1917-10-20

HOW QUICKLY THE YEARS REVOLVE

          Sixty years ago, Hamilton was a home town, and the boys and girls came together as naturally as members of one family, and before the boys got into bad habits, the dear good girls took them into their keeping and trained them up to be good citizens. The young people married early, and the census reporters did not have the story to tell that there were so many thousand men over the age of twenty-one years, and so many girls of the same age, and reaching up into the thirties, who were living lives of singleness. A young man earning $9 a week, and of sober and industrious habits, was looked upon as a happy husband for any good girl. They started early in life with but little of the world’s goods, and they toiled together and saved, and in time made comfortable homes, and helped to make of Hamilton a prosperous and happy home town. Instead of beginning life in a house of high rental, they were satisfied with a modest home. The same house that rented sixty years ago for $6 a month on Elgin street, and it was new then, today rents for about $15 a month. Where would a young fellow come out at the end of the month if he had to pay nearly half his wages for rent for a house to live in? Well, the boys and girls of sixty years ago had economical habits, and it did not require a man like Food Commissioner Hanna to warn them against extravagance in living. The girls were good cooks, for they had learned in their mothers’ kitchens, and the boys had appetites that could get away with anything from a red herring to a roast of lamb. Talk about love in a cottage! It was to be found in those dear old homes. The ancient Hamiltonians never discussed divorces, and it was a rare thing to hear of a man and wife separating.

          Well, that was the kind of home life in a majority of homes in Hamilton sixty years ago; but unfortunately the reverse picture obtained at rare intervals. The boys and girls who married young generally had the best of life, for they always had an eye on the future, and a hope that prosperity would come in due season. And it did come in nine cases out of ten, and they drifted into it gradually. They saved in their youth, and when their working days were over, they contently could say : “Soul, take thine ease, for thou hast enough in store for the wants of remaining years.” Hamilton was a dear old home town sixty years ago even though the assessors tried to make such an increase in population when they could have dropped off a few thousand in the number and then been a little nearer the truth. But, then, it may have been pardonable in those days to brag a little. In those days, one knew his neighbor, even though they were not intimate. Now you can travel from one end of the town to the other, and rarely meet a familiar face. Such is life.

         

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          Sixty years ago yesterday, (October 19, 1857), Miss Kate Scott, from the old town of Niagara, and Richard Butler, a Hamilton printer, were united in marriage by the Rev. W. S. Wright, pastor of the Methodist Episcopal church. The elements seemed to have been turned loose that night, and the streets were enjoying the luxury of a bath. The pastor’s house was one of the three cottages on the north end of West avenue, between what is now called Cannon street and Barton. There were no gas lamps, nor any other kind of lamp to guide wedding parties to the east end of the town, and the sidewalk was a single plank laid lengthwise, and one would have to be very careful to keep from making a misstep and slipping into the gutter. That did happen to more than one of the party, and the preacher’s wife had to provide the bride with a pair of dry stockings before the ceremony. The average bridal party could not enjoy the luxury of carriages and drivers with bits of white ribbon on their whips; but, bless you, they never worried about style in those days, and were as happy as though they went to a church in a coach and four, and had dear old Tommy White playing the wedding march on his little melodeon. And such a thing as a wedding as a wedding tour was not to be thought of, for it took all the little savings of the bridegroom to furnish his humble home, where he and his wife were to be gin the realities of life. Our bridal party had their little trip, it is true, but it was only from the parson’s house on West avenue north, and Dick Thorne’s cigar store on the corner of King and Hughson streets, now known to modern history as Clyde’s block. The young printer became reckless of this memorable night, and although he was accustomed to smoking a pipe on ordinary occasions, nothing less than the best five-cent cigar was to be considered. And would you believe it, he was so reckless that he bought five of those fragrant five-centers, and continued on his wedding tour, puffing his cigar as he was always accustomed to such luxuries. Bridal trips are more costly nowadays, but are they any happier than the one that young couple enjoyed from the parson’s home to Dick Thorne’s cigar store?

          Sixty years are formidable to look forward to, but take a look backward and it is but a dream; and what pleasant recollections when two young people start out with the determination to make each other happy. Now and then the sunshine may be hid behind a very thin cloud; but even Adam and Eve, it is said, did not always agree as to which gave to the other the apple. However, this young couple grew in years gradually, and as they came to know each other better, and as the dear girl was born with an angelic temper, she had the happy faculty of being able to smooth out the ruffles in the life of her Irish partner. Ah! those sixty years have been happy ones, and now that we are nearing the end of life’s journey it is pleasant to recall them on this anniversary occasion. What changes have come to dear old Hamilton since the days when Lover’s Lane, known now by the prosaic name of Wellington street, was the delightful promenade of the ancient boys and girls! But few of them are here now to tell the old, old story. Whitcomb Riley expresses the thought in his old sweet song, That Old Sweetheart of Mine :

          “The lamp seems to glimmer with a flicker of surprise.

           As I turn it low – to rest me of the dazzle in my eyes.

           And light my pipe in silence, save a sigh that seems to yoke

           Its fate with my tobacco, and to vanish with the smoke.”

          “ ‘Tis a fragrant retrospection – for the loving thoughts that start

          Into being like perfume from the blossoms of the heart;

           And to dream the old dreams over is a luxury divine –

           When my truant fancies wander with that old sweetheart of mine.”

          TALKS WITH A POLICE REPORTER

          We were speaking, Johnson and I, about the kinds of work that were particularly dangerous for women, not only physically but morally.

          “Have you ever thought about waitresses?” asked Johnson.

          Johnson is a police reporter, and there is a feeling of professional kinship existing between the boys and this ancient muser, for many years ago we had that detail on a Burlington (Iowa) morning paper, and while it was work in which the seamy side of life could be studied, it, at the same time, broadens one’ s ideas as to the pitfalls that beset the unwary. What a Hamilton police reporter doesn’t know about everyday social conditions hasn’t been discovered, and Johnson is one of those bright young fellows who keeps eyes and ears open as he sits at the reporters’ table, day after day, in Justice Jelfs’ court.

          “Well, I feel sorry for waitresses,” said Johnson. They have long hours and hard work. Think of the strain of lifting those heavy trays and keeping up the pace when the rush is on. No wonder so many of them go to pieces. And naturally the attractive ones are always exposed to temptation. Every man who patronizes the hotel where they work can speak to them without being introduced; and there are always men who will take a mean advantage of their opportunity. Of course, if a man of that kind becomes too familiar the waitress can complain; but it isn’t easy for her to know just where to draw the line. A certain amount of disrespect they have to endure whether they want to or not. And, in any case, they hate to make trouble for fear of getting the proprietor down on them. To me the marvel is that so many resist temptation. Once upon a time there used to be a bright woman in charge of the dining room at the old Waldorf hotel, who kept close watch on the actions of the waitresses and the travelling customers of the house, and if she saw anything approaching familiarity on the part of either, she was at that table like a shot and promptly put a stop to it; and she used to do it so quietly that both the guest and the girl were saved embarrassment. Occasionally one of these unrestrained girls will get worn out and disgusted with her life and start on the flowery path. In most cases, it means that she goes to perdition. But I happen to know a case where a girl made a false step, which finally brought her into the police court. The kindly face of the cadi looked in compassion on the wayward girl, for, really, she wasn’t lost beyond recall, and after giving her a fatherly talk, the cadi told her to go and sin no more. When she realized that it meant late hours, drinking, dangerous associations, not to mention other horrors, she had sense enough to quit and return to her home in the country.”

          “How long do they last when they don’t quit?”

          Johnson shrugged his shoulders : “Oh, about five years,” he said. “At the end of that time they are down and out. Drink gets most of them, and disease. A few of them marry – it would amaze most people if they knew how many men marry women of that sort.
          Johnson is a bit of a philosopher in his way, and I wanted to get a few pointers from this practical student of life, who relied less on theory than on everyday observation. There is no place like a seat at the reporters’ table in a police court for one to study the weakness of human nature.

          “What is the solution of the problem of protecting girls that work for a living?”

          “There’s no solution,” replied Johnson, “except putting them in the way of protecting themselves. And that way lies in treating them fairly. Nowadays, in most lines of business, girls are paid less than men for doing the same kind of work. Why this should be I could never understand. The women have their innings in the munitions factories and the employers are compelled to pay them the same wages they have to pay to men; but this won’t last long. At housework, the girls have the call, the girls have the call, and can command wages that were never before heard of; but the average girl would rather stand behind a counter for $6 or $8 a week or even less than study the chemistry of “co’on vittles” in somebody’s laboratory at equal wages, and board and home thrown in. Give the women fair wages and a lot of our social problems will clear up themselves.”