Iowa Old Press
Cedar Rapids Gazette
Cedar Rapids, Linn co., Iowa
November 1, 1888
NEWS AROUND IOWA
A woman living a few miles north-east of Cedar Falls was suddenly
taken sick last Monday night and a neighboring woman went to wait
upon her and then went to another neighbor to request him to go
for the doctor. He declared that he would not go if a half dozen
women died.
Onawa had another narrow escape from a disastrous conflagration
Monday. Fire broke out about 2 o’clock in the restaurant of
Scartac Carmon and but for prompt action great loss would have
been sustained. This is the second narrow escape the town has had
in less than a week, and some of the citizens are becoming
suspicious.
Mrs. Leindecker of Keokuk, was arraigned in the supreme court of
Keokuk on Saturday and plead guilty to eight counts for selling
intoxicating liquor. She was fined fifty dollars and cost on each
count. Her husband is wanted for the same offense but the
officials did not succeed in finding him and it is presumed he is
out of the city.
Margaret Curran, of Sioux City, was before the commissioners of
insanity on Monday. Hamilton Curran, her husband, has appeared
before the commission three times on the same errand. He wants
Margaret put in the insane asylum. Twice she has been sent to the
asylum and then released because she did not need the care there.
This time the commissioners gave Curran a good “raking.”
Southwestern Iowa seems to be good enough for the Kansas farmer
who sent this note to the Indianola Advocate: “A subscriber
writing from Topeka, Kansas, speaks of that vicinity as “this
sun-burned desert,” and adds, “tell all Iowa people for
me to stay in Warren county. It is so dry in some of the western
counties they have to soak their hogs in wet sand over night, to
get them so they would hold slop the next day.”
Dick Hitchcock, a dissolute character, is in jail at Dubuque
charged with the crime of bigamy and starving his wife to death
in the town of Liberty, Wis. He has two wives living in various
parts of the county. The one he starved to death was from Dubuque
and was named Messersmith. When his inhuman treatment became
known to the people of Liberty, they drove from that place,
threatening to resort to lynch law if he ever returned. He fled
to Dubuque and was nabbed.
[transcribed by L.Z., August 2018]