Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1883-08-31
Swindiing the Farmers.
Lancaster Teller.

| Lancaster Teller.
We presume there is an infinite
variety of ways to perpetrate SWIM
dies upon farmers and Others who
do not follow swindling. Last week
we gave an account of how a bank
president was swindled out of 81 500
by a sharper in this state. Another
bank president was similarly con-
fidenced out of thousand in Penn
sylvania last Monday. If bank
officers can thus be duped one
would think ordinary country
working men would be easy prey.
Recently an agent was in this vicin-
ity taking orders for the Combined
Corn Shelter and Feed Grinder
manufactured by the STANDARD
Machine Co.," of Cleveland, Ohio.
The agent would go to a farmer and
represent to him that he wanted the
farmer to become agent for these
machines and that for all he sold
he could have one-fifth of the mon
ey. The price of one was $50.
For every one the farmer could sell
he would make $50. The agent
then exhibits II lot of blanks and
furnishes the farmer with a sup
ply of blank orders and gets him
to sign paper which he supposes
is simply an acknowledgment of
his responsibility as an agent and
an agreement to receive the ma
chimes for delivery whenever he has
made a sale. In quick time the
farmer receives postal card in
forming him that one of the ma
chimes has been shipped to him and
notifying him to remove it to avoid
cost of storage, &c. If he is taken
by surprise and declines to receive it
he will soon be officially informed
that the Standard Machine Co. has
in its possession an order over his
signature like this:
STANDARD MACHINE Co., CLEVELAND, ONO.
GENTLENEN:-Please ship me by freight via
county State of Wisconsin, one combined corn
shelter and feed grinder. For all further ship
ments / am TO pay the above named company
fourthffths the retail price when a sale is made
by me. am to receive the combined mill when
it arrives, and pay the freight, which the I
company is to allow me on settlement. Retail
fifty dollars each. Extra set of grinding burrs |
So each. Then follows a statement of value |
of property the farmer is worth and his sig i
nature
The order from which we copy !
the above had Mr.. Jacob Wenzel's /
signature to it and was printed on a
postal card. He insists that it is
not the paper he put his name to, but |
even if it were, it does not look |
like dangerous paper to sign.
Clearly, it is so worded as to convey
the idea that the machine is sim ply
a sample for his use in selling others.
But it is an order for machine. II
the farmer declines to receive it he
would make himself liable for dam
ages. If he receives it and declines
to pay for it, the company may sue
him, and here is where the swindle
comes in. In suit the farmer
would probably win, but as the
is in Ohio and the farmer
in Wisconsin, the suit would be
brought in the Z. S. court, and for
the farmer to defend would cost
him two or three times as much as
the price of the machine. He
therefore concludes, as Mr. Wenzel
did, to take the machine and pay
for it. So Mr.. Wenzel, who is well
off, but is a hard working
man, when he sells his hogs next
winter, has to count out $145, (the
amount settled ON and send it to
,he Standard Machine Co., for q
machine that he did not mean to
GUY and did not know he was buying.
Probably the aggregate of money
sent out of this county for those
and in this unintentional
is a very large sum. In
many cases it will call for a mort
rage. Thus the industrious mems
loses are kept on the grindstone.
rhe pockets of the farmer are kept
Trained by the far-away sharpers
md as we all have to depend on the
we are all shaved.