The Bennington evening banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 19??-1961, 1910-05-06

That the high prices for the neces-
saries of life are not incidental and
exclusive to the year 1910 is conclus-
lively shown by a perusal of the trade
reports for the year 1910, just 'one
hundred years ago OF course the
commercial reports of century ago
were applicable practically to New
England for to think. of It, Ohio was
then frontier state, but gaining
daily in its population by immigration
from all the then FIVE New England
states but more particularly from
Massachusetts and Connecticut A
century ago how short the time, and
eighty per cent of all the heads of
families in New England were tillers
of the soil, for included in this class
was the minister, the physician and
the lawyer. Then thousands Of the
veterans of the Revolutionary war
TILED the field of interyale and Mill
side, or were active in the pioneer set
tlement of new towns and localities.
Washington had been dead for but
little more than a decade while John
Adams and Thomas Jefferson and
host of compatriots were still active
in the pursuits of life and happiness.
There were no railroads, no tele-
graph, no steamships, but there was
individual opportunity, for the day of
the trust and of special privilege had
not come.
It was time when every man,
woman and child did nothing on Sun
day except attend divine service,
morning and afternoon, for the Pur-
tanism of the fathers was kept intact
and undefiled and because of this the
nation grew and became great. But
that chief stone In the national fab
ric is in this day become undermined
and everywhere is the decay Of Am
erican life apparent, and especially in
Vermont where the churches contain
nothing except the vacant pews that
a sturdy and vrile ancestry built, and
the schoolhouses are closed because
there are no children in the district.
AS one peruses the market reports
of a hundred years ago and recalls
that then IS cents was a big wage for
a days work Of ~ and even IA hours,
he is amazed to learn that sugar cost
u cents a pound, or to be exact, $12
per hundred weight as against six
cents today, and even half Of that is
simple extortion by a soulless trust.
Coffee in 1910 could be bought for "a
cents a pound but as early as 1875
it's cost was only 81 cents but it is
not probable that a prize of a tin cup
or a jewsharp was then given with
each pound. Pearl ashes, which were
then a product of every community
sold at the seemingly high price of
Sl65 per gross ton Barley was worth
81 cents a bushel but rye in 1910 sold
at the great price of Sl.75 per bushel
which price, considering the purchas
ing power Of money at the time,
would be the equivalent Of 81 a bush
el today In 1909 rye sold at 81 a
bushel so It must have been that in
1910 there must have been a failure
Of the crop. Yet the fact that the
average price paid for rye in the ten
years ended in 1914 was Sl29 shows
how general was its use as an artic-
le of food for was it not the day OF
rye and injun?' First quality beef,
corned, sold at FIVE cents a pound, or
relatively as high as ten cents today.
First quality salt pork at nine and
half cents pound, and Why such a
relatively high price should have been
it Is hard TO comprehend, for 1t was
the price that prevailed for more than
thirty years, or from 1895 down to
1880. In 1895 corn sold for 81 bush
el and in 1896 it went to Sl.25, the
equivalent of double the sum today
when corn is less than 60 cents in
Western elevators. The average
price for corn, New England grown,
for the fifty years ended in 1874 was
81 cents a bushel OF course corn at
that time as It had been for two cen
turtles, was the one great staple ar
ticle OF food. Il appeared on every
table in one form or another three
times a day. Molasses, not the filthy
swindle by that name OF today, but
the pure product of the sugar cane,
sold at IS cents a gallon, but tea sold
AT SIPS a pound. Leaf tobacco was
eight cents a pound and Liverpool
salt, the only kind listed, was 81 per
hogshead, the weight OF which is not
given Cocoa was 25 cents a pound
and sole leather 20 cents a pound In
those days a farmer was either his
own shoemaker and cobbler or else
he looked to the village shoemaker
/ for the work SDerm oil I'm 1910 was
81 gallon and the average fifty
years price for this article was 94ia
cents Kerosene nor John ID. Rookie
Teller were unknown in those days
In these days our grandmothers' rails
ins were much used and they were
TO be had at eight cents a pouns. Sal
Goldfish. ever staple article, sold II