Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 19, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 October 1897 — Painting the Pole. [ARTICLE]

Painting the Pole.

One job bf high painting which Uncle Bill Jones has had his eye on, he failed to get. It was that of painting the flag pole on top of the new court house. The work was done Saturday forenoon by Tom Manley, one of the men who put up the pole. He climbed to the top of the pole, 40 feet from the peak of the court house tower, and 200 above the surface of the ground, then drew up after him a large rope and a seat after which he leisurly proceeded to apply the paint beginning at the top and working downwards. Scores of people, and at times hundreds of them, watched him during the whole course of his seemingly very dangerous task. This painting job completed the work of putting up the flag-staff. Judging from what has been said about this pole by some of our own and neighboring papers, the job was about equivalent to going out into the woods and cutting a good-sized hickory pole, and bringing it to town and setting it in the ground, small end up. In point of fact, however four men have been working on the job for two weeks, and some of the time five men, and not counting a great deal of work done in our black-

smith shops. People who will climb up into the top of the tower and see the four huge iron beams that were cut in two, and the dozens of half inch holes drilled in thick, hard iron, and all the other cutting and fitting and drilling and chizleing of hard iron in most inconvenient places, will begin to get some idea of the amount of work that has been required in the erection of this staff. And to see the many specially made Bracings and Sitings, circles, bolts and clamps will give some idea also of the cost of the material that is in it.