The Rents
Today's puzzler is historic, brought to us by an old book of trivia sent in from a listener years ago.
Here it is.
In Ireland in the 1800s, it was common for peasants to rent the land they lived on from landlords. And, as is often the case, rents would get out of hand and the rent collectors became very unpopular fellows.
One particular rental agent was collecting taxes for the Earl of Erne in County Mayo, and this land agent ignored the peasants' pleas for more reasonable rents during a time when things were really rough. The peasants were so poor, they had nothing at all to spare. But he insisted on collecting these outrageously high rents anyway for the Earl.
So, one morning he awoke to find that he was apparently invisible to the town folk. His servants had left him. The shops in town would not wait on him. The blacksmith would not see his horse. The mailman didn't bring his mail, and most importantly, he could get no one to harvest his crops. So he called in the army. He asked for 50 laborers and an escort of 2000 soldiers to come to his assistance because he was fearful of some kind of civil unrest.
So, when the small army arrived in the town, they found there was no transportation available at the train station. All the shops and pubs in town were suddenly closed and out of everything. So, the army walked 15 miles to the farm and then ate him out of his house and home while harvesting the crops. Then he found he could not sell the crops that were left over. No one in town would buy the crops.
Other than these petty annoyances, the man never came to any harm, and in fact lived to a ripe old age. He lived long enough, in fact, to see his name become a household word.
What was his name?
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