Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1888-08-02
CLEAN OFFICE TOWELS.

"A
Popular in New York.
1t is not often that Chicago teaches
New York any thing worth the learn
ing, yet the metropolis is indebted to
the Windy City of the West for the
idea of a company supplying offices,
stores, barber-shops, restaurants, bar
rooms, ETC.. with clean towels or table
napkins. The plan started there, it is
said, with a poor washer-woman, who
saved enough money to purchase few
score towels and persuaded the hus-
bands of the families she had long
worked for to rent them from her for
use in their Offices. She got few GUS
toners at first, moved more by charity
than by any idea of the utility of the
scheme, but soon the convenience of a
constant supply of clean towels with
out the accustomed bother of getting
them washed began to take hold and
from these small beginnings the bust
ness grew to respectable proportions.
Like all other avenues to making
money, it quickly became crowded;
competition brought down the prices
and increased the patronage; other
cities began to notice it, and New
York, quick to appreciate any thing
new, adopted it and, of course, inn
proved on it. There are now several
companies engaged in the business
here, one of which furnishes to Offices
mirror, a comb and brush, toilet
soap and four towels a week for
seventy-ive cents a month. How the
thing could be done cheaper than this
it is difficult to see. .-...
The capital is not large, of course.
and two men with one delivery wagon,
delivering a weeks supply of clean
towels and removing at the same visit
last weeks soiled stock, can serve a
great many customers in day. The
towels cost little, and if lost by the
customer must be paid for; laundry
attached to the concern does the wash
ing at a minimum of expense. toilet
soap bought at wholesale figures is
cheap; the mirror will last forever al
most, and the brash and comb are ca
silly cleaned from time to time and will
not wear out with ordinary usage in
twelvemonth. Many patrons take
from twelve to eighteen towels week,
none less than six, and many big
houses where numbers of hands are
employed take as many as ten or doz-
en- daily.
The economy of the system for the
customer comes in in the saving which
is made in the cost of towels, which
are constantly being lost in the wash.
| The advantage on the side of cleanli-
ness is also of no small account. The
chronic dirtiness of Office towels has
long furnished the funny man with
themes for witticisms, and some West
ern humorist is authority for the wide
ly held opinion that the towel in
printing houses attains such consist
ency from long divorce from water,
that it is used occasionally to stab the
spring poet with.-N. Y. Tribune.
! Little Irene, when twenty months
old. had a habit of asking strangers
for cents. Her mother told her she
would punish her if she asked for any
more. Next morning she went to a
neighbours house alone and said; 81
s'pose you got some tents, Miss
Gifie?" Mrs. Griffin answered Yes. ~
well. Irene says. Il s'pose you doing
to teep 'em, amt you?" She got the
cents without asking for them.
Married woman - '.MatrinonS
without love is perfectly dreadful -
Old maid-'.Not more dreadful than
love without matrimony."- RGshtD9-
ton Critic.