Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1882-11-27

uduOlCdp WAS WOu ny DOSW0il.
The Railway Carriage works of the
London & Northwestern railroad at Vol.
verton, burned. Loss 100000. Three
hundred persons are out of employment.
THE CHEWING GUM TRADE.
4 business L,ocLed ,cith 4nr;cty by til,
Tickle Tastes Of Childhood.
Around the corner from Blocker street
New York, in one of the streets west OF
Broadway, an old sign on dingy house
front bears the inscription. Chewing Gun
Factory" When reporter OF the Su,
started to go in he found the door locked
as though to seclude from intrusive obser
walton the processes by which the durabl;
delicacy is produced. The proprietor him
self responded to the ring of the door bell
and, standing in the hall talked feeIingly
of the vicissitudes of the chewing gum
trade. This may be called the dull. sea.
son, I suppose" he remarked, ''for now
the schools have broken up, and there is
apt to be less call for chewing gum
In the fall, when the children get to their
| books again, the demand will pick up, for
chewing gum is a quiet comfort during
school hours. If pupil brings in taffy or
candy, sticky fingers and smeared books
are the result, and the rustling of the
paper wrapper may draw the teachers at
! tention and lead to coniscation. Then,
too, chewing gum is eco lomical. A pu-
| pill may slip it in the desk, when called
| upon to recite, and when it dries it be-
comes fresh and crackly again, as when it
was first bought. But. as I said before,
the demand goes by such fits and starts
that you can't tell exactly when it will
spring up OF when it Will die away. Chew
ing gum is not such staple as people
imagine. We have to be continually on
the outlook for novelties in order to make
it co.
Are there many kinds of chewing
gum"
mo; Natural gum is almost unheard
of nowadays. There used to be q trade in
spruce gum, and believe there is still in
New England. Trade chewing gum is
nearly all parafine wax. There is one
| manufacturer in this city who uses spec
les of India rubber. Gum chikley is it's
trade name. There is no waste OF sub
stance in either kind. You may chew out
the sugar in it, but the gum itself is unal-
tered. The sweetening constitutes the
only difficulty in chewing gum manufac-
ture. You cannot candy the gum. If you
should try to boil parapiine wax with
sugar the wax would float to the top while
the sugar would be burning at the bot
tom. The syrup must be worked in cold by
pressure. If there is any staple chewing
gum it is what is known as White Noun
tain gum, made in Maine. 1t is parafine
wax gum, with its natural white color, but
nd &c in
size. Other makers devise all sorts of
novelties. If you happen to hit the chill
dren's fancy you may have big rush; but
if style does not take, it is of no use to
keep it in stock Better melt it down and
work it over into different shapes
''What different shapes do you put chew
ing gum up in.''
''Oh, almost every conceivable shape.
You know wax is easily nodded. Now, for
the 4th of July trade we make fre-crack-
ers, rockets and torpedoes. A cigar shape
has pretty constant demand. It pleases
the boys. I made quite run once on
babies. Once l got out five little pigs in
box, and for some weeks I sold them by
the thousand. Strawberries have had
quite run. I sold about 10000 of them
in three weeks. Chewing gum made III
a while under the name of needles and
pins. We follow up the season in toys.
For instance in the spring we get out
tops and marbles. We use several col0rs,
principally white and red, but sometimes
yellow and chocolate.
'Do you supply the shops directiy?''
No; the manufacturers sell to the job
bers. who supply the retail confectionery
40 no 70 ~, fOr nj,
ing-gu,n is from 60 to Go cents per box
of 100 pieces. The retail price is cent
| apiece. The demand for chewing gum is
largely kept up now By the prize package
system, and there is a house in this city
| that makes speciality of that branch of
| the business and almost monopolizes it.
| They are always on the lookout for cheap
| job-lots of anything that can be used IS
| prizes, and that constitutes the greatest
| portion of their outlay. The prizes range
from ring or doll up to
| a clock or watch. When the prize is too
bulky to go in the same packages with the
| gum the prizes going to shopkeeper with
| an assortment are numbered, and cor
responding numbers are put on slips fold
| ed up with the chewing gum.
''The great difficulty about the business -
| before, the tickle taste of children. 1t is
impossible to foretell how any new style
will take. It is hit or miss operation. I
tell you, sir, it may seem strange for me to
say so, but some of those big houses down
town with large capital and extended trade
don't have to rack their brains in doing
business nearly so much as we chewing
gum manufacturers have to do"
LITTLE Eodie was having mis- hal
combed by his mother and he grumbled
at the operation. ''Why, Eddie, you
shouldn't make such fuss, don't when
ny hair is combed." eyes, but your
hair amt hitched to your head like
mine"
"WHERE are you going, my little
man?' "To school," " You learn to
read % "No." "To count ?" "No."
What do you do?" Il wait for
| nj, 11k