125 years ago
february 13, 1885
Mr. E.N. Eby, of this city, is gradually getting into the newspaper business, having taken in the Florence Tribune on chattel mortgage. Capt. Morrison and Charlie Barker, of Florence, can give Mr. Eby some good points about the newspaper business.
The Graphic gives an account of a brutal beating given a Peabody shoemaker, last week, in a gambling den, and in the presence of the Marshal of the town, who did nothing it seems, to stop the fracas. We cannot get up much sympathy for the pounded fellow, for he had no business monkeying around such a place. But, what was the Marshal, the chief executive of the law against such dens, doing there?
Mr. Butler, a worthy man, has succeeded to the proprietorship of the Palace barbershop, and we doubt not will strive to please his customers.
We regret to be compelled to announce the failure of the Riggs stone arch bridge proposition. It seems that leading citizens of Doyle opposed township aid to the project, unless the Florence contractor was awarded the job, at higher figures than others offered to do it. A lot of county money will be squandered on an iron structure, or possibly upon some repairs to the rickety old rattle trap that now spans the Cottonwood at that important point. These gentlemen may have been as wise as Solomon in this, but the Record, as champion of stone bridges, does not think so.
The old wagon has disappeared from the vicinity of the public well, on Lincoln Avenue, and the Record is correspondingly happy.
The Marion correspondent to the Emporia Republican says in her last letter: “It is said that Marion will make a greater boom in the next two years than it ever had in the same length of time in the past. We hope the ‘wise heads’ are not ‘off their bases.’ It is quite evident that such will be the case. New additions are being added, and altogether the city is in a very prosperous condition. We hope to see, and it is a project not at all impossible, that there will be a fine hotel built the coming season. Walter Sharp is having the stone hauled for a new hotel and bathhouse at the mineral well. We expect ere long to see our streets thronged with walking skeletons in search of health, which they will undoubtedly find by using this water.”
Mr. E.E. Marsh, the Fairplay butcher, who sells meat in Marion once or twice a week, met with quite a loss one day last week. His team, which had been left unhitched in front of Mr. Doster’s residence, on the hill, suddenly ran away going pell mell down the hill near A.D. Billings, scattering meat in every direction and finally bumping up against the stone bridge, fairly wrecking the vehicle. It was a severe loss to Mr. Marsh, who is a cheerful, worthy man. He has had his wagon fixed and is rushing around again with his meat.