The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1890-08-08
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ONE DAY GUT OF MANY.
THE WAY AN ITALIAN NEWSBOY
SPENDS HIS BUSN LIFE.

Holiday Each Week, with No VacaAion.
This is the story of DAY in the life OF
Tony, a Brooklyn newsboy, and 1t is MT
unlike the story of many other newsboHs
and of six days in the week. or couESa
TONY has another name, but what 1t Is not
half dozen boys of his acquaintance
could tell, and not one OF them cares. He
was born in Brooklyn fourteen years ago,
and he has never been anywhere else eX-
cept in Park row, between the bridge en-
trance and Ann street. He never saw
Central park or the Battery, and he has
never been at Coney Island Once he went
to a circus, and few times he has sat IN
the gallery of a theatre and watched very
thrilling plays, which were as real to him
as could be.
Touy's father and mother are Italians.
His father owns two fruit stands, but he
cannot speak English. His mother speaks
English and so do his brother, the barber,
and his sister, who was married when she
was II years old. When the mother gets
through with her homework she sits and
knits. "Her fingers fly; you ought to see
her. says Tony, proudly.
And Tony himself-well, he is a brown
faced youngster, with big brown eyes and
No. 6 shoes, and is as good looking as any
boy should be, and wholesome looking
withal. His clothes are pretty ragged, and
his face and hands pretty dirty, but if that
were not so he would be, perhaps, unpleas-
anGly conspicuous among the other boys.
HIS EABLY MORNING VENTURE.
His life? 1t begins early in the day. Not
later than O'Clock every morning in the
week and every week in the year Tony's
father or mother wakes him up. Possibly
be had rather sleep, but business is bust
ness, and a boy cannot sell papers lying in
bed. There is no breakfast waiting for
him, but down the street near the bridge
there is little eating house where he buys
a cup of coffee and roll for cents. Then as
quickly as he can he comes over to New
York on a bridge car. In pleasant weather
this turning out early, when the flush is in
tie eastern sky and the shadows still liDger
in dark places, is not SO bad, though it
makes Tony shiver bit when he comes
out into the cool air; but in winter it is
black night and miserable indeed.
La New York Tony buys his papers. He
takes fifty-fve OF these. On some of them
he makes half cent, on one two-ffths Of
a cent, and on one he has profit of 1 cent.
But he does not stop to think of profits.
He runs to the bridge, rides over, jumps
on a street car, sells If he can, drops off
and jumps on another and so works his
way up to Fulton street and Flatbust ave-
nue. That is his field, and there he stays
till he sells out When his stout arms are
empty he is 30 cents richer than when he
tunbled out OF bed, less for that break
fast.
But there is a real breakfast waiting at
home, and if he does not run all the way
there to get it 1t is because even his stout
legs ara tired jumping on and off street
cars. Selling newspapers isn't any fun,
and you, my boy, in your smart clothes,
with your books under your arm, unwiIl-
ingly on your way to school, don't know
how hard that little boy, with his face the
color of bit of new bronze, has been
working. You have vacation almost
within touch, while Tony-weu, vacation
is a word of three syllables, but if it had
one its meaning would be beyond him.
There are no vacations for newsboys.
HIS AFTERNOONS WORK.
1t is past 9 O'Clock when Tony gets home,
and when he has finished breakfast he goes
to bed Tony wears fewer clothes than the
boys in the avenues, but he regards IN
dressing and dressing with as much dis
ldNOEatS ILGN ttllNL III lllo SIOIueS
1t is noon when he is again called, and there
is dinner to be eaten
And now there comes a time concerning
the disposition of which Tony is not very
clear. There must be fully an hour when
he has nothing to do. Maybe he sits around
the house watching the flying needles of
the black-eyed mother, who never calls him
caro- milo, and seldom kisses him-never
since he grew TO be such big boy. But
she loves him deeply and would cry and
moan in her passionate way if one of those
street cars should run over him and he
were fetched home some day, as he is likely
to be, dead or manned
In little time Tony is out in the street,
and soon he is one of mob of boys in
front of The Eagle office down in that part
of Fulton street which is coming to be for
gotten Most of the Brooklyn newsboys
get their afternoon papers there, and it is
a curious crowd of future men, and wo-
men, too. Tony smokes a cigarette some
times, and he probably is not as careful OF
his speech as he might be Most of the
boys are not careful at all, and smoke
good deal 1t is a pitiful crowd in some
ways, but the boys play and fight and seem
to have fun. Tony can fight. He had his
first fight year ago, and few mornings
ago, just as it was getting light. he and
negro boy Of his own age fought for half
an hour on the sidewalk In front of the
office OF the Brooklyn News company in a
truly reprehensible but not unenjoyable
manner.
THIS BOY MAKES 4 MAN.
Tony buys So evening papers, for which
he pays Ga cents, and sells them for 81. IL
Later he buys enough extras TO give him
an additional profit Of 81 cents He rarely
has any papers left, and if lie sells all he
buys each day he makes in all SlO9 II Is
safe to say that he earns from 80 cents to
81 a day, though there are only morning
papers Sunday. He can read very little,
but he gets around that by shouting moth
ing but ''ExtraI' II he thinks that some
thing important is in the papers he asks
some boy who can read TO tell him what 1T
Is, and then crys il. He has been TO school
little, but one day he had some trouble
with another boy, and the principal of the
school to which he was going told him not
to come any more. He does not like that
school very well. He says there is a teacher
there who makes the boys and girls chew
soap when they nishehave.
Ii is 9 O'Clock when Tony gets through,
and he goes home TO supper. He gives his
earnings to his mother and goes TO bed,
this time taking of his clothes. Sunday
afternoons he goes out to Prospect Park
with some Other boys, and they roll around
h.