USA > Kansas > Sedgwick County > History of Wichita and Sedgwick County, Kansas, past and present, including an account of the cities, towns and villages of the county, Vol. I > Part 19
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Fate hath so far made Wichita a branch-line town in name, but we are the only "branch-line town" that "time tables" are made to accommodate. The only one where twelve commercial trav- elers for a wholesale house might make Marion, Newton, Burton, Lyons, Kingman, Harper, Medicine Lodge, Anthony, Caldwell, Arkansas City, Neodesha and El Dorado, and get home the same day. Wichita as a town paid for all it has; no legislative larceny hath added a dollar to the millions of taxable assets of Wichita. The sums paid to the state treasurer give us a right to demand some public enterprise, enable us to criticize appropriations made to towns whose existence depends on biennial legislative plunder.
Note .- The writer hereof, speaking only for himself, hopes we will continue this policy until all the lunatic asylums, state prisons and normal schools are located. Though home industry is a good thing, it is better to ship lunatics and convicts out and thrifty people in. So far as a normal school is concerned, it will add nothing, be nothing; 'twill only take luster from and dwarf our present splendid educational institutions. Another great reason is that we are now at liberty to examine into and criticize all appropriations not just or demanded. The location of a pub- lic institution forces us to let all "steals" go through to save our own particular larceny of public money. Wichita is the resultant of local pride, brain, labor and push. Situate on buffalo grass ; surrounded by sunflowers; hundreds of miles from commerce; the political and commercial Ishmaelite of Kansas; without nat- ural advantages save land (the supreme mother of all fortune) and-
With no powerful "friend at court," Of every bantling town the sport ; The ribald jest and envious sneer Were daily ours from year to year.
The years came and went, yet slowly, surely, we were upward climbing. High was the mark at which our archers shot. We aimed at the capital, aud struck the column above the base. Our
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rivals became our helpers and by hatred "pricked the sides of our intent," goaded us to shoot at the unattainable and lose a thousand arrows. We learned to shoot high. And from the peak of our efforts we beheld our rivals groveling in the dust beneath us, scrambling for the crumbs of the Wichita banquet.
The shafts of envy, spite, rancor and malice were hurled at Wichita from every point of the compass. Our success only created a larger band of "howlers" and our misfortunes were heralded abroad as if our misery, desolation and woe were mat- ters to be proud of. In fact, the "Kansas fight" on the only town having spirit or independence reminds one of the exultation of a family over the ruin of a sister, because it gave a chance to get into print. Before we succeeded, columns were printed by
"Lean-faced envy from its loathsome cave"
and scattered as autumn leaves. Poison was shed on the evening air like the deadly upas, to inoculate all within its zone.
"With rival hating envy" our good offices were spurned; our friendship was a badge of disloyalty to the coyote hamlets, which, at last, stood afar off, contemplating the dying lion, waiting for the hour for to "hold a wake" and gnaw the carcass. In 1886 we felt we had succeeded, despite the many handicaps put on our steed by the jealous rivals in the race. In fact, we may truth- fully say :
On prairies level, bare and brown, Which seem'd to reach from sky to sky.
United brain built up a town Which envy said would surely die ;
Dwellers therein all move away ; Soon it would crumble and decay, As many another had done, And, save ruin'd brick and stone, Naught remain to recall, some day, The dreamers on the Arkansas Who founded what was "Wichita."
But these calumnies, base as hell, blacker than the hue of . dungeons, as rancorous as the tongue of a "turncoat," only made our fires burn brighter and spur the town to carry a heavier load, and break every colt to work in "lead, swing or wheel," and push on the hilltop. Yes, in 1886, we had triumphed, and yet
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we felt that until we achieved the mountain's top, the regal peaks, and stood upon the lofty crest, o'ertoppling the naked beetling rocks that frowned on the valley below, far above the timber-line, beyond the ragged pine and the flower that buds amidst the snow, beyond the clouds, above the glare, where, wrapped in the ever- lasting shroud of frosted ice, the frozen sentinels guard the rocky pass in solitude and grandeur, we should neither pause nor rest. Our ambition was not baseborn, but high, sublime and lofty. Old age would be in comfort; the generations unborn would lisp our names, and build monuments when we were dust of ashes.
"Our high-blown pride at length broke," and there "were none so poor to do us reverence." We fell, and oh, what a fall ! "Aye, verily, as Lucifer from the battlements of heaven"; and what royal company-Kansas City, Omaha, Los Angeles, Denver, Galveston, Tacoma, Sioux City-and the small fry. Railroads went into receivers' hands. The shock that cleared our decks, tore away the mast, flooded the hold and tore from our sides the lifeboats and left us "to the mercy of a rude stream," was felt from Marblehead to the Golden Gate; from the Lakes, north, to the Gulf, south. 1
Our bold temerity dwarfed the past and made us a monument -a milestone in the highway of the historian-and we will not be forgotten.
Note .- Ere we say to this farewell, I desire to give a few facts as to the Wichita & Colorado Railway. Colwich was made as the name from the first syllable of Colorado and Wichita; An- Dale (this is the proper spelling, as fixed in the charter of the An-Dale Town company) was formed from the name of George Anderson and Will Dale (Judge Dale's brother), the first syllable of Anderson and the name of "Dale."
REORGANIZED BOARD OF TRADE.
In the winter of 1886 the new blood was striving for place, for recognition. The old Board of Trade was dictatorial. It was the pioneer, and, like "old politicians," hated to surrender to the young men. The new men were impatient and aggressive, and had some cause for it. They wanted a place on the Board of Trade. No one would give way. The Board of Trade held its meetings and heeded not the brewing storm. Some of the mem- bers felt that the new men were not treated fairly, but the "man-
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agement" just "sawed wood," heard not the "rabble." The "rabble" aforesaid was composed of men that had themselves held power ere they to Kansas came-men that had brains, influ- ence, "and, by jingo, had the money, too," belonged to the new crowd, and in their veins "blood ran warmer than wine."
They, too, had read Rob Roy, and learned- "The good old rule, the simple plan, That he shall take who has the power, And he shall keep, who can."
Acting on this humanitarian impulse, which has been the rule amongst the civilized and uncivilized heathen since the days of one Julius, surnamed Cæsar, the new blood circulated a call around town for a business men's meeting at Garfield Hall on that evening. The old Board of Trade held off, but many of the silent members attended.
(Up to this date the Board of Trade had no funds, save the dues, which were small; no funds were in the treasury. Collec- tions around town were made to raise money for any committee work.)
On the night above set out, at least five hundred men met at Garfield Hall, as agreed in the call, and a more enthusiastic band never before or since had business in hand. George W. Clement (afterward mayor) was made chairman and Alexander Steele was secretary.
Among the then prominent men present were: George M. Dickson, Colonel Bean, W. K. Carlisle, Attorney Pacy, Ed Foster, Mr. Hess, George Blackwelder, George L. Rouse, Mose Hinman, R. A. Haste, Sam Howe, George Masten, W. R. Dulaney, Elmer De Vore, George C. Strong, Talmage (of Todd & Talmage), George G. Mathews, Arthur Parks, W. F. Green, C. E. Ferguson, W. P. McNair, C. H. Peckham, Gardner Work, W. M. Bond, Colonel Topler, George W. Walker, J. S. P. Gordon, Frank Dale, Jim Mercer, J. J. Parks, Judge Museller, Bruce Keenan, Wesley Mor- ris, Aaron Katz, Lee Hays, Sam Goldstein, Robert and M. Jacks, Murray Myers, Hank Heiserman, and hundreds more I cannot at this date recall.
On that night George Clement "won his spurs," demonstrated his power to talk, and his right to be ruler.
Alexander Steele that night proved he could think and act.
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"Things" moved along, with suggestions, until Pacy arose and said :
"Time was money; money was power; power was what we needed; that a corporation with such purposes as we were at- tempting needed cash; that an empty treasury could do noth- ing-was as nothing. He therefore moved that 100 men donate $10 apiece, to be called membership fee; that each new member donate $100 apiece, and that this money be used to defray the expenses to be incurred in securing industries for Wichita."
Pacy sat down, and fifty men seconded the motion. The roll was called, and Clements announced over $5,000 donated in twenty minutes. The crowd went wild, to draw it mild. Every- body smiled. A committee was appointed to draw a charter for The Wichita Chamber of Commerce; a committee for rules and by-laws; a committee for soliciting members. All committees to report next night at same place.
Meeting adjourned.
The old Board of Trade had its ears to the ground. It had heard the rumbling sound. A detail was sent out to recall the wandering sheep from its fold and learn what was on foot. The aforesaid sheep were called together by the Chamber of Com- merce bell. Dire destruction's desolating discrimination had cut the old "board" in twain. The silent members were free and were glad that they were free. They exclaimed, when accosted by the detail sent after them by the old board :
"Let the galled jade wince; our withers are unwrung."
The imperious temper of the "old board" was checked. There was naught to do but "stoop to conquer." Delay was dangerous. The new charter must be left unwritten. Concession, compromise, capitulation on honorable terms were all that was left. The old board saw that dissension was death; that in harmony only was success to Wichita. The board met in the room where C. V. Ferguson's law office was later, and sent a committee to the Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber of Commerce sent a com- mittee, composed of Clement, Steele, Dickson, and two men who were members of the old board, and who had linked themselves to the new. After deliberation, it was agreed that the board be increased to twenty-three; that the old board have thirteen; new men, twelve; that A. W. Oliver be president; George L. Rouse, vice-president ; George W. Clement, secretary; M. W. Levy, treasurer; that the subscription made be turned to the old board;
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that a meeting be held in the court room at First street; that the new directory be elected, new officers chosen, the subscriptions be paid. With some modifications, the program was carried out, and as the meeting adjourned, some one (probably from Kentucky) sang out :
"United we stand, divided we fall."
Some one answered:
"In harmony triumph, in unity fall, Be the banner sheltering all."
This was the "starter" of the motto :
Harmony, Unity, Strength, Success.
The new Board of Trade soon had in its treasury $12,000. The old board had surrendered, but by a strategic act it regained all it lost. The board was too large to handle anything. The per- sonnel of the directory, for brain, labor, power, "result-getters," was never surpassed by any town, but the board was too big to act. Therefore an executive committee! President, vice-presi- dent, secretary-treasurer, and Colonel Murdock. The old board lost the "deal" and won by taking "the last trick."
The personal aggregate wealth of this board ran into millions -millions based on tangible wealth. And yet the "slump," the subsequent decline, has left them as ruined gamesters of rou- lette, faro and the "Derby." Of that glorious, gallant, generous band, few remain; many are dead. Some died almost as paupers. The monument that marks their resting place cost more money than the estate they left was worth at final settlement. Some are almost outcasts; some are working by the day to earn bread for their respective families. Many of these men subscribed and paid donated subscriptions that today would make their family above want, if not in comfortable circumstances.
And yet, even at this short day, their names, deeds, lives, are almost forgotten. Verily, verily, you stick your finger in a glass of water, beer, brandy or other liquid, and when you pull it out no trace of said finger remains; so with man.
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"The evil men do lives after them ; Men's evil manners live in brass, Their virtues we write in water."
Monuments in brick and stone, in railroads, colleges and pack- ing houses attest their liberality and labor; yet all, all is wiped out by the remembrance of what they failed to do.
"All honor to him who wins the prize ! This world has cried, for a thousand years ; To him who tries, who fails and dies, There's naught but pitiful tears."
In our little world, naught is left but curses for many who have fallen, and every noble act is effaced, obliterated by the remembrance of a debt unpaid, an obligation uncanceled ; and yet he who thinks, realizes that but for this army of workers, who in unselfishness worked for all, there would be but little here, and that little would have but a nominal value.
Those who are here, who know the sacrifice, who beheld them in health, ambition and pride, cannot but feel a pang that they were only to "behold the promised land, and were never to enter therein." To name these men now will wound the living-wound many of them, yet living, afar off.
Some day, when the historians write of Wichita, they will, "in letters of gold, on leaves of silver," inscribe the names of our "heroes," and the generation yet to follow us will do them the honor which this generation withholds. The pioneer since the world began has never reaped the harvest; he that plants a tree seldom eats the fruit thereof. The pioneers of Wichita are no exception to the rule. Of the pioneer of the West, of southwest Kansas, it may be said :
There's now a city, a thousand homes, On land he broke for his first sod-corn ; He, a stranger, now aimlessly roams Where his wife died and his babes were born.
The fusion of the new blood and the old blood was a guarantee of success.
George Clement afterward became president of the board;
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then mayor of Wichita. His sun went down in a cloud, never to rise again. He was a man, proud, ambitious, noble, generous, undaunted, and his friends yet believe that had he lived and kept his health, he would have cut his name in the Kansas tree deep enough to have it remain until our archives became as "dust of ashes."
Clement was, in many respects, an orator. He was clear-cut, forcible and argumentative. He stumped Kansas for Charles Rob- inson for governor, and made friends wherever he went. His speech at Galveston was the one speech made by a Kansas man. The Texans who attended that meeting all recall Clement of Wichita.
The writer hereof and Clement were never warm friends. I do not, in his praise, disparage others; recalling the Roman say- ing, "Let nothing save good be said of the dead."
I do but call to mind his worth, his noble attributes. In the hundreds that belonged to the Board of Trade, Clement "dared to lead where any dared to follow." His friends were proud of him and his enemies respected him. He was a good hater, and a warm friend. "And the elements so mixed in him, that nature might stand up and say to all the world, 'This was a man.'"
The amalgamated forces of Wichita were, in their day and generation, invincible. The new Board of Trade
"Had an eye as keen, A brain as clear, An arm as strong, A purse as long,"
as any rival they had to grapple with.
Association with these men was a liberal education. It was a school where matured men learned the power, worth and genius of each other; where opinions were weighed by enemies and deliberately adopted as the course of wisdom and business sagac- ity. The majority ruled and the minority submitted.
This paper has reached its length. In number four (when written), the Burton Car Works, Dold Packing House, Whittaker Packing House, Rock Island Railroad, and minor things, will be treated; and then-"and then the Deluge."
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CHRONICLE V.
"Examples, not precepts, govern the world."
On July 4, 1887, as the writer was going to town, he saw an excited crowd in front of Levy's bank; I think there were at least fifty men. A. W. Oliver was talking, and in a moment it was learned that J. O. Davidson had sent a telegram to the effect that he had secured the location of the Burton Stock Car Works, on terms that he was sure Wichita would accept. The John Bright University, located somewhere in the vast terra incognita lying southwest of Wichita some miles, was for the time being forgotten; the Baptist College, down south (since dedicated to humbler uses by Henry Schnitzler by hauling part of same away and building with the remainder), was overlooked ; the Reformed Church College and Fairmount were laid away in the shade; Gar- field College was no longer a theme; the talk concerning the location for the government building was suspended; city hall and county court house locations no longer engrossed attention ; the Gould car shop in the "Y" across the river no longer inter- ested any one. These things were sure and certain, and the Bur- ton Stock Car Company was a "bread winner." It was to be the initiative of the dreamed-of "tin bucket brigade" that would draw others similar to it. Aye, verily, as a magnet attracts iron filings; as Sunday schools do boys who love girls; as Christmas doings at a church or picnics in May draw the one-gallused "kids" from swimming holes and fishing places for a day.
The excitement July 4, 1898, was loud, noisy, and went off in explosion ; the feeling July 4, 1887, was deep, exultant and trium- phant. Of course no one knew what the things were to cost, nor how it was to be paid. No one cared. A stranger, coming to Wichita, as he met each individual unit that made up Wichita, would have at once exclaimed :
"There is either liquor in his pate or money in his purse, When he looks so merrily."
Up to this hour we were on smooth seas, under benign skies, and unconscious that the rapids were but a little way below us. We had never known defeat, and had the hot blood of past suc- cess in our veins. We could well exclaim :
"This is the period of our ambition ; O this blessed hour !"
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The cautious individuals who hinted that this "thing" might cost more than it was worth, hunted niches in the walls and as mummies sat like their "grandsires cut in alabaster." To have faith in things hoped for was a part of our creed, and he that dallied was a dastard, and he that doubted we already damned by an almost unanimous vote, and if the "boomers" could have fixed the penalty, like a Missouri jury, each ominous croaking raven would have left the town or climbed a telegraph pole.
We admitted no doubts; had no patience with the man whose caution bade him hold his purse-strings; and urged each other on, so that the entire seething mass of humanity resembled a mob, which, moved by one impulse, rushed to the hanging, and each unit, when alone, was afraid of his own shadow. Collectively we were-
" All too confident to give admittance to a doubt."
On that day we were so purse-proud and pecuniarily plethoric that if the secretary of the United States treasury had requested a guaranty on an issue of government bonds, we would probably have wired him as follows:
Wichita, Kan., July 4, 1887.
"Your wire received. Don't issue bonds; draw on us for the amount required .- Wichita Board of Trade."
At this ambitious day we felt no misgivings as to the future. We all felt like Al Thomas, who dropped a $20 gold piece and hesitated as to whether or not to stop and pick it up, for fear he would lose $40 worth of time. If on the evening of that day an absolutely true and correct horoscope of Wichita ten years hence could have been shown us, the drug stores would have run short on arsenic, prussic acid, antimony, strychnine, hemlock, hellebore, nightshade, belladonna, aconite, laudanum and all kindred poi- sons. We would have become students in toxicology. The fumes from hundreds of unlighted gas jets would have told of escaping gas; the town would have been a charnel house; grave diggers would have rivaled plumbers in per cent per hour; undertakers would have astonished the coffin manufacturers of the United States in their telegraphic demands for coffins; we would in ten
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days have drawn the line on metallic caskets and "bulled" the market on poplar and "yaller pine."
The Creator brings us to bear our ills by gradual stages and by easy and slow descent.
The misery, want, woe and desolating scenes we have wit- nessed since July 4, 1887, can never be told to a stranger without risk of being informed that the grand lodge of the Ananias Club, with a Sapphira (Eastern Star, Rebecca or Woman's Relief Corps) annex to the same, evidently has its annual meetings in Wichita. Who can believe that bankers are outcasts, speculators tramps, merchants day laborers, lawyers section hands and society people reduced to penury, beggary and brought face to face with absolute want; diamonds pawned for food; and watches with monograms on " 'em" sold for one-fifth of their cost; furniture mortgaged to friends and shipped on Sunday to avoid attach- ments; thousands of deeds and mortgages made and dated back a year, to save something as salvage from the greatest financial and local storm that the United States ever beheld since old Noah loaded his ark and steered for dry land on the highlands of Armenia; the uplands overlooking the second bottom of the waters that surrounded the plateau of Araxes, cycles of time before Jim Mead, Dutch Bill and the original Buffalo William swapped beads for buffalo hides at the junction of the St. Peter and St. Paul, and founded the town of Wichita. .
Note .- Some may say I should not get down to "brass tacks" on these reminiscences; but "Grover" some years ago (and "Grover" is one of my tutelary gods and patron saints) said, "Tell the truth," and I have resigned my membership in the Ananias "outfit," quit shaking plum trees, put on my belt, and stuck my George Washington hatchet in it, and dare not lie- "I'd like to, but I dassent."
To return to the cold mutton, the Board of Trade was con- vened, the Burton Stock Car man and the inebriate he had with him for an attorney arrived. After several meetings, a contract with no marrow in it was drawn up. The same was read over in the parlor of the Manhattan Hotel, and rejected; another was drawn and approved by the inebriate aforesaid. Old man "Per- kins" read it over, and he saw that he needed a lawyer, and he got one.
The next morning a new contract was submitted, and it was a "jug-handled contract," had two handles, and both of them
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on one side-and Perkins had hold of both handles-and it was a glazed jug, and there was no place for Wichita to get a hold on at all. "Things hung fire." We knew that to sign this up was simply wilful and deliberate suicide. Colonel Lewis was the only man who denounced the contract. Some of the others wanted to say something, but all were mum, until Lewis spoke. We could not get the boys to take $200,000 of the stock of the company.
We wanted "car works," but we wanted 'em on the homeo- pathic plan. This dose was an alopathic dose, by an old-fashioned regular, who was brought up on blue mass and calomel, and who bled patients as Dolds bleed hog. Hence, we went slow, cautious, just as if we were hunting a match, after attending a "Bobby Burns" banquet, and wanted to get to bed without falling over a sewing machine or cradle. At last Oak Davidson said if the Board of Trade would make him a guaranty of $50,000 he would subscribe $200,000 stock.
Oak's nerve secured the Burton Car Works.
That night the Board of Trade sent out a note to the "tops" of the board, just as a "feeder" selects a carload of best steers to send to market, and the "tops" aforesaid met in the room where Ferguson's office is. At 9 o'clock that night, the guaranty was duly signed and delivered. The guarantors wanted to "cover their bet," and it was agreed that nothing should be said about the guaranty, but the board should announce that instead of tak- ing $200,000 stock, we were to raise in cash, by subscription, the sum of $50,000 instead of stock.
The board issued a call to the entire membership to meet at the board rooms the next morning at 9 o'clock. At the hour named, fifty men were on hand. Some were almost ill, but imbued with the spirit of Ligarius, who said, when Brutus sent for him : "I am not sick if Brutus have in hand any exploit worthy of the name of honor."
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