Mrs. Grundy. (Tracy City, Tenn.) 1903-1930, 1911-02-09
TIE CSNLER

mushroom business THE C4Sy7lER
which springs up over
night in cheap store, leased from month to
month, and stays until trouble occurs or the field
is worked dry
New York city alone demands to be duped
by nc less than eight practically permanent com
panies of this sort only shifting their positions to
greener fields as the crowds change.
There are three ways to tell legitimate
ton. If the place is permanent and advertises
sales certain days, If the goods to be sold
are cataogued piece for piece, and If there are no
outside men hired to control the bidding, then
it is certain that the sale is genuine.
The fake auction game is played under the
pseudo patronage of reliability. The auctioneer's
license issued by the city, is hung conspicuously
near the door and the goods are claimed to have
been consigned from private sources or pawn
brokers in nearby cities. 1t is Misrepresentation
from the start AS a matter Of fact the goods
were picked up in job lots from novelty houses,
jobbers, Japanese stores and regular auction sup
ply firms who handle job lots of trashy stuff
and are to be found in all the larger cities. The
worries they handle are made of cheap clay by
shrewd Japs who have scraped through the shell
of American bluff and found the fabbness of the
flesh beneath. These antiques crumble to pieces
after six months in a heated apartment Practi-
cally all the goods handled in these stores are
made on the same principle and bought at from
auction.
There is nothing criminal in selling at an ex
orbitant profit if the purchaser gets the square
deal. But a fake auction company is primarily
ring of cheats never Intentionally giving anyone
a square deal.
The proprietor is the arch rogue His profit
depends on selling an article at anywhere from
fifty to two three and sometimes five hundred
dollars. The auction does not pay If run for the
average buyer; it is merely a trap, a plant" for
the occasional good thing" who happens in and
is quickly relieved of a large amount of money
through an elaborate system he suspects
1t is joyless game played cut-anddried
rules which admit of no freshness or originality
The average CASTOR they are all actors and
play the same cheap show every days made up
of one hacker, or proprietor, two auctoneers one
pretty girl cashier and from two to ten 'shills"
(the pae-faced people with mushy morals), their
number depending the size and situation OF
the store
The hacker usually is shrewd and unscrupu-
lous man who rents vacant store, fills 1t with
scattering of cheap, snowy articles to attract at
tention and a number of large so-called works
Of art" and antiques" which, on inspection.
prove to be minors. The range runs from foun-
tain pens at ten cents to deceptive 'ivories,"
'bronzes" and paintings by the old masters that
bring from fifty to two hundred and fifty dollars,
and sometimes more, from the uninitiated
The proprietor hires pretty girl cashier and
counts her an additional attraction. He gets
one or two auctioneers-they usually travel in
pairs, to relieve one another and the public<-and
guarantees them ten per cent. Of the sales; which
commission runs from forty to two hundred dollars
week.
Then the dealer Incorporates the backbone of
the whole crooked business-the body of "shills."