Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-06-11
FIFTY YEARS AGO
In THE STAR

On Monday. June 4. 1856. Washington was
in the throes of an election. with Know
nothingism as al. issue. In
Eiect1on its issue Of that date The
Fr.ud. Star said:
Quiet at the Polls.-Up to
the time at which we go to press every
thing had been going on tremendously at
all the polls In the city. That is. no H.
temper had been manifested by anybody.
We understand that in the first ward some
thirty-flvs votes had been admitted OF per-
sons Introduced to sleep a night or so to
affect the election in the particular ward.
Our friends demanded that they should be
sworn. which was not accorded by the
Know Nothing judges. The names Of all Of
them are known. and as they are wholly
without the right to vote there. their votes
viii be entirely lost to their side. for the
return will surely be purged Of their votes
The Know Nothings triumphed at the
polls by an apparent majority ranging
from 292 to 307.'' as The Star noted on
Tuesday. June 5. The American party
candidates for register, collector and sur
veyor were elected. and that party also car
ried all but the first and second wards for
the councils. Fraud, however, was prompt
ly charged against the victors. and steps
were taken to tnvalidate the election. The
Star remarked editorialiy:
I'VE have no room today to comment on
these so shameless transactions That they
can triumph. however. Is impossible. as the
rights OF our fellow citizens yet under
the guardianship Of an Intelligent and firm
court OF the United States OF competent
Jurisdiction"
Washington then apparently suffered
from a surplus Of dogs. as the following
letter to the editor shows:
Street WIN you please to bring
Dooa to the particular notice Of
the mayor and our police
authorities the enforcement OF the law rel
alive to dogs? II persons who keep them
were fined or obliged to pay the tax thele
Our city has got to be a second Constan-
tinOple, and every street. lane and alley
Is flied with the canine race. Although
deprecating the carrying OF deadly wea-
pons, yet your subscriber is obliged to do
so at night to protect himself against the
attacks of. not men, but dogs"
In the course of an editorial in the issue
OF June occurs a word rarely used now
slang. This word. "absquatulate." meaning
to decamp was first used in 1888 in a play
entitled The Kentuckian,' by Bernard, in
which the elder Hackett played the char
acter Nimrod Wildire. The Star used 1t
to denote the sudden disappearance of Kin
ney and Fabens, the Nicaraguan flibusters
from the view Of officers searching for
them.
The opening Of the warm season was
usually marked then. as now, by con-
certed action on the part of the city mer-
chants for early closing. Nowadays five
o'clock on ordinary days and one o'clock
on Saturdays Is the rule with many houses.
But in 1855 a seven o'clock weekday clos
ing was regarded as special concession to
the social and health interests of the clerks,
as advertising notices appearing in The Star
III 49, a.
Of E. Tucker & Co.. e. Wheeler & Co..
Campbell & Coyle. Evans & Thompson and
Johnson. Guy Co. agreed to close at
seven, Saturdays excepted. Hilbus & Hitz.
music dealers, announced that they would
close at 7:3O every evening until September.
X i
This paragraph. in The Star of June Z,
affords a glimpse Of the conditions Of the
middle ffties in point of To-
A stage cal transportation in the
H;~un days of vociferous Jehus and
slow and painful progress:
"Atrocious Conduct-A respectable citizen
tells us that In the afternoon of the day
before yesterday the driver of the George
town omnibus, No. %, at a point on 18th
street opposite the Treasury Department
drove up to the side of the lead horse of
three-horse stage and commenced beating
that horse most numerically, causing in
the melee the running off of both teams
wheel horse of each to fall. both being
dragged some distance The omnibu, was
crowded with ladies'. who left It, The con-
duct of the driver was most reprehensibie
and endangered the lives not only of the
ladies' but of the passengers in both We
hicles'
The steam fire engine was then bidding
for public favor, but in some quarters it
had encountered stout prejudice. The
Star of June reprinted paragraphs from,
two Boston newspapers showing that the
new apparatus had not met with much
favor in that city. The Telegraph said:
TT came out incidentally in the board
Of aldermen yesterday that there is an in
junction on the steam fire engine This Is
why 1t has not been out at the fires. When
the private history Of the contract for and
purchase of this engine gets outfit 1T ever
does-the public will learn that some things
are done as well as well as others"
1t is not quite plain whether. the peculiar
phraseology of the last clause Is due to a
typographical lapse or conceals a subtle bit
OF Bostonian satire. The Journal is thus
quoted
THE steam fire engine remaiass at the
city stables, neglected and a roosting place
for pigeons. The 5000 which it cost might
as well have been thrown into the sea,
far as any benefit is likely to be derived
from it In the present position OF affairs"
It may be that the following brief article
in The Star Of June proves that the spec
tacle Of a man In liquor in
Before ana Washingtons streets was so
Ae&., infrequent as to excite COM
ment. Or possibly 1t was the
unfortunate's attire that won him distinc-
ton In print:
That's the Figure.'-A day or two ago
we noticed mddle-aged. well-dressed man
his pantaloons snow-white and his toilet
arranged with good taste-proudly prone
nading Pennsylvania avenue, touching his
hat to male friends and lifting it in a
D14 t,,An 10 a~k T.