PIONEER MARKETING
Suppose you had just one dollar to spend, and but one opportunity insix months to spend it in a town seventy miles away, and that what you bought would have to come by an ox team requiring three or four days to make the journey, what would you buy with that dollar?
Charley Anderson, born in 1842, says that was the big question confronting the Macon county settlers along in the fifties when he was a boy living on a plantation north of the place where Macon is.
"Money was fearfully scarce then," Mr. Anderson said, "and when a family got hold of a dollar or two they would sit up nights figuring what they needed most so as to be ready when the covered wagon hit the trail to the market.
"Men working in the fields or forests were glad to get 25 cents for a day's labor. Most of the planters paid in things they raised. What trappers caught was legal tender. So was honey, venison and knitted articles. The circuit rider was glad to get these things for his services.
"About twice a year the oxen were yoked to a large covered wagon, and one of the settlers would drive to Quincy for supplies, traveling along the trail some Miles north of federal highway No. 36.
"This wagon, hauled by four or six oxen, would bring home the supplies by the people of a community extending many miles. The word wouId be passed out that the wagon would start on a certain date and the the people would come in with their commissions for the driver, handing him little hoards of cash and a list of what they wanted. The returning wagon would bring what looked like a miniature drygoods and grocery store.
"Among the goods were always a barrel of liquor and some jugs of the same-brandy generally. There was some of it in nearly every household. It was regarded as a necessary family medicine. In those carefree days, with no officers to worry you, I don't remember that I ever saw a tipsy person.
"Most everybody would have on his list, 'be sure to get me a new almanac.' It was the trusted weather forecaster of the period, with its signs of the zodiac, hints on health and funny stories. No home was enhappy without it. The almanac's circulation was way beyond that of today's'best seller.' In every cabin you would find one, new or old, and a Bible. In manv other cases these two publications formed most of the pioneer's reading.
"The man who drove the covered wagon carried in the wagon a sack containing the money given him by the people. He had with him a gun, but that was for the game he might run across. I never heard of a driver being robbed.
"Sugar, coffee, salt, ammunition, groceries, boots and shoes, calico lawns, quinine, maybe a few pieces of inexpensive jewelry, several boxess of striped candy and candy 'kisses' if it was near Christmas, and some liquor were the principal supplies ordered. A young Scottish woman 'wrote on her list, 'The Lassies of the Highlands,' a work having some note at the time. The driver said he tried every grocery store in town, but none of them had that sort of 'lasses.
"The driver put in the greater part of his day in Quincy as purchasing agent and in seeing the sights of the city.
"But few of the settlers had made the journey, as seventy miles over a rough trail was a formidable distance then, to say nothing of the hazards of swollen streams. So when the driver got back with his load all would gather about the big wagon while he handed out the goods, all carefully marked as on a Christmas tree, and told of his wonderful adventures on his trip to fairyland.
"The driver of the supply wagon became an important personage. He had traveled; had not only seen the great river, but had actually crossed it. He could talk with easy familiarity about the tall-stacked steamers running the upper river, and brag about the speaking acquaintances he had with Some members of the crews.
"It was worthwhile to listen to a man like that. No question stumped him-none we could ask.
"About the only sickness in those days was chills and 'ager.' But by and by a doctor moved into the neighborhood and talked about a lot of new-fangled diseases. Then we all had 'em."