Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1895-02-28
Old Times.


Ed. Register-In my last article l
spoke of the pen; now / want to say
something about the printing press.
And do you have any idea how many
at the present time, as they take up d
paper, or magazine, or a book, ever
stop to think of the origin. or when
printing was first thought of? and how
many ever think of the wonderful
strides the art ofprinting has made in
the last half century? And do they.
as they read, ever stop to think of
what a civillzer-if that's the proper
word to use-a book, a paper, or mag
azine, is? How it lifts the mind to
better and higher spheres?
In my boyhood days there were but
few papers and magazines printed in
all the world. AS | have said before,
the first paper 1 ever subscribed for
was the Philadelphia Dollar Newspaper.
Soon after was married. 1 thought,
as had wife, | would take the New
York Observer. Soon after that Hdr-
per's Monthly Magazine was published
by Harper & Brothers. and l subscrib-
ed for the magazine and took it for a
good many years. About the same
time l subscribed for Godey's Lady's
Book for my wife's benefit. After
awhile we took Arthur's Home Maga-
zine, and last the st. Louis Republican.
So we were pretty well provided for
reading matter. And now let US look
back over the world, and see what has
been the result of the press. AS We
read of the early days of the world. in
the times Of the Pharaohs. Herods, and
Old Testament history, before the age
of letters, we find a cruel, barbarous
world, without laws or morals. Might
was right. The human family seemed
to be but little above the brute Gre
alton, and it continued to be so until
people learned to read. Ignorance,
superstition and vice always keep COM
pany with the ignorant.
A few days ago received the Jan
uary number OF Harper's Magazine from
a young lady in St. Louis, with note
saying she would send me the maya
zine every month. When | received it
sat down and looked at the cover and
read every word on the cover. Then
began and carefully turned over, leaf
after leaf, and looked at all of the IL
lustrations and read the title of every
even to the last cover. How
it brought up to my mind my early
life, and how my mind wandered over
past years that have gone, never to be
recalled! How, in my sleep that
night, scenes of early life came back
to me as if to mock me and tantalize
me with their memories. And as
these memories woke me up, and I lay
awake for hours, thought how this
world has advanced in the last fifty
years; and i thought of the refining
Influences good reading has on COM
Just take away all reading
matter from a man or community, and
you carry them back to barbarism. To
illustrate what the effect is when cnt
off from all books or papers: In the
year 1S49, two years after | was mar
ried, news spread all over the land
that gold had been found in fabulous
quantities in California and such an
excitement as it created, all over the
land. Nothing was talked of but gold;
nothing was thought of but gold; old
men, middle-aged men and young men
to go to the Land OF Gold.
left good farms, stores.
shops, manufactures. There was no
business, no trade. but what had got
the gold fever. Nothing was thought
OI only W SeI " tu0 Soiu uiuCo c1o Sood
as possible and in the quickest, short
est, cheapest way. Men, with OK
teams, in clubs; men with pack mules;
men, even with hand-cart or wheel
barrow-to make the journey oyer
thousands of miles of unknown noun
tains and deserts. All that was thought
Of was to get there. AS thousands got
10 the mountains they abandoned their
teams, and took on their backs packs
of only such things as would prolong
life until they reached the mines. The
route was marked by the dead bodies
Of cattle, and mules, broken down
wagons, ETC., and the wayside with
graves of the dead that had fallen by
.he way-buried without coffin-just
covered out of sight of the living. Re-
lief parties had to be sent out from the
mines to aid those thousands to reach
he end of theirsjourney, and they were