Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 20, Number 30, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 December 1898 — Ten Thousand Turks Beheaded [ARTICLE]

Ten Thousand Turks Beheaded

To Make a Christian Holiday. In.the old days, that are not so very old, the Christians were sometimes sacrificed to make a holiday for the Turks, now the “Turks’’ get it in the neck to make a holiday for the Christians. But it is the kind of turks that are raised for that purpose and they can’t be put to any other use that is so proper. Rensselaer has come to be a great market for this kind of turks, and it looks like the Christmas output this year would break all previous records. The two houses hero which make a special feature of buying and shipping poultry have been buying and dressing turkeys this week, by the thousand. Jake McDonald, on Front street and B. S, Fendig. on Cullen are our great poultry dealers. Both pay top prices for good birds, and they draw turkeys from all directions and from far beyond the limits of this county. Steady streams of teams have been unloading at boih places all the week, and every man and boy in town who wants work, and is not cutting ice for Starr or Moody, has been stripping turkeys day and night in one place or the other. > Both houses have already made large shipments this week and both have more to follow. Mr. McDonald estimates that he will have handled between 6,000 and 7,000 birds this week, and Mr. Fendig figures his at about 4,000, Between them both the number will reach 10,000 and that is a good many turkeys to go out of one small town in one week. The prices paid to the producers for their birds average just about one dollar each.