The Press Scribe Visits the river towns of Tolu, and Weston

 

As the Press correspondent traveled the county getting ads and subscriptions for the paper he would share some of his journey’s adventures with the paper. They are interesting and fun to read, plus saving some of our past history along the way.

 

 

Crittenden Press, Feb. 23, 1881

Visit to Weston

I took the road, if road it can be called, for there is no rougher one in the county, to Weston in company with Cal Elder, who was visiting tobacco growers in the interest of his firm. I saw a five-mule team badly stuck in the mud and only one hhd of tobacco and assisted the teamster to unload and get out of that snap and the need of good roads again impressed me. 

 

Next we came to M. G. Gilbert's the boss tobacco farmer. Uncle Mike is getting old but he is a determined farmer and was busy at work. Then on to John Gilbert's another one of our good farmers, who raises tobacco with the many other crops, such as grasses, corn and wheat.

 

We soon arrived at the town of Weston, we were the guests of the Weston Hotel, kept by J. L. Hughes, and no one knows better how to care for the wants of the weary and hungry, his table is supplied with the very best of eatables, his rooms comfortable and neat, and beds with snowy linen and elder down. You at once feel that you are at home. Connected with this well kept Hotel is a good table, a grocery store where staple and fancy groceries, as well as the choicest wines and liquors, cigars and tobacco are kept.

 

Weston is a very unpretending little place, but is surprising at the amount of goods sold there, all lines of goods are very well represented and no complaint of dullness in trade, all the merchants assuring us that trade was very good. Our young friends the Haynes Bros. are going to increase their business by adding groceries to their neat drug store.

 

Otho Nunn and Son intend building a storehouse soon to accommodate their growing trade. They carry an assorted stock of general merchandise. Lambeth Bros. are doing a thriving business. Billy is going to Cincinnati soon and if you will read the Press when he gets back you will see what he has for sale.

 

John Nunn and Co., has a nice lot of hardware, saddlery, furniture, plow, and field seed for sale. They keep the best line of cooking stoves I have ever seen in the county, and they sell for prices to suit the times. The store is presided over by the junior member, Bob, that enterprising, modest and gentlemanly young man, will charm you and you will be pleased and sure to go again.

Crittenden Press, Oct. 29, 1903

Tolu  by the Press Scribe.

Tolu is a much larger and prettier town than I expected to see, and viewed from the hilltop approaching it presents a picturesque and very beautiful appearance. There are a number of handsome residences and some really pretentious cottages – Mr. Ed. Dowell’s and the one adjoining it for instance.

 

The town has a fine flouring mill, which manufactures the best grades of flour; there are several general merchandise stores and a number of other business houses, two hotels – the Minner House and the Weldon Hotel.

 

Judge Gordon and Mr. Grayot dined at the Weldon, and your correspondent did the same, and was a guest of the house until Friday morning.

 

While there I was treated most royally, both by landlord Weldon and wife, and their handsome and accomplished daughter, Miss Mima. Every attention is paid to the comfort of the guest’s at this hotel and I will wager any amount that in a cooking contest Mrs. Weldon will win the prize every time.

 

I thought we had a beverage called milk here in Marion, but the golden nectar they gave me at the Weldon dispelled that illusion. Any traveler wishing the real comforts of a home will surely find them at the Weldon Hotel, with a grand landlord thrown in for good measure.

 

About half-past 7 o’clock Friday morning Old Eagle and I took the back trail for Marion. The sun shone brightly, the air was sharp and frosty, and as Eagle hit the road with that long, heavy swing of his which whizzed the buggy along like a young tornado we soon rattled off the miles between Tolu and Marion.

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