The Bottineau courant. (Bottineau, Bottineau County, N.D.) 1895-1929, 1920-12-16

~hA~ w 4VAVS viz SO41x
pany's tenants and "Peons", as tn.
workers down in Dixie now call them
selves, to come and trade with me
guaranteeing to see them better good!
for less money than the Company:
"robbersaries" ever did or could do
which was as easy as rolling off {
log once you know the "business'
methods of these company stores, OF
SO I thought at the time.
"Well, as soon as the wives of thu
workers found out I was telling then
the truth, that they could pay thei1
railroad fare from their depot to my
store and back home and still save
money on their purchases Of better
goods, they began to hoard thei1
dimes and every week more and more
of them journeyed to the little store
at the halfway station and, looking
at the sales and profits, I began tc
feel velvet under my feet.
"But there is always a fly in the
ointment as the poets say. The Com
pany did not like my butting in on
their trade Interfering with OUR
labor they called it) and so informed
me. To which I replied that I was a
'freeborn American citizen and pro.
posed to trade with whoever wanted
to trade with me Did I? I DID NOT,
"Neither did the Company bottle,
itself with legitimate business meth
DDS when it went after my goat. II
had a far simpler, more direct and eff
ficient way of dealing with ~'interloop-
ers' such as I.
Cali it did was to station it's Dep
uty Sheriffs' (the Southern farmers
and workers call these birds Gun
men') at the depots in it's two towns
and, whenever a woman came in and
asked for a ticket to my station, Mr.
Deputy just slapped his Colt per
suader' and ordered her to Beat it
back up town and damn quick SHE
DID. :
NATURALLY my business fell off and
about as swiftly as wheat slumped
when the grain gamblers began SELL
ing Canadian wind for No. 1 Northern
In my anguish I made several loud
appeals to the governor of the state,
who finally wrote me that he had
talked with Mr. John Doe, president
of the Watered Stock Lumber Com
pany, who was a lifelong personal,
school and church friend of his, about
my persistent complaints Of unfair
competition and had found out that
I was a dangerous agitator' who
ought to be in Jail for *sedition," end
ing with the fatherly advice that, Il
will try to help Mr.. Doe put you there
if you do not soon change your ideas
of what is and is not legitimate bust
ness.'
"What did I do then? Well, I fold
ed my tent-faded away-went into
Observation-Disclosures it from
Dixie to DakotaA Joined the Townley-
ties? No stree, not me! Those fellows
work too hard and take too many risks
for too little real money. AS soon as
I found my bearings and got acquaint-
ed, l went into the liquor running
business, am doing we'll, and Mr.. Doe
is now one Of my best customers and
trends.
"But that's beside the question unde,
discussion. A fellow must live some
how or other. What's bothering me
now is that I see this tenant-slave sys-
tenn slowly spreading over the whole
country and I don't like it-don't like
the notion of my boy being forced to
become a liquor runner in order to
make a living, and I don't like to
out of Dixie, and we must do some
thing to stop it, or the Plutocracy
will soon have. us all herded up and
these United States nothing but one
big Tenant Ranch and Peon camp
Take your nose out of the ledger and
look around you for awhile if you
don't believe I've got the right dope
boys.
"They may not get you as they got
me down in Dixie, but if they don't
get Mr.. Merchant that way, then they
get him thru their Banks and Whole
sale Houses,-thru the control OF
SACuIt1 tIAdV LII VIC IldCuIS I'll IlllIlSS
belongs to all the people, and not
to a handful of private bankers.
"Phink this over brothers, I was
an Independent merchant once my
self. And, Townleyism' or no Town
leyism', here's hoping North Dakota
wins her battle for Industrial Free
DOM" e..
(Note: The above story is based on
facts. The merchant was put out 81
business just as it is told.) 4
Senator A. M. Hagen Of Westhope
was a county seat visitor yesterday
Mr.. Hagen brought his SON to the To-
cal hospital.
NOTICE OF MORTGAGE FORE
CLOSURE SALE.