Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1896-10-25
SECONDHAND MATERIALS.
Business Whose Growth Has Kept Pace
 with the steady Growth of the City.

A Business Whose Growth Has Kept Pace
 with the Steady Growth of the City.
 There never was a time when there was so much secopd-hand building material for sale as now, and thert never was d better market for it. It might seem to one unfamiliar with the business, stroiling through the yards and buildings of a large dealer, that the stuff looked old, and that it was piled up to stay there long time; and it may be that some of the things are ''shoplleepers." Secondhand building material is nevertheless a quick moving stock, as much so as the average mer chandise stock, and sooner or later somebody comes and takes the slow things, too.
 There are times when the market for certain kinds of materials is dull, as it might be, for instance, for some kinds of building stone. and when it would be more profitable for the dealer to take such stuff out to sea and dump it than it would be to take up room for it in his yard, holding it for customer; but the general fact reminds that there is a sale for everything that the dealer gets.
 Years ago there was only one large dealer in secondhand building mate rials in the city. Now there are half dozen who would buy any building and undertake to remove it within a speci- fled time. The manner in which they come to buy the buildings is very slm pie: The owner of a property desiring to put up new building engages an architect When the plans have been approved the architect invites bids from builders for the construction of the building. The contract awarded, the builder wants the old building out of the way. and he calls on the deal CTS in secondhand materials for bids for it's removal Sometimes the build CT pays the dealer to take the old build ing away; sometimes the dealer pays for the building; that depends. The owners of church building, for exam pie, might have to pay to have it re- moved. Though the church is a large structure, there might be in it com paratively little material of market l value; while building no larger, but cut up into rooms and containing many | fittings, might contain much more material of value.
 The dealers go through the building that is to be removed and make esti- mates. Taking the area and the thick ness of the walls, they calculate, if it is a brick building, the number of bricks in the building. Taking into account the number of stories and the sizes of the rooms, they arrive very closely at the amount of material in floors and partitions, They take everything about the building into account. and figure on the value of the material and the cost of removing it. and make bid. The work of estimating the value of such buildings has been reduced almost to a science; even on very large build- ing the bids of big dealers might not be more than $10O or $200 apart.
 The great bulk of the secondhand building material is sold within 100 miles of the city; perhaps half of it in the city. The primary object of the purchaser is, of course, economy. The purchasers include a very wide variety of persons, including rich and poor, and the material is bought for very great variety of uses. Among the regu- lar customers are many builders.
 The occasional buyers may want a single window or a mantelpiece or door or a beam of a certain length. They come for all sorts of things, but varied as their wants are they can all be sup piled, for one could find here material for house, and, if he wanted, stone sidewalk to put down in front of it, and lamp post to stand on the edge N. Y. Sun.
 INFLUENZA AND SUICIDE.