The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1889-03-06
EXPRESS PARCELS.
QUEER PACKAGES THAT ARE
SENT OVER THE RAILS.
A View Of the Cellar Storeroom OF q
Big Express Company -Hu'
man Freight - Chinese
Bones Sent Cheap.

"Of the hundreds of mel I have met
during the twenty five years have been
! here you are the first newspaper man
who has ever been down these stairs"
said the old janiror of the American Ex-
press Company's Building, on Broadway,
as he showed o Star reporter the sub
cellar where the recei pit books and vouch-
ers of the company are kept. The cellar
is merely an immense vault divided into
ten aisles 925 feet long, on both sides OF
which are. piled from floor 10 ceiling,
millions of receipts and statements OF
the G500 different agents throughout the
country arranged in alphabetical order.
"There are SO re very queer things
sent by express" Agent Rogers remarked,
while wandering through these subtcr-
rauean passages. Il have seen human
being boxed up in crate and shipped
by express. lie was an insane mall 60
ing from Staten Island to lunat!c asy-
lum. That was some years ago. For
the past seven years we have not handled
live people, but before that we used to
ship men, women and children. 1t was
too much bother to keep it up. We used
to charge double frst.c ass passenger
rates, and frequently took bright little
girl from friends here and delivered her
at the door of friends in Iowa or dakota.
"Very few people, continued the
agent, ''have an adequate idea what the
business of a large express company
comprises at the present day.
sIs it not simply the handling of
roodso No, indeed. We pay mems
taxes q thousand miles away, act as
undertakers, do shopping for ladies,
and attend to the marketing for entire
families. 1t was not long ago we had
to exhume a body that had been in
cemetery at Sioux City, Iowa, for years,
and bring it here. We gos nothing Tor
the work outside of the charge for
transportation. Our agent at Sioux
City received instructions from this office
to open such grave in q designated
cemetery, have the remains of certain
person placed in new Casket, and
shipped to New York. He ordered the
work performed and sent the body on
with the vouchers of expenditures. 1t
is part of our business.
ssWhat is the strangest thing l have
seen forwarded Well, that is hard to
answer. have seen nearly everything
shipped from needle to an elephant.
One of the strangest shipments probably
was a dead woman and her two live
babies. The little things were twins ana
yerv small. A nurse had to accompany
them. You may remember the story of
an elephant that otopped the train by
pulling the bell cord. That is perfectly
true. Monkeys arc also great nuisance
and create no end of bother to the mes.
sengers. There are only three things
that cannot be sent by express to-day,
and they are dynamite, gunpowder and
live people. The easiest articles to
handle are goods from business house,
and tie meanest is honey. 1t leaks out
and gets over things.
Next TO honey are packages done up
by ladies. They generally have to be
done oYcr again. When you handle
from &c, 900 to II, 900 packages day in
the New York Office aone, it becomes
nuisance"
The Chinese have CUSTOM" said
one Of the heads of a department., who
came up at this stage of the conversa.
tion, '!of exhumipg the remains of their
dead and shipping them back to hlna:
Did i. ever strike you how they do itl
Thoy forward them as merchandise and
get freight rates. oh, yes, it's aSulnst
the rules of all companies; but If rail
way agent receives u boi said to contain
cotton, for instance, he has no right tc
examine its contents. Cinnamon fire.
cucr:iy come here and get oar rates tc
San Francis o, but they never send
corpse. l have made inquiries at the
other ices, and find they have never
forwarded one. The rates are the samt
and are too high to suit them; so the!
box hem up and let them go by freight
at less than half the expense. 90 NOT
see how the practice can be stopped, fo'
the very box that may be suspc ted Is
liable to be all right"