Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1884-1886, 1886-04-29
TRAGEDY. OF THE HOG.
A WILD WESTERN DRAMA FULL OF
eLooD-cuRDLiNG SCENES.

BlOOD-CURDliNGS SCENES.
How Pigs Arc Killed in Modern Ma
| chine slaughter-House = Tho Sucker
and His Fatal Knife--Scraped by Ma
ehinery-Decapitated At Last.
In the Town of Lake, only few miles
from the modern, civilized city Of Chicago,
lives a man who commits 1000 or 1000
murders a day, and is never arrested for it
! He kills hogs, gets "a day, and goes home
| at night with no cloud on his conscience,
but with heap of blood upon his clothes
Did you ever see this hog killer at work.
In pen two or three men are at work
catching pigs The catcher is an active fell
low with keen eye and a nervy hand. He
reaches for pigs kind leg, gets what he
reaches for, affixeS loop-chain, and the as
| cension Of Mr.. Pig from this vale of tears at
once begins A man above pulls lever
and the onnipotent power Of steam yanks
the pig TO hanging position.
The chain attached to his leg is fastened
10 carrier which slips along an overhang-
ing rail, and the victim slides clear of the
pen, takes his last look at his unsrspecting
brothers and sisters, and goes to his doom
Half dozen feet away stands the sticker
He grabs the pigs foreleg, pulls the fat
throat toward him, exposes the region of
| the heart, and with quick, quiet sort Of
movement drives the knife home The life
blood spurts out. the squeal redoubles in
volume and intensifies in agony and then all
is over. With his death song in his throat
the dying pig slides down the fatal way,
iostles against those of his fellows whose
fate iiafx
few times, struggles little more, and then
his voice is stilled forever.
Jab, jab, jjnb, goes the fatal knife, every
jab pig, worth dozen dollars, and adding
another go pounds to the pork supply
which Chicago sends the world Eight pigs
a minute, -0) an hour, they come and 60
The sticker is never In hurry, his arm "a
never unnerved, his aim never untrue
DROPPED INTO THE scALDrNG VAT
The victims jostle each other while their
life blood runs out and down the scuppers
| to be converted into fertilizers for the very
fields, perhaps, Oh whose fatness they were
prepared for the slaughter Each in turn
arrives at the end Of the track, and there
stands a man who deftly removes the chains
from his leg ard lets him drop into the
scalding vat This is great tub, twenty
feet long by eight wide, and here the victim
JONES his mates in the bath. Steam is con-
tinually flowing in, keeping the water at
boiling heat, and as the bather Is rolled and
foated along by a pair of workmen with
pokers in hand the hair upon his hide be-
comes loose and his skin becomes cleaner
than it ever was before Then he reaches
the end of the tub and is foated upon a big
iron cradle whose fingers nearly compass
his steaming body. A man pulls lever,
steam-power raises the cradle and the car
cas- is thrown upon smooth plank plat
form Sometimes, not often, a pig reaches
this interesting stage OF his unreturnable
journey with remnant Of life in his body
He is hot and steaming from his Russian
bath, and now comes the scrape. First he
slides through cloths which brush the water
from his skin: and then he Is squeezed and
pulled through a gauntlet Of nine wheels.
each foot wide at its tire, and all revolving
in direction the reverse of that in which
the carcass is moving. The peripheries OF
these wheels are set with steel blades, in
triplets, all thin and flexible, and their ends
turned in the sixteenth of an inch, forming
scrapers. One end of the axle OF each
wheel is set in a mitred or movable bearing
and balanced with weights Through this
narrow avenue of revolving scrapers the
carcass is slowly drawn, soon emerging with
most of the hair removed from the hide.
The movable bearings and the fiexibility Of
the steel blades render the apparatus self-ad-
Unstable to animals of ali sizes and varying
shapes The lean pig is well scrapei, and
the skin of the big fat hog is not bruised or
scratched. The mechanical scraper will do
the work of more than 100 men, and turn
the carcasses out whittier and more uniform
In color than the best hand scraping. OF
course, the machine can not reach all parts
of the carcass Here and there are portions
from which the hair has not been removed,
and these are attended toby q gang Of hand
scrapers
DECAPITArIoN or TIE CARCASS.
The men work in pairs, one on each side
of the bench. and the carcass gets little rest
First one pair and then another slide it
along, and finally it reaches the end of the
table, clean of hair from head to foot and
white enough to hang in front of the butch
er's shop Here stands another man with
knife in his hand-a remarkable knife used
in a remarkable manner 1t Is a small man
ana a small weapon, but together they do
terrible work. Grabbing the hairless ear of
his porkship the man throws the neck into
just the position which suits him, makes
three slashes with his knife, and piggy's
head hangs only by threads of SKIN on one
side OF his neck There are few men in the
world who can do this trick 1t requires
but a simple twist of the wrist, and yet the
beheader draws s. day as a skilled work
man Every carcass is decapitated exactly
as every other carcass is decapitated There
is not the variance of a hairs breath. This
man cuts of pigs heads faster than most
men could cut of pigs tails, and makes
cleaner job of it He is an artist, else he
could not hold position as beheader- in chief
to his excellency Phil Armour, the prince of
pork.
As fast as the heads lop to one side a
workman affixes the gambrels to the ham
strings" pulls lever. hoists the carcass to
another overhead railway. and starts it
sliding toward another department. Here
sight is lost of our noble hog With his
throat cut, his hide scalded, his skin scraped,
his hair off and his head hanging by the
gills, he now goes to have removed that
for which he lived and rooted and fought
his inner self A brief pause only will be
made at the bench where he dissolyes into
quarters, to be scattered TO the four corners
of tho earth. Stalwart men uplift huge
cleavers. which fall-did somebody say with
q dull thudEupon the inanimate form Of
the victim. At one fell stroke ham sepa-
rates from side and shoulder from rib
piece. No sooner is one carcass Quarterej
than another drops into place. Down again
come the huge cieavers. and another por-
cine individuality is lost forever Chicago
Herald