FromDays Gone By June 16,1915

June 16, 1915.

    It's interesting to know what was going on in this country in 1915, the things that people were doing and who are doing them, and why.

    Eighty-eight million gallons of whiskey was made. Fifteen billion cigarettes, thirty-two million pounds of snuff, two hundred twenty million pounds of smoking tobacco and eight and a half billion cigars. Half a billion packages of chewing gum was manufactured.

    Twenty thousand moving picture theaters paid $25,000,000 for films and 11,000,000 persons saw the moving pictures. Ten billion copies of newspapers were printed. One hundred and seventy thousand clergymen preached in 220,000 churches and congregations of all denominations numbered 40,000,000.

    Two signs of increasing prosperity were noted. One is an increase in the earnings of railroads and the other is in the very great improvement in the steel business. When the steel business is prosperous the country is, as a rule, prosperous. Then building of all kinds is going on, showing that the people have money and are confident that business is on a firm foundation.

    And when the railroads are prosperous there is no doubt that business is booming, since people are traveling, crops are good, the merchants are buying freely and the industries are running full time with orders far ahead.

    Of course the steel mills haven't reached their minimum output, nor do the railroads find use for all of their cars, but they have use for more than they did a month or two before and they expect to have use for all of them in the near future.

    Prosperity may come slower in the South than in other parts of the country, though there isn't a very great deal to complain of now. It will come slower because if the war continues it is going to be difficult to find a market at a profitable price for the South's chief crop. Still, because the crop this year will be smaller than was that of last year, the price may so advance that the South will have as much prosperity as any other section. There was a general feeling, however, that better times were close ahead and that they will continue to improve.