The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1900-04-27


York Tribune Col. r. r. May
Has That Honor.
From The Avant Courier, Bozeman, Montana.
Col. r.. f. May enjoys the dis
tinction ofbeing about the strongest |
republican in town, county or state,
and when any one wants to hear
republican doctrine, plain and un-
vanished, there is no better place
to go for it than to his store. 1t is
very natural that he should be a |
subscriber to that pillar of repub-
licanism, the New York Tribune.
But it may be somewhat of sur
prise to know that he has taken
that paper for nearly sixty years,
almost a lifetime for an old man.
The story is an interesting one as
he tells it.
Col. May was living at Elkton,
Md, working for his board and $50
| a year. In figuring up his finances,
he found that he should have just
two dollars to spend for reading
matter, and gave the postmaster,
David Scott, that sum to send for
some paper. The boy was father
of the man, for he was every inch
a whig as he now is republican.
The postmaster, half jokingly, said
to him: "Well, you're a d
wing boy; I suppose you had better
have that new wing paper publish
ed up in New York"-meaning the
Tribune. Letters cost ten cents
each, and he had only the two dol
lars to spend. A postmaster, how
ever, might send in subscriptions
to any periodical, on the govern
inent franked letters; and so the
Tribune began its weekly visits.
That was early in 1871. When Col.
May was in New York in 1882, he
went 20 the Office to inquire about
the matter, and the Office found
no record of any other so long ago
as his. Gen. Il. A. Merritt came
three months later. That was 49,
years ago, and the Colonel is still a
subscriber.
/ Along Just before the war, the
Maryland legislature passed law
against the circulation of seditious
literature, which meant abolition
papers, of course. 1t was peni-
Tertiary offense to read or have an
abolition paper or to talk abolition
In that slave state. Just after the
John Brown episode, the grand
Jury of Cecil county met, and they
planned to do a wholesale business
with the few aboiitionists in that
part of the country. The DO t.
master gladly gave out the names
of those who received the northern
papers, among others being Mr..
May. On the morning Of the meet
ling of the grand jury, the post
master handed out the Tribune
with the remark, "Dick May, this
Is the last time I ever will have to
hand this paper to you" The jury
consisted oftwenty- three members,
and an indictment was sure con-
viction. The jury stood eleven to
eleven, until the foreman finally
cast the deciding vote against an
indictment. There was, however,
a little secret history which ex-
planned his voting as he did. He
was stock dealer, an ardent South
erner, but himself stealthily took
the New York Herald, as none of
the Southern papers gave the mar
ket reports which he needed. He
also exchanged for Mays Tribune,
so as to get more complete report
of the market. This was known
to no one but the two. The FORE
man knew Mays temper well |
enough to know that the moment J
he voted for conviction, his own
head would fall, as he himself took
one of the hated abolition papers. |
So he voted against his prejudices
in order to save himself from the
penitentiary. When it was thus
found impossible to convict the
most rahid of the wings, the matter
was dropped, and no other cases
were brought up.
When May went to California in
January, 1856. he sailed from New
York by way of Panama. He
bought fifty Tribunes from the
office, paying two dollars for the
lot. When he got to San Francisco
thirty four days later, he sold every
paper within few minutes, for
fifty cents each; and then found a
mail carrier from one of the mines
300 miles away, who would gladly
have given one dollar each for
them, as he himself sold them for
81. 80 each at the mines. The sale
of these papers was the first money
Mr.. May made on the coast.
1.-THE editor of this paper hap
pened to be member of that fam
GUS grand jury. Mr.. May was not
nearly in such imminent danger of