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Hogs And Garbage.

North Branch Street And Vicinity Given Over To Them.

     “If you want to see the dirtest spot in Chicago,” said Mr. William Coakley, of No. 306 North Branch street, to a reporter of the Tribune yesterday, “you ought to go over to Goose Island. It is -that is, about where I live-the filthiest hole I ever saw. Talk about sanitary inspection! Have you ever seen a report from any of these volunteer inspectors of the Board of Health on any of the streets over there. No you haven’t, and it’s a burning shame.”

     The inhabited sections of North Branch and Cherry streets lie south of Division street, and about midway between the two arms of the river which bound this piece of land. They are devoted to small dwellings, miserable shanties, lager-beer saloons, and pig-stys. The latter largely predominate.

     The streets are in horrible condition, the gutters along Cherry street, being filled with stagnent water and the refuse of the domestic animals. These thoroughfares are the runways for hogs and cows, and the alleys the bottomless barnyards of the neighborhood, it was fortunate that the reporter went at such a dry season, no doubt, for there is no telling what would have been his fate had the ground been submerged by recent rains. It is related by one of the most trustworthy and reliable citizens of North Branch street-and he says he will make his affidavit covering the case if anybody wants it- that a horse sunk to his shoulders in the filth of the alley behind the speakers house last spring, and the animal died before it could be rescued.

     ‘Over yonder,” said Mr. Coakley, pointing across the road and toward the river, “the residents are all squatters.” They pay no taxes, and they outrage the senses of all the decent people of the neighborhood.” The point indicated is occupied by a few tumble-down shanties of the meanest description, such as would disgrace the lowest peasant. They haven’t the first claim to decency. “Now continued the speaker, a tidy, respectable, intelligent man, “those people over there make life a burdon for us. What is their occupation! They-that is the O’Briens-raise hogs in the summer. They have alot of hogs, and these hogs just run the neighborhood. They come and go at their own sweet will. They go down my side alley there, and on many a night I have had to get up and turn them out of my cellar. They roam through the alley’s, carring and depositing their filth; They lie around our sidewalks; they stop the gutters. They do just as they please, and we are powerless.

     These animals are fed on garbage, it is a fact sir, that a West Side garbage-wagon dumps its loads three times a day over there on O’Brien’s hog-yard. They come about 5 o’clock in the morning, again at noon, and then about 5 o’clock in the afternoon. They are careful, you see, to not run afoul of any of the residents here. This was the program up to a week ago. Then the outrage had grown so unbearable that a lot of the neighbors went for the two rascals, and would have killed them, I guess, had I not interfered. The people were incensed. The same thing had long been done by one scavenger until he was chased out with a pitchfork, and then these two came together. Why, they brought loads of rotten eggs,-yes, loads of em,-and dumped ’em right over there on the ground. Then they’d bring rotten fish, and rotten oysters, and rotten cabbage, and all the garbage they could gather up. And down it would go on that lot. The result was the flies were so thick and the stench so horrible that we could hardly live there. Billions of flies filled the air, and we’d have to hold our noses whenever we came home.

     Who are these scavengers, Why, they are two fellows hired by the city to collect garbage and rotten articles and take them out beyond city limits. These people over here, who keep the hogs, hired them to bring the stinking, putrefying messes here for the hogs.

     “Then there are others about here who keep hogs just the same as the O’Briens do. There’s a man over on Cherry street-No. 22, I believe-who goes about in various parts of the city gathering garbage, which he dumps on the ground alongside his premises, and thereby poisons the air. This filth is placed there for the hogs to devour. He is a private scavenger. Up the other way, north, is another hog-raiser, who pursues the same vocation.

     “Has anything ever been said to the Health officers. Well, I should remark that I complained to Commissioner De Wolf and he said he’d “see to it.” That’s all the good it did. He never bothered himself any further. If we’d go there and insist on something being done, ten to one he’d order us out of his office. That’s the kind of man he is. Then it don’t do any good to go to the Alderman, I’m a Republican, and he’s a Democrat, and on our side we get no show.

     The statement of those who live in the vicinity is that only the fear of bodily injury from outraged citizens is what keeps the scavengers from further dumping their rotten mess here.

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