Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1912-08-24
CURIOUS FINDS IN NEW YORK.
Fourteen Forgotten Wooden Legs and
a Dozen Ear Trumpets in the Sub
way.

way.
Fourteen gentlemen shed theii
wooden legs in the New York suhways
and Il lines last year and 10 Others
! managed Ia step lively from trlirs
without their accustomed crutches
An even dozen forgot their ear trump
cts. Five left their glass eyes in the
cars. Two forgot artificial arms and
| hands. So many persons abandoned
their false teeth that the traction
| commpany accumulated almost a peek
during the year.
Comparing the losses Of to-day with
( those of q decade ago. ii doesn't re-
/ quire the son of prophet TO see that
, If we continue To maintain the pace
we have set in forgetting we shall
soon degenerate into a nation wherein
every man will wear a string upon his
finger our memory seems to be los
ing its grip. We have recently broken
all records for misplacing our wits.
Tricks of memory have probably cost
us in the past decade a sum sufficient
to wipe out the bonded debt oil the
United states Within the next 10
years, unless someone applies the ma
tional brakes, the sum will be trebled.
We are forgetting now twice as fast
as we forgot in 1902.
Thousands of men throughout the
country receive real money for keep
ing track OF what we forget. There is
hardly a tr2llv company in the coun-
try that doesn't employ at least one
man as custodian of articles found on
its cars.
In New York scores of men are thus
employed. because here we have the
finest crop of forgetters that flourish
anywhere under the sun.
These Hue ribbon men and women
have erected half Il dozen monuments
to departed memory. Let us begin
with the monument dedicated to the
memory which gave UP the ghost on
the subway.
You grope your way up a flight of
stairs and INTO a narrow hallway. The
MONDAY sun shines dimly and half
heartedly through the dusty panes of
the solitary window.
\ woman is talking with little man
behind tall counter There opens ON
her left a gate in the railing within
which you stand. Your gaze follows
her as she enters at the beck of the
clerk Twenty feet away woman and
clerk stop before a high. odd shapen
mass of black. As your eyes adjust
themselves To the thin filtered light
the object takes form and you behold
"A pile of umbrellas. It is 10 feet long
and four or five feet high, big enough
to make a good sized bonfire. Just
back of the woman is another heap, a
larger one. These are the umbrellas
made for and forgotten by men. They
come in at the rate of hundred or
more a day in fine weather just after
storm, and although more than half
are redeemed $500 go under the auc-
tioneer's hammer, unclaimed. every
year. All things not claimed are,
through him, put back into eircula-
ton.
Mankind's umbrella, from pauper to
plutocrat. is in the heap. The woman
who doesn't find hers is mighty apt to
pick out better one than she lost and
call it even; bat if she knew the rules
of the game she wouldn't. Nearly ev-
cry one of the 200 or more articles
brought every morning into the lost
property room has history. and that
history is written in the applicants
book of judgment. The tag attached
to the umbrella tells no tales except
to the clerk; the number it bears is
the key to its chapter in the book; and
many polished reputation has been
badly cracked within these walls in a
hopeless effort to get back any UNI
brella for an unbound one.
.rt.
favorite loss is his hat or his eyeglasses.
There were three pecks and a quart
of eyeglasses awaiting their owners at
one of the lost property stations in
New York the other day. OF hats there
were enough to stock a retail store.
Men lose twice as many articles as
women, but women lose their pocket
books twice as often as men. One
woman's handbag in every 10 found
contains a package of cigarets-dainty
little gold-tipped affairs.
All secrets fade like morning mists
before the sun when a woman's hand
bag bares its heart. Most contain
several hundred dollars
and nearly all hold letter. lock
of hair, bit of lace. samples of rib
bon, postage stamps, a handkerchief or
TWO. powder stationery. or some
trinket that tells you just what sort of
woman the owner is.
The snug fortune picked up each
year on the streets and cars of New
York is made up of the mites of those
who have least for loss. Worn pocket
books with their losers poverty stamp
ed on their faded covers are a hundred
to one to be the purses of the well-to-do.
The lost bag of many factory girl is
found with an unopened pay envelope
inside; IS or S7-sedom more-within
the brown paper Enclosure are usually
returned, as the pocketbooks go to the