The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-06-10
TEE PASSING OF THE JEHD
He Sees His Fate in Al!-Night Cars
ard Automobiles.
Small Returns From What Was mt
One Time Prosperous Business.
Old-Style Travel Fading Away in
the Light of Modern Progress.
Patrons Few and Fur Between.

The cabby is passing. Have you noticed
| it? Modern methods of transportation. al
night trolley cars and elevated service have
knocked his business galley west. The cab:
are disappearing by the dozen. Wh.re 6
| few years ago there we're scores of vehicles
at the stands day and night the number as
dwindled now SO the man VINO searches for
a cab after night is likely to have Icing
walk before he finds one still hanging on
the edge of the business.
| 1t is only few years, SO few that the
change seems amazing, that the downtown
streets, especially at night, we're filed with
| cabs. On all the prominent corners, and
especially around the City Hall and Court
House, they stood by the dozen. On rainy
night the streets were alive with them and
the cabbies coined money. When the ordi-
nance was passed fixing the legal fares for
| cab hire the cabmen managed to have the
| figures placed comfortably high. far out OF
the reach of the ordinary night prowler, so
that even at legal rates they made plenty
of money and the ordinance did not bother
them much when they came to compute the
marvelously short and their hours were in
proportion. OF course when the town was
wide open," when gambling fourished
along Clark and Dearborn Streets and men
made Stakes" which they were eager to
spend, the Cables reaped harvest. No one
thought of street cars then. 1t was cab
from the gambling house to the all night
restaurant and few drinks for the cabman
and then a cab home-perhaps three or
foIr passengers to homes for apart meant
$40 to the cabby.
Then came the first move of retrogres-
sion. Chicago suddenly discovered that she
was too old and too big to be like u West
ern mining camp and the gambling houses
were closed. The battle was long drawn
out, but the forces of law and order finally
won and the halcyon days of the FOUNDERS.
the men about town. and the cabbies
were at an end. The rooms which once
sheltered hundreds of men, some Of whom
were bound to win and spend their money
freely, were closed and dark, and the cab
men were obliged to turn to transient bust
ness-after- the-theatre trade and belated
homeseekers-for their shekels. The night
cars were an hour apart on most OF the
lines and slow and crowded when they did
arrive. Not all the lines had even such
miserable service as that. People who
lived any distance from the main lines OF
traffic on which the slow night cars ran
had to wait an hour downtown, spend an
other hour or so jogging out toward home,
and then walk perhaps a mile or SO in the
darkness to reach home.
Those who could not afford to do other
wise were obliged to put up with such
service. Those who had a couple of dollars
to spare willingly yielded them up 10 the
cabby to get home in something like de-
cent time and get to bed. And thus for
time the business was saved from utter
stagnation. But there was not enough of
this sort Of trade to keep the army of cab
bies alive who had fourished in the "old
days. Their horses began to eat their
heads off as they stood night after night
with one fare for dozen cabmen, and
the wise ones quit the business and went
into something else. Some of the old
timers who had spent their adult lives in
the business were reluctant to quit, and
managed to hold on by reducing their ex-
penses.
But then, a few years ago, came the n
nal shock. and 1t was an electric shock
which killed the business. The street car
companies put on all night trolley cars.
Streets which had never before had an all
nigh; service, like Ogden Avenue, reaching
diagonally into vast field of residence
territory, were equipped with the fast fly
ing. comfortable cars. running at short in
tervals. Wentworth Avenue trolley cars
came down into the heart Of the city to
take home South S!ders and some of the
crosstown lines. like Thirty ninth Street,
were supplied with all-Dght cars to trans
fer the belated folk across town. The
North Side blossomed with trolley night
cars and the elevated roads began with
their big, bright. warm cars at twenty
minute intervals That was the finishing
stroke to the cab business. No one was
going to pay 81 to ride home in cab
when he could be whirled home in one
third the time for a nickel. The cabmen
saw ii and began to drop out.
As If things were not bad enough, the
automobile cabs are the latest addition TO
the forces which are crowding the old time
cabmen off the map. Owned and run by
wealthy corporations, the electric cabs can
afford to cut prices if necessary in order
to corral whatever business remains 10 be
captured. Even at equal rates, the very
novelty Of sailing along in the big, silent,
rubber-tired affairs would induce the av-
erage person TO take one OF them instead
of the rafting old cab with its wind bro
ken horse and its sleepy driver. After
midnight now 1t is doubtful whether n
score of the old horse cabs could be found
in the downtown district.
The business around the railroad depots
had also fallen away to almost nothing
owing TO the improvements in the street
car service. Time was when the stranger
arriving within the gates of Chicago was
assailed at the depot by half hundred
cabbies, shouting opportunities to ride.
People crossing the city from one depot to
another to continue their journey east or
west patronized the cabs because the street
cars did not touch the depots except they
CHANGED to be on main lines of street cars. |
Now the traction company has special de- |
cot cars running around loops which con-
meet all the depots directly and the man
with the grip can be whisked from one to |
another for a nickel. He knows 1t and he |
saves $3.50 The hotels too, are reached |
by the streets cars and that once fruitful |
source Of revenue to the cabman. the ho- |
tel trade, is practically gone Now and |
then some drummer" with half dozen |
sample cases takes cab and charges ii |
up in his expense account. He doesn't |
care what it costs. But the man who is |
paying his own way has grown wary and |
looks around for a street car which VIII
take him to his hotel.
The newspapers were good patrons of |
the Cables few years ago. before the |
all-night trolleys and elevated trains were
installed. If fire struck in from some dis |
tant part OF the town, an explosion or any
other piece of news developed after mid
night reporters jumped into cabs and were
hurried TO the place as fast as the old
knee sprung horses could take them. Now
the Offices have the time tables of all the
all-night cars and elevated roads and
when there is need Of reporter out to-
ward Jackson Park or Cunning at o'clock
In the morning the man jumps on trolley
or elevated car and knows he will get out
there and get back in far less time than