Judge — July 21, 1906 — page 10: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

FIORRIBLE HE investigators came tottering out of the great and gloomy buildings with their faces blanched and their knees trembling. For several mo- ments they were unable to write a novel; then, brave- ly taking them- selves in hand, they each wrote <= one, and sat down | on the nearest bench to wait a few minutes until the novels reached | their fifty-second editions. In ten minutes the evening papers re- | corded that their novels were selling in the hundred thousands, and | the investigators allowed the reporters to interview them. | “It’s true,” they said, “that in exposing the conditions in the | } abattoirs of the India Rubber Trust we have done the country the greatest service that has been done it since Washington crossed the Delaware. We say this in all modesty, and do not desire | that it shall be given any more publicity than top of | right-hand column, first page, with « scare-head of let- | ters six inches tall. Please do not use our portraits in your papers, as we do not seck personal publicity. All Wwe want is to sell a few million copies of our } novels, In this we do | not seek money, but only { to make our country | | more like heaven. | + We found the con- | ditions in the killing- | rooms of the India Rub- ber Trust so horrible | that we believe our nov- | eis will be among the ssix best sellers’ this week, The things we | saw were unfit to read. | You will find them all detailed in our novels. | The price is $1.50 per each, + We found that the rubber that goes into gum-boots is not pure Para, as it should be to make a pair of boots, but that it is made from the necks of lumpy-jawed rubber-necks from Missouri, who have been grabbed from the ‘rubber-neck* automobiles. While in the abattoir we saw one of the lumps on the jaw of one of these Missourians cut open and found it to be filled with plug-tobacco of the worst kind. ‘In the lead-pencil department even worse conditions were seen to exist. The girls employed in sticking the lit- tle rubber erasers in the ends of the lead-pencils were, many ot them, suffering from corns, warts, chilblains, and bunions, In using the sharp knives to cut up the lit- tle rubber erasers it was no un- common thing to see a girl cut off a wart by mistake and insert it in the end of a pencil. These warts were not treated with an antisep- tic before they were so used, and are consequently a menace to the “She used such words as ‘ain't’ and * skiddoo, °§ JUNGLED wvaoes & EXPOSES "A lumpy-jawed rubber- y health of every stenographer who neck from Missouri.” RUBBERNECKTOWN. has the habit of chewing the end of her lead-pencil. We saw bushels of old rubber bands that had lost all their elasticity brought into the renovating-rooms, and, after they had been manicured and given a Turkish bath, they were glued together into sheets and sewed up to make hot-water bottles. ‘The super- intendent, when questioned about them, sneer- ingly remarked that if we didn’t like it we could go away from where we were to somewhere where we would rather be. +In one department we found the forelady to be a most unfit companion for the tender men who were under her supervision. She used what we feel justified in calling bum English, Such sain’t’ and +skiddoo’ ren- “The superin- tendent said we could . . go away from where dered the room unfit for refined ears, so we went” Ye were." aw: degrading words “In the department of goloshes we found the same frightful con- ditions prevailing. We saw one employé sneeze while putting the sole on the golosh he was making, and he did not take the trouble to do anything about it. The thought that some unsuspecting purchaser of that golosh will walk for days on that sneeze was more than we could bear. If sneezes are in- fectious he might get a bad case of sneezes in the foot, and that would be shocking. A man who has to stop every few minutes to take off his shoes and use a handker- chief on his feet is not fit to carry out the highest duties of American citi- zenship. “In the garter de- partment we found that the good ok way of mak- ing elastic garters from elastic garter-snakes had been abandoned, Instead we found that angle- worms are used. These are knocked on the head in the most brutal manner and then run through a clothes-wringer. Often they are not entirely dead, and their shricks “These are knocked on the head in the most brutal manner." of pain are blood-curdling. One of us had his blood so badly curdled in this way that his pulse beat in chunks, y ran across the department where doarding- The scene was revolting. We did several revolts while in that room. Boarding-house steak is made from cast-off gum- shoes instead of from the new rubber, as it should be. The result of using this second-hand rubber is that the boarding-house steak is a very inferior article of food, as compared with the boarding-house steak of other days, Some of the specimens we saw were so rotten that they could almost be cut with an axe, This will work un- told injury to the boarding-house industry, for a steak that it is possible to destroy in any manner short of using dynamite is not fit for a boarding-house. The first thing folks know some boarder will manage to cut off a bite of steak, and then he will die of joy, and as like as not it will be Mr. Slowpay, who owes for ten months’ back board, thus causing the landlady an un- told loss. We recommend that the government appoint an inspector of boarding-house steaks intended for the home markets, just as we already have inspectors for boarding-house steaks that are exported. Unless a steak has a certain standard of resiliency and resistant strength, it should be condemned and refused the gov- (Continued on second advertising page following ) comicbooks.com