Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1909-12-18

ago at $4,000, an investment OF al
much as $4,000 in improvements ought
to make our lights fairly shine or give
us two sets of wires for emergency or
grant us something like Darlings pro-
posed rate without a lawsuit 1t will
Do remembered that Mr.. Darling offered
to make the rate as low as 6S cents,
to the consumer who would use eighty
kiiowatts per month, and the city Of
PASADENA even goes as low as cents
ior very large hotels while nearly
everybody In the average Marshall
town residence now pays IA cents to
Jones & Hovey. If we lived in Rich
mond, Ind. everybody's rate would be
~ cents whether he burned many or
few lights. ana If we lived in Danville,
Va, the rate would be cents.
4
The question arises. too, as to what
would the rate be under municipal
ownership. We all know that rates
would be cut, for the city would have
no need of profits of $4,000 annually.
BUT how would the rates be adjusted?
Today Jones & Hovey have a beauti-
ful arrangement whereby they charge
terrific rate Of ID cents, double the
average municipal ownership rate, for
light up to turning point, and then
drop to 7 cents thereafter. Just WHY
electric light can be furnished at Z
cents beyond the turning point, and
yet be worth IA cents before. is hard
to understand. but the method of de-
tefmning the turning point explains
IL little. The number of light OPEN
ings In a house are counted and each
mans turning point Is 2 kilowatts per
month for each sixteen-candle power
opening in his house. If man would
get along with six electric lights in his
living rooms he would get a 7-cent
rate as soon as he had burned twelve
kllloWatts in month at IA cents per
klllowatt. or after his bill had reached
$l.bS. But most people using electric
lights live in eight to ten-room houses,
and wire the whole house They will
nave from twenty-five to thirty lights,
and the turning point like the wish Of
hay. tied in front of the old mares
nose, keeps getting farther away the
faster you go and these people pay the
double price of IA cents until they have
burned forty to sixty kilowatts per
month, or until their bills run up to
$3.50 or $40 per month. Now, will
city ownership sell electric lights to
everybody at the same price?
One week from today everybody's
heart will grow mellow. The spirit of
human charity will pervade the atmos-
phere. Archie Parker has started
very commendable movement to direct
the good fellows of Marshalltown
quietly to the little folks whom Santa
Claus is sure to forget, but there are
hundreds of prosperous, well fed,
healthy people who have not yet stop
ped to think of the poor. hungry and
sick people of the city who could re-
ceive their aid thru the agent of the
Ipterdenominational Charity Associa-
ton. Mrs. Luther Ray, 519 Bromley
street, is agent.
And then will the well-to-io and
wealthy people of the city remember
the hospital? Here the sick ar heal
ed, the injured cared for. Human lives
saved every day by doctors who often
times donate their professional serv-
Ices, and by women who have conse-
Grated their lives to others. Will the
men who have prospered until they can
not eat nor wear even, the income
from their accumulations, let loose Of
u small piece for the support of st.
Thomas hospital? Will they do 1t or
will they trade in the old automobile
for a song ana put another thousand or
two into a 1910 model?