Little Falls weekly transcript. (Little Falls, Morrison Co., Minn.) 1894-19??, 1900-10-30
ighers Are Able 70 Divide by Sixty. and
55 5 Some Are Not. NJ = ! t5,ss .s.

n There Is no subject about which
more advertisements have been made
by the administration speakers, in.
Guiding Co... Lind and his railroad
commission, than the grain inspection
department. And it is also fact that
while the methods Of inspection have
been discussed to quite an extent. the
weighing department has been oyer
looked. This department is just as
important as the inspection. for what
!lprofiteth IT q shipper to gain grade
ion a car OF grain and lose fifty bush
els In weight? xs5,. Z n
Unfortunately, the work Of the
weighing department is SO utterly de-
void Of merit that II the whole truth
Should be told it would hardly be be-
jNexed. -. .-.,s. 49,. 49,. !: o..
~. Prior to Gov. Lind's administration
1.-THE weighers represented every SHADE
Iof political opinion. Out OF hfty
lweighers in the Minneapolis district,
:itwepty-one could be named who were
mot Republicans and did not vote the
Republican ticket; yet not an In
istance can be- found in the whole his
tory Of the department where one was
removed on that account =
= The first ruSk of new grain in the
fall of 1889 found lot Of new and In
Experienced weighers. They had all
carried their precincts at Democrat
lie caucus or been delegates to a Dem.
;ocratic convention. This was the prin-
lcipaL qualification. The reports Of
tsome Of these new weighers were COR:
jgeous with red-ink corrections. Mis-
takes aggregating 10000 pounds were
frequently made in Weighing. car
load; car rymb1rs were crossed, twist
I'd and trahsbosed: 'c6mblaalnts Of
shortage were made by shippers, and
general CONSERVATION prevailed. Two
lsfpen were taken from the weighing
6ofte and, transferred to the inspection
force because they were unable to d.
wide by 60 IN reducing the pounds In a
car load to q bushel. AS a result
shippers became vehement in their
ldenunuiation Of the Weighing service;
dealers were distrustful or dissatisfied,
and the lack of confidence was so far
reaching that many shippers of other
states who had been shipping to this
market began shipping elsewhere.
But, in the face Of all this, Weigh
master O'Brien, whose knowledge Of
the department is. confined to political
teervice rendered and money contrib
Mted by each employe, was instructed
Ito keep chopping off heads until his
assistants were obliged to protest, he
cause there were no longer old weigh.
ters enough to instruct or watch the
new ones1 .,..
EGov, 1lhd and the commission un.
derstood this condition of things, but
those. who had rendered political SER
vices had to be rewarded, regardless Of
qualifications.
l. Not every one can make successful
fWeigher. The business is peculiar. A
good weigher is born, not made. He
must be, first, a man Of keen percep-
ton, quick and accurate in figures, a
fair mathematician and a good PEN
man. He must make reports Of his
work. which constitute the basis Of
= settlement for the commodity weighed,
and he must have a fair knowledge of
the mechanism of scales and elevat-
2ors, in order to know whether or not
they are working properly; and, last
lily, he must be on the alert to see that
Everything done at the elevator or mill
lis Just and businesslike, for the inter-
ests Of the shipper are wholly in his
hands. Men past the age of forty
Eve or fifty, particularly those not &C.
customed to writing, or figuring, sell
dom become accurate as weighers, al
though one who becomes a good
: weigher at thirty or thirty-five can
continue good weigher until, per-
maps sixty. g. ss'[i ",. :: ~.
r; But men continued to be appointed
jAs weighers who were anywhere from
4 |Jifty-f1ve to sixty-five, and had none
Df the necessary qualifications. Meth
;er did old age constitute the only
: source Of disqualification Some were
disqualified for physical reasons and
some by dissipation. But in the face
of all the disqualidcations and In
: competency Of the new men, not one
twas removed on that account except
the two men who were unable to- d.
vide by so. Weighmaster O'Brlens
disqualification for the position he
holds is SO we'll understood by the rail-
road commission that an outside man
Is employed to do the most RESPONSE
bic part Of his work; heretofore done
iby his predecessor. This man and the
deputy supervise all the work, and
Mr.. O'Brien simply devotes his time t.
editing his newspaper. The work Of
the office would go on just the same
perhaps better, II he kept away all the
time. O'Brien, however, attends well
:. Ind faithfully to the duties which BIZ
was appointed for-the political du.
tiles. :. ~ 4 ~, 's>sl: "a ~ '22<t
AS an instance OF the peculiar meth
DDS in vogue, a man who had beer
weighing for more than a year loaded
q scale so heavily that there was not
enough scale weights to balance 1t
He went to another mill and carried
weights enough from another scale Il
null the beam down. There have beer
other transa ctions equally ridiculops
. r...gF