Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-10-15
OLD-TIME DRUMMER
he Is FAST DISAPPEARINGNVIC-
TIM OF TRUSTS.
Decline of the Travelling Agent-Some
Of His Traits Of Char
acter.
From the Chicago Tribune.

From the Chicago Tribune.
The days of the old-time drummer are
numbered Even as the prairies and the
buffalo succumbed to advancing civilization,
the commercial traveller is vanishing before
the advancing trusts. The members OF this
species are growing fewer and fewer. and
the day of what practically will be final ex-
tinction is not far off. From the ranks OF
the few remaining drummers of commerce
goes up the cry, The trusts did it!'
Who does not remember the drummer OF
yore, dapper, confident. suave and thor
oughly at ease in Office or desert? AS gal
liant, as hardy in his search for sale, as
the pioneer in hunt for a new country, ne
journeyed over this broad land to the
boundaries Of east, north. south and west,
the private of industry, making 1t possible
by his work, building with his hands the
Frankensteins which have been his undoing.
He knew men and the human mind, the old
time drummer, and he brought to the aid
of his business the arts and subtle cunning
of a Ulysses. the assurance of Beau
Brummel and the oratory and power of
conviction of a Webster. He read men
whom he had picked out as customers as
the physician reads the symptoms of dis
ease. Were fiattery needed, none could so
tickle the merchant who opened his order
book at the beck of self-aduiation.
Versatile and Adaptable.
He was all things to all men; a Greek In
Athens. a Roman in Rome. Were his Gus
toner a se1f-made man, rough in the exte-
rior and scornful of the conventions and
niceties of tongue and manner, the drum
mer could meet him on his own ground
Were he grabbed, sour, irritable and insult
ing, the drummer had q demeanor I'M
ruffed as newly Numbered dress shirt. He
could not be insulted. Were the customer
tlmlC. deDreCatinY not of his
own mind, the drummer was conviction
itself: his words were calculated to make
firm the belief that the moon is made Of
green cheese. Patient, untiring, as perse-
vering as the spider. defeat was a word he
would not acknowledge knowingly. With
the gay customer there was no better COM
panion for nights registering than the
drummer. He went to church with the
Sanct1moniouS to the theater with the Sc
date. yet harmless pleasure loving. His
mind was a storehouse of information
all subjects He knew the political stua-
ton in every state and territory from Kam-
chatka to Bangor. from Cape Cod to the
Golden Gate. He could describe every city
in the Union talk the dialect of the down
easter. the southerner, the westerner and
the Pennsylvania Dutchman. He knew the
name of every railroad and the territory it
covered: he also knew most of the conduc-
tors and trainmen He knew as much about
hotels. from the best to the worst as their
clerks. and at the jump-and-hurry stations
on the edges of civilization he was served
NY tHo waiting MAIDS While Pullman traV.
elers TUNED and went hungry.
Made Many Friends.
He made friends with everybody. discov-
cred their hobbies and foibles and melted
reserve as the sun melts the snow His
name was known in every town he stopped
at. yet he vas never known to buy a gold
brick or a lot of green goods. He was the
purveyor of stories. moral and immoral in
hotel corridor and railroad smoker. At
farm house or S. a day caravansary he
was equally at home. His clothes were al
ways of the latest fashion. and he would
flrt with almost anything that wore skirts.
Those were the palmy days of the expense
account. The drummer made his letters to
the firm on the stationery of S. a day
American plan hotel. and took his meals
and sleep on the European plan at board
Ing house or a hotel where his room cost
him dollar night. How expenses in
CURED in mellowing customers up to the
order giving point stood out on his expense
account! Intense was the rivalry between
the representatives of different houses when
they met in the same city. Every sale
made by one was a Waterloo for the other
and even as triumphant generals sent mes
sages of victory to royal courts, SO the sue
cessful drummer telegra phed his firm
Every KIND Of every article manufactured
was sold in those days by drummers, from
spool of cotton to a frame house. Rail-
road men respected his sample cases, and
smoked his cigars. He always carried q
life saver.
Buyers at Trade Centers.
Now. though there be drummers. they are
not of the old school and they are fewer.
The combinations Of business enterprises,
the merger of various manufactures the
formation of trusts in everything from
tacks to tin cans has done away with the
need of the services of a vast corps of out
side men. Where there were formerly hun
dreds of manufacturers of one class of
41. rr,1<
divide the entire country among them into
a working territory there are now twenty
five such concerns employing in the aggre-
gate one quarter of the number of drum
merS that praised the wares of the 100
firms. In other cases. one firm now repre-
sents the fifty of former days, and ten
drummerS the $50 that the fifty houses once
employed. Business houses in these days
too, send their buyers to the trade centers
and deal direct with the merchants The
buyer for the Texas store now comes to
Chicago or New York. instead of having
the drummer go to Texas.
The drummers of today, too. are differ
ent class Of men, They are more in keep
ing with the size of the capital invested in
the trust syndicate they represent-soIid
important looking. The firms they repre-
sent in many instances having monopoly
of the goods they manufacture, their atti-
tude is take it or leave 1t. just as you
choose: If you want 1t you are obliged to
buy Of u.s." There is no need Of the PLAYING
on human nature as though it were a mu-
steal instrument: there is little rivalry The
drummers of yesterday are the clerks of
today. living in dreams Of their former
glory.