Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1907-10-17
TRAGEDY AND COMEDY.

TRAGEDY AND COMEDY.
Council Bluffs Nonpareil.-Few
spectacles are more pitiable than of a
prosperous Iowa farmer who has sold
his broad acres and holds their cash
value in his hand. Daily newspaper
items telling of such transactions are
tragedies in three lines.
Tragedy:
John Jones yesterday sold his 300
acre farm to John Smith. He re-
ceived $4,000 in cash.
Everybody says, Lucky John! Got
a good price" In the next breath they
say: Wonder what John will do
now?"
"Ay. there's the rub" What will
John do now? There he stands. Yes
terday he had farm; today he has n
fist full of money. Yesterday he was
farmer; today he is nothing If not a
f1nancier He suspects he Is not the
latter. Yesterday he was free land
owner, with never thought of burg
lars or shaky banks to ruffle his seren-
ity. Today burglars and banks are
Scyllia and Charybids, and he is be-
tween them. -
John knew what to do with his farm
He had accumulated it acre by acre,
with pride in his thrifty expanse.
Panics might come and go. prices rise
and fall-there was always the GER
tatnty of living. There was diversion
In planning the years crops, earnest
struggle to stimulate their growth, ex-
ultation in the honest and well-earned
recreation after the yellow grain and
the fattened stock had been sent 10
market. Johns farm was more than
a business. 1t was home. Never I'M
til now did he realize how much Of
life itself was to him.
Now John has traded his farm for
a cash fortune which he does not know
what to do with. If he puts it in the
bank (and the bank does not break)
he can get three per cent interest
$3.50 a year. A paltry income for man
accustomed to the bounty from a 300
acre farm! He is beset by thousand
imps of care he never dreamed exist
ed. Formerly he paid his taxes like
any self-respecting citizen-knowing
that other financiers elude the asses
sor tortures John with the fear that
the official will ferret him out. The
tax would absorb a good share of the
interest; and If he should essay to
loan the money on mortgages the tax
man would get him sure.
His view Of his fellow men has de-
generated. Before he sold his farm
John thought all other men were hon
est At least they looked honest to
him. Now they are all sordid pack
of thieves trying to get that $4,000
When John used to go to the bank to
negotiate small loans for sundry little
farm needs, the cashier wore a halo
Of integrity Since John sold his farm
he has discovered that the cashier is a
bank wrecker in disguise.
Often John and his family move to
town and John "retires," just to graf
ify the laundering of the boys for dude
clothes, cigarettes and billiards, and
so that the girls may wear fine
dresses, play the piano go to dances
John it would be different, but John
Is not always heavy enough to hold up
his end of the argument when all the
rets of the family are clamoring for
the high buildings and paved streets.
Sometimes, however, John comes to
his senses. He might not put it ex-
aCCly tnaC way Dut ne reallZeS COM
edy is better than tragedy any day
He takes his handful of money,
straight-way hunts up the real estate
man and pays him another fat commits
sion to buy another Iowa farm as near
as possible like the first.
Comedy:
John Jones, who sold his 300-acre
farm the other day for $4,000 has
bought the Henry Brown farm for
about the same amount and will occu-
py it at once:
And some people wonder how the
real estate agent lives.