Rabbits, worms and schmoos

The Feds have outlawed "chain letters" but they keep popping up in one form on another. Last week Montana's Insurance Commiss-ioner told us the con men are now putting chain letter scams on the Internet.

The idea is to convince the recipient that he should send the letter to others and send money to the one who sent it to him. And, if he mails copies to enough people he will get rich and so will everyone who passes it on; however, anyone who breaks the chain will suffer the most hideous curses such as, "A man in Philad-elphia broke the chain last month and within days lost his home, then suffered a stroke and couldn't attend his wife's funeral."

The chain letter is just one of hundreds of variations on the old pyramid scheme which probably goes back farther than Egyptian architecture. You'd think folks would learn "There aint no free lunch," but each generation produces a whole new flock for the fleecing.

Years ago over 700 people in 19 states gave David and Wilma Maddux four million dollars for the privilege of getting into the rabbit raising business?

The investors were told there was a fantastic market for both pelts and meat, and in no time at all the average rabbit rancher would be making $45,000 per year.

All those folks who lost their hard earned coin got small satisfaction over the sentencing of the Maddux couple to short prison terms.

A generation before, it was the chinchilla business. A person could start raising chinchillas then get a percentage from each of the other folks they talked into joining the chain.

In the early seventies, some fast talkers showed up in Kalispell and related a fascinating story about the future of the world being in the earthworm business. There were so many folks at the big sales meeting I could barely wiggle in. Those boys told us that their brand of earthworms ate what comes out of sewer plants and they ate it by the tons. The head man explained that when the worms weren't eatin' they were reproducing, yet "We can't raise these little critters fast enough to meet the demand from the big cities, let alone the towns like Kalispell."

They also said the resulting "odorless castings" were the finest fertilizer known to western civilization so there were lines of eager farmers waiting with cash in hand every time one of those worms had a bowel movement. With that amazing background of information, it sure didn't take long to see that anyone getting in on the ground floor of the worm business was, " . . gonna be rich beyond your fondest dreams."

Some people couldn't wait to mortgage home, car and underwear to buy their first herd of worms for breeding stock.

Many years ago Al Capp, the man who wrote the famous comic strip "Lil Abner" came up with "schmoos." They were adorable little creatures who loved to be eaten and they turned into whatever you were hungry for, fried chicken, ice cream, or steak. You didn't have to kill them. They just died of happiness to please others. Maybe that's what the next flock of suckers is waiting for.

Considering the rapid progress in sales techniques. I wouldn't bet a nickel against some slick talking promoter taking orders for schmoos within the year. Maybe some of the folks, who are still stuck with chinchillas, rabbits, worms, and diet schemes, can trade them in for a schmoo store. All they have to remember is, there's a new one born every minute.

I won't be falling for the shmoo deal, but sometimes it's hard to believe that worm plan didn't have a little merit.