Sam Moore

From the pages of the Rural New-Yorker...

A Snake Story, June 23, 1883
The best Jersey cow of a writer in the N.Y. Times, a very quiet, petted animal, and a remarkably steady and even milker, came home a short time ago for three afternoons consecutively with less than the usual quantity of milk. This caused inquiry and a watch was kept upon the cow. The cause was discovered by an accident. The cow was lying down in somewhat deep grass near a row of pear trees, when examining the pear blossoms and casually looking over to where the cow was lying, a large black-snake was seen quietly sucking the cow, which seemed quite oblivious of the liberty taken with her. The snake was killed, and was 49 inches long and 7-1/2 inches round at the largest part. It was perfectly gorged with milk.

How Cheap Can We Live? Oct. 31, 1857
Pretty cheap, if we please. Witness a Mr. Thoreau, of Massachusetts, who having borrowed an axe, went down to the shores of Walden Pond, where he built a hut of hewn logs, which he occupied for two years, supporting himself on fruits of the earth, raised by his own hands. During eight months of this period he kept an account of his expenses, which amounted to $60, including $29 paid for materials for his house. (About $1,370 and $660 in today’s terms, respectively. – Ed.)

Sure and Safe Remedies for Fits, May 2, 1850
For a Fit of Passion – Walk out in the open air; you may speak your mind to the winds without hurting anyone, or proclaiming yourself to be a simpleton.

For a Fit of Idleness – Count the tickings of a clock. Do this for one hour, and you will be glad to pull off your coat and go to work.

For a Fit of Extravagance and Folly – Go to the workhouse, or speak with the ragged and wretched inmates of a jail, and you will be convinced that “Who makes his bed of brier and thorn, Must be content to lie forlorn.”

For a Fit of Ambition – Go into the church-yard and read the grave stones; they will tell you the end of ambition. The grave will soon be your bedchamber, earth your pillow, corruption your father, and the worm your mother and sister.

And, on that cheerful note, I'll end this look at the wit and wisdom of the Rural New-Yorker, first published on Jan. 3, 1850.

Here at Farm Collector, it’s easy to keep a grip on our mission.

“Dedicated to the preservation of vintage farm equipment” is, after all, printed on the front cover of every issue. But it’s summer: What better time to stray off the beaten path?

American Industrial Machinery Since 1870, C.H. Wendel A Babcock country press from the 1880s. The working print shop display at Printers' Hall (on the Midwest Old Threshers Reunion grounds, Mt. Pleasant, Iowa) uses a Babcock press powered by a vertical steam engine.

And so it is that in the September 2009 issue we visit a different past — that of the weekly newspaper of 90 or 100 years ago. Don’t get nervous: We’re still talking cast iron machinery, line shafts and stationary steam engines. Like equipment on the farm, machinery in the print shop was big, heavy, cantankerous, noisy, dangerous and dirty. It was also elegantly designed, brilliantly conceived and often stupendously dependable.

The weekly newspaper not only delivered news to rural residents for whom no other media existed, it also often served as a small town’s printer. Need envelopes? Business forms? Tickets? Funeral programs? Wedding invitations? Sale bills? You’d talk to the boys at the newspaper’s job shop.

There you’d find sheer tonnage of cast iron designed to enhance and elevate the most fragile material imaginable: sheets of paper. Powered first by steam, later by line shafts and gas engines (and later still by electricity), Linotypes, presses, folders, trimmers and cutters made up an arsenal of equipment ready to meet any conceivable printing challenge.

For me, this is a sentimental journey. The dictionary defines “printer’s devil” as a trade apprentice. But among the pressmen at my father’s weekly newspaper, I am confident the term was used to describe the boss’s kid. A little girl in the print shop — hovering at the clacking Addressograph, sitting astride a massive roll of newsprint like a pony and rocking it gently, darting toward the press and grabbing just-printed sections just like the men did — was tolerated but not encouraged.

Times were different; no one thought to instruct a girl child in the intricacies of printing equipment. But memories loom clear decades later: the absolute danger of the massive paper cutter; the way eye contact and nods replaced speech when the press roared; the cacophony of sound that rose and fell in a bell curve, collapsing into the sweet quiet afterward when the paper was out for another week.

The country print shop is a relic of the past – unless, of course, you stray off the beaten path. Extra! Extra! Read all about Printers’ Hall in the September 2009 issue of Farm Collector!

	The Library of Congress/ Chronicling America The front page of the New York Tribune, Jan. 1, 1880.

What follows are excerpts from vintage newspapers with blogger Sam Moore’s asides set in italics. — Ed.

Automatic Cow-Milker, July 13, 1878
The Automatic Cow-Milker is a sterling-silver tube with highly polished surface, and in all respects a nice piece of work. The tubes are sold in sets of four attached to each other by strips of leather, and seen to be as convenient a contrivance for lessening the labors of the dairy as has been introduced. (A Colonel Weld, who tried the device, wrote: “I have tried the Automatic Cow-Milker (and) it worked well on one cow repeatedly. I have no hesitation saying that the milker is a valuable article in any dairy, especially for cows with sore or wounded teats, and for milking very short-teated cows, and I think it would be particularly convenient for gentlemen having one or more cows, and liable to be left, now and then, without a person to milk them when changing servants.”

(Don't you wonder why a “gentleman” with only one or two cows couldn’t manage to milk them by hand himself?)

Big Profits in Ice, Feb. 5, 1859
Several new ice houses have been erected on the banks of the Hudson during the present winter. They have been, or are being, filled. The season thus far has been unusually favorable. The Kingston Journal says there are 99,000 tons of ice gathered, valued at half a million dollars! If correct, it’s safe to say that more than 300,000 tons are already stored on the Hudson — worth more than a million and a half of dollars! There is certainly a very handsome crop.

Birth of the USDA, May 24, 1862
The bill establishing the Department of Agriculture has passed both Houses of Congress, and only requires the signature of the President to become a law (President Lincoln signed the bill on May 15, 1862). The act creates a new Department, distinct from all others, at the head of which is to be a Commissioner, with a salary of $3,000. (About $64,000 in today’s terms.)

Advice, Jan. 10, 1850
It should be the aim of young men to go into good society. We do not mean the rich, the proud, and fashionable, but the society of the wise, the intelligent, and good.

How To Cook A Husband, Feb. 5, 1859
The time has arrived in the year for the preparation of many good things, and I have no doubt that the following will prove to be the most valuable in the catalogue of recipes. To cook a husband, as Mrs. Glass said of the hare, you must first catch him. Having done so, the mode of cooking him, so as to make a good dish of him, is as follows:

Many good husbands are spoiled in the cooking; some women go about as if their husbands were bladders, and blow them up; others keep them constantly in hot water, while others freeze them by conjugal coolness; some smother them in hatred, contention, and variance, and some keep them in pickle all their lives. These women always serve them up with hot tongue sauce. Now, it cannot be supposed that a husband will be tender and good if managed in this way; but they are, on the contrary, very delicious when managed as follows: Get a large jar of faithfulness (which every good wife has on hand), place your husband in it, and set him near the fire of conjugal love; let the fire be pretty hot; especially let it be clear, but above all let the heat be constant. Cover him with affection, kindness, and subjection, garnished with modest and becoming familiarity, and spice with pleasantry, and if you add kisses and other confectionaries, let them be accompanied with a sufficient portion of secrecy, mixed with prudence and moderation. We advise all good wives to try this recipe, and realize what an admirable dish a husband makes when properly cooked.

More next time.