Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 35, Number 104, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 September 1903 — THE STREET CAR SLAUGHTER. LABOR NOTES [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

THE STREET CAR SLAUGHTER.

LABOR NOTES

Over 1,200 Chicagoans Hart in Seven Months and 34 Killed. In Chicago the slaughter of innocents by trolley and cable ears continues, police department records showing an alarming increase in accidents this year. The increase is attributed by Chief of Police O’Neil to the recklessness of motoraien, the luck of cars and consequent overcrowding. The number of accidents for tlie first six months was 1,117 and the number of injured reached 1,291. The deaths numbered 47. In July there were added 135 accidents, with 158 injured and 7 deaths. The first 13 days of this month saw 07 trolley car accidents, with 3 dead and 77 injured. The accidents are decreasing on the cable trains because the inside footboards, except on the grip cars, have been abolished, and chains are used as barriers to prevent passengers from falling between the trailers. The fender is also more u.s-fuL on a cable grip car than on an electric cor, aa the grip doe* not go at anything Hke the rate of speed the troiiey car attains. The following table shows that the number of accidents on trdlley cars have been increasing nearly every year since 1898: Accidents. Injured. Deaths. IPO2 1,031 1,087 51 1001 847 027 75 1000 881 042 102 1800 711 708 48 IS9B 574 848 5T The large number of deaths in 1900 resulted chiefly from three disastrous collisions between trolley cars and trains at grade crossings. Of the 47 deaths from street car accidents of all kinds for the first months of the year 41 were of males and 6 of female*. Most of the deaths were of boys who flipped cars when the latter were going ah a high rate of speed. In the flirt six* month* of 1902 there were 31 males and 5 females killed by street ears. ■ ' Charles C. Beveridge. of Fremont. Web., died in Escalator Springs, Mo., of •eat# rheumatism. He was State chairman ,for Nebraska of th* Prohibition party and had been prominent in the work of his party for fifteen years. • O

Boston bricklayers get 55 cents an hour. United Mine Workers of America contemplate the erection of a SIOO,OOO labor temple in Pittsburg, Pa. At the beginning of the year there were 10,000 women members of labor unions in New York State. Recently there has been a movement started to unionise the laborers connected wioh the public works of Nashville. There are 227 lead pencil factories in Germany, which employ 2,813 persons, and export each year 1,614 ton# of pencil*, worth $2,000,000. Of the 100.00 Q men in Newfoundland more than half are fishermen, who catch 150,000,000 pounds of cod a year, consume one-fourth of it, and sell the rest for $4,450,000. Bt. Paul has taken up the matter of forming international furriers’ union, and an organization to include the workers in all brandies of the fur trade in the United States and Canada will be the result , These national labor organizations have headquarters in Washington, I). C.: Journeymen Stone Cutters, Letter Carriers, Electrical Worker*, Machinists, Granite Cutters, Knights of Labor, and American Federation of Labor. Cincinnati Liverymen’s Protective Association. an organization comprising in its membership almost orery livery stable keeper and undertaker io the'city, has derided to establish a uniform pries of $5 a carriage, commencing Sept. 1, for all carriages hired for funeral purposes. Engineers and firemen of the entire Union Pacific Railway system hare been granted an average increase of wages—for the engineers of about Z% and the firemen 4Vx per cent. The Increase run* from 10 to 20 cents a hundred miles for tbs engineers, with proportionate i»rrease for the firemen. •