The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1894-06-08
THE BASKET MAKERS
THINGS MADE OF WILLOW BY WORK.
ERS WITH SKILLED FINGERS.


ket Shops That Play Parts on the Stage,
and Play Them WeIl-An Industry Of
Which Little Is Known.
Down in the dimness of cellar in
Fourth avenue-a cellar where there is al
ways q soft, warm, damp atmosphere, sug-
gestivc of the carly stages of Turkish
bath or tho limp handshake of some peo-
ple-mcn in half undress, but protected
by enormous aprons sit the livelong day,
year in and year out, and weave baskets.
1t is very quiet as well as very shad-
owy cellar You hear no sound when you
enter there and leave tho clattcr Of che
street behind you, save the tap, tap of the
hammers and mallets used in the building
of the basket frames and the rattle of the
willows as they are whipped to and fro in
those def bat gnarly and calloused fingers.
For 80 years or moro those mon or other
men who arc now dead or have wandered
otherwherc have sat upon those Same
square boxes, with their legs stretched out
and turned and twisted and doubled and
pounded and hammered innumerablo will
lows from many different quarters of the
world.
It isn't much of q business in New York
either. The output of all the New York
and Brooklyn shops is only drop in the
bucket to the enormous amount of basket
work that is used even within the imme-
diate range of the New York market
But it's q great trade for all that.
There's diversity in it that Is amazing.
The willows, which are unloaded at the
door and upon which the men are forever
at work, meet you at every crook and turn
in one form or another. The big basket
that your laundress totes your clothes to
the wash in the hamper that your board
ing mistress Tugs to market on Saturday,
the carriage perhaps that your wife trrn-
dies the baby in, tho trunk that your
drummer friend and your Europe going
acquaintance pack their things in, the
wastebasket that yawns for your letters to
the editor, and good share of other things
that you would never think of are from
the hands of the basket makers down in
that dingy cellar
They even make actors there-basket-
work actors that never have any lines to
speak, but are mono the less Indispensable
to the modern melodrama. The chap who
Is actually thrown over tho cliff while the
mob of Irish pcasantry bowls out its ha-
tired Of landlords is invariably one of these
basketwork actors. They arc. impcrvious
alike to Kisses and applause, and never
murmur at n long series of one night
stands Cabbages and back number eggs
cannot wound them.
Whole menagorics are turned out, too,
by the basket makers nimble fingers The
elephants and camelopards in which Imre
Kiralfy's soul delights are born there, in
sections, then fastened together and cover
ed first with canvas and afterward with
glory. In the recesses of the dark subcel-
lar, where, in sulphur vapors, the willows
are put to bleach out to snow whiteness,
there lingcr yet few dust covered ami
mails and parts of animals which never get
sick, never need feeding and never howl
for light or air or food.
"Now, abroad" said the basket man,
"there arc whole communities where
men, women and children do nothing but
make baskets their whole lives long. Last
year, the statistics show, there were i'm
ported into tho United States, from France,
Germany, Belgium and England princi-
pally, S367,656 worth of manufactured
baskets, and sos, 1907 worth of willows.
why, 25 tons would include all that Is
grown here for baskets. The chief farms
arc over in Jersey, down around Philadel-
phia and on Long Island. But the Ameri-
can willows arc better than tho foreign ex-
cept in tho very small sizes, Those are
found best in France. The foreign willows
are so i'll assorted, too, that there Is about
per cent loss on them. The rattans which
are used for the uprights or framew"-S