Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1913-09-09
Looker-On In Iona

Newburg. Sept. "a sensible thing
Is that seen at the entrance of the din
ing, room in the Hotel Monroe, Grin
nell. A nicely printed sign is, Take
your coat off if you want to- and
signed by Mrs. Clifford. the proprie-
tress, and we all wanted to take our
coats off every day last week, with tho
thermome ter registering los on the
front porch. And no sensible person
could make any criticism on the APP
pearance of the room filed with we'll
dressed men, wearing imma culate
shirt of ali kinds an descriptions. In
fact. many of these shirts were more
expensive or as the women folks say.
more dressy than some OF the cheap
shirt waists worn by the gentier SEX
And the newspaper man noticed an
other thing, at some Of the tables were
travelling men wearing coats and in
"a number of cases 1t seemed evident
that they did not want to- take eff
their coats because of their inability
10 find laundry that suited them in
the last town. All this is mentioned in
this column hoping that some of the
landlords of our other first class hotels
in Iowa will have a similar sign near
the dining room door, if the present
weather continues.
The pure food agitation in the state
of Iowa and elsewhere has resulted in
great improvements in some of the
grocery stores and meat markets in
this state. Wellsburg, small town 81
Grundy county has a meat marked
run by S. j. Smittjer whose inside
furn ishings are worth mentioning He
has a marble counter with glass sides
and glass projecting sixteen inches
high all around it and covered with
glass sixteen inches vide Under this
is placed all of his fresh meats. kept
cool with plenty of Ice. Such estab-
ishments are common enough in our
of enterprise to run an establishment
in this way in a small town.
The public are now pretty We'll ed
ucated to the use of the private drink
ing cup on all our passenger trains,
and in short time. for a stranger to
try TO borrow another passengers
drinking cup will be as difficult as to
borrow his tooth brush. Still another
Improvement, however, would be the
use of the spring bubblers such as
they use ii our school buildings. rs il
frequently happens that foreigners and
some families of immigrants on these
trains are not provided with drinking
cups and suffer much inconvenience in
getting accustomed to our way.
We have made a great many sen
sible additions to the school work hee
in Iowa. We now teach our children
all kinds of manual work, including
sewing. fancy work. and home cooking.
The next addition in this lire should be
a department headed instruction in
good manners, especially with refer
ence tn travelling. For instance. II
could be mentioned that 1t was de-
cidedly impolite for a woman weighing
$50 to deliberately walk over the feet
Of some poor travelling man afflicted
with corns Young ladies, for instance,
away from home in the depots should
De admon!shed. not to discuss a t the
top of their voices, so that every one
in the depot is forced to listen. their
/ interesting and intimate love affairs.
They. Of course, do not know how little
interest the waiting passengers have in
their particular affairs. Then the
young men and boys could be told by
their teachers that when one goes out
in the world as travelling man or on
| business Of his own remember that
other people read the daily papers and
! 1t is not necessary for him to read
! aloud in a crowded hotel office the de-
| tails Of the latest public question and
| to this could be added a thousand and
one impolite little things that people
do and say away from home that they
would not even venture on in the home
circle. This criticism applies equally
! to the educated and the iiiitsra:e, IL
fact, If there is any difference between
the two classes more real politenesi
is shown by those from our factories
and off Of our Iowa farms.
There are large number Of Iowa
merchants in the small towns that are
sure to get into trouble and have some
costs nut upon them unless they pcs,
themselves and observe the law aftel
investigations in regard to selling
many articles by weight, formerly sold
by measure. Talking with an lows
merchant the other day, in q small
town. the merchant claimed that he
could take an order over the telephone
for so many cents worth, or dollars
worth. Of any article that the law re.
quires to be sold by weight. II he tool
the order for, say % or 50 cents. Ir
other words II he was selling potatoes
for a dollar bushel. which was ths
common price at that time, and re.
ceivei an order by telephone for 81