The Portland daily press., 1896-06-20

1t has heard the tales Of woe which
tradesmen tell of having to abandon their
proper lines of business and start the sale
OF bicycles to keep from making assign
ments and going irretrievably to the wall
The shrinkage in every line of busiLss
is tremendous, and the trade periodicals
which voice the feelings of the business
men are full of complaining.
Perhaps the best financial and econo-
mical authority in America is the Journal
of Commerce. After indicating the trades
which have suffered the most, the Jour
nal of Commerce makes this editorial
"Some of the expenditures for bicycles
may have come out of savings but such
banks and building associations indicates
that very small part of 1t has been SO
obtained. The deposits in savings banks
in this State last year were exceptionally
large, and yet it is evident without staels-
tics that the expenditure for wheels was
very great. Most the wheels are In all
bought with money that
would otherwise have been spent for dress
or ornaments or housekeeping sxpenses,or
lunches or amusements. The diversion
of anywhere from fifty to seventy million
dollars In year from the clothing and
jewelry and dry goods t.ades and other
lines of business catering to comfort and
luxury, and to certain extent TO real
needs also, will account for good deal
of dizziness of trade and a good deal OF
diminished requirements on the part of
retail merchants.
HORSEMEN AND TAILOR
No line of trade has suffered so great a
proportionate loss as the horse trade.
The bicycle has killed the horse trade.
The manager of the Windsor Livery
Stables, in Forty ninth strset said:
Our business fell away full 80 per cent
last year. There is no use saying that 1t
was the trolley cars and cable cars that
did it. 1t was the bicycle. Men VINO
keep their own horses, and who have
generally taken them along to the ooun-
try in the summer time. are leaving them
homo this year, with instructions to sell
if opportunity comes. Especially are
saddle horses a drug in the market. You
can buy them for song. You can get
first class horses now for what you would
have paid for an old carcass five years
ago. hiding academies have failed and
Eeen turned into bicycle school s. Livery
men have, in mary cases, disposed OF all
but few of their horses and put bicycles
in their stalls instead. The business is
dead. Carriages are equally a drug in
the market. and saddlery hardware firms
have absolutely nothing to do. Failure
upon failure attests that. Men who dealt
in hay have no business, and 80 the far
mer has no market for his hay. The BIZ
cycle won't eat hay. Fully two-thirds of
the livery horses have been thrown upon
the MARKET at anysprice that could be
gotten.
Worse hit, almost. than the horseman,
is the tailor-the merchant tailor. Mr..
Burnham of the Burnham & Phillips
firm in Nassau street represents the most
substantial upper middle GLASS of the
trade. eyes" he said. "tailors reckon
that the bicycle furore has diminished
business fully 25 per cent. the country
over, counting in all the modifying con-
siderations. The ''best Clothes" the
"Sunday suit" SO called, has been
Abolished he said. So has the ordi-
nary summer suit. The bicycle suit,
ready made, cheap and shoddy, can be
bought for five-dollar note. That Ia
what is worn on Sunday now. There Is
no call for man to be we'll dressed,
jaunfing through tho cou ntry on bi-
cycle Without counting what posi- Bile
compromising influence there may be,
the tailors' loss would be fully 80 sper
gent. But tailors Try to look at 1t in a
moderate light"
CIGARS AND JEWE LRY.
People cannot smoke on a wheel, and
the habit is inconsistent with the train
ing notion which the bicyclist imhibes
The total product of cigars is 1000, oo0,-
000 The consumption, reliable figures
show, is decreasing at the rate of mil
lion day. The decrease since the BIZ
cycle craze reached it's present height av-
erages no less than 700, 600, 900 year. Do
you know what that meansP 1t means
ID shrinkage of one-flfth and mora. That
goes for wheels. If this continues, there
need BIS no fear of famine in Havana
tobacco, for the cigars will not be needed
nor the workmen to make them either. ="
The editor of the jewelers. Weekly
said: "There is no doubt that the man.
ufaoturers of and dealers in watches and
jewelry are the hardest hit of any Of the
trades at the present time. A man or
woman with the price of watch or BIZ
cycle buys the latter. I can readily IN
derstand why thousands of jewelers. all
over the country are now selling bicycles
AMI why SO many of our Leading watch
manufacturers have extended their plants
and are now making bicycles or bicycle
goods. The sale of $50, 600 bicycles at an
average of $50 each means that sec, O00, DOC
| is to be diverted from the ordinary chan
Il lis Of trade and go to enrich the makers
OF wheels and their appurtenances, such