The Fort Dodge Messenger: Dec. 16, 1905

Christmas With Fort Dodge Poor

People of City Make Plans to Aid Them Wherever Possible

County Already Overtaxed

Is Only Able to Provide Necessities – Figures Show 200 People Now Cared For in City at the County’s Expense.

With the near approach of the Yuletide season it is well to give a thought to those within the city who are unable to partake in the spirit of the time, in so far as the same relates to good cheer and plenty.

A visit to the commissioner of the poor this morning, and inquiries as to the situation with the needy has brought forth the information that the county is already overtaxed in providing the poor of Fort Dodge with necessities, and that absolutely no provision can be made for Christmas.

40 Families Cared For.

At the present time forty families in the city of Fort Dodge, and more than two hundred separate persons are being cared for at the county’s expense. The poor fund is overdrawn in doing this, even through no attempt is made to provide the needy with more than the bare necessities of life, extending merely to fuel and food. Clothing is given by the Mosaic club, Salvation Army and Associated Charities in considerable amounts, and these organizations lend a helping hand in providing food and coal also. But even under this circumstances all are taxed to the utmost to keep body and soul together in many families that exist in poverty, dirt and squalor in the lower parts of the city.

An earnest appeal for aid, from the well-to-do people of the city is made by the county and by the charitable organizations of the city, for help in providing with more than the usual fare, and attempting to bring Christmas cheer into the homes of the poor during the coming week.

Tags: 1905, Christmas

The Fort Dodge Messenger: Dec. 16, 1905

Chief Tullar Sells Livery Business

His Stock of Horses and Rigs Sold to Charles Smith of Iowa Falls

A deal was completed last night by which Charles Smith of Iowa Falls becomes the sole owner of the livery barn of Chief of Police Tullar on First avenue south.

Mr. Smith is an old and experienced liveryman. He has been in the city for some time looking for a location and takes possession of the Tullar stables at once. Mr. Tullar states that he has found his duties as chief of police to great for him to give proper care to his business so decided to sell.

The entire stock of vehicles and horses except those kept by Mr. Tullar for his personal use were involved in the transaction. the consideration for the stock was $15,000.

(Editor’s note: The amount of $15,000 in 1905 would be equivalent to about $359242 today.)

Tags: 1905, Tullar

The Fort Dodge Messenger: Dec. 16, 1903

Fire at Corpus Christi Academy

Early This Morning For Time Threatens Destruction of Building

Starts in the Furnace Room

Blaze Discovered by Sisters at 3 A.M. – First Floor is Badly Damaged.

Spontaneous combustion in the coal room of the Corpus Christi academy, situation at the north end of Eighth street, was the cause of a run by the fire department at an early hour this morning to extinguish a blaze which for a time threatened the destruction of the building. The fire was extinguished only thru the utmost efforts of the firemen and that the damage was not greater is due to its early discovery and the prompt arrival of the department.

The loss could not be estimated today, although it is probable that much of the first floor of the building will have to be replaced. The remainder of damage is due to smoke, which for a time filled the entire structure.

The blaze was discovered at 3 o’clock this morning by members of the order of Sisters of Charity, who have charge of the school and live in the building. The firemen found the blaze to be confined to the northwest corner of the basement where is situated the coal and furnace room. Before the department could control the flames the latter had burned thru the floor of the room above and promised to envelope the entire building. The blaze was finally controlled and extinguished.

To spontaneous combusion (sic) can be assigned the only cause whereby the fire could have found its origin. An early discovery undoubtedly prevented a bad fire.

Corpus Christi academy is a new building, dedicated a year ago last October and its loss would means no little to the congregation of the Corpus Christi church.

Tags: 1903

The Fort Dodge Messenger: Dec. 15, 1906

Fort Dodge’s Live Ones: Harry Holm

Santa Claus is the original “live one” and perhaps a picture of him should appeal in a Christmas edition but Harry Holm makes a pretty good looking type for Santa Claus,a nd being a local man we prefer to illustrate him in this space. The county warrants that have been passed over the counter by the present auditor of Webster county have made the many recipients feel as grateful as though they were getting attention from Santa Claus. They recognize a relationship between the two personages.

The cartoonist has caught Mr. Holm with some of his favorite interests in plain sight. He is a railroad man by training and persued the occupation with success for many years. Under the former owners of the M & St. L. he was assistant superintendent of the entire railway. In those days if he wanted to put a locomotive under his arm and “heft” it he had the authority to do it.

Future historians will give Mr. Holm the credit that is due him for the securing of the Newton & Northwestern railroad in Fort Dodge at a time when the railroad situation was causing much anxiety to our people. Business men here had spent the hot days of nearly all one summer raising pledges of funds to bring the Crooked Creek railway here, only to find in the end th at their efforts were put forth in response to a hot air proposition. Just at that moment of chagrin and disappointment J.L. Blake, manager of the Newton & Northwestern, began inquiring of his old friend and former comrade in railroad work, Harry Holm, about the feasibility of extending their road to Fort Dodge. The boosting that Mr. Holm did for the new extension was of the thoroughbred variety and it was but a few weeks until the deal had been closed. We hope the Interstate Commerce Commission will unanimously vote Mr. Holm a perpetual pass on the Fort Dodge Des Moines & Southern Railway for his good work.

The subject of Masonry is very near to the fraternal heart of Mr. Holm and he is up on all its higher branches. But for real, absorbing interest during the summer season base ball has all the other interests “lashed to the mast.” Fandom has no greater crank than he, and if by fate it is decided that Riverside Park shall not resound to the rooting of the crowds next summer a silent spectre will haunt the hallowed spot where Boyle’s troops have twice nobly fought for the pennant and landed so high they could peek over at the prize. That ghost-like slender form will belong to County Auditor Holm.

Tags: 1906, Holm

The Fort Dodge Messenger: Dec. 14, 1906

What They Say

“A white Christmas would make trade better for everybody. Unless snow comes it will hardly seem like Christmas at all and if the streets and ground are bare of snow it is certain the merchants will have less trade than if a good covering of white would come.”

-William Mulroney.

■ ■ ■

“All of the business men along the street are wishing for a fall of snow this week. They think the holiday trade will be heavier if there is snow on the ground. At any rate sales on boy’s sleds will be light if the snow doesn’t come.”

-S.A. Smith

■ ■ ■

I was out to Storm Lake this week ice-boating. it’s great sport. Got skating and all the other winter sports beat a whole city block. We  went a distance of two miles in four minutes once, and some other records almost as good.”

-George Somers

■ ■ ■

“If there is one person who ought to write plainly, it is a doctor. It is so easy to make a mistake in reading illegible writing, and because of the similarity of the scientific names of the various drugs and compounds, the prescription clerk is as liable to read one thing as the other, if the writing is not plain and readable. I know one physician in the city who writes his prescriptions on a typewriter, which is an excellent way, and sure to make mistakes in reading impossible.

-Dr. H.G. Ristine

Tags: 1906, Mulroney, Ristine, Smith, Somers

The Fort Dodge Messenger: Dec. 13, 1905

Woud (sic) Victimize Mayor Bennett

Latter Thinks an Attempt Has Been Made to Work a Graft on Him.

Mayor Bennett is of the opinion that an attempt has been made to work a smoothy graft on him, in a letter received by him this morning. The letter states that one Sidney J. Bennett took a government claim of 160 acres in 1874. It says that the writer, an abstractor in Washington, D.C., is of the opinion that he is not the Sidney J. Bennett who did this and asks him to state as much and put a price on his right to take claims. The mayor things that the writer desires to get him to state that he is not the Mr. Bennett who took such a claim, and to purchase his right. He would then sell this right for a large sum to some third party. It would be discovered that Mr. Bennett had once taken a claim when the third party attempted to use the purchased right, and he could be prosecuted for attempting to defraud the government.

Tags: 1905, Bennett

The Fort Dodge Messenger: Dec. 13, 1905

“Lid” Is On In Earnest In Fort Dodge Today

Reign of Terror Through The City Will Be Brought to Speedy End.

The Slot Machines Go Down

Mayor Gives Chief Orders to Throw Out the Drag Net For Tough Characters

General Cleaning Up Started

All Gambling Institutions, Saloons That do Not Company With the Law, and Any and all Disreputable Places Will be Closed.

The lid is on in Fort Dodge today. A general cleaning up process has been started, and the city is to be thoroughly  gone over, cleaned and disinfected of the moral filth that has existed during the past few months.

At nine o’clock this morning Mayor Bennett entered police headquarters with a grim look on his face, and calling the chief announced that the lid was to be clapped down and hermetically sealed. The chief was given orders to take down all slot machines, whether operated for the purpose of winning cigars or money; all gambling devices of any sort, close all saloons that did not comply with the law, all gambling institutions and disorderly resorts, and throw out the drag net and rake in all the suspicious, tough and disorderly characters that could be found from end to end of the city.

Work Starts at Once.

The work starts at once, and it is safe to say that by night Fort Dodge will exist under the tightest lid that ever covered an Iowa city. Chief Tullar will personally visit all places in the city where slot machines are operated this morning, and will order them consigned to the garret, and on refusing will confiscate them. Saloons will be notified to observe a strict compliance with the closing law at nights and Sundays, warned to observe the black list and preserve order in their places. All suspicious localities will be visited, and anything that hints of disorder or lawlessness will receive a thorough investigation.

Throw Out the Net.

This completed the net will be thrown out, and the city raked through from east to west and from north to south. Alleys, by streets, dens and dives will be visited, and all undesirable characters found therein will be loaded into the patrol wagon, which will accompany the visits, and landed behind prison bars to await a sentence of a few days labor on the streets or a jail term on a diet of bread and water.

Mayor Bennett is determined that the reign of terror that has existed here during recent times will be ended, for good and for all if possible. The whirr of slot machines, and the rattle of the nickle (sic) will be heard no longer. Dice shaking for drinks and cigars will be prohibited, and the crap game in a sequestered spot in alleys is to be a thing of the past. Hold-ups, burglaries, drugging in saloons, and slugging on dark streets by foot pads will cease, and the gentry who have been perpetrating the acts will hide by day and night, or leave the city.

It is is expected that it will take several days to complete the work that has been started. It was placed well under way by noon, however, and a large part will be completed by night. The rest will await the action of time and vigorous action.

Tags: 1905, Bennett, Tullar

The Fort Dodge Messenger: Dec. 12, 1906

Fort Dodge’s Live Ones: A.D. McQuilkin

As the owner of “The Big Store with little prices,” A.D. McQuilkin is most familiarly known, but there are other names that might serve to designate him. One is the word “Hustler.” Another is  his title of President of the Iowa Retail Furniture Dealers’ Association, which place he has filled with credit since a year ago last June. No one deserves a place among Fort Dodge’s live ones better than Mr. McQuilkin. Where questions of the city’s progress are brought up he is always found in the front rank and willing to carry the banner.

Of course, if the city’s wagon were the real thing, not figurative, Mr. McQuilkin’s shoulder at the wheel would not cause it to fly, for he doesn’t measure up well with the ringside stalwarts. But when it comes to a matter of push, as those who understand know the word, he is right on the firing line with the fellows who are making the wheels of Fort Dodge progress hum. And in this line his efforts are such that when the bunch gets out to boost his place is always reserved for him.

Not satisfied with seeing Fort Dodge grow away from him, Mr. McQuilkin has instead decided to do a little of the leading himself, and just to show what real enterprise is like  he now decides to build and start next door to his present big furniture store another one equally large which will give him the room that he needs to expand his business along progressive ideas. The two will be connected with an overhead passageway.

The friend suggested the other way that when the two stores were running Mr. McQuilkin might have some trouble in adapting his business byword, “The Big Store with little prices,” to the change, “for,” said the friend, “to have it read ‘The two big stores with the too little prices’ wouldn’t sound right” Mr. McQuilkin responded to the jest by saying it “guessed he would have to call it The bigger store with the littler prices.”

Tags: 1906, McQuilkin

The Fort Dodge Messenger: Dec. 12, 1904

Christmas Shopping Already Started

Saturday Was a Good Day With the Merchants in Fort Dodge.

Stores Crowded All Day

Purchases This Year Will Be More Along Sensable (sic) Lines Than Usual. Along Sensible Lines Will Visit Clothing, Dry Goods and Shoe Store

The Christmas shoppers are already at their work of selecting the “things” for the Christmas gifts. On Saturday there were large crowds of farmers in this city, and all of the stores were fairly well crowded the greater part of the day. In the evening the town people came in and filled the aisles left vacant by the rural trade, so that Saturday was probably one of the busiest days that has been seen in city for some months, and in consequence the faces of the merchants have brightened to a considerable extent.

There is now a prospect that the holiday trade will be very fair. While it will not be record breaking, there is enough of prosperity in the city and surrounding country to bring it up to the usual standard. Money seems to be much more free than it was expected a few weeks ago.

The farmers, in particular, are opening up wonderfully. many of the things that were really needed in the way of wearing apparel are being bought. The long deferred purchases that were put off from time to time on account of the bad crops, are being made at the present time, and many a fine top coat or cloak has replaced the time worn garment that has seen service much longer than it would have under ordinary conditions.

“Yes,” said one merchant, “I really believe there will be a first rate Christmas trade this year, but in my mind the purchases will be more along the sensible lines. The times have been too close for the past three years to encourage the people in spending their hard earned money for the fancy things and hew-gaws that are usually purchased for the Christmas gift.

“This year, I believe, there will be a good trade on the articles of dress and other useful things that are always acceptable to the sensibly inclined. Of course, there will be much of the usually light elegant but entirely useless stuff sold and the run on toys I think will be very good. Of course, the toys are the only thing for children, and they will always have them. What I mean is to convey the idea that there will be more of the really serviceable things sold this season than is usually the case. Christmas shoppers will not this year ignore the drygoods, clothing and shoe stores of the city.

Tags: 1904, Christmas