Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1891-11-22
TOMMIE PANTS.
How His Father Got Even With
Corporations.
TEN DOLLARS A FRONT FOOT
For Rich Meadow Grass-Chunks of Wis
dom on Many Things Now Asitatins
the Public Mind-A Poem EN-
quisite on Thanksgiving Day.



Dear Gazette:
You see several years ago my pa sorter
flue the track on politics for while and
joined the F'armur's Lance or the Maude
GraingerS, or somethin' like that, ana went
TO far;iiiu', and that's how we got our start.
My pa. he's pretty slick when it comes to
skeamin', and rite after the railroad was
bilt close to our house pa he used to lay
around the court house 4 heap liStnin' TO
the damadge suites bein' tryed there, cause
he said il looked like everybody in our
county was bein' damadged by that road in
one way and another and gettin' Somethin'
outen the company for it every time, and
he Sorter wanted to ketch on. Pa said he
knowed in his own mind he couldn't get
nothin' on account of damadgin' our place
cause rite after the road was bilt man Of
fered him four times what it was worth be-
fore. but he said he thought if he had 4
medder and could get the grass burnt off
he could naturally lift the company outen
their bOots-and he did. Pa he was chair
man OF the Demokrat klub, but ne sent IN
his quittin' paper, Stain that his helth
was i'll and that ne was convinced of the
error of his ways and means, and then he
joined the 'Agrykultural Farmurs klub'
and went to abusin' everybody else, and
sowea cur yard in clover or millet or some
thin like that, and long in the fall here
comes the grasshoppers and lites onto it.,
and it looked like they'd get it all before
the cars ever set fire to it; but one evenln'
shure enuff a spark lit in it and here it
went, grasshoppers and all. My pa, and
me and my ants all got brooms and went
out and beat the fire the best We could but
we couldn't put it out, and it looked like
the broom brigade out there shown off on
dress parade, only it bein' tolerable lait in
the evenin' we didn't any of US have nothin'
but our disabilities on. Next day my pa
he went to see Sickem 81 Downem, attor-
neyS and barratOrS at law and, they brot i
suite, and got good oneSt jury when the
tryal come off, and pa got 5000 damadges,
ben' $40 front foot for all four sides of
our 1GGx100 TT. medder and $1,000 for the
grasshoppers, cause my ants all swOre
their mockin' bird, ''Dick,'' was worth that
much, and they said that he died cause
the grasshoppers all got burnt up so they
couldn't ketch none for him outen our
medder.
Pa has about quit farmin' now and thinks
he will get Il job as alderman from our ward
on the Demokrat ticket, cause he says he
knows in his own mind he is as good q
fnancer as any of 'em, and can show 'em
how to get in all the skrip the kurbstone
breakers has bot up at reduced rats, by
maxim an assinment and maxim him Trus
tee, cause now that his cotton crop amt
shown up much he's got lots o. time and
can do it cheap. You see Pa he read in
The GAZETTE as how the best way to farm
successfully was to have small crops and
tend 'em well; so he got a pint of cotton
seed and planted 'em in our medder in rows
three feet apart, with a nice strait stick for
every plant to grow up on, and one seed to
every stick so he wouldn't have to thin IT
out. Some of 'em came up real nice, but
my old Cote got away with 'em about rs
fast as they came up, so Pa said he reck-
I., h
cotton this year, speshally as the man that
sold him the seed made mistake and gave
cuckOled burrs instead of cotton seed. The
man says they Will come up next season If
we will only wait, and that they will be
fine for my cote.
There amt goin' to be no school next
cause Prof. Numbskull says its
Day and everybody orter be
mitey thankful that it amt any worse with
'em than what it is, cause it mite be a heap
worse, and we mite have been somebody
else and had to live in Dallas and drink that
water; and he told all of us 10 ask our folks
at home what Thanksgivin' was for, and |
asked Pa, and Pa he said it was to cele-
brate the New York Election, he reckoned,
and when told the Prof. he sorter got hot
like, he bein 'Publickan from Massey
chewsits, and he said l had a good solid
head on me, like pin, and that | mite
stand up 'longside o. my chum who was
dom duty cause when he was sayin'
Histry lesson and the teacher asked him
who lost their head durin' Queen Eliza
beth's rain, he said-"John the Baptist on
a Charger" Poor Bub, he just got his
Sunday School lesson mixed up with his
temporary affairs and didn't mean any
harm any more than l did when the Prof.
asked me what great lady lent her jewelry
to her Uncle to raise money to give Column
BUS to discover America on. and one of the
big girls whispered "Annie Rooney" to
me and | said it. They all liked to dide,
and Prot. he said as how if l kept on I'd
soon have as much sense as my Pa. My
;hum, he says if the Prof. don't quit maxim
EN- stand up cause they amt got no sense
he'll have to hang out an IS. X. o. sign
ike Mr.. Greenwall did at the Fort Worth
Opera House the mite we went up there to
see Sol Smith Russell and somebody got
INTO our preserved seats in the parachute:
ny chum says he'll be jim-wiggled if he
lidn't feel sortcr diaphoresis rite at first,
out the gentlemanly usher found his seat
-or him just as soon as we pointed it out to
lin and showed up our cowpendS for the
fourteenth time. Talkin' about theaters,
you see my Pa has been takin' The GAZETTE
onger than | can remember and he believes
he reads in it; so the other day
when he read as how Brady was
,oin' to show the Bottom of the Sea-"
It the Fort Worth Opera House
"a said he thought he would run up there
md take it in. cause he knowed in his own
mind that he'd see N1cGInty, and he had a
curiosity to see how he looked after being
Town there SO long. Pa he went on to say
s how he read in THE GAZETTE some time
go that McGinty went down to the bottom
i the sea, dressed in mis- best Sunday
lothes, and that he must be mitey wet,
cause they hadn't found him yet, and pa
aid he might not get another good chance
o see him; so pa, he wrote to Mr.. Green
vail and he sent pa ticket marked: Good
or one seat in the Bottom of the Sea on
'ayment of 81" and pa got all reddy to go,
Then Ant Calamity-she's always in trou-
,le-had axident, and pa missed SEEM
dcGinty. You see, my Ant Calamity, she
vas ridin' in boss car 'longside of man
nat was carryin' of keg of Ohio cider
mats made down there in Fort Worth, an
he bung few outen the key and put a |
resko decoration right on her left eye that |
ooked like it mite have been ham painted |
and now anty has got one blue |
We and one black eye, an would make |
freek for dime museum. Pa, |
10 gave up his trip to Fort Worth and went |
o see Ketchem q Skinem, (his other law
ers that got the damages for our medGer |
urnin' bein' on i've years visit to Cher |
kee county, Texas and they brot suite |
or sl00,0O damages against the boss car |
They told pa as how it was |
litey lucky that things was just as they |
Tere, cause if the key had flown outen the |
Jung and BACKED antys eye; or il anty |
ad flown outen the key and blacl,ed the |
We Of the bung or if the buns had flown |
uten anty's eye and BACKED the keg; or |
the black had flown outen a'nty's eye an |
unged the key, why she couldn't have got |
ny damages; but bcin' a simple case like it |
- I.,,f