Stories of Interest from the Hickman Courier from July 21, 1876
- The Hickman City Council met on July 18thto withdraw charges against the city’s wharfmaster after charges against him were proven unjust. An order was issued by the Council to show that $82.50 was collected, and fully accounted for, by the wharfmaster. A resolution was passed suggesting the “local editor of the Hickman Courier that good taste should restrain him from hazarding unsolicited advice.” The Council also passed a motion to elect a Councilman to replace J. H. Plant, who resigned. William A. Brevard, R. M. Methany and W. L. McCutchen were nominated, and Metheny was elected on the fourth ballot. City Marshal J. W. Cole was paid $30 for one month’s salary.
- Boys bathing in the river, inside the City of Hickman’s corporate limits, were to be arrested and fined.
- The Hickman Steam Furniture Factory commenced running full-time after undergoing thorough rehauling and the placement of new machinery.
- The telegraph companies were establishing telegraphic money order offices for general money transfers and some local businessmen moved to have an office established in Hickman.
- Sheriff B. R. Walker sold off 3,798 acres of land to collect back taxes at the Fulton County Courthouse on July 20th.
- Preston Fortune, of Hickman, relocated to New Grand Chain, Illinois to establish a drug store.
- Reuben Levi, of Hickman, went on an extended trip to the east coast to celebrate the Centennial.
- A firm at Sassafras Ridge planned to construct a poultry farm on 20 acres near town.
- Farm hands were still in demand in Fulton County to harvest the crops. The editor of the Hickman Courierobserved that “many able-bodied men, white and colored, idling about town complaining of hard times and nothing to do … and that’s what’s the matter with this country.”
- The new steamer, E. Leewas scheduled to take an excursion party from Cairo to Hickman in the upcoming days.
- T. Allen, Democratic Elector for the First Congressional District, was to address the people of Hickman on July 28thand Clinton on the 29th.
- The formation of Clint Randle Clubs, which pledged to support Randle for Congress, was reported growing and causing concerns with other candidates.
- Several “old citizens” in Fulton County called for the organization of a Tilden Reform Club and a meeting was called for on July 28that the Fulton County Courthouse. The club planned to distribute “public documents for the general information of the people and to do any and everything to further the cause of thorough reform and honest government.”
- The editor of the Hickman Courierstated that the Democratic candidates for Congress in the First District were almost evenly divided between Oscar Turner and A. R. Boon. He noted that his paper could “support either.”
- Popular enthusiasm appeared to be growing for Presidential candidate Samuel Tilden and his running mate Thomas A. Hendricks in the district.
- Unsubstantiated report from Fulton declared that a resident nearby a schoolhouse in the country poisoned apples in his orchard by which a child was killed.
- The Paducah Newsreported that a string of horse thefts in the Jackson Purchase and “if several of them [horse thieves] could be caught and given the benefit of a strong rope and a short shrift, it would have a tendency to put a stop to the operations of the gang.”
- There was a reported outbreak of the “flux” in Paducah.
- Tom Burgess, the man who stole Alfred Trimble’s buggy in Paducah, was arrested in Columbus on the charge of grand larceny.
- Emerson Etheridge was considering on canvassing Tennessee for Republican presidential candidate Rutherford B. Hayes and his running mate William A. Wheeler.
- Tyler & Harness Furniture Company have closed their store at Jackson, Tennessee.
- Ervin Anderson, one of the oldest citizens of Graves County, died at Mayfield the week prior.