1200 
'fHE RURAt NEW-YORKER 
December 16, 
PUBLISHER’S DESK 
0 
You are fighting for the farmer and give 
ns facts from the farmer's standpoint. Your 
work in getting money from snide commis¬ 
sion men, and showing up snide invest¬ 
ments, is worth more than The It. N.-Y.’s 
cost to any farmer. 
New York. j. a. m. 
We can give the people the fatts, but 
the facts are worth little. It is the use 
made of them that counts. This infor¬ 
mation surely ought to save our people 
collectively more than the total sub¬ 
scription revenue of the paper. 
Perhaps you will remember, I asked your 
advice sometime ago about the Columbian 
Publishing Co. I am very thankful that I 
took your advice and did not put any more 
into it. Now in reply to inclosed circular 
would you send .$10 to them, or would you 
keep it in your jeans? p. c. E. 
Massachusetts. 
This is the company that was paying 
4% quarterly dividends, or 16% a year. 
The 16 cents was simply returned out 
of your dollar. The dividend was not 
earned. Afterwards it was merged 
with Hampton’s Magazine, and the new 
company was recently closed out by the 
court for $10,000. All the promoters 
who could be found are under indict¬ 
ment on allegations of fraud. The cir¬ 
cular letter referred to is simply the 
old, old scheme to work the old victims 
under the pretense that they are to get 
something out of nothing. Think of it! 
Besides the stock the old company had 
$600,000 of liabilities. It is alleged in 
the circular that this has been scaled 
down by mutual consent, to probably 
$200,000. The assets sold for $10,000, 
and a promise to pay 60 per cent on the 
debts in five years. This comes a long 
way from paying the debts, and, of 
course, leaves the stock absolutely 
worthless. How idle then to pretend 
that the old stock has any value! If 
you dropped a hundred dollar bill into 
a furnace and saw it go up in smoke, 
would you put in another ten dollar bill 
expecting to get it and the hundred 
back? By all means, keep the “ten” in 
your “jeans.” 
This letter is no doubt a fake scheme. 
Better investigate and put your readers 
wise. For my part I will have nothing to 
do with it. k. w. c. 
West Virginia. 
This letter is from the First Burbank 
Timber Company and with an accom¬ 
panying circular proposes to sell stock 
at $100 per share to raise vegetables for 
New York City and in fact for the 
markets of the whole country. There is 
not a word to show either assets or 
liabilities of the company. The stock 
authorized is $1,000,000, under the laws 
of Maine, a State which makes the way 
easy for promoters. The offices are lo¬ 
cated in one of the most expensive 
office buildings in the city, but investi¬ 
gators report that they were unable to 
locate them at the address. A com¬ 
mission of 10 per cent is allowed you 
for selling shares. _ The ordinary truck 
grower receiving 35 cents or less of the 
consumer’s dollar will wonder how this 
concern can afford palatial offices in this 
expensive building. We would like some 
one in the company to tell us just which 
one or more of the Burbank plants are 
to be grown for the New York market. 
You could probably go over the terri¬ 
tory adjacent to New York with a fine- 
tooth comb and find nothing of his 
lauded creations, unless it be a strag¬ 
gling Wonderberry—the black night¬ 
shade. 
Concluding a long list of apparently 
eminent directors we find the following 
taken verbatim from the prospectus: 
BOARD OF EXPERTS ON OPERATION. 
Dr. W. P. Brooks, 
Director of Experiment Station, Massa¬ 
chusetts. 
Agricultural College, Amherst, Massachu¬ 
setts. 
G. F. Warren, 
Professor of Farm Management, 
Cornell University, New York. 
T. I,. Lyon, Pb.D., 
Professor Soil Technology, 
Cornell University, New York. 
We do not know whether these agri¬ 
cultural teachers know that their names 
and the institutions that they represent 
are being used in a promotion scheme 
or not. They may not realize the effect 
of their passive endorsement of the 
scheme if they have consented to it. 
They may have the right to indorse any 
scheme personally, but it would be too 
much to say they are justified in lending 
the influence of our State institutions to 
promotion schemes. TheSe names are 
used for the purpose of securing the 
confidence of country people. Seeing 
these names, many farmers would go 
into the scheme believing that the pro¬ 
fessors of these colleges would not per¬ 
mit the use of their names if it were 
not safe for them to invest. That is 
why they are printed in the circular. 
No doubt they are engaged for a specific 
purpose and paid for the service. But 
to say the least this is a speculative ven¬ 
ture. There is not one chance in a thou¬ 
sand of there being anything in it for 
anyone but the promoters. Do farmers 
want their leading agricultural colleges 
to stand as indorsers of speculative 
ventures of this kind? 
Do you know anything about the Pro¬ 
ducers’ Commission Co., of Kansas City, 
Mo. ? They claim to make great savings 
to the farmers. E. H. s. 
Kentucky. 
All we know about it is that they 
charge $10 membership fee, and promise 
farmers 30 per cent more on what they 
sell and 30 per cent savings on what they 
buy. We have never known a member¬ 
ship scheme to be successful for any¬ 
one but the promoters of it. All such 
schemes of the past that we can recall 
have been fakes and swindles. Until 
these people show some practical method 
of reaching the results they promise, we 
counsel farmers to keep their ten dol¬ 
lars, or make better use of it than to 
turn it over blindly to the promoters of 
a scheme. 
Last Fall I shipped poultry to the Egg 
Producers’ Company. Brooklyn, N. Y., to 
the amount of $80, that they did not pay 
for. This concern was run by a man named 
Morgan, who is running it now under the 
name of the Morgan Poultry Co., 49 Walla- 
bout Market, Brooklyn, N. Y. Will you see 
wliat you can do about collecting this for 
me? r- c. p. 
Pennsylvania. 
Our friends are pretty well advised 
regarding the treatment this Egg Pro¬ 
ducers’ Company accorded some of our 
subscribers. The first complaints that 
reached us were from shippers who got 
returns with reductions for broken eggs. 
Apparently every shipment was dis¬ 
counted from 10 to 25 per cent, for this 
cause. Finally no returns were made at 
all, and shippers could get nothing. We 
could do nothing for them. But after 
repudiating old accounts they have 
cheerfully gone right on at a new ad¬ 
dress with the old practice of neglecting 
the remittances. If people will trust 
such concerns they must expect losses. 
The following letter comes to us 
from a subscriber in a Western State: 
A stranger died here alt the mine re¬ 
cently. Among his effects we found your 
name and address. We want to dispose 
of the things and close the incident in so 
far as concerns us. Send us $5 to cover 
cost of shipping and we will ship things 
to you to do with as you see fit. The 
things consist of a trunk—it is full of 
clothes—suitcase, handbag, watch and 
chain, and photographing outfit. We 
stood all the expenses of his burial. We 
feel we have done our part. This is our 
busiest season at the mine. We have al¬ 
ready devoted much valuable time to this 
matter. We ask you to answer at. once. 
Just enclose five dollar bill in a letter 
and mail same to us. We will assume the 
risk. Say all in first letter. We haven’t 
time to engage in a correspondence. An¬ 
swer at once. Address T. C. Cooper, P. O. 
Box 17, Mt. Morrison, Colo. 
P. S.—We are 28 miles from our post 
office. A registered letter or post office 
money order would cause us a two-day 
trip to town. I)o not send either. Just 
enclose bill iu letter. We will get it. 
SOUTH PLATTE MINING AND MILLING CO. 
It doesn’t seem that any rational 
being would be silly enough to bite on 
a hook with such transparent bait. This 
is a modification of the old Spanish 
swindle. Of course the intimation is 
that there is considerable of value in 
these effects and the rogues expect that 
the cupidity or desire of their corre¬ 
spondents to get something for nothing 
will induce them to mail the $5 bill. If 
once mailed, of course, that is the last 
that will ever be heard of it. Regis- ■ 
tered letters or post office orders do not 
afford a means of remittance that is at¬ 
tractive to the ordinary crook. 
“The Journal of the American Medical 
Association” tells of a Kansas “medical” 
swindler who pretends to cure almost every 
known disease with a “secret” preparation 
of his own compounding. His “remedy” is 
an “eye water.” Analyzed by the chemists 
of the American Medical Association it was 
found to consist essentially of a mixture of 
equal parts of salt and sugar in hydrant 
water. Ilis price for the mixture is $25 
an ounce. “The Journal” says that it 
does not take an expert to prove that such 
a mixture will not cure consumption, blind¬ 
ness, paralysis, Bright’s disease or any of 
the hundred other ailments that the quack 
professes to treat. “Expert knowledge is 
not required to declare the treatment a 
fraud and the ‘professor’ a swindler.” “The 
Journal” adds: “It is a conservative state¬ 
ment to say that a man who will take 
money from a consumptive, an epileptic or 
a victim of the morphine habit under the 
pretence of curing his disease with a mix¬ 
ture of sugar, salt and water is an un¬ 
conscionable scoundrel.”—Daily Tribune. 
It ought to be apparent to anyone 
that a mixture guaranteed to cure any 
ill is a fake and a snare without the 
formality of a chemical analysis. These 
medical quacks are the meanest of all 
swindlers, unless it be the publishers 
who conspire with them by running their 
advertisements to help rob unfortunate 
people. If it were not that we have 
daily proof of the traffic, one would 
think it impossible that any human 
being would trifle with the miseries of 
his fellow beings for personal gain. 
Certainly human depravity cannot fall 
lower than this. j. j. d. 
Money Interests and Railroads. 
The most significant event of the week 
was the revelation of the influence of 
moneyed interests in preventing any com¬ 
petition in transcontinental rates. Two in¬ 
cidents tend to confirm this view. One is 
the testimony of Mr. B. N. Baker before 
the Senate Committee on Interstate Com¬ 
merce, and the other is the failure of the 
Postmaster General to receive a bid for the 
carrying of mails from coast to coast via 
the Panama Canal. A few months ago 
many papers printed at length the 
plans of the Atlantic and Pacific Transpor¬ 
tation Company, a corporation organized to 
build a number of large ships to ply between 
the Atlantic and Pacific cities by the way 
of the Panama Canal on its completion some 
two or three years away. These plans were 
businesslike, it seemed, and warranted by 
the traffic that would be offered. Trans¬ 
continental rates are so high as to be pro¬ 
hibitive for many articles. Then too the 
time taken in transit and the difficulties 
of refrigeration make the traffic in fruit 
hazardous. It would seem that perishable 
products could be handled to much better 
advantage by water. Also bulky articles 
and articles of low value compared to 
weight could be handled much cheaper than 
by rail. 
Our government is investing a half bil¬ 
lion dollars in building the Canal. The 
public generally presumed that it was prin¬ 
cipally for coast to coast trade, and not 
solely for the use of Europe in sending its 
productions to the Orient. We supposed it 
was for our benefit in some measure at 
least. But if what was developed in the 
hearing before the Commerce Committee 
November 20 is true the American public 
is confronted with a problem. Mr. Baker is 
the organizer of the Atlantic and Pacific 
Transportation Company. lie is an experi¬ 
enced steamship manager, having been for 
years at the head of one of the large At¬ 
lantic steamship lines. lie thought he saw 
a field for a profitable line of ships and 
started to secure capital to finance a line 
of ships costing $15,000,000. He met with 
some encouragement at first, hut when it 
was seen that the proposed line would be 
a competitor of the transcontinental lines 
banks and men of means refused to assist 
in financing the line. Mr. Baker says ho 
cannot give any specific evidence of any 
conspiracy in restraint of trade, yet he feels 
that the “money trust,” so-called, widen 
owns the controlling interest in the rail¬ 
roads of the country, has had something 
to do in preventing the carrying out of 
his plans. An ocean line of steamers would 
be likely to affect the rates of transcon¬ 
tinental railroads and affect the securities 
of ^transcontinental lines and therefore 
there must be no competition. 
Supporting this charge of Mr. Baker 
comes the statement of the Post Office De¬ 
partment that no bids had been received for 
the mail subsidy contract via the Panama 
Canal. November 25 was the closing day 
for the bids for this contract. In the spe¬ 
cifications the Postmaster General has pro¬ 
vided “for a guarantee against the control 
of these lines by competing railroad com¬ 
panies. This new provision in ocean mail 
contracts is in keeping with the adminis¬ 
tration respecting the restraint of trade.” 
The proposed service is to be inaugurated 
not later than October 18. 1914. at winch 
time the Panama Canal will be open. The 
government promised a 10-year contract 
from New York, Charleston, Savannah and 
New Orleans to San Diego, San Francisco 
and Seattle. 
Putting these two happenings of the 
week together it seems clear that the 
American people face a situation that calls 
for action. Many people believe there is 
no “money trust.” but this situation looks 
much like a “trust” or “conspiracy” in 
restraint of trade. The transcontinental 
railroads have secured the holding up of the 
orders of the Interstate Commerce Com¬ 
mission reducing their rates. Now they 
are preventing the use of the Panama Canal 
as a route for a competitive line. It has 
been assumed that the Canal would be of 
service to our people, and if no private 
capital can be found to operate lines of 
steamships between coasts it may be the 
duty of the government to enter the field of 
transportation. The government now oper¬ 
ates a line of transports between San Fran¬ 
cisco and the Philippines, and if necessary 
it can operate a line connecting our East¬ 
ern and Western coasts, giving our people 
the benefit of a service merited by the ex¬ 
pense incurred in building the Panama 
Canal. F. N. C. 
Enamel Paint in the Cow Barn. 
Can you inform us whether enamel 
paint on wood or on galvanized iron can 
be used successfully and economically in a 
small cow-barn to further cleanliness and 
facilitate cleansing? w. 
Katonah, N. Y. 
Enamel paint can be used successfully 
on wood or iron in a cow stable. Such 
enamel paint as I have had experience 
with needs to be applied after two or more 
coats of white lead paint. But I doubt 
the economy of using a high-priced enamel 
paint (the best ones are high-priced) in 
this way. Good white lead paint may be 
finished with a smooth surface and spots 
that are injured by wear and tear can be 
very quickly recovered. R. A. P. 
Lameness. 
We have a voung mare, will be four years 
old in Spring, whose front hoofs are short 
and stubby. What can I do to make 
them grow out? We use her for driving 
only, and when not in harness she has 
plenty of blue grass pasture in Summer 
and in Winter we feed some corn and 
oats, but not much, with plenty of good 
wild hay. Her mother had the same kind 
of hoofs, and when eight years old she got 
ringbones on her front feet, and that is 
what I am fearing will be the trouble with 
this mare. Could you advise me how to pre¬ 
vent it? .a. C. 
Iowa. 
The unsound mare should not have been 
used for breeding. Ringbone is hereditary. 
Blister the coronets with cerate of can- 
tharides, one at a time, once a month, 
to stimulate growth of horn. a. s. a. 
REFLEX 
%=WI1LM» 
1 WeatherstheRoughestWeather 
On ordinary slickers, water finds its 
way in at the front. On the KEFLEX 
Slicker, our REFLEX edge (pat ~d) guides 
every drop of water to the bottom of coat 
whereitdrops off/ 
1<eepsYou^ 
’ AbsolutelyDry 
*3.°-° Everywhere) 
Satisfaction Guaranteed I 
Ask your dealer to show you | 
the TtBPLEX 
I—’- 
<3 
S'SHl RAS© 
A.J.To wer Co., Boston 1 . 
Tower-Canadian Ltd.,Toronto 
I G5II 
FOR MENDING HARNESS 
Ittakes * shoes, tents, awnings, pulley belts, car- 
awax -'sjL. pets, saddlos, suitcases, buggy tops, 
thread, dash boards, or any heavy material, 
feeds s Automatic 
from spool and Awl is the only per- 
doesthe work of feet Sewing 
any harness maker t/%. Awl. 
maehino. It is 
ponsnble for farmers. V 
Agents wanted. Sent prepaid T|(iA •' - j# Jjh 
for $1.25. Send at once for 
catalog. STEWART-SKINNER CO. JM 
35 Hermon Street, Worcester, Mass. 
BUY AN ICE PLOW 
and save the ice crop. Cut your ico. 
quick and cheap with my double 
row Ice Plow. It equal^ 20 
men with saws. Pays for 
itself in 1 day. Also Tools. 
Ask for catalog and prices- 
WM. II. FIUT, Vorbank, 
N,T| 
TYOURIDEAS 
$8,500 offered for one invention. 
Book “How to Obtain a Patent" and 
“What to Invent" sent free. Send rough 
sketch for free report as to patentability. 
Patents advertised for sale at our ex¬ 
pense in Manufacturers. Journals. 
Patent Obtained or Fee Returned 
CUANOLEE & CHANDLEE. Patent Att’ys 
Established 1G Years 
999 F. Street, Washington, D, C. _ 
SKUNK 
M. J. .lewett A; Sons, I 
We buy Skunk, Mink,Musk¬ 
rat and all other raw furs at 
highest market prices, and 
give liberal assortments and 
“A square deal" to everyone. 
Price-list free. 
Redwood, N. Y„ I>cpt .29 
RAW FURS 
G. I. FOX. 162 
W. 26th Street, 
N.Y. A squaro 
deal, liberal as¬ 
sortment, top 
prices. Write 
for price list. 
Cash for 
Raw Furs 
Mako more money out of 
Raw Furs by getting full 
value yourself and savo 
middleman’s profits. 
Now York is best market 
and we pay highest prices 
for hides of Skunks. 
... . . , Minks, Ooons, etc. Out 
out the commission house humbug and ship to us di¬ 
rect. Wo stand express. More than 30 years in business 
priT Dim CD rn Write for price list and references. 
DLL 1, DU I LLK IU., Exporters, 4 East 12th Street, NewYork 
WE BUY RAW FURS 
and being located in New.York sinco 1861 can pay 
best prices: references; no commissions. Price 
list free. SHIP TO A RELIABLE FIRM. 
L. BRIEFNER <& SONS, 
No. 4 East 16th Street, New York 
--W 
I Raw Furs Wanted I 
i 
9 
I 
Skunk, Mink, Raccoon, Opossum, Fox, Muskrat and 
other furs are bringing high prices in New York, the 
best market for you to ship to. Do you want to know 
‘ ‘ How to Got More Money for Your Raw Fur* ? ” 
Write for “ Monjo’s Hunter and Trapper” and price 
list—it’s free. Highest commercial references, 
F. N. MON JO, 156 W. 25th St., N. Y. 
I 
I 
Skunk, Mink, Coon a Specialty 
The highest prices paid for these, and 
all other furs. No matter how largo or 
small a lot you have, I want 
v you to got my PRICES. I hold 
V all shipments for approval 
when requested and tele- 
\lL graph offers for largo lots, 
! * i pay expross charges on 
‘all over $10. Write for 
prices today to 
__ 0. L. SLENKER, East Liberty, 0. 
LET US TAN 
YOUR HIDE. 
Cattle or Horse hide. Calf, Dog, Deer, 
or any kind of skin with hair or fur on. 
We mako them soft, light, odorless, 
wind, moth and water proof, and make 
them into coats (for men or women), 
robes, rugs or gloves when so ordered. 
Your fur goods will cost you less than 
to buy them, and bo worth more. It 
will certainly pay you to look into it. 
Our illustrated catalog gives a lot of 
'information. Tells how to take off and 
care for hides ; how we pay the freight 
both ways ; about our marvelous brush 
dyeing process which is a tremendous 
advantage to the customer, especially 
on horse hides and calf skins; about 
the goods we sell, taxidermy, etc., but 
we never send out this valuable book 
except upon request. If you want a 
copy send in your correct address. 
The Crosby Frisian Fur Company, 
571 Lycll Avc., Rochester, N. Y. 
