As most of those he approached knew him to be reliable, he had no difficulty in securing a little over 100 subscriptions of the kind desired; then he went among the merchants of the town and contracted for a sufficient amount of advertising to pay the cost of printing the bulletin, leaving him the entire amount received for publication of the “for rent” and other notices as clear profit.
He faithfully distributed the bulletins from house to house, in hotels, reading rooms, and barber shops. This gave him a start. He continued to solicit advertisements and worked faithfully at his little publication which gave returns sufficient to make his living.
PLAN No. 59. MAKING HENS LAY IN WINTER
That grasshoppers, which have been the scourge of many sections of the country for many years, can really be made to serve a useful purpose, and so utilized as to pay at least a part of the damage they do, was proven by the experience of a Kansan woman who had found great difficulty in making her hens lay during the winter months.
The grasshopper pest had been unusually active in her part of the country that year, having destroyed practically every growing thing within reach, and her hens were about the only available source of revenue that remained. But how to feed them was the problem she could not solve.
Suddenly she became impressed with the fact that the hated grasshopper was an ideal chicken food and tonic, and as other foods and tonics were too expensive for her slender purse, she decided upon laying in a good supply of grasshoppers—but how? They must first be caught.
She bought a piece of screen wire 4 feet wide by 20 feet long, bent it lengthwise in a circular form, and fastened the edges with large-size hooks and eyes, with circular doors, working on a single hinge, at each end, fitting the edges closely. She then constructed a frame of 4-inch pine sheathing, 4 feet high and 20 feet long, back of the trap, and covered it with white oilcloth, slanting it in such a position that when the grasshoppers struck the oilcloth they would slip down into the trap. These they carried out into the wheat field one evening in August, placed them in position, and started driving the swarms of grasshoppers toward the pitfall thus prepared for them. The white oilcloth shield proved a great attraction for the hoppers, and in forty-five minutes they had driven four bushels of the insects into the trap. Beneath this they placed a formaldehyde generator, covered the trap with muslin made to fit over it, and soon had it full of dead grasshoppers. These they carried to the barn loft, spread them out to dry, and put them away in sacks. Altogether they got over eighty bushels of dried hoppers, and those hens laid that winter as they had never laid before.
PLAN No. 60. MAKING POLISHING CLOTHS
A polishing cloth would seem an insignificant thing in itself, and it is, but often it is the little things that make good profit and a man in a western city, who understood this fact, made thousands of dollars by giving it practical application.
He bought a bolt of outing flannel of the cheaper grade, and from this he cut a few hundred small pieces of the proper size for samples. These he immersed in a solution which he had made, as follows: One-half pound of castile soap, shaved fine and melted to a jelly. When thoroughly dissolved, he added a gallon of soft water and 4 ounces of powdered pumice stone, coloring it with tincture of red analine. This gave him a polishing cloth that worked wonders with silverware, brass and other bright metals, imparting to them a lustre that but few of the high-priced polishes can give, and doing away with the mussy method of using a powder with an ordinary cloth.