Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1902-03-22
SAVE THE WISHBONE.
How the Little Lucky Bits Are
Utilized.
An Interesting Discourse on the Bone
We Pull.

Do not pull your wishbones Send
them to market, for they have a money
valGc.
Everyone recognizes that the modern
industrial world has carried to great
peri, ction the system of utilizing small
things that were once considered of no
Importance or even as expensive refuse
that had TO be gotten rid of. The oil
refineries have been made important
and revenue producing by products
out Of the stuff that at first was vast
ed and disposed of at a loss of time,
labor and money. The big packing
houses have in the matter of handling
the beeves. hogs, sheep and other do
nestle animals slaughtered and pre-
pared for food, followed the same lines
of turning everything to account until
the old and stale description of the va
rious operations as utilizing the whole
hog and permitting nothing to get
away except the Squeal is more nearly
correct than it is new.
The extent to which this utilization
Of unimportant little things has been
carried is not realized by the general
public nor by those engaged in the
same economical work in other branch
cs of industry. Each man has enough
to hold his own attention and each one
is constantly finding some small bone,
particle of line on cotton seed, pith
in a cora stock or fiber of the bark off
the timber he deals in that has a COM
mercial value if it is properly treated.
There are surprises, however, due
every day to the man who is looking
out for some of these things formerly
thought to be useless, but now worth a
stated price in the markets of the
world. The law that demands that
motiern business shall be conducted on
the lines which will give the largest
possible returns from certain amount
Of raw material spares neither .tradi-
| tions nor old-time prejudices in its
seizures upon the things that will sell.
For ages, perhaps since the first man
ate the first spring chicken. the most
useless of the uneatable portions of the
| fowl has been the wishbone. That is it
| is useless in a commercial way. The
superstition that gave it a value in
the eyes Of the young folk dignificd the
wishb0ne and made it a thing to be
Strivcn for, but this was always a sort
Of reput ItiOn like that of the man
whom his friends call "a good fellow,
that was considered as a badge of its
| utter worthlessncss for any practical
purpose.
The man who has settled himself to
| the belief that there is no place in the
| modern commercial world for the de-
= spised wisbbonn has made mistake
| however. and a bad one for his own
| reputation of having proper appreci-
alton OF the possibilities of the modern
system OF utilization of small things.
One Of The largest handlers of poultry
i'm the country, which has it's gather
ing stations in a score of states and its
cooking and canning plants in half {
dozen cities, handles tens of thousand:
of wishbones every day or at leas
every week. 1t would be considered by
the outsider that there was no more
value TO this little two-pronged piece
of the fowls anatomy than was to b.
extracted in the place where bones are
ground and bone dust made. Not so
however for just the other day one
dealer closed contract with this cor
poration that handles the chickens
turkeys and other domestic fowls b,
the thousands. and that contract called
for the delivery of half a million o
nicely cleaned wishbones, everyone o
which Is to be perfect and unbroken
The firm buying the wishbones is no
alone in the business, and there ar
others who have appreciated the com
mercial value of the little framework
on which the white meat grew.
i The particular big order for 10000
was to be used as quickly as the orde
was filled in an advertising schem
that had struck the ingenious man VIII
attracts the attention of the public I
the firms goods. and at this time the.
are doubtless being sent out over tn
country. The barriers once broke
} down and the reputation of the wish