THE INTER OCEAN
CURIOSITY SHOP
FOR THE YEAR 1883.
EDITED BY
WILLIAM P. JONES, A. M.
SEVENTH EDITION.
CHICAGO:
THE INTER OCEAN PUBLISHING COMPANY,
MADISON AND DEARBORN STREETS.
1891.
PREFACE
So well known now is this little annual cyclopedia of facts in agriculture, manufactures, commerce, politics, literature, science and the arts, that this sixth volume of Our Curiosity Shop needs no preface, except to make due acknowledgments to the many who have aided the editor with information, and to explain to such of its readers as are not yet fully advised of this fact, that these pages constitute but a part of the several columns of questions and answers published every week in the Daily, Semi-Weekly and Weekly editions of The Inter Ocean. To have all such answers for the year, one must be a regular subscriber to, and reader of, the paper. Hundreds of disputes, raised in political gatherings, in debating societies, in Sunday schools, in social and sporting circles, at the village postoffice when waiting for the mail, on railway cars, in club rooms, around pioneer camp-fires, and in all kinds of places are referred to The Inter Ocean for amicable settlement. When none of the several thousand books on the shelves of The Inter Ocean and the Chicago Public Library give response to such questions, original sources of information are appealed to; and, again therefore, the grateful acknowledgments of the editor of Our Curiosity Shop are very heartily made to the Heads of the several executive departments at Washington and many of their chiefs of bureaus, to State and city officials, to his obliging associates of The Inter Ocean staff, and to that daily companion and efficient assistant, his daughter.
Every answer given here is in response to at least one person enough interested to call it forth. Not one started up at the editor’s own bidding, but each of them might use the speech put into the mouth of King Philip of Pokanoket, when summoned to meet the General Court of New Plymouth: “You sent for me, and I am here.” So, being here in response to popular call, the editor hopes this volume will have as cordial a welcome as the public has accorded to its predecessor of last year, of which, already, the second edition is nearly exhausted, and to the still earlier volumes of 1878 to 1882, inclusive. It is now a matter of regret that the volumes of 1878 and 1879 were not stereotyped, as all succeeding volumes have been; since that fact renders it impossible for the Publishers to supply the repeated calls for the entire series of six volumes. Readers will take note that the first two are out of print, but all the others will be supplied as fast as called for.
The Editor.