NATURAL GAS AT FULTON

The Cortland Democrat, Friday, January 6, 1888.

NATURAL GAS AT FULTON.

A Vein Struck This Morning—A Flame Sixty Feet High Burning.

   FULTON, Jan. 3.—At 8 o'clock this morning a vein of gas was struck on the well on the Van Buren farm, three miles down the river, and the stove in the drill room set the gas on fire. The flame rose to a height of sixty feet, and burned the building over the well. The vein was struck at a depth of 1,730 feet, and after the drill had passed through 830 feet of Trenton rock.

   George Sawyer and George Clark were working at the drill, and they barely escaped with their lives, their hair being singed and their bodies seriously burned. An iron clamp over the drill was blown clear over the roof of the building.

   The escaping gas made a noise that was heard a mile away. There are 1,680 feet of rope and a drill in the well. An iron plate has been placed over the hole but even these obstructions do not prevent the gas escaping with such force as to give a flame thirty feet in height.

From Everywhere.

   Oneonta is to have a street railroad.

   Oxford has several cases of diphtheria.

   Diphtheria is very prevalent in Utica.

   The New York elevated railways last year carried 435,000 passengers daily.

   The New York Herald asserts that coal could be sold at a profit in that city for $3.50 a ton.

   The Irish World says Brooklyn's saloons receive nearly $20,000,000 yearly from the sale of liquors.

   New York City’s municipal expenses are $5,125 an hour. No wonder its local elections are exciting.

   Diphtheria has been doing deadly work in Schoharie and vicinity recently, and there have been twenty-eight fatal cases.

   The new silver vault in the treasury department is finished. It has a capacity of 100,000,000 standard silver dollars.

   One Trumansburg produce dealer paid out over $50,000 cash to farmers in that vicinity in the month of November.

   The Great Eastern, which originally cost $2,500,000, and was sold a year ago for $135,000, has again been sold at auction in Liverpool for $100,000.

   The potato crop of the United States this year is estimated at 134,000,000 bushels, grown on 2,300,000 acres, about 30,000,000 bushels less than last year and the smallest crop in eight or ten years.

   Samuel Spencer, who has just been made President of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad at a salary of $25,000 a year, was a rodman earning a scant salary only a few years ago. He is not yet 40 years old.

Page Two/Editorials.

   The selection of Henry K. Low to be president pro tem and John S. Kenyon to be clerk of the [New York State] Senate, is another victory for Platt. How long will it be before Platt will have the scalps of all the decent men in the party dangling at his belt?

   The selection of Fremont Cole for Speaker of the Assembly by a vote of 51 to 19, shows pretty conclusively that Tom Platt has the republican party in this state by the neck and proposes to handle it as he chooses. Husted is a clever politician, but he couldn't beat Platt's machine.

   That most excellent crank, John I. Platt of Duchess County, offered resolutions in the republican Assembly caucus opposing the confirmation of the appointment of L. Q. C. Lamar to the Supreme bench of the United States. The resolutions were very bitter and denounce Lamar for having been engaged in the rebellion. They were passed. The resolutions contain no reference to John S. Mosby, the guerrilla, who was appointed to high offices by a republican president and confirmed by a republican Senate. It is true, Mr. Lamar was a rebel and is now a democrat, while Mr. Mosby was a rebel guerrilla and is now a republican. During the war, the former used such means to succeed as has always been recognized in honorable warfare, while Mosby used any and every means at hand whether honorable or dishonorable to win. No one can for one moment doubt the ability or the integrity of Mr. Lamar. He was an honorable man in time of war and he is reputed to be an honorable man in times of peace. If he had joined the party owned and controlled in this state by Tom Platt, even the Dutchess county crank, Mr. John I. Platt, would undoubtedly have been singing his praise instead of offering resolutions of censure, at the behest of his saintly master, whose legal place of residence is yet to be judicially determined.

Notice of Election.

   The annual meeting of the stockholders of the Cortland Top & Rail Co., Limited, for the election of directors for the ensuing year, and the transaction of such other business as may be brought before the meeting, will be held at the office of said company at No. 130 Elm street, Cortland, N. Y., on the 10th day of January, 1888, at 9 o'clock P. M.

   Dated Cortland, N. Y., Dec.15, 1887. IRVING H. PALMER, Secretary.

Married.

   BRIGGS—COUNCILMAN-At the home of the bride's parents in Nanticoke, by Rev. J. K. Warner, December 21st, 1887. Mr. Albert F. Briggs of Cincinnatus, N. Y., and Miss Bertha Councilman, of Nanticoke, N. Y.