Black Friday back then

[In the 1880s] Armour and Company sold meat to all comers at whatever price it took to gain a foothold in the market. A butcher in Akron, Ohio ruefully described it:

‘Upon opening these markets they were supplied in enormous quantities with the best the country produced in everything that was made out of meats and all the finest appliances of the markets of our largest cities. These markets were advertised throughly throughout the city to sell at never-before-heard-of prices. Long before they opened at 6 a.m. people were waiting for the doors to open. After they commenced business the crowd seemed to grow with each passing hours until the markets would not contain the people, and the waiting crowds on the sidewalks almost, if not entirely, obstructed travel. So great was the crowd that it was necessary to call policeman to preserve order and permit travel.’

From William Cronon’s Nature’s Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West