Stories of Interest from the Hickman Courier from September 8, 1876
• The businessmen, farmers and tobacco growers wished that a tobacco market be established in Hickman, or immediate vicinity, to regain the market as a “chief product” of the region.
• Pap White, “the old saddler,” relocated his business establishment from Hickman to Fulton.
• The Hickman Methodist Choir planned a concert at city hall on September 11th for the benefit of the Methodist Sunday School Library.
• The pastors in Hickman, after requesting assistance for a poor widow with several children, reported that they were able to bestow the woman “some substantial assistance.”
• The public school in Hickman opened on September 4th. In sparsely populated districts in the county, there was a “general cry of failure.”
• The St. Thomas Academy opened in Hickman on September 1st.
• The Hickman City Council voted to rebuild the West Hickman levee.
• C. T. Allen, Democratic Party Elector, and E. W. Bagby, Republican Party Elector, will address the citizens of Hickman on September 15th.
• Senator Henry A. Tyler addressed the Tilden and Hendrick Reform Club on September 4th which was “mainly addressed to the colored voters” to “disabuse their minds” that the “Democrats were seeking to re-enslave them of certain privileges they now enjoy.” His brief speech had a “decidedly favorable effect.”
• The Fulton County Democratic Convention was scheduled to meet on September 11th at the county courthouse to address the upcoming First Congressional District Convention in Paducah on September 27th.
• Oscar Turner, candidate for Congress, gave a speech at Jordan on September 6th. Turner spoke for over two hours on national politics and how politicians he termed “the Paducah Ring” were in a “conspiracy to defraud the people” and defame him. Henry A. Tyler also addressed the crowd to defend his call for a county convention as the Chairman of the Fulton County Committee. He explained that it was not aimed at Turner but to allow other candidates to present their case to the people on “fair and equal grounds.”
• Anti-convention Democrats of the First District claimed that the “history of conventions in this District” has a “long line of frauds, wrongs, trickery, and corruption” and there was “no necessity for a Convention.”
• The Paducah Tri-Weekly Republican began publication and was promoted as a “campaign paper in the interest of the Republican Pary of the District.” It was edited by T. J. Pickett.
• The Thorn Dramatic Troup and the Dresden (Tennessee) Band committed to putting on a play and furnishing music for the Fulton County Fair.
• Plans were being made for another big barbeque on Mud Creek, and that speeches from Democratic Party representatives would be “made in the interest of the colored citizens of county” which would declare the “facts and truths” of the next election.
• John A. McConnell, of Fulton County, married Ida D. Smith, of Memphis, Tennessee, married August 31st at the residence of C. J. Rogers in Obion County, Tennessee.