USA > Kansas > Reno County > History of Reno County, Kansas; its people, industries and institutions, Vol I > Part 31
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Mayor Fontron was one of the youngest men ever elected to this office. perhaps the youngest. He was raised in Reno county and received his early education in the county schools, later graduating from the city high school. He was a successful business man and was popular in the election and made the city a very fine mayor. The following offices were appointed 'by the mayor and confirmed by the council to act for the ensuing year : City attorney, W. F. Jones : police judge. J. M. Jordan : city clerk. Edward Metz; chief of police, E. M. Davis. This council, like its predecessor, was largely engaged in internal improvements in all parts of the city not before improved ; rebuilding some of the smaller bridges of the city and in the general routine of commission work, such as admitting new additions to the city, letting sprinkling contracts, etc. This commission also established the "White Way" on Main street, a system of a cluster of lights on stand- ards, one cluster in each block on each side of the street in place of the old swinging arc lights in the center of the street. This added greatly to the appearance of Main street at night. It may be said that Hutchinson was among the first cities of the state to put in these kind of street lights.
This commission passed the first ordinance for the parking of antomo- biles on Main street. It will be recalled that one of the things the early councils had to contend with, was the hitching of teams on Main street. However, the commission that handled the automobile parking matter did (23)
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not have as serious a time as its predecessor did in dealing with the hitch- ing-post question. But the question was one that recurred so often that the plan of parking now in use was devised by this commission and it also passed speed regulation ordinances, which, however, are not quite as much honored in the breach as in the observance of the ordinance by the automobiles, yet a sufficiently large number of violations are found every clay and automobile accidents are so common, because of the great number of machines, that it perhaps would be about as well for the commission to raise the limit of speed and save having so many violations of its ordi- nances, as there are but few instances when automobiles are driven on the streets strictly in accordance with the ordinance governing the speed of machines on the streets of the city. This commission also adopted the policy of its predecessors and continued the improvement of the city, putting a sidewalk and curbing where desired by property owners and where it would add to the improvement of the city.
The election of April 7. 1914, was not as warmly contested as the previous elections. F. W. Cook and L. S. Davis were the candidates for mayor. Cook received 3.102 votes and Davis 2,855 votes. R. H. Flinn was elected commissioner of parks and John F. Smith, commissioner of public utilities. George Hern was appointed city marshal and Edward Metz continued as city clerk.
In the election held on April 12, 1915, there were two candidates for mayor, F. W. Cook and J. P. Harsha. Cook received 2,977 votes in the election and Harsha, 2,946 votes. G. W. Winans was continued as com- missioner of finance and J. E. Buskirk, street commissioner. In the ap- pointive offices, Walter Jones was continued as city attorney: George W. Hern as city marshal. This council had the question of "Sunday closing" to contend with. Some wanted all show places closed on Sunday. The show people resented being singled out and began a campaign to close all business houses. In the movement many of the business firms joined, as most of them wanted to close and they desired an ordinance that would force their competitors who did not want to close, to conform to the rule. The result of the controversy was a "referendum" vote. The Sunday-closing ordinance in the "referendum" vote lost, by a vote of 2,920 against the ordinance to 2,430 for the ordinance.
In the election of 1916, Doctor Cook was opposed by A. C. Gleadall. The latter won, receiving 2.854 votes to Cook's 2.232. For commissioner of parks R. H. Flynn received 2.434 votes and his competitor. H. N. John- son, 2.384 votes. For commissioner of utilities. W. A. Knorr received
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2.002 votes and J. F. Smith 1,865 votes. Walter Jones was continued as city attorney; Ed. Metz, as city clerk and W. F. Cody, city marshal.
In the election in 1917. F. W. Cook was a candidate again. His opponent was Frank vincent. Cook polled 2,383 votes and Frank Vincent received 2,124 votes. For finance commissioner, George W. Winans was continued, he receiving 3,365 votes and E. E. Wilson, 953. For commissioner of streets Will H. Shears defeated J. E. Buskirk, he polling 2,337 votes and Shears, 2,132 votes. The appointive offices of the former administration were con- tinned except that of city marshal. The commission, acting on petition, ordered Adams street paved and ordered a large number of sidewalks and gutters, and likewise approved the drainage plans proposed by the pro- prietors of the soda-ash plant, the strawboard factory and the packing house, substituting a closed sewer for the open ditch formerly used.
CHAPTER XLVII.
THE SALT INDUSTRY.
The salt vein in Kansas is fairly well defined. It is a rock salt deposit and is found in the counties of Rice, Ellsworth, Kingman, Harper, some in Meade county and in Reno county. While there are salt manufacturers at other places than in Reno county, yet a very large percentage of the salt busi- ness in Kansas is centered at Hutchinson.
Salt was known to exist at an early day in Reno county and in Rice county. It was found on top of the ground in 1875 by some cowboys camping ten miles south of Raymond, in Rice county. This discovery was reported in Hutchinson and a salt company was organized to make salt. F. E. Gillett was elected president; E. Wilcox, treasurer; Hiram Raff, secre- tary; F. A. Smith, engineer, and C. C. Bemis, superintendent. They pro- posed to pump the brine from the salt marsh to Raymond, on the Santa Fe railroad, ten miles distant. It was soon discovered that the brine was not strong enough to make it profitable to evaporate it. Very little money had been paid into the project when it was found unprofitable. Salt was made in small quantities at Solomon, Kansas, by the solar process, but no great amount was ever made.
Ben Blanchard first discovered the rock salt in this county. He was drilling for gas in South Hutchinson when his drill struck salt. This was on September 27, 1887. Salt at that time was selling on the market in Hutchinson from three to three dollars and a half a barrel. It was all brought here from Michigan. Within a year after the discovery of salt by Ben Blanchard there were ten salt plants in operation in Hutchinson.
In June. 1888, representatives of the Michigan Salt Association visited Hutchinson. The party consisted of W. R. Burt, president, Edwin Wheeler, W. J. Barstow. Thomas Cranage. D. G. Holland, Joy Morton and J. F. Ewing. They expected to start the erection of a plant, but they found so many plants in operation that they considered it a bad time to invest. Later, Morton bought many of the plants that had failed to make money in the manufacture of salt and today the Morton interests are largely in the lead in the manufacture of salt.
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The first salt plant that was built in Hutchinson was erected by Doctor Goninloch, an experienced salt manufacturer of Warsaw, New York. He began the construction of his plant in October, 1887, and his first well was completed on December 16, 1887, after he had bored through three hundred feet of rock salt. On March 24, 1888, the first salt was produced.
The "opening day" for the salt industry in Reno county was on Sun- day. A large percentage of the people living in Hutchinson and a great many from over the county visited the plant on this day. The crowd that attended this first day's manufacture of salt was estimated to be over five thousand. Dr. Gouinlock associated with him C. H. Humphries, who was superin- tendent of the plant. The company soon put down another well. This plant at the start had a capacity of five hundred barrels a day. Five years later it was enlarged and the capacity increased to one thousand barrels a day, consisting then of nine open steel pans from which the brine was evaporated.
The second plant started was called the "Vincent plant." The com- pany organized consisted of' Thomas Kurtz, president; George L. Gould, vice-president ; John F. Vincent, secretary and treasurer, and Frank Vin- cent, general manager. In addition to these, Calvin I. Hood. C. A. Leighton and Preston B. Plumb, then United States senator from Kansas, were inter- ested in the plant. But the three men from Emporia sold their interest to Kurtz before the plant began operations. This company was called the Hutchinson Salt and Manufacturing Company and was organized in March. 1888. Their plant, which was completed in July, 1888, was located on Avenue C east and Lorraine street. Its capacity was three hundred barrels a day. The following year they built the first dairy mill for the manufac- ture of dairy and table salt.
The Diamond Salt Company built the third salt plant. G. W. Hardy was president and Sims Ely, secretary. In addition to these two men, J. S. May. W. E. Burns and Grant Easley formed the company. Their plant was located in Blanchard's first addition and consisted of two open pans. It began the manufacture of salt in December, 1888, with a capacity of two hundred barrels a day. On April 25, 1892, it was soll at sheriff's sale to Charles F. Phelps, mortgagce, who, in turn, sold it in June, 1893. to Joy Morton, who operated it until the fall of 1897.
Late in the fall of 1888. G. H. Bartlett, of Providence, Rhode Island. built a small plant of one pan, located over in the northeastern part of the city. It was not an economical plant to operate and for a short time was
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idle. It was then purchased by Samuel Matthews and Charles Collins. Shortly afterwards Mr. Matthews purchased Collins's interest and operated the plant, enlarging it from an eighty-barrel capacity to three hundred barrel daily capacity. Mr. Matthews had had considerable experience in the manu- facture of salt in England and successfully operated the plant for many years. This was the fourth plant to be started.
Henry Hegwer built the fifth plant, in the northeastern part of town. He began the construction of his plant early in the summer of 1888 and had it in operation in the fall of the same year. It was a four-pan plant. Early in 1889. R. R. Price and W. L. Moore leased the plant of Mr. Hegwer and operated it under the name of the Western Salt Company. This lease passed to the Kansas Salt Company when it was organized and was operated by them until 1897. The Kansas Salt Company and the Hutchinson Salt Com- pany consolidated in 1899 and finally became the property of the Morton Salt Company.
The Riverside Salt Plant was the seventh to be built. It was erected in South Hutchinson and was an open-pan plant, with a capacity of five hundred barrels a day. It also had a dairy mill in connection, with a capacity of one hundred barrels a day. The company was organized in June, 1888, by J. M. Mulkey, W. F. Mulkey, N. White, J. F. DeBras, A. M. West, W. E. Hutchinson and H. Whiteside, J. M. Mulkey being president of the company. In August, 1890, the ownership of this plant passed to the Kansas Salt Company. In May, 1899, it became the property of the Hutch- inson-Kansas Salt Company and is now a part of the Morton property.
The eighth plant to be erected met financial troubles early in its exist- ence. It was called the New York plant. Anthony Oswald was president of the company and J. M. Zinn, secretary. Early in 1889 it met with financial reverses and was not completed until early in 1891, when it was purchased by the Standard Salt Company. It was later sold to the Hutch- inson Salt Company, finally becoming the property of the Morton Company.
The ninth plant was built by Indiana men. The company consisted of John 11. Briggs, Andrew Grimes, J. N. Phillips, J. Q. Button and Frank Brittleband, all of Terre Haute, Indiana. They erected their plant in Blanchard's first addition to South Hutchinson. Beginning early in June to construct a plant, they called it the Crystal Salt Plant. It had two open steel pans and could produce three hundred barrels a day. It began opera- tions in the fall of 1888 and in March, 1891, it was sold to the Hutchinson Salt Company and is now the property of the Mortons.
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The tenth plant to be put up was erected by an organization called the Pennsylvania Salt Company. In the latter part of 1888, W. R. Bennett, T. J. Decker and C. R. Thoburn organized the company. The plant was erected in South Hutchinson and had a daily capacity of three hundred bar- rels. In 1800 it was sold to Jay Gould, who soon sold it to the Hutchinson Salt Company. This company operated the plant until May, 1899, when it passed to the Hutchinson Salt Company and finally to the Morton Com- pany.
In the latter part of 1888, the Great Western Salt Company was organ- ized by D. T. MeFarland. Z. L. MeFarland, J. O. Grimes, all of Hutchin- son, J. H. Crabbs, of Dodge City, and M. Brandome, of Wichita. The company completed a small plant on South Monroe street, in this city, with a capacity of two hundred barrels a day. It was a poorly constructed plant and was never operated successfully. It passed to the Gould interests in November, 1800, who sold it to the Hutchinson Salt Company in 1891. It is now one of the Morton properties. This was the eleventh plant erected in less than a year after the discovery of salt.
In February, 1888, some men from Warsaw, New York, organized the Wyoming Salt Company. It was composed of E. H. Bucklin. J. B. Crossett, M. E. Coffin and W. W. Hanley. The building of the plant was handled by Mr. Hanley and the company commenced to make salt in August, 1888. The management and the business was not profitable. The plant was sold to an organization called the Queen City Salt & Mining Company, com- posed of J. R. Van Zandt, J. N. Sweet and A. F. Smith, all of Hutchinson. This plant was operated until November 1, 1892, when it was sold at sheriff's sale to B. F. Blaker, of Mound City, Kansas, Mr. Blaker operated the plant at times until 1895. The plant was then leased to G. C. Easley and Samuel Matthews, who operated it for a short time. The Kansas Salt Company and the Hutchinson Salt Company operated the plant jointly until January. 1900, when it passed to the ownership of the Hutchinson-Kansas Salt Com- pany. It was an open-pan plant, with a daily capacity of two hundred bar- rels. It is now the property of the Morton Salt Company. This was the twelfth salt plant built in Hutchinson.
The thirteenth salt plant bore the "hoodoo" that is associated with that number. E. H. Holbrook, of Port Huron, Michigan, started the plant in South Hutchinson in 1901. After building four cement graner pans and drilling three brine wells, and after receiving several carloads of lumber with which to construct the plant, Mr. Holbrook disappeared from Hutchin-
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son. It was generally supposed that he was unable to finance the enterprise and dropped it in that manner. The property was foreclosed in 1903 and was purchased by the Hutchinson Salt Company in March, 1908. The plant never was completed and in the consolidation of salt plants became the prop- erty of the Morton Company.
The fourteenth plant to be built was that of the Hutchinson Packing Company, owned by the Omaha Packing Company, of Chicago, Illinois. Its officers were James Viles, Jr., president; E. F. Robbins, vice-president ; Sidney Underwood, secretary; Walter Underwood, general manager. It began the making of salt as a side line of the packing plant, the brine being evaporated with the used steam of the packing house. It began operations with two pans and in 1895 increased its capacity by adding two more pans. The output was then three hundred barrels a day. In 1895 the company put in the Craney Direct Heat Vacuum Pans, with a capacity of fourteen hundred barrels a day. The investment in this plant was about one him- dred and fifty thousand dollars, with a storage capacity of eighty thousand barrels of salt. It also had a complete dairy mill. Financially it was not a success and closed down in 1900.
One of the successful salt manufacturers was Emerson Carey, who organized a company on April 25, 1901. Emerson Carey was president : C. W. Southward, vice-president; Edith Carey, secretary, and W. D. Puter- baugh, treasurer. This plant was located on South Main street and the steam to evaporate the brine was supplied from the ice plant. The first car of salt was shipped from the plant in July, 1901, to J. B. Baden, of Win- field, Kansas. This plant has continually grown until it now has a large daily capacity. In 1905 this company installed a small steam vacuum pan, but it was not successful and was later dismantled, and in 1907 the com- pany put in the Lillie quadruple vacuum pans.
The second plant of this company was erected east of town, just out- side the city limits. It was equipped with the Lillie quadruple vacuum pans and has a capacity of one thousand barrels a day. besides a dairy mill of two-hundred-barrel capacity, making a total capacity for the two plants of fifteen hundred barrels a day.
In the fall of 1892. E. E. Barton, Frank Barton and William Banta organized the Barton Salt Company, leased the packing house built by the Toby & Booth Packing House Company and installed a three-pan salt plant, with a capacity of three hundred barrels a day. In August, 1903, this plant was
BISONTE HOTEL, HUTCHINSON
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destroyed by fire and on the old site, in the fall, they erected a new building and installed a five steel graner salt plant. They incorporated their com- pany on July 1, 1905, with E. E. Barton, president ; E. M. Barton, secretary and treasurer, and H. M. Barton, F. L. Martin and G. A. Vandeveer as other directors. This plant was operated by E. E. Barton until his death, on February 26, 1912, when the plant went into the hands of C. HI. Humph- reys. The company now operating it is officered by C. H. Humphreys, president ; E. M. Barton, vice-president G. A. Samuelson, secretary, and George M. Bonnell, sales manager. In June, 1913, the company put in a vacuum evaporating plant and has made salt under this process since its completion, the latter part of 1913. It also has a dairy or refining plant in operation.
The Union Ice and Salt Company was organized in 1892. It was located on Avenue D east. It began operations in 1892 and has a capacity of two hundred and fifty barrels daily .. J. F. Redhead was president of this company until July 1, 1900, when the plant was sold to Ed. Gardner. It has an ice plant in connection with the salt plant and perhaps is more of an ice plant than a salt plant.
The Star Salt Company was organized in 1889. R. E. Conn was president : Will Randle, secretary, and John Welsh. treasurer. Their plant was located west of town on the Santa Fe railroad. It had a dairy mill. with a fifty-barrel-a-day capacity. This company operated the plant until 1804. when it was sold to the Kansas Salt Company.
Such was the way in which the salt business in Reno county was started. As might have been anticipated, it soon became a matter of elimination. There were all classes of men engaged in the business. Some of them had had experience in the manufacture of salt, many of them had not. Some had the capacity to make salt at a reasonable cost. but they found that mak- ing the salt was only a part of the business. They found that the selling of the salt was equally important with the cheapness of manufacturing it. The result was that as soon as the market was filled and there was no demand for salt. the price fell to a point where the plants were operated at a loss. The salt makers stood this loss for a while, then undertook to remedy it. They held a meeting, at which the condition of the salt business was dis- cussed and they found out that with a restricted territory they would have to curtail the output. Each man thought the others should cut down his output. Agreements were made, with no serious intention on the part of
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any making them to keep the agreement. These meetings disclosed some interesting facts about the salt business of the Hutchinson territory. The amount invested in these plants was over six hundred thousand dollars. There were twenty-nine open steel pans and four steam graner pans, with an annual capacity of production of nine hundred thousand barrels. Owing to the competition of the first three years eight different plants were either sold or leased to stronger companies. Those that were sold brought less than half the cost of construction. Later, nearly all of these plants were dismantled, as it was found that they were too expensive to operate and that they could not compete with the larger and more compact plants. Especially was this true when the vacuum pans were put into operation, which reduced the cost of production so greatly.
The railroad greatly appreciated the value of the salt business, which consisted not only of the freight on salt shipped out, but on the coal and barrel stuff shipped in, after the plants were constructed, and there was an immense tonnage represented in the plants themselves.
The first expansion of the salt market came when the Goulds became interested in the salt business. The result was the changing of freight rates that enlarged the field for Hutchinson salt. The larger companies also had rebates on freight and other advantages that enabled them to keep their plants running, much to the disadvantage of the smaller proprietors, who either did not know how to get rebates from the railroads, or did try and found that some other manufacturer had the attention of the railroad official to an extent that excluded them from sharing in the rebates.
The first plants were all open steel pans, with heat applied directly to the pans. The salt was raked out of the boiling brine and left on the edge of the pan to drain, after which it was hauled in carts to the storage room. In 1895 a steam graner was installed, steam being conveyed through pipes in the pans. In 1896 direct heat vacuum pans were installed, but were not a success. Later steam vacuum pans were tried and the success of this method of making salt revolutionized the business, by reducing the amount of heat required to precipitate the salt.
Michigan was early the greatest competitor of the Kansas salt manu- facturers. The Wolverine producers had been long in the business. They occupied the entire territory and the Kansas manufacturers had to contest every inch of ground with the Michigan competitors. They had favorable freight rates and. for the first ten years, restricted the territory of the Kan-
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sas manufacturers, who made more salt than their territory consumed. The following is an estimate made by Frank Vincent, one of the oldest manu- facturers of salt in this field, as to the annual output of salt in the Kansas field. This estimate embraces more than the output of the Hutchinson plant, as it includes some plants operated outside of Hutchinson, but in gen- eral it gives the volume of business of the salt industry since it began in 1888:
1888 -- 190,000 barrels. 1889-380,000 barrels. 1890-600,000 barrels. 1891-800,000 barrels. 1 892 -- 850,000 barrels. 1893-900,000 barrels. 1894-875,000 barrels. 1895-839,000 barrels. 1896-850.000 barrels. 1897-812,000 barrels. 1 898-952,000 barrels. 1899-1,197,000 barrels. 1900-1,344,000 barrels. 1901-1,014,000 barrels. 1002 --- 928,000 barrels.
1903-915,000 barrels. 1904-1,070,000 barrels. 1905 -- 958,000 barrels. 1906-930,000 barrels. 1907-997,000 barrels. 1908 --- 1,132,000 barrels. 1009-1,215,000 barrels.
1910-1,206,000 barrels.
1911 -- 1, 198,000 barrels. 1912 -- 1,137,000 barrels. 1913-946,000 barrels.
1914 -- 1, 110,000 barrels.
1915-1,250,000 barrels. 1016-1,400,000 barrels ( partly esti- mated. )
The consolidation of the salt industry began in March, 1891, when Jay Gould agreed to the consolidation of all the Gould plants with those of the Hutchinson Salt Company. This organizing of interests dates from April 22, 1891, when an amended charter of the Hutchinson Salt and Manu- facturing Company was granted to the Hutchinson Salt Company and the capital of the company was increased to two hundred thousand dollars, one- half of which was paid up.
The Hutchinson Salt Company continued to operate its plants until May 16. 1899, at which time this company and the Kansas Salt Company consolidated and the name was changed to the Hutchinson-Kansas Salt Com- pany. On January 1, 1900, all of the stock and plants of the Hutchinson- Kansas Salt Company was purchased by a company, of which Joy Morton. of Chicago. became president. AAn office was maintained in this city, with Frank Vincent as general manager. This company, by virtue of the con-
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