Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 34, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 January 1902 — ITEMS HERE AND THERE. [ARTICLE]

ITEMS HERE AND THERE.

Rensselaer is brnsbing her skirts of gamblers and doing the good work thoroughly. Monon should go into dry dock and have her sides scraped of these barnacles. These specimens are quite tame and their brazenness is of general local comment. —Monon News. Governor Durbin has announced the appointment of Henry A. Barnhart, editor and publisher of the Rochester Daily and Weekly Sentinel (democrat), to the board of trustees of the Northern hospital for the insane at Logansport, to succeed Rufus Magee, of Logansport. Mt. Ayr is soon to have a telephone exchange. J. F. Bruner, of the Halleck company, haß been over there and arranged 10 put in a system as soon as’ the holes can be dug for the posts. It will start in with about 50 phones, which will include a considerable number of surrounding farm houses. A statistical report shows that there were more pounds of paper consumed in the United States during 1901 than there were of iron. The paper mills are all behind with their orders and the price of paper has advauoed considerably though it is expected to come down after the holiday rush, William Rayburn, a resident of Gillam Tp., for many years, died Dec. 26th, at the home of his brother, James Rayburn, in Medary ville. This age was something over 77 years. He was never married. The funeral was held at Independence, Gillam Tp., on the 27th, by Rev, D. L. Handley, of Medaryville. It was a newspaper office and the devil was sweeping the floor, to celebrate New Years. Enters lady, who asks if the editor is in. “No mum, he hasn’t come down yet. Anything I can do for ye?” “I don’t know, are you connected with the poetical department? ‘‘Yes, I empty the waste basket.” The lady said she wonld call again. The Monon freight wreck on the Michigan City division last Wednesday night was worse than at first rep jrted. The debris of the wrecked train oaught fire and about a dozen cars are said to have been burned. There were several slight injuries among the crew, but no one was seriously hurt. The wreck train and crew went up to clear the track which was blocked for several hours. The breaking of guy ropes on a pile driver that was being operated at the Barnes bridge, on the Kankakee river between LaPorte and Stark counties, Tuesday evening, caused the derrick to topple over. Bruce Barnes, of Kingsbury the contractor, was carried with it, being pinioned to the bottom of the river by the machinery. The body was recovered after several hoars of difficult work. He was forty-eight years old and left a family. Peter* A. Kliue, of Washington Tp., Newton Co., left Thursday for Oregon, where has bought 1,300 acres of land and intends going into the cattle business. This is one of the war-like and litigious Kline family, and the same Peter A. who had a big trial here, a few years ago, ou the charge of trying to dump Attorney Cbizum into the Iroquois river. The Kentland Enterprise says that after all that has been said, Peter is a square man financially and a genial good fellow personally; also a shrewd business man. Rural free delivery carriers will be placed under civil service on February I. The recent order of the president extending the classtied civil service to the rural freq delivery service contMfjjji .vision that it should

effective as to rural letter carriers until the necessary rules were agreed upon by the civil service commission and the postoffice department. Since that time the commission and a representative of the postoffioe department have held frequent conferences looking to the preparation of plana to meet the special conditions existing in rural communities. A dispatch from Peru, Ind., announces that Rev. Mr. Speicber, a noted elder in Dowie’s Zion church died at Mexico, Ind., Jan. 1, after a three weeks’ illness from pneumonia. No doctor was permitted to see him until it was too late to be of any service. Elder Speioher was one of Dowie’s most eloquent preachers and stood high in the councils of the church. The dispatch states that he came to Mexico about six weeks ago and succeeded Rev. Frank Fisher, as Superintendent of the Aged People’s and Orphans’ Home of the Dunkard denomination.