The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1890-09-10
THEY TOOK AN OUTING.
HOW LABOR'S GREAT HOLIDAY
WAS CELEBRATED.
Their Tools ON One Day of the Year and
Go Out tn Make Merry i'm the streets and
Parks-A Great Proce sslon.
lChicago dispatch. !

Parks-A Great Procession.
Chicago dispatch.
A day especially reserved for the Amer
lean workingman To march out on the
highways and, as IL were, exclaim: ave
are the people!" has fixed place in the
calendar OF this big town of working
men. Public offices close, school does
not keep, sixteen feet OF Stars and
stripes are flung from the flagstaff on
the City Hall.
NOBODY labors on Labor Day-nobody
TO amount 10 anything. The streets, tho
parks and the newspapers are given over
tor once 20 the man with the strong
hands and the sweating brow. And he
takes them proudly and just barely says:
Thank you" They belonged TO him be-
Tore, says he, but he only cares 10 use
them once a year.
Yesterdays demonstration was not SC
ooastiul as previous labor parades have
Deen. Ihe banners were trihe more
modest and less inclination was shown 10
bump into men with plug hats on the
corner.
There were $40 men in line, and per-
haps they had good reason To feel proud,
but the people who watched the line
drawn like a cable through a sheathing
~
street were astonished, not so much by
the size OF the procession, for $40 men
Is not a drop in the veins OF this place,
as by the evidence that half the thou
sands Of men and women who cheered
on the marchers themselves belonged TO
the organizations represented in the
parade.
The tramp began at Lake Front Park.
InnU a n y L Is,
playing and young men in the stunning
clothes a Chicago workingman loves to
don once in a while could be met on any
downtown street plodding over TO the
rendezvous from the West and North
Sides. At 10 o'clock the park was
jammed from the Illinois Central fence
to Michigan avenue with a crowd in
which no man was capable of individual
motion. 1t sureed TO and fro as if il
We're set on rockers, and when it moved
forward it won't with huge lunge that
drove handful of boulevard policeman
flying before IT. All one could see of the
throng was vision of the printers stove
pipe hats and hundred transparencies
waving around them.
The crowd took the jam good-naturcdly
enough and the women were noticeably
jolly about 10, and no wonder. They
were the best treated women that ever
fell into hurly-burly throng. The men
gave way 10 them and allowed them TO
occupy the parquet seats on the curb. A
tall girl with blue hat received almost
an ovation near Wabash avenue when
the plumbers tramped down Jackson
street. They all knew her, evidently,
and when she waved her handkerchief
at them a chorus OF "Why, hello,
Nellie" went up and the plumbers stop
ped 70 shake hands with her until the
machinery men bumped into them.
The procession started about 1890
o'clock, and for two hours it wound
through the streets. For an hour after
the boOmety- boom boom boom of the
bass drum sounded ii seemed that tho
procession would be interminable. The
people were so thick on the street that
they left only a narrow alley for the
men 20 march through. IL was 50 mar
row when a sudden movement caused
bulge in the walls that marching by
fours became almost impossible, and
most of he organizations were com
PEELED TO form in threes or twos. At
times the line became so thin that IL
looked like bright thread in the black
blanket covering the street.
There was a pleasant incident con-
nectod with the arrival of the carpen-
ters' house in the line. \ young man
wearing a blue badge tried 20 stop 10 and
quarreled with the driver. While his
friends were holding him the driver
whipped up and got in line. The young
man followed with the intention OF
smuggling the driver, but he fell i'm with
some marching carpenters, and, while he
was talking 70 them, a large man stepped
down from the back stoop of the house
and batted this aggressive person on the
nose. Then he went back intothe house
and the young man withdrew, bleeding
unpleaSantly.
This was only an incident, though,
and n rare one. The procession was UNI
usually Jolly and it banded jokes with
its friends along the line.
why don't ye byes wear yer coats
when yez appears in publc?" shouted a
voice from the crowd as the molders
went by.
~If yen gimme back the wan ye'er
father sthole from moine, Ofll wear
that" replied big molder who was
keen at repartee.
Rats" was also treated with q lot OF
chat. "Rats" is the plumbers boy. and
he was proud of the distinction of wear
ing white gloves and marching behind
the great Second Regiment Band. But
it took the pride out OF him TO hear a
roar at every block: "Rats, are you with
me? Fifty dollars for pipe Rats"
marched on Needless, though, and he
was one Of the effective features OF the
great turnout. Everywhere the parade
was cheered and everywhere the streets
were choked with its admirers. Sailing
through the streets of the North and
South Sides it took its punishment of the
dust and heat with a grinning face and
declared, as has been remarked before,
with a rear that could be heard across
tho laka. .NNn n 70 tho naon lc'D