The daily morning journal and courier., 1899-04-25

HOT III provided adventures was un
 shipped upon the beach, and attacke' by a fatal epidemic. With his owl
 hands he made, out of such material
 as came to hand, the first collins tha
 were made in San Francisco, and, whel
 others shrank from the task, with hi own hands he cared for the bodies of tn
 dead strangers, to give them decen
 Christian burial. Out of the profits o various useful enterprises, he built hin
 a house. and alongside of 1t factory
 with steam power which he rented ou
 to mechanics, encouraging and assist
 ing them to buy machinery of their owr and start in business. It was while thu
 engaged that he undertook the enter.
 prise of furnishing San Francisco witt
 good water. That town, growing sud
 denly from huddle of huts and tents tC
 the dimensions of a city, had no ede-
 quate water supply; and the craving
 needs of man and beast were mercllessly
 exploited by those who commanded the
 sources. Water was delivered from dool
 to door by the gallon; and team could
 have drink for half dollar. Here MT
 Goodwin's studies at the Boston water
 works stood him in good stead He
 bored an artesian we'll on his own prem-
 ises, and broke the monopoly.
 I have named only small part of the public services rendered by this private
 citizen. Meanwhile his own affairs had prospered His plant and business he reckoned to be worth about thirty thou
 sand dollars. The buildings took fire
 and burned to the ground, and he lost,
 as he said, thirty thousand dollars in
 thirty minutes. Thereupon he. conclu-
 ded to settle up his affairs in California
 and return to the east. But before
 leaving he had one more opportunity of
 rendering an eminent public service.
 Of the many hardships of life in that
 new state, there were few more grievous
 and more unnecessary than those arising from the shameful condition of the post al system.
 do not know at what time of his life
 MT. Goodwin had acquired his extraor-
 dinary mastery of the methods, the his-
 tory and the law of the postal service
 But it was ready at this time. A brief | "Open Letter to the Postmaster of San Francisco" signed Rowland Hill
 published in a daily paper put to that | functionary six short, sharp questions on the one point of box rents. The postmaster, much to his credit, in- quired out the author of this article | and MT. Goodwin convinced him that | it was possible at once, under the laws as they then stood, to organize sys- tenn of letter delivery that would reach all parts of the state, and relieve it of the intolerable grievances made which lit was suffering. The plan was drawn out in detail It was submitted to the postmasters of other California cities, and to the agent of the post office department for the Pacific coast, and thoroughly scrutinized and approved. ! In conjunction with responsible busi- | ness men, he organized "The Penny Post company of California" and it went at once into splendidly beneflcent operation Vested interests, however thus infringed resolved to protect themselves by breaking down the Pen ny Post company. The very officials by whose advice and encouragement, and with the explicit promise of whose CO., operation the enterprise had been be- gun, entered into the conspiracy to de- feat it. By a series of unlawful out rages which did not stop short of as sault upon his person and false im- prisonment in the common jail MT. Goodwin's very noble enterprise was frustrated and the investment of money and labor was lost. He went to Washington to present his claim for indemnity. But all demands for re- dress were evaded or refused. The ig- nominious administration of Buchan- an had no principle, in such matters, but to back up its off1ceholders, with the understanding that the office hold CTS were to back up the administration A long struggle was made to prevent congressional inquiry into the matter; and when at last the documents per taining to it were printed by order of the senate, the volume of ATT pages, making record disgraceful to the his tory of that wretched period, was some how so effectually suppressed that no copy of it can be found in the public | archives at Washington, to this day.
 MT. Goodwin never abated his inter- est in postal improvement, his sense of | its importance to the universal welfare, his conviction that great advances | were practicable and easy. By and by ] the time came when, at the general postoffice, from which he used to be sent away unheard, with supercilous sneers and insults, his suggestions be- gan to be respected as coming from high authority in postal affairs. Some of the most valuable postal improve ments to-day enjoyed by the whole are due to the initiative and urgency of this tireless man. And from this point on, may speak with less de- tail, for you have been his neighbors, and have known him year by year. In particular. you know the pathetic story of his marriage, his brief months of happy family life, his awfully sudden and thenceforth, widow ed and childless in the old home, his solitary life, consecrated now more than ever to the unpaid, unselfsh ser- vice of his fellow men.
 His interest in the railroad transpor- -ation of passengers grew naturally rom his studies of the great postal 'eform of Rowland Hill. Following out he magnificent demonstration of that history, he held that there might be great reduction of railroad fares, not )ny to the immense accommodation md enrichment of the people, but also 0 the pecuniary advantage of the rail- 'oads themselves. And in the same