Stories of Interest from the Hickman Courier from September 16, 1871
• The Fulton County Fair was set to run from September 26th to September 30th.
• The Steamer Illinois was making semi-weekly voyages between Cairo and Hickman with “considerable freight” and was expected to make daily trips to Hickman during the Fulton County Fair.
• Frank Miller declared that his beer garden near Hickman would have music and dancing each night during the County Fair.
• Downpours occurred on September 13th and 14th at Hickman. Those being the first significant rains in many weeks.
• The Hickman City Council met on September 14th and enacted an ordinance that every day, except Sundays, shall be market days and open from daylight to 10 a.m. and the evening market to commence from 4:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. The Council also enacted a Boarding House Ordinance, in which boarding houses in the city were ordered to pay a tax of ten dollars. The city judge’s salary was set at $62.50 per quarter.
• The Hickman Courier reports “trade is improving in Hickman” and local physicians pronounced the health of the community “distressingly” good.
• Gid Garret and Tom Jones planned to open an auction house in Hickman on October 7th.
• The Masonic Lodge in Hickman was considered to be “working more efficiently and successfully now than for many years.”
• An immense number of newly made staves covered nearly a quarter of a mile of the riverfront near Hickman.
• The new Hickman City Market House opened on September 11th.
• Contractors began building a bridge over the Bayou de Chien River near Hickman.
• Some farmers in Fulton County desire to organize a County Blood Horse Association.
• Some citizens are anxious for a free school to open in the district.
• The General Teacher’s Institute of the First Congressional District planned to meet on September 25th at the U. S. Courthouse in Paducah. The meeting would last six days. P. A. Towne of Louisville will present and assist in conducting the Institute.
• The Circuit Court adjourned on September 13th completing “considerable business” and settling many old cases.
• James Daniel Pollock, infant son of J. H. and Sarah Pollock, died on September 13th at age 3 years and 13 days.
• Judge A. R. Boon delivered a temperance speech at Kirk School House on September 9th. He enrolled 15 new members to the lodge.
• Some citizens of West Hickman wish to raise the level of the streets in the community since fencing of private property along the roads had caused flooding issues.
• A band of thieves was reported stealing horses and mules in the region.
• The Mayfield Democrat reported that over 10,000 people were expected in Mayfield for the Pioneer’s Barbeque on September 22nd.
• F. E. Long of Mayfield reportedly shipped 3,180 chickens to New Orleans, which was the second such shipment he made this season.
• The Paducah Kentuckian reports J. M. Bigger, John W. Blue and John Martin will likely become candidates for Congress in the district later this year.
• Columbus passed three resolutions to secure construction of the Elizabethtown & Paducah Railroad into the city.
• The citizens of Union City organized committees to take subscriptions of stock and investment pledges for construction of a branch of the Holly Springs, Brownville and Ohio Railroad.
• W. B. Bate was to deliver an address to the Agricultural Association of West Tennessee and Southwest Kentucky at Union City next week.
• The Union City Courier reported that the goober pea district of Tennessee might have a record crop this year.
• Discussions on constructing a narrow gauge railroad from Hickman to Troy continued at Hickman. The proposed track would connect to the New Orleans & Paducah Railroad and the New Orleans & Louisville Railroad at Troy, Tennessee. The expected cost would be around $7,000 a mile of which half of the amount would need to be raised.
• Farmers from Ballard County state the corn and tobacco crops are the best that they have seen in many years.
Jackson Purchase Historical Society