1884

G. W. Williams & Company, of the Ossian creamery, have completed a large hog feeding building, 42' X 240' . They have a hundred brood sows of Jersey Red breed in steam heated farrowing pens. The basement contains facilities for fattening 1300 chickens and turkeys. It was constructed by W. H. Oxley.

The following is an editorial from the Decorah Republican titled, A word with Ossian: "Decorah township has voted to tax itself to the extent of $41,000 to secure the extension of the Burlington, Cedar Rapids & Northern railroad.

It is not to Decorah only, but to some other objective point of more importance. As the surveys are made, Ossian is on the line of the extension. It will be convenient to make a station    at Ossian, but it is not necessary    to do so.    It    cannot be that the people of    Decorah are mistaken in calculating the benefits    to be derived from a choice of routes to the great markets. If they are not them all the arguments which have induced Decorah to vote a five percent will apply with equal force in favor    of a three percent tax in Military    township.    It    will be passing strange if the    business men of Ossian cannot in a    brief time    make such an investment pay a round percent of profit. We believe it is possible for it to make Ossian unquestionably second only to Decorah in the county, and equal to any of the villages or incorporated towns in northeastern Iowa. We can see no reason why it should not rival Postville, for certainly the country surrounding it is able to support a town of that size.

Decorah prefers that Ossian shall reap all the benefit it can from this extension. It takes the big end of the load, and asks only a minimum of tax aid. While a five percent tax is voted in Decorah, only three percent is desired from Military township. Will they give it?

If not, then the required sum must be sought elsewhere. If it can be secured without injury to Ossian and its business men, the disposition will be to do that. But the amount will be raised; and if Ossian desires not to assist, the probabilities are that the other means will be detrimental to that place.

We do not say it as a menace. Indeed, we have tried to make the expression in a form that shall be as nearly devoid of a threat as possible; and if it sounds at all like one, it is not so intended, but because the statement of a simple truth conveys an unpleasant fact. It will be impossible to place a station anywhere near Ossian--east or north—without seriously injuring the business of the town more each year than the amount involved in the three percent tax.

This intimation gives the exact aspect of the case. The road is going through. Ossian can make or lose by the operation. Decorah prefers that she shall gain; but the decision is for her own people to make."

Shortly after this editorial, the village of Frankville offered to assess their citizens to subsidize construction of the Burlington, Cedar Rapids & Northern railroad, providing the route be extended through their town. Upon receiving this information in Ossian, another vote was scheduled for January 18, 1884. This election resulted in a subsidy of a 2-1/2 % tax upon the citizens of Military township. The vote was 191 for and 132 against. The route through Ossian was now assured. The surveyors laid the route of the rail bed to enter Ossian south of the C. M. & St. Paul tracks as far as the elevator where the lines crossed and the Burlington rails passed north of the Milwaukee through town.

We continue with excerpts from the Beacon.

Mr. N. Limbeck complains that the Burlington tracks as surveyed will run within 30 feet of his front door.

Good butter is now 20¢ a pound; eggs 20¢ a dozen; and dry wood brings $4 a cord.

Schoonmaker & Co. have, in the past year, shipped 10,076 hogs, 1776 head of cattle and 8 cars of horses from Ossian. What town in northeastern Iowa makes a better showing. Let Calmar beware: we may absorb them!

Cressy & Lamb will open a new mercantile store. Is this the beginning of a