Eureka weekly sentinel. [volume] (Eureka, Nev.) 1887-1902, 1901-05-11
SHOPPING BY PROXY.
"Pony Express" System coodoet-
Cd BY Out-of-Tovn Buysss.
~Professtonais PurcAase for eaoe.
of Towna Wear Chicago ON Cow
Misunderstanding Ra11rcad
aad Express ComDaatss-


known as the pony express" won a
victory the other day in the first round
of the fight which 10 being made to
Impress it. In the United States
district court a pony expressman'
named Joseph II. Lund was awarded a
verdict of $1,000 against the Chicago,
Milwaukee & st. Paul railroad and the
United States Express company. The
action of the plaintiff was for false
arrest, but that failed to tell the in
teresting story back of the nght, re-
ports the Chicago Chronicle.
Briefly expressed pony expressing"
is shopping by proxy and shipping
goods without paying therefor to
either express companies or railroads.
The system is carried on between Chi
cago and towns which r a little far
Their away from the city thar those
towns which are ordinarily called sub
urbs. Elgin, Aurora and similar sized
towns, located 30, 40 and so miles or
even farther from Chicago, r the
ones where the business thrives.
Those who are engaged in the lex
pressing simply come TO Chicago and
do shopping on commissions for their
townsmen. carrying the packages back
with them in big bundles or putting
them in trunks and checking them
back on their tickets. The profess
SIGNALS who do this work make it a
regular business and il is said that
they can easily make IS or Sc a day on
their commissions. While they thus
make good wages for themselves
they are saving considerable money
for the people for whom they shop.
Supposing there were ten or twelve
people in Elgin who wanted to come
IL Chicago to make some purchases,
and supposing that they do not feel
that they could spare the time or the
money for the trip. The pony ex-
p%ressInan" comes around to them and
agrees for a small fee in each case to
make the purchase and deliver them
the same day. OF course that is a
great convenience as well as money
saving scheme for the purchasers.
They save the price of the tickets to
and from Chicago, expenses while in
the city and the half day or days time
they would have expended on the trip.
The expressman charges them from
Is to about so cents for each purchase,
according to the size of the bundle and
the time necessary to make the pur-
chase. AT night when his days shop
ping is over the "expressman" ties all
his bundles and climbs on the train for
Elgin or wherever he is going and on
his arrival at his destination he dis
tributes the packages to the various
purchasers and collects his commits
sions.
Some of these "expressmen" have
a much better method han tying
their bundles together and carrying
them. They bring a big trunk to the
city and place it in some convenient
ground floor Office or store. Here they
carry all of their purchases and pack
them in the trunk. Then late in the
afternoon they have the trunk cart
ed over to the station and checked
as baggage to their destination 1t
is said that this trunk packing used
to be practiced in some of the largest
in Chicago. but that when the
discovery of the system was made it
was thereafter prohibited.
1t will readily be seen that the
losers through the pony express"
system are the railroads and the ex-
press companies. The latter do not
get the express matter which they
would otherwise handle and the rail-
roads instead of carrying the ten or
twenty more passengers each day,
carry only the proxy shopper, who
comes to the city for the dozen or
more people for whom he is working.
enough both the railroads
and the express companies are siren
endeavoring to suppress the
practice, but it seems so far with
success.
The professional shoppers are well
in the towns from which they
come to Chicago. and in nearly every
Instance they have built up quite a
business, for there are hundreds and
hundreds of citizens in these towns
who are naturally enough not averse
10 saving the many dollars which
hey can save by letting the commits
ion mar do their shopping. The Tex
FRESHMAN" has his regular customers,
md each evening he makes the
among them to find out what
lie can purchase for them on his trip
Chicago on the following day. The
customers give the man their orders
the same as they do to the butch
r boy when he calls, and the next
they receive whatever they
ave ordered from Chicago.