Custer weekly chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, S.D.) 1890-1931, 1904-01-09
CONCLUDED Next Week.)
COATS FROM OLD HATS.
New York Firms That Buy Diiapidated
Headoear to Mako Shoddu

'SFS ~ftNSS
New York Times: In Hudson street
not far from the old New York Cen
traIs first freight station, with Com
modore Vanderbilt's status in front of
IT., is a firm that gathers in all the
old hats 1t can get from all parts of
the United States. In the lofts are
thousands upon thousands of old hats
OF every size, shape n descriptions;
hats tHat have been worn by men
women and children in every part OF
this colntry. San Francisco, New
Orleana, Chicago, st. Louis and other
western cities send more old hats to
New York than are collected in the
city itself. In fact, the old hats coll
lected In New York cut slight figure in
the market.
The trade in old hats is most pe-
culiar. 1t actually has a quotation in
tie wool market, usually 2 cents a
pound. But New York purchasers pay
much more han that when the SUPPL
runs short, and also when some man
out west offers q few tons Of damaged
hats that have come to grief in a fire.
The collectors in the west do not stop
to sort or strip the old hats Of their
frames or Innings. The New York
firms must buy Did hats as they are,
and have the trimming done after the
purchase has been taken off the scales.
The old hats are put into steam
presses of tremendou power, and
packed into bales of 800 pounds each,
and from that up to 500 or even 1000
pounds. 1t is too expensive TO ship them
by rail. There is no hurry, so the
cheapest route is the best. West of the
Mississippi they are sent by river to
New Orleans, and from there UP by
coast steamers or sailing vessels. East
of the Mississippi the great lakes and
the Hudson river are called into sery-
ice. But go a they will, the shipper
from San Francisco counts 2 cents a
pound to get his goods to New York,
and the Chicago shipper counts on l
cen a pound. There is no market for
old hats out west, comparatively
speaking, because there are so few
shoddy mills there. The fasteners
have a monopoly of the old hat BUSH
ness.
When the hats reach New York the
bales are cut, and a gang of women
put at work sorting out the different
sorts of material and casting eside the
frames. What is left of tho old hats
is again put into a press and packed
in bales of 500 or 600 pounds, much
tighter, and in a far superior fashion
than the bales received from the west.
When the bales from far-off cities
reach New York they are bound with
cord so loosely that n might cut them
asunder with a pocket knife. When
sent away from New York to the shod-
dy mills, paper mills. or wherever else
a market can be found, they are bound
with wire as thick as telegraph wire,
and so tightly fastened that when one
of them parts it is with a spring and
snap like a broken violin string.
There are only three firms engaged
in business in this city, and they are
very reticent about their affairs. The
fact that the one near the old freight
station has been there ever since that
structure was built Is sufficient evil
dence OF h fact that there is money
in the trade. The old bat buyers won't
tell where they sell their wares, but
one Of them admitted that any number
of New Workers wearing cheap suits
are likely as not carrying around small
Of old hats raked in from
al parts Of Uncle Sans wide domains.