Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1886-01-09
oLD-TIME /" DEALS"
A CONSTOCKER'S RECOLLECTIONS
OF EARLY DAYS.
How Points" Were Given on Stocks
Nolan and His Friend Sweeney
-" Needles Makes a Hit.
correspondence of the RBoOED-Usros. !

VIRGINIA CRY New, January Z, 1886.
In the flush days of the Comstock the
great majority of the jewellers on that
"lode" became imbued with a passion for
stock gambling, ard it is said that even
ministers would at times vary the monot
ony of their calling by discussing the prob
ability of rich development in this or
that particular mine. 1t was no uncom-
mon or unusual sight to see standing be-
fore the brokers' windows, on their way to
and from school, groups of children
sandwiched in between horny-handed
miners and mining operators-scanning
with eager eyes the stock quotations on the
bulletin boards. If the army of small
children who were at that time stock
holders in the great lode could have been
marshaled together, they would have num-
bered in the hundreds. Children became
possessed of shares of mining stock in much
the same manner and at the same times
when it is customary to bestow gifts on the
recurrence of birthday anniversaries at
Christmastide, on New Years day and
when school promotions have been won by
diigent application to study. The mania
for dealing in stocks, which had become a
disease with the seniors, proved infectious
as would smallpox, cholera, or malignant
feyers; of course those of tender years to
whom these presents were made contracted
it.
CASE IN POINT.
As Christmas gift well-known Com
stocker handed to his son a slip of paper
reading e" hold to your order 100 shares
of Ophir" Shortly after this Ophir began
an upward marcel, and when nearly all
others were expecting to see it climb still
higher, the boy came in with the usual
point" and asked TO be allowed to sell
his 100 shares. The old gentleman was
rich, having courted the tickle goddess,
Dame Fortune, and received, in return, her
fondest caresses, and he agreed to the sale,
thinking it would be test of the boys
shrewdness. The point won, however as
the crash came shortly afterwards and
caught the old gentleman before he could
unload. The boy is now prosperous mer
chant in an Eastern city. where his parents
reside with him. His foresight, or luck
or both-in letting 90 his shares at the
right time gave him his start, and as Christ
day day rolls round each year pleasant rec
objections of early mining and school-boy
days are brought to mind, and also the day
he gave his father the point on Ophir.
"HIs NAME WAS DENNIS"
A shrewd saloon-keeper and quite char
acter, by the way, was Nolan. He was for
tunate in accommodating a nice little bank
account Ia saloon in those days was equiv
alent to srnall-slzed bank, and Dennis
devoted his best energies and time exclu-
sively TO his own business, unheeding the
dead points that were flying in the air.
One fine morning, however, Dennis was
drawn into the net. On my way to break
fast / was hailed by him, and he thus adj
dressed me:
Say, -, bought some Savage to-day
What do you think of it?"
Not much, Dennis; but how came you
to invest in securities? I thought you
never dealt in EN-"