Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 41, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 March 1909 — Page 2
TELEPHONE CO. PRESENTS ITS CASE
Offers Argument for Granting of the Franchise and Asks the Consideration of Tax Payers.
4 The telephone company is asking to a new franchise at a higher rate. It is an undisputed fact <hat unlike most businesses the cost- of the installation and operation of the telephone system per telephone increases in direct proportion to the number of telephones. The reason for this is that as the number of telephones increase,thefeouble multiply, the equipment is more expensive and the operation of the switchboards more complicated and requires more operators for a given number Of telephones. In a small exchange one operator can take care of about 250 telephones; in the largest plants one operator cares for only about 35 telephones. Again the value of telephone service to the subscriber is measured solely by the number of telephones in the exchange. It is obvious that service to eight hundred subscribers is worth more than service to two hundred. When the present franchise was granted there were only seventy-five telephones in the Rensselaer exchange, and it was never expected that the exchange would grow to its present proportions. The telephone company is giving more to its subscribed when it offers eight hundred free telephones than when it had only seventy-five, and it is costing the company mo e per telephone to give this service. The company has $48,000 invested in this plant, and during a business existence of fourteen years, has never paid over six per cent dividend, and that only four out of the fourteen years, and has been unable to accumulate any surplus whatever for natural depreciation and stoim calamities. It is estimated by the best authorities that a telephone plant dep elates ten per cent per annum, and that to be on a sound business basis the company mqst accumulate a surplus of that amount to take care of this depreciation. The company is now facing a large financial lo s owing to the recent storm, and to repair this damage will neeess tate the borrowing of-the money to pay for it, and there is no possible way to pay this debt except to suspend all dividends, until this loss is in this way paid. Perhaps before it is paid another storm will wreck the plant again and in the mean time there is a steady depreciation in the value of the property at the rate of at least ten per cent per annum. These storms come periodically 1 , and the damage result ng is necessarily a legitimate part of the operating expense, and if the revenue does not provide for these losses how |ean| they be paid? This company has suffered storm damage twice in two years, and the loss resulting will exceed SB,OOO. Can any one suggest a method of meeting these losses except by providing a revenue sufficient to cover them. Does the public have any moral right to expect or demand that any public J service corporation serve it without a fair return on the capital invested? A considerable part of the company’s equipment is old and out of date, and the people have a right to expect and to demand modern, up-to-date telephone service; but the company also has a right to expect a fair price for what they sell. It is proposed that if an increase in rate is granted, to rebuild the plant, put in a new and modern switch-board that will dispense with all ringing when "central’’ is called — pimply remove the receiver and '"central” is thereby notified that a connection is desired. All lines will be metallic, thereby removing all cross-talk and electric light noise. To make the lines metallic means two wires Instead of one, to each subscriber, thereby doubling the present wire mileage, and consequently requiring cable and more and heavier poles to carry the additional load. A large percent of the bare wire now obstructing our streets will be removed and in their place cables will be strung. It is only a question of a comparatively short time until this plant will have to be rebuilt and modernized, and now when it is practically wrecked, seems the proper time to make this change. To repair it now, and then in a few yean to throw this all away and modernize it then, seems a poor business policy. It is estimated that the advance in rates, which is only one and twothirds cents per day per telephone, will enable the Company after its debts are paid, to pay a six per cent dividend and accumulate some surplus for renewal find storm damages. Surely six per cent is not an unreasonable incqpe on capital invested In an undertaking M hazardous as the tele-
phone business. The proposed improvement will necessitate the outlay of a sum estimated at fifteen thousand ($15,000) and With the present franchise expiring in 1913, no company can aford to make the additional investment at the present rate. The service under the new conditions will be worth the additional price asked, and the Company is not asking something for nothing; for the increased price it proposes to give- a service equal to that given by any city in the country. There is no other business that is so hampered and cramped by law as the telephone company. The rates they may charge 'are limited by law so that it is imjpossible to make more than a bare five or six per cent. In all other business there is a chance of a prosperous year bringing extra or increased dividends. Would it seem right to limit Tjy-law“th6“profitff Txf-the merchant, the lawyer, the doctor, the grain merchant, the farmer, or any other business to a bare five or six. per cent with no chance or hope for more at any. time? The telephone company, by its franchise, is in no way obligated to give to its city subscribers free service to the farm lines, and a toll charge could be made for each call by a city subscriber to a farmer’s line. The cjty subscriber is getting free service to the farmer’s line without paying anything for.it at all. Experts have been employed to appraise the plant of this company, and have advised it that the company’s property has depreciated in value at least 50 per cent; in other words, it is more than half worn out The revenue has not provided one cent to take care of this depreciation. The life of poles in the ground, according to government statistics, is ten years, and wires and switch-boards much less. Depreciation and natural wear is a necessary part of the legitimate expense of any telephone company as well as all othe forms of business. AU railroads charge five per cent depreciaion per annum as a part of their operating expense, and the depreciation of a telephone plant'is at a much more rapid, rate. The telephone company here is a home organization, that pays out for labor and material in thi city each year, a sum exceeding seven thousand dollars (7,000). The city is now trying to induce manufacturing industries to locate here. If the city is successful in this effort, does it propose by law to compel them to sell their product for cost or less? Because a few feel they cannot afford to pay for a telephone at an increased rate, is it right or just that the company be compelled to sell them service for less than it costs? No one is compelled to pay the increased rate, because no one is compelled to subscribe for a telephony Is it possible that this community desires to simply confiscate the property of the telephone company by legislation that will gradually force it into bankruptcy. The company proposes to invest fifteen thousand dollars new money in the plant to give its patrons better service, and with the hope of eventually saving what is left of its proprety. In all candor and fairness, is the company asking anything unreasonable? The Jasper County Telp'one Co.
THE LURID GLOW OF DOOM
was seen in the red face, hands and body of the little son of H. M. Adams, of Henrietta, Pa. His awful plight from eczema had, for 5 years, defied all remedies and baffled the best doctors, who said the poisoned blood had affected his lungs and nothing could save him. "But,” writes his mother, "seven bottles of Electric Bitters completely cured him.” For Eruptions, Eczema, Salt Rheum, Sores and all Blood Disorders and Rheumatism Electric Blttera Is supreme. Only 50c. Guaranteed by A. F. Long. Url'-’d Slave Senator Stephenson, of Wisconsin, was Thursday re-elec-ted. receiving 63 out of 123 votes. The result ends a long deadlock.
A PLEASANT PHYSIC.
When you want a pleasant physic give Chamberlain’s Stomach and Liver Tablets a trial. They are mild and gentle in their action and always produce a pleasant cathartic effect Call at B. F. Fendig’s drug store for a free sample. c
The trial of the $20,000 damage suit of Mantle Barekman, a Knox county farmer, against Frank Fox, a wealthy y.oung man of Vincennes, which was taken to the Daviess circuit court on a change of venue, began Thursday.. Barekman’s son, while returning home from school near Wheatland last summer, was struck by Fox’s automobile and killed.
ECZEMA IS NOW CURABLE.
ZEMQ* a scientific preparation for external use, stops Itching Instantly and destroys the germs that cause skin diseases. Eczema quickly yields and is permanently cured by this remarkable medicine. For sale everywhere. Write for ■ample, E. W. Rom Medicine Co., St Louis. Sold by B. F. Fendig. ts
FIRE HORSES EASY TO TRAIN
System That Will ffurn an Average Horse Into a Fire Veteran in a Day —-Trielks the Fire Horses Learn For Themselves. A man who didn’t know very much about the mode of training Fire Department horses stood in front of a fire hoiise the other day just as an alarm came in. He saw the big hprses jump from their stalls the moment the gong sounded and take their places beneath the harness. He saw the collars fastened in less time than it takes to tell and noted by the watch he held that the five ton truck was leaving the house within nine seconds after the alarm came in. the fire horse,” he said to a Fire Dethe fire horse,” hesaid to a Fire Department official standing at his side. “It must be a big job to get the right sort of horse in the first place, and a still more difficult task to train him.” “Do you see that old horse”li'auling the crosstown street car by the door?” replied the official. “I can take that car horse or any truck horse yeu will bring me, if he is not vicious, and make a well trained fire horse out of him in a few hours. The system by which we take a green horse and make a veteran out of him is so simple that I have always wished that we could make a good fireman as easily as we can drill a fire horse. “In the first place, the rules of the department- require that a green horse must be between 5 and 8 years old. He, must be sound and not vicious. “The horse comes to the door of the fire house absolutely green; He is even worse than the new fourth grade fireman, for the fireman has been through a epurse of sprouts at the school of instruction and knows a little about what is expected of him. “As the green horse looks inside the door he sees the gleaming brass and shining nickel on the fire apparatus, and directly in front of his eyes the harness is suspended over the pole of the truck or engine. The horse looks around the interior and sees many other things that are new and strange, and it is no wonder that he stands in the door trembling. “This moment is critical. The' driver who knows his business lets the horse stand in the door until he has found that none of the strange things has made a move to molest him, and then he is coaxed gently inside a stall. “Then the driver leaves him for a few minutes and lets him stand until he learns that nothing is going to harm him. When the driver sees the animal’s ears resume their normal ap» pearance he knows that he can go on . with the training. “Then the real training begins. The horse is bridled and the driver leads him by the bit out to his place underneath the harness and the collar is fastened around his neck. This process is tried a few times until the horse goes but without hanging back in the least. “Now a lead Une” about four feet long is fastened around his neck and as the chain across the front of his stall drops the driver steps toward the horse’s place under the harness, and the animal now goes willingly. He is led out by this strap maybe forty or fifty times until he begins to learn what is expected of him. “Up to this time the gong hasn’t been rung, and now the driver sets out to make him understand that when the gong rings he is expected to move. A man is posted at each side of the stall and one at every other avenue of escape. The driver gets behind him with a whip and when the gong rings and the stall chain drops he gives the horse a cut over the flank with the whip. “This is so unexpected that the animal gives a snort and jumps forward. He looks both ways, but there is a man on guard who raises his hand. The horse sees that there is no place he can go except right under the harness where he has been led all the time. He goes there and the man in front clamps the collar around his neckneck before he can make another move. “It may be necessary to persuade the horse to move by means of the whip across the flank a few times, but Inside of a day any green horse can be thoroughly trained so that the next morning at the stroke of the gong he will take his place as promptly as a veteran. This one day’s training Increases the value of the horse just about SIOO. The city buys most of the Fire Department horses at $250 each. "The average life of the fire horse is only about ten years. It is a sad commentary on the manner in which the city treats the fire horse that at the end of the time he is almost a wreck, good for nothing but pulling a street car or junk wagon. I think the time has come when some humane Mayor will decide that ft will pay to have a far mto which all the horses owned by the city can be sent for a vacation, such as the other members of the fire, pollcs, street cleaning and various other city departments get. “The number of horses killed In the service every year Is amazing. You know there Is a rule that If an accident Is unavoidable the Fire' Department must take the brunt of it. That’s why the drivers send so many horses into elevated pillars and all manner of obstructions in an effort to prevent damage to some other vehicle or to a person who gets in the way c the apparatus.”—New York Sun
" KING W" CURES DR. KING’S NEW DISCOVERY - COUGHSe- COLDS AND ALL THROAT and LUNG DISEASES. . . . . . PREVENTS PNEUMONIA - CONSUMPTION “ Two years ago a severe cold settled on my lungs and so completely prostrated me that I was unable to work and scarcely able to stand. I then was advised to try Dr. King’s New Discovery, and after using one bottle I went back to work, as well as I ever was.” W. J. ATKINS, Banner Springs, Tenn. PRICE sOc AND SI.OO SOLD AND GUARANTEED BY A. F. LONG
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