The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1880-01-29

Up -Four Flights in I3axter Street-Sfair-
ways on which CHildrenI Never Laugh
Rooms Never Lighted By Gods Sunshine
Railways Which Echo Cries Tor Bread.

Rooms Never Lightedby Gods Sunshine
Railways Which Echo Criesfor Bread.
IA1. Quad, in Detroit=FFee Press
Within four blocks of each other at
one point are Broadway and. Baxter
/ Street, New York-one with its mil
lions Of wealth, the other with its woe,
/ misery, Wretehedness, poverty. filth
and crime. You can not realize the
/ change until you walk from one to the
other-until your eyes turn from mar
/ bic fronts and costly carriages to pens
! built for the use of human pigs and the
/ grab-bags of the lowest ragpickers.
! When you enter Baxter Street you
are "spotted by man, woman and
child. Some take you for a detective,
some for the g taX-man - and others for
! the landlord who has come to raise the
rent on his poverty-clutched tenants.
g Say, gif you four dollar for dot
oafer-coatIn called out blear-eyed,
half blind dealer in clothing as halted
under his awning TO avoid the pouring
rain
'.Who yer lookin' fur this time!"
called boy from a third story window
opposite.
:. Say, pard, hain't you putin on a
swell around herei' demanded a red
necked, bullet-headed man as he left the
I
In sixty seconds there were sixteen
men, women, boys and half-grown girls
around me. On the corner was a sa-
loon, and just as the bullet-head was
saying g as how he couldn't be swelled
over" / asked the crowd to take a
drink.
"a drink, is it! An! he's a perfeck
gintleman, and we knew it all the
time!" was the chorus, and we crossed.
Some drank gin, some rum and some
beer, and there was a general groan of
disappointment when called for cider.
/ placed it where some one could reach
out for it, and girl seven years old
reached behind me and gulped it down.
And now what d 'ye want in Baxter
Street?' inquired three or four at once.
s. want TO see the poorest, darkest
and worst tenement house in the
street. -
tAh! that's mine-come alonglr
called every soul of the sixteen, and but
for the bartender I should have been
iugged off in sixteen different directions
all at once.
'tThe best is the worst and the worst
is the BEST was his philosophy, and
I'm thinking you'll see misery enough
in any of them. You'd better 90 with
the old woman there
Yes, it was an s'old woman She
had on the clothes of a woman, and hel
hair was gray. Some one had broker
her nose in years gone by; some one
had closed one of her eyes; some one
| had drawn a knife across her cheek
leaving a horrible scar, Rum and deg
radiation had worked the rest-had driv
en- out of look and voice and form al
semblance of womanhOOd.
q Call me Old Maggie, - she said, az
we crossed the street, ssand if any O
the low-lived tenants dares to give We ,
word I'll mash them to jelly!'
She is the ianitress of this four-stor,
tenement, and her first dive is dow
cellar. In the front is a bake-shop KEEP
by an old woman and a girl. Furthe
back are
Cant you stand the smell, me dar
lint?'' she calls out as / halt. sEWell
now, but think of all of us poor Greater
who live above it AMI have this smel
twenty-fOur hours a day Why, thi
! cellar is the playground for our chill
, dren!"
; g Have a pie, sir-only five centsP p
! called the girl in the bakery as turne'
; to go.
"a pie-take that, you minx!" re
, piled Old Maggie, las she boxed her ears
DO you think, that a gentleman wit
! his delicate nose is going to buy pies il
! Baxter StreetP'i
: In this den all the closets are in tn
: cellar. There is not trap in any pipe
Every second throughout the year tn
, sewer-gas creeps up and up and up, un
til it becomes the atmosphere of ever
{ room, and is taken into every pair @
!. lungs. A wagon-load of lime would nc
deaden the odor for more than half a
4 hour, but there is no ime-no disinfect
! ant of any sort. In its place is a sho
for the sale of bread and pies!
j, 1.-THE GRAND FLooRE"
: g This" said the old woman as W
crowded up the dark and broken stair
S case, is what we calls the grand fioore
0 and the rooms rent accordingly. Thi
S palace of a parlor, with its two bed
I rooms off, in only $12 per month.
G The ''parlor - was a room 12X12, an
e the bedrooms 3x6. In those three room
It a family of eight cooked, ate, lodged
It lived and called the place home. TIL
a floors had not been mOpped in 1
# months; there was hardly any plaste
4 left on the partitions; the ceilings wer
: black with smoke and dirt, and the
e raised the windows to look out rattle
e than wash them.
e "a snug home it is, and the rent
;. very low!n remarked the old woman a
& she saw me looking around.
e This was fair sample of the frs
g floor. The sewer-gas poured up I
t meet and fight thousand odors, an
e yet the mother of the children said as
e went out:
e 81 can't understand for me life wha
s ails them two small children. TIL
(. neighborhoOd is very healthy, and We
= they are sick all the time!"
e Up narrow, greasy, dirty, broke
d stairway and we came to
It 1.-THE sECoND-BEsT FLOoRE,"
as Old Maggie calls it. Here, for IS O
r 80 per month, one can get a 10x12 ROOF
# with a 3X6 bedroom off.
q 81 don't like to let these rooms to
a family of over six explained the oil
4 woman, - but them Spanish and TIA
f yuns sometimes crowd in dozen pei
i sons. Gurus creeters them folks air
The walls and floors were black wit
dirt, the doors broken, glass out, and til
furniture for a family of five could hav
been carried on ones back. The chi
IS dren looked up with wild and haggar
V faces, and when l tossed them an appl
n they rolled over the floor in a bunch an
It I fought for it ike wolves. Down belo,
r them was the crooked, dark and mudd
e street and its awful smells-above ther
a misery worse than theirs.
y 1.-THE COMMON FLooRE."
/, tThis fioore,'' said the old woman
> as we gained another story, sis 70
: them as DON'T want to put on too niue
! style, and pay too much rent. I can
!. always be sure of the character of tn