Submitted by RHolt14709@aol.com to mail list and used here with permission.
Excerpts from the Interior Journal Pulaski Column Edited by Will C. Curd Somerset, Ky., Jan 12, 1874
The Old and New Year, Pulaski County, Her Present Condition and Future Prospects. How thankful should the people of our County be for past blessings, favors and continued prosperity. Notwithstanding the great scourge which visited our county during the year 1873, the cholera, yellow fever and other sickness and death, together with the great financial panic and prostration of business of all kinds in our large cities, we have been protected and provided for by that All Wise indulgent power, and the hand of affliction, pestilence and misfortune has fallen but lightly upon us. It is true, suing the old and constant every day phrase, times have been hard, which must with us be attributed more to the failure of stock trades and coal merchants in making sales than to any other cause and we have sufficient evidence to convince the public mind that this little financial pressure has seriously affected but few of our citizens. Business nowhere in the county is on the decline, but expanding and increasing, while the motto with our traders, merchants and enterprising farmers is, "onward and upward." We hear of but one class who appear to be dissatisfied with a home in Pulaski, those who are too indolent to work and till the soil, too proud to learn a trade and have ever been and we fear, will ever be strangers to prosperity, and we must here quote from the words of our friend Ben. Chesnut, who remarked, some years since, "that he had traveled over nearly all the States, but had never found a better and more prosperous home than Pulaski county, that he was satisfied that there was more in the man than there was in the land." Friend Ben lives upon what we call a poor farm out here but he works and a wagon going to his home after grass or grain never comes away empty, provided you take the money with you. The docket of our courts now show less litigation and fewer actions for debt than at any other time within the memory of our oldest citizens, and taking every thing into consideration, the history of the past year, 1873, must be remembered as an era of remarkable favor and prosperity to the citizens of Pulaski county. Our new Courthouse, one of the most magnificent buildings in the State, is now almost complete, which will cost the county from thirty-five to forty thousand dollars, and we hear of but little trouble in collecting the tax to liquidate the debt. A number of beautiful residences were built and as many old ones repainted and put in good order. Business houses erected and most of the old ones repaired, made larger, more convenient and more desirable to the merchant. Our coal merchants have been fortunate indeed. Out of the great number of boats not a single one lost by shipping or otherwise, and we are informed by the Louisville boys that they are satisfied of the fact that there are more goods sold in Somerset than in any other town of its size in Kentucky, and more prompt, reliable and enterprising merchants than those of our town and county cannot be found. The crops of last year were plentiful in this regards there can be no grounds for complaint. White but a short time before the close of the year glad tidings again reached our town and made our citizens jubilant over their success. The great Cincinnati Southern railway was certainly located through our county making Somerset a point and crossing the Cumberland at Point Isabel. The building of which has already commenced in Lincoln county and we will, ere many days, hear the sound of the pick and spade in our county. This railroad connecting the North with the South is destined to make ours one of the wealthiest counties in the State, because the rich and valuable mineral resources of our county are inexhaustible, saying nothing about the great value of our lands and the timber thereon from the giant oak to the beautiful white, yellow and spruce pines. All those favors and blessings have been bestowed upon us with but little effort on our part and must we now stand idle with our hands in our pockets and wait for others, if so, perchance we will be disappointed. We say to each and every one of our citizens, go to work with a determined resolution to succeed in whatever business, trade or profession you undertake. Commerce with the new year and take advantage of each progressive move made in your county, go to work and built upon your churches, and school houses. Go to work and exterminate whisky and all kinds of ardent spirits from Pulaski county. Go to work and educate your children, teach them morality and religion that they may after while build up a character for themselves and become useful members of society. Go to work and improve your farms, put them in good condition, then divide and sell that part which you cannot cultivate yourself to those who will soon come among you hunting houses near the railroad. Go to work and cultivate the tobacco plant. Our soil is adapted to it, and it will at all times yield you ready money. Go to work and plant to your orchards. Look at your neighbor county Russell. Her citizens realized from the products of the peach and apple crop alone in the year 1871, we believe something in excess of $60,000, and if Russell can do this without a railroad what may we do with one. We need more enterprise in our county and we must have it. We are in favor of our representatives passing the emigration bill and all we have to do as a means of inducing good people to come to our county is, to tell the truth, to represent in a proper manner our resources and advantages just as they exist. Tide in The Cumberland. The rains together with the melting of the snow of the past week caused a considerable rise in the Cumberland. Twenty-two heavily laden coal boats were shipped form the mines in our county on the 8th inst. To Nashville and other points below, belonging to the following firms: Jones & Newell 6; Owen Newell and Co., 6; Elliot & Ballew 6; Sutton 2 and Wm. Smith 2.
Last Update Saturday, 14-Apr-2018 17:06:43 CDT
County Coordinator
|
|
County Coordinator:
Gayle Triller
|
|
