, 1872-10-27
The Lager-Beer* Riot Of 1855
IA Useful Bit of
History.
Mayor Boone and His TroubIes---Gen-
eral Dick Swift Cuts a
Central Figure.
The City Under Martial L2Y...Cannoa in
the Streets...The Killed, Nvnnd.
ed, and Missing.

History is philosophy teaching by example
Charts are made to show where rocks have beer
found, oftentimes by going ashore On them
The burned child breads the fire. We scorn tt
give credit for any Of this wisdom, for no one
will believe it original. The invention is no
oura. Old Mother Eve bit it out Of the frs
apple. Humanity gets forward, carrying with il
the lessons of human mistakes. Where it trie!
to travel unincumbered by such hand-baggage
iti only aecu1nulating the freight-list for some
body else. And generally humanity makes suct
information useful, and saves to itself many
broken shin and stubbed toe By noting the foot
steps Of others. The only exceptions We arr
aware Of are the, We believe injurious, state
ment that geese always stumble over the enmt
stone and Q1ere our doubt flashes into certainty,
the kitchen-girls who are always getting
up funerals with cookstores and kerosene
So let us to page of history OF seventeen Year,
ago, the Lager-Beer Riot, which, We confidently
hope and fervently trust, may seventeen yenrs
hence be an undin,med and minated example Of
how easy it is to start q large confagration
with kindling gmaterial. And how even monkey
with a match may fire powder-magazine.
It Was in the midst Of the peaceful admins.
tratlon Of Mayor Boone. The prairies that clasp
than now, and the State street omnibuses to
the Southern Hotel on Twelfth street, and the
half-hourly line that penetrated the remotenesa
of Vest Madison street as far rs Bulls Head
stock-yards, were our only street vehicles. The
old blue brick Sherman House still hung
its shabby balconies over the sidewalks
of Randolph and Clark streets. The old
TRIBUNE WAS giving its readers it's broad pages
from thelow brick building opposite, and among
the lookerH-on in that days doings WAS q Cleve-
lander who arrived at the fremont House that
morning, with view Of buying TIE TRIBUNE
for himself and his associates. The present
Mayor Of the city can probably review with in
terest his sensations as he surveyed from the
top of some shoe-boxes on Clark street the e3-
ceeding Iyeliness Of street-scenes in the city Of
his proposed adoption. Perhaps his pur-
chase was hastcned by the sugges-
lion SO gained that Chicago was q
wide-awake place for home news. Messre.
Scripps, Bross g. Spears we're issuing the Daily
Democratic Press from DR.. Brainard's Block, g
little farther north. The new Court House,
with the pepper-castor and inverted saucers that
crowned it, was just coming to be trite subject
OF admiration and the citizens were just begin
ming to wonder, after all, if it quite equaed the
Parthenon. On the opposite side Of the Court
House Square to the Sherman House, was
Washington street, q quiet suburban thorough
fare, filed with church~goers On Sunday. The
Baptist brethren we're very proud of
their brand-new church-structure, where
rises the stately Chamber OF Com
nerce. Good Doctor Curtis YVES preaching
to the First Presbyterians on the site of the
present village structure of William S. Johnston.
The Unitarians, and Methodists, and Universal
lists, were all wo1shiping and praying on Wash
ington street, between Dearborn and Clark
Streets Doctor John Evans and Doctor Ham
mills residences we're snugly ensconced under
the caves of these sanctuaries. East OF Dear
born street, Washington Was an extent OF green
gardens and modest cottages, John B. Rice
ivedin q wide door-ya1d On the site of the Opera
House, and Jerry Price had just died in q little
cottage in closed garden where now stands
Portland Block. The wooden structure OF Ply
mouth Church confronted the terminus of Dear
born street on Madison, and Rector
Swope was preaching in the wooden edi-
dee Of Trinity Church, just over the
way, diagonally opposite the present TRIBUNE
Office. Mayor Boone domiciled in his neat frame
residence On State street, near Madison and his
meditations we're doubtless bucolic aR he looked
over the lawns and cabbage gardens Of his neigh
Upon this pastoral community, that filed all
the streets leading prairieward night and morn
ing, with their lowing kline, which came back
full-uddered at nightfan up the 1eafy avenues,
an easy Journey to and from bountiful pasture,
suddenly rose the wrinkled front of grim
visaged war, and out of the events Of the next
two dnyB the Lage1-Beer Riot made its records
on 81 indelible page Of our local history. We
turn it over to-day, for the lesson is one every
citizen can take home to himself, and tell it to
his children at his knee, if he chooses. But he
will do better if he slips round the corner and
tells it to any collection Of hot-headed men.
Keep the dear little boys and girls On the Fables
much capsicum chopped into the children'a
modern literary feed. We are not to be betrayed
into 3 long story. It is not necessary to go too
far back into the quarry and talk geology. We
are lifting q few blocks OF history from the
street where our citizens found them on that
eventful sunny Saturday, April q, 1856. a ques-
tlon of the enforcement Of Icense-regulatlons
against saloons Was agitating community, and
law. It does not matter as to the details.
They were not novel, and have not expired
By. limitations: Judge Henry l.. Rucker
had many Of these cases before him
proceeding. Nobody dreamed OF disturbance or
disturbing. It always needs some frebrand of
q fellow to inclte defiance Of the law. The idea
Fever strikes the mass as whole. They al
the citizens to remedy the ballot-box, and all
excitement is worked OF in ward-meetings and
Bpeech-making. And thus goes forward stead
ily the ship that holds all our destlnles, now one
at the helm, now another, the traverse worked
now here. now there but we get onward, and all
the while the hull is staunch below, and the
rigging ataunt above. And here is where the
crime comes in, when some bloodthirsty or
simply reckless fellow seeks to scuttle the ship
and fire the magazine because he cannot have
his own way among the cooks stew-pans.
Now the mild soul Of Mayor Boone had been
vexed very much in these days by the cantan-
kerous performances Of Alderman Larue, one OF
whose remote ancestors fred the Ephesian
dome, and go got eased Of his itch for fame.
The family are always doing it; will continue to
do it to the end of time. Alderman Laruea
spirit was seyere1y exercised by the troubles
and trials Of the saloon-keepers, and sat up
nights over the subject, untlit became a mania
with him. His remedy for the wrongs inflicted
by the Courts was the sublime and o7erawing
power Of the masses. He couldn't
think OF 8 better thing to do than
to bring up all the contestants in solid phalanx
nn$a fhn ~ rrfi r1.1 al