Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1895-07-21


| Patience on a monument smiling at
| Delay would be good design for figure
10 be erected on the triangular lot at
the intersection Of Broad street and Brook
avenue.
Some sort OF memorial OF this descrip-
| ton Is due the Broad-street merchant
the most patient and long suffering man
| in the business world; man who ii"es
| In an atmosphere of electricity, and yet
contents himself with a bob-tail horse
car drawn by mules on the greatest re-
tail street in the city.
Yes. the patience exhibited by the
Broad-street merchant is extraordinary
BY energetlcally prodding the City Coun-
ell and the street-car company he might
long ago have seen the mule dispiaced
be tho trolley. but he forebore: he chose
rather that his business should suiier
than that the Council aud the company
should be worried by his opportunities
Baker street has an electric line, Gay
street has an electric line. Marshall street
has one Main street has one. Nanches-
ter several-but Broad street.-The peoples
street.-The great retail street-has the
old-fashioned. out-of-date, ridiculous
mule-car-bob-taIl car at that.
The forebearance that the patient
Broad-street merchant has shown the
city councilman has been more than the
councllman's due. The councilman ought
to have been urged up 70 his duty un'ii
he made terms with the company. we
have always heard that the company
wished TO substitute the trolley for The
mule: but that the City Council would
never give the company the franchise.
The object Of the Council, we suppose,
was TO exact better terms from the COM
many than the company is now subject 10.
But, however that may be, the city, and
the Broad-street retail trade particular
". have suffered greatly. You may talk
up Richmond as much as You please. and
refer to the statistics Of your trade
when you will. but the stranger who
comes here and sees the shaved-tail mule
and the bob-tail car doing the transporta-
ton business of our longest. widest, and
best street has his own very decided
opinion of Richmond-though he may not
express 1t publicly.
The City Council and the street rail-
way company ought to come together;
they have been apart long enough. The
old lines ought to be allowed to extend
all their tracks TO the Exposition
Grounds, and at once. The street rail-
way company ask this as privilege,
but not as an exclusive privilege. They
will agree that upon the tracks that they
build other companies may run cars upon
fair terms. Yes; and there ought TO be
electricians on BROAD street.
In short, the Broad-street merchant.
having won the honor Of being sculp-
tured as Patience on a monument, ought
now to bestir himself. and beg and en-
treat the City Council to give him cleo
tric-cars on Broad street
Next spring there will be between
twenty-five and thirty thousand strangers
here at the Confederate reunion.
Hundreds Of these are coming
from Texas. Louisiana, Tonnes
wish to cut proper figure in their sight?
OF course. Will the mule-car on Broad
street have that effect? Hardly. The
only effect that II will have will be to
cause the veteran to say: "Heigho.
here are the very same old street-cars
that you had on Main street the first year
of the war! No, not the same cars, either;
for / think that the Main-street-cars in
1861 were a good deal longer and bet
ter looking than these Broad-street cars"
And tnen to himself the veteran VIII
say: This is progress!'
Won't such observations as these be
gratifying to our people? Won't Rich
mond get a fine advertisement to the
world when the thousands and thousands
of strangers who are coming here next
year see our Broad-street-car line?
If Broad street is ever to have its
rights, now is the time to demand them.
Now is the time for the Broad-street
merchant and General Peyton Wise's
committee Of veterans and the Agricul-
tural Society to join teams and urge the
City Council to act, and act at once. so
that the Exposition Grounds may be con-
nected with the city by electric-cars, and
so that Broad street may be put on a
footing with Main street, so far as street.
car facilities are concerned.
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