The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1893-11-18

cdI LOT thanksgiving day. But YOU can't
send man TO the bridewell because he
! goes on clutches or has palsied hand or
Is Dilnd. No other city wants them. The
! ponce are too tender-hearted to club a
man whose hands are twisted up under
I ms elbows. These hand organists and
! DeggarS have horror of Dunning.
chicago is overstOcked with them.
! Iney have no desire to get away. Those
VINO nave saved little money viii not
waste 1t IN travel. They prefer to live it
out right here in Chicago and try to pick
! up enough after that for a lodging house
punk every night. You can find them in
! every cheap place along lower Clark
street. Some of them are in the Des-
plalnes-street district All are tattered,
ShlVerlng and unclean. One has both
legs gone. and wheels himself in low
chalr. Another has shoes which tit over
MS knees, and he crawls along on all
tours. Some are blind, with tin placards
hanging around their necks. Some have
lost an arm or hand and take a profess
slonaI interest in showing a twisted
stump. There are old women whose rags
and wrinkles are their stock in trade
Before the worlds fair there were such
people here, but now there are more than
ever before.
Il should estimate there are twice as
many cripples and beggars along Clark
! street as there were a year ago" said
Capt. Hartnett at the Harrison street
station. They have been coming in for
a year from every part of the United
States, attracted by the promise of large
crowds during the fair. Some of these
blind and crippled people who play hand
organs, sell lead pencils or simply beg for
nVlng, have money saved up and have
| homes to which they will return. Most
OF them are simply drifting. They are
now cooped up in lodging houses and will
remain in Chicago. OF course it is a
problem to decide what to do with them.
1t does not seem right to interfere with
them when they try to support them
selves IN some way, and yet it will not do
to have the streets south from Van
Buren, swarming with hand-organs and
cheap takers. They are not
allowed in the business districts
north from Van Buren,. For few months
the crowds along Van Buren,, Congress.
Harrison and lower State street have
been so large that these people found it
profitable to work the streets, but now
that Chicago has settled back to its every
day life, the crQwdS are TO the north
You will notice that most of these takers
who sold trinkets and souvenirs at the
approaches to the alley Il and Illinois
Central trains have disappeared. A few
are still hanging around, but they cannot
sell anything. The visitors have gone
home, and it was the visitors who patron
lied them. These men, several hundred
of them, have nothing to do now, and uu-
less they have saved some money, they
will be on our hands this winter They
have come in from other cities, and there
were so many of them, | don't think they
made more than bare living"
AT one of the Clark street 10cent places
three blind men and several cripples are
waiting for restoration of confidence
One of the blind men has a hand-organ,
which he played at a lower State street
corner. moving up toward Van Buren,
street in the evening, when the stores
had closed. He had not been out for two
days.
1--WE was too thick" said he. "Some-
times there'd be six or eight of us right
close together, and when we all tried to
play at once you couldn't hear any tune
at all. Then people wouldn't give any
thing. One man could have made a good
thing. People from the country give
more money than city folks These peo-
pie in the cities get used to seeing blind
people and cripples. Money comes in
slow, few pennies at time, but it
counts up. Last Saturday I took in about
81. Sunday didn't go out. On Monday
l took in about $3.50, I guess, and then
Tuesday it went clear down to 80 cents.
You see there was no one going to the
fair. tried it again Wednesday morn
ing, and got IL cents, SO l haven't been
out since. I've saved about $40, and
! that'll keep me for while. l don't know
where I'll go after that's gone"
! Inspector Ross says there are more pro
! fessioDal beggars on the own-town
| streets than were ever before known at
this time of year. Some are crippled, and
others simply have "hard-luck' story
He has no idea what will become of them,
except that the crop of Migrants will be
| unusually large about the time the first
snow flies, and last pennies Of the summer
| campaign are absorbed by the barrel
hOnSeS.