Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 37, Number 26, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 April 1905 — HOBO STEW. [ARTICLE]

HOBO STEW.

A CallaWT Triumph That Is Dear to the Tramp. ! The professional hobo generally travels and operates alone, but if upon arriving at some large town or city he happens to meet other congenial members of his profession a pooling of interests is sometimes undertaken, a holm camp set up, and the town is systematically worked. The spot or a camp usually chosen is in the outskirts on some wooded tract not too far from the railroad. Here the profits are divided and the different territories allotted. At nightfall all congregate to this point with the spoils and supplies, and over the “hobo stew" incidents of .the day are discussed. “Hobo stew" is a triumph of culinary art that these gentry have a particular weakness for. A large iron pot is purchased, begged or stolen and half filled with water. Into this are thrown pieces of beef, pork, chicken (from some robbed henroost), bread, potatoes, carrots, onions and, in fact, everything edible that has been or can be secured. When the saIvory mess is sufficiently boiled it is eaten with much gusto by the tramp. These camps are never kept in existence long, however, because the hobo realizes that the danger of detection and a roundup is an ever present one .when a large number remain long together in any one camp. Professional tramps, like the birds, have regular migratory seasons. From April to September this tide of immigration is tojward the northern and eastern states and the region of the middle west •From November on through the winter his peregrinations take him south, southwest and to the southern Pacific coast—Pilgrim.