East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current, 1905-07-17

John McMahan, traction engineer,
sack sewer, sheep shearer and an all
round useful and skillful man who has
worked in sheepshearing time and
during harvests in Umatlia county for
the past 16 years, has arrived from
California and will drive a team on
a combined harvester in this county
for the next 60 days.
The story of McMahan is interest
ing and shows the evil effects of
gambling when pursued with persist
ence. According to McMahans own
statements he has worked for 16 sea-
sons in Umatilla county. making as
much as 81 per day during the sheep
shearing season, which lasts for 40
days in Umatilla and as many more
days in other places each year, and he
has always worked at jobs in harvest
which have paid him from "a to SIS
per day, for so and 20 days each year,
and yet, according to his own confess
sion, he always leaves here dead
broke, usually on board a brake beam
or in box car.
And the reason for this is gambling
He is an inveterate gambler: one
who believes in luck, and that al
though he loses continually yet some
unexpected day his luck will take a
turn and he will break a faro or rou-
lette game and go away with a stake
that will keep him the remainder of
his days.
This is the one eternal hope that
buoys him up and causes him to risk
his last cent in the games. He does
not know when his turn will come and
so he is always risking and always los
! ing.
To the East Oregonian McMahan
grew reminiscent today and made a
calculation of the wages he has earn
ed and gambled away in this city and
| county in the last 16 years.
1t was enough to buy him a wheat
farm.
He estimated that he has worked
! 100 days each year at sheepshearing
in the past 16 years, and his average
wages have been Sc per day for that
entire time, although on many days
he has made SO, This would make
him $500 per year from sheepshear-
ing for 16 years, or a total of $4,000
Then he has worked 80 days each
year in harvest for the same length
of time, his average wages for this
work being SO per day, or $240 pei
year for 16 years, or a total of $324C
for that time. After harvest he has
run stationary engines in sawmills ant
gristmills in Oregon and California
each winter, working at this trade fol
perhaps three months each year a
an average of $50 per month, or {
total of $24O per year for the pas
16 years.
The total income from his wage!
for the past 16 years he estimates a!
follows: Sheepshearing, $4,000; har
vesting, $3240, and other labor, $3240
or a grand total of $16,0S0.
He is single man and does no
drink nor use tobacco and he esti
mates that he has spent 5000 per yea
for clothing and living expenses, leav
ing a sum of $12,SSO which he ha
spent in gambling, largely in Pendle
ton and other eastern Oregon town
where he has worked in that time.
1t is thus seen how gamblers AM
tin horns are supported, although the.
produce nothing and have no capita
to start on.
McMahan, (Which, by the way, i
his name for the purpose of this stor.
only and not his true name) is onl
one in perhaps a hundred such hard
working men who visit Umatilla coun
ty each year. whose history is the sam
and whose incomes go the same way
They believe that luck will turn som
day and they will get back more thai
they have ever paid into the game
and so they go on working and earn
ing money with which to dress tin
horns in broadcloth and decorate then
in diamonds, while they, themselve!
wear overalls and ride in box cars.
McMahan is now over so years oil
and some spring will fail to retur
from California, where he winter
every year, and investigation will fin
him in some poor house or free hos
pital, too old to work and not sic
enough to die, but burden on tn
community, while the vampires VIII
have taken his earnings will flaur
their broadcloth in the face of tn
world, while boasting to ignorant lis
teners about the business" which tn
gambler brings to the community.