her that the State h air was about to open, and she called to the children under the cover: “ Sam, you wake up, and Mary, you you wake up, for here’s the biggest crowd of folks you ever seen!” No one in that crowd had ever seen such a homely woman. She was crosseyed, teeth out, nose awry and mouth big enough for two. A man in the crowd stepped forward, after a long look at her face, and said: “ Madam, we are offering a premium here for the homeliest woman in America. Do you wish to enter for it?"_ “ How mnch is itP” she asked. “ Two dollars.” “ And how much’ll I have to pay?” “ Nothing.” “I’min America now, ain’t'lP” “Yes.” “ Then sot me down as the woman who’s going to win that two dollars or die! Here, Sam, you hold this hosa while I git down whar’ the jedges kin have a fair look at me!” She got down. The crowd roared and threw up a hundred hats, but she drew herself up and solemnly remarked: “When they, offer a prize on the homeliest woman in America I’m going up to, the head of the class like a fourl«is9 team! Whar’s the jedges?” “Madam,” said the man who had previously addressed her, “you are entitled to the prize. I believe you are the homeliest human being I ever saw. I don’t think you’d look anv the worse if you had one eye out ana was baldheaded.” “ Hand over the chink,” she said, holding out her hand. He placed a two-dollar bill on her palm, and said: “ Champion homely woman of America, accept this premium!” “ You bet I will!” was her healthy reply, and in five minutes she had four or five dollars in change tossed at her. When the shower ceased she made one step from the ground to a seat on the wagon, shook up the old horse, bowed right and left, and said: “Now, Sam, you git baek thar’, and Mary, you git hack thar’, and we’ll drive along to the fust vacant lot and so into camp; fur if I kin take a prize ere before the Fair opens, what kin we hope fur when the performance gits under full 'blastf’— Detroit Free Press.