Items of Interest October 17, 1914 Issue

Items of Interest

The parcel post service between the producers in the rural communities and the consumers in the cities has been declared to be a great success by the post-office department, and its rapid extension, until it shall embrace all of the most important urban centers of the country, has been determined upon. Emphasis is given the growing importance of this service by the recent announcement that several cities have been added to the list of twelve originally set apart to receive the service. Ten of these cities were designated for the first experiments last March, and two others were added in July. "Complete reports from the ten cities first chosen have been received," said an official of the department, "and the postmaster-general regards them as encouraging in the highest degree. It is the belief of the postal authorities that the service has proved so successful that its future is assured, and that gradual steps should now be taken for its expansion throughout the country."

The ten cities set aside experimentally were Washington, D. C., St. Louis, Boston, Lynn, Mass., San Francisco, Atlanta, Birmingham, Baltimore, Rock Island, Ill., La Crosse, Wis. The two cities added in July were Louisville and Cincinnati. The newly designated cities, in which the service began on Oct. 1, are Chicago, Brooklyn, Philadelphia, Indianapolis, Denver, Seattle, Portland, Ore., Cleveland, New Orleans, Austin, Providence, Nashville, Los Angeles, and Hartford, Postmasters of the smaller towns in contiguous farming areas are to prepare lists of farmers and others who wish to sell their products direct to the city buyers by way of the parcel post. These lists are to be forwarded to the postmasters of the large cities, who will have them printed for general distribution by their letter-carriers, going into every home in those cities.

Trustees of the Rockefeller foundation have announced the inauguration of an investigation into the problem of industrial relations. The root of the social disorder which the foundation acknowledges exists today, is, it is stated, to be investigated systematically and throughly. It will be sought to disclose the cause of the destructive tendencies between capital and labor and to "find means of promoting harmonious, united action." The foundation says in part: "The Rockefeller foundation is deliberately attempting to grapple with what it believes to be the most complicated and at the same time the most urgent question of modern times. The foundation is not baffled by the knowledge that the task has seemed hitherto well-nigh hopeless. It is hoped that an investigation started on the scale of which the foundation is capable, and impartially pursued, will gradually win for itself the cooperation not alone of employers and workingmen of industrial organizations, of individuals and institutions interested in social reform, but also of universities and governments throughout the world." The foundation is capitalized at one hundred million dollars.

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