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 39
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WICHITA: CITY OF THE NEW WEST.
Out there on the gently undulating and fertile plains of Kan- sas, away from the Father of Waters, and still removed from the Rockies, is arising a great kingdom-the kingdom of the New West. The Old West was a place of short grass and long horns;
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of sweeping, dreaming distances; pregnant, potential, unawak- ened earth. The New West is a place of long grass and short horns; awakened vitality, springing up through green stalk and mighty tree trunk; richness pouring up through alfalfa, corn, wheat. In material wealth this kingdom is becoming fabulously rich, for its wildness has been subdued, and Ingalls' benignant blue grass has worked its wonder in superseding the prairie grass. And the capital of the New West is Wichita, a city of 60,000 peo- ple. The New West is the home of a people noted for hospitality, open-heartedness and good will toward men. So the traveler in visiting Wichita is pleased to find that its metropolis in every way exemplifies these graces. When the editors of Kansas re- cently visited Wichita, they were allowed to march behind the town band-just like they longed to do when they were boys- to the corner-stone laying of the first Wichita skyscraper, which, by the way, was the dedication of a Greater Wichita, the mark- ing of a new epoch. This shows just what Wichita is. It is a great, big, husky, red-blooded boy of a city-strong, and growing, jolly, good-hearted. It has not developed the foolish bored air of the large old city; it is too fragrant of fresh earth to despise what gives it life-agriculture. It has none of the cheap cynicism which laughs at country-bred people and at the same time depends upon the country people for an existence. It takes a boyish delight in its recreations and achievements and is boyishly optimistic.
Wichita is too large to have the curses of the small town- people who spend most of their time at the business of others, gossips, town rows. It is too small to have the curses of the great city-slums, under-world, the frenzied fight for existence. And it can and will be a city of half a million without having any of these evils, for it is started right, in the right place. No one can travel up and down the Arkansas valley, with its developing cen- tral part and its upper part just stirring from its age-long dream, without feeling that to be true. Wichita's growth is not purely material, for, with its average of five new houses each day, and daily thousands invested in new industrial enterprises, there is keeping step the moral, civic and artistic interest. The enforce- ment of law and the adoption of a new and improved system of government, the existence of several colleges, music and art schools and churches, these things are the proofs. The structures
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are built of stone, steel, concrete, brick. There are no false fronts and no cardboard scenery in Wichita .- Cimarron "Jacksonian."
WICHITA.
By MACK P. CRETCHER.
(Of the Sedgwick (Kan.) "Pantagraph.")
Wichita ! What memories cluster around the name! Memo- ries of achievement in the strenuous past, promises of greatness in the mightier future. Scarce forty years since the coyote skulked through the undulating sea of blue-stem where Wichita now stands. A brief span since buffalo grazed and the shy prairie hen nested where now stand substantial edifices of brick and stone. Founded by men with the restless red blood of the pio- neer in their veins-men with Western brain and courage and confidence-Wichita's growth has been as wonderful as a chapter from the Arabian Nights. Her greatness is not alone in her miles of paved streets, her skyscrapers, factories, churches, schools or homes, but in her magnificent citizenship that has made her dreams reality. Here men have stood shoulder to shoulder since the first bleak sod shack arose beside the tepee. Here the investor has been welcomed and encouraged as a brother. Always and ever the indomitable faith in Wichita and her future. Always a willingness to dig deep into the pocket to furnish the sinews of war, firm in the conviction that the dollar spent for Wichita would return as bread cast upon the waters.
Today Wichita stands a city of 50,000 people. A new genera- tion from the old pioneer stock is taking over the reins. Forty years of struggle and achievement have whitened the heads of the sturdy empire builders. Their sons and daughters are step- ping into line and accepting the load with the loyalty and courage of youth. With the magnificent vantage gained in the brief span of forty years, where is the limit for the bounding blood and keen brain of the new generation? Today Wichita is only in the swad- dling clothes of her greatness. Her territory, the Great South- west, is as yet in the inception of its development, a mere scratch- ing of the surface, exposing the outcroppings that lead to the
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mother lode. To the sons and daughters of the men who have builded a city of 50,000 population in forty years, there is no limit of possibility. That a city of 250,000 will spring from the Wichita of today is by no means as wild a prophecy as that the present metropolis of the Southwest should arise from the Indian camp and trader's store in less than half a century. The golden stream of Kansas grain is just beginning to trickle through Wichita to the gulf. The packing industry is yet in its infancy. The proud boast of the jobbers of today will cause a smile when millions of people of the Southwest look to Wichita as a distrib- uting center -- and millions will some day look, mark that! The 1,800 homes built in Wichita the past year will be but the domi- ciles of pioneers who got in on the ground floor. In the dawn of her greatness, Wichita stands beckoning, the smile of confidence upon her lips. She still holds wide the door of Hope.
THE PIONEER REAL ESTATE DEALERS.
The pioneer real estate dealers in Wichita and Sedgwick county largely gave to the county and city its first impetus toward a large population and consequent prosperity. John M. Steele, or Jim Steele, as he was known far and near, was a pioneer in this line. The old firm of Steele & Levy, composed of J. M. Steele and Morris W. Levy, were among the early real estate men of this valley. John Stewart, afterward one of the richest men in Kansas, was associated with them; so was Doc Mann, Charley Stanley and others. Steele is now dead; died in Tacoma, Wash .; Levy is retired from business and lives in New York; Healy and Neiderlander came next in point of time; Pat Healy and Nick Neiderlander composed this firm, and they were hustlers; Neider- lander lives in St. Louis and Pat Healy is still here, and Wichita would feel lonesome without him. Jocelyn and Thomas were act- ive in the early eighties; both are dead; Al Thomas died in St. Louis, and Colonel Jocelyn died a short time ago in this city. This firm were active sellers and price-makers on the realty mar- ket. Later on came a vast number of realty men who have in many ways helped to develop Wichita and Sedgwick county. One thing we can always admire in the real estate men of Wich- ita, and that is their unswerving loyalty to their town and locality. To them there is no town so promising as Wichita, and no county in all the bounding West so fertile as Sedgwick .- Editor.
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THE STORY OF THE PEERLESS PRINCESS.
When the men who first stood at the confluence of the two Arkansas rivers and with prophetic vision saw into the future and declared that here was the place to found a city, men laughed at them. When that city was founded and the trade of the great Southern empire was turned this way, filling the coffers of the early merchants and bringing prosperity to all who had the enter- prise to engage in business, men thought again that they saw something of the greatness which was to come to this city of the plains, but there were doubters still. When, at a later period, dreamers came from the East and adding their faith to that of those already here, and commenced to build a city far in advance of the needs of the country, some men again said that Wichita was to be great, and others scoffed. Of this period in its history the least said the better. Suffice to say that the dreams of the pioneer, the later business enthusiast and then of the boomer have all at last been realized, and Wichita stands today a monu- ment to the business sagacity and the unwavering faith of all the men who have given their best efforts for its building, and the scoffers have been silenced. All know the Wichita of today, with her splendid railroad facilities, her magnificent commercial enterprises, her manufactories, her thousands of workingmen, her fine parks, her good schools, her fine churches, her handsome business houses, her "up-to-now" citizenship, and her determined advancement to the metropolitan leadership of the Southwest, indispensable alike to the great West and to Mexico, the pivot on which the business future of the great Southwest, the commercial prospects of half two nations must revolve in the growth of the next century. There are a few throughout the Southwest who have kept in touch with the city's progress, and these few remem- ber from what a small beginning has grown the Wichita of today. . For the information of those who have more recently come to try their fortunes in this great empire, a terse but truthful descrip- tion of the town as it used to be is here given :
"Wichita, 485 miles from St. Louis, 723 miles from El Paso, and 1983 miles from San Francisco, was one of the great way points on the great Santa Fe trail. This was the first rapid line across the continent. John Butterfield and his associates were paid $600,000 a year for carrying tri-weekly mails between St. Louis and San Francisco. Ruling influences in congress and the
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White House compelled them to adopt a far Southern route through Kansas, touching Wichita, the Indian Territory, Texas and Arizona, while a branch line from Memphis joined the main stem at Fort Smith, Ark. The coaches ran day and night, ordi- narily going from St. Louis to San Francisco in twenty-one days, though the law allowed them twenty-five. It was the longest stage route in the world. Wichita in those days was nothing more or less than a trading post and a way station, where travelers refreshed themselves and the stage drivers changed horses. The next way station was many miles farther Southwest, and the drive was through a very unsettled country, principally inhabited by ranchmen and a few Indians. Habitual gambling was uni- versal, from the boys' game of pitching quartillas (3-cent pieces Mexican money) to the great saloons where silver dollars were staked at monte."
In view of the picture here drawn when contrasted with the present day Wichita, it is little wonder that some are amazed and others have been led to become satisfied with the transformation. It is not, however, in its past that Wichita is great. Its greatness lies in what it is yet to be.
Never in the history of the country did a city have such a future, a future contingent upon that eternal vigilance which is the price of success, a future contingent upon unremitting labor and determination, a future contingent upon lack of fatuous folly of being content with winning the first lap in the race. Wichita is to become a metropolis, which will be greater commer- cially than St. Louis, greater in population than Denver and ex- celled in resource and importance by no city on the continent. The greatness of Wichita is not contingent upon the efforts of its citizens alone nor upon its location geographically. It is situ- ated in the midst of the richest agricultural and stock country in the world, and from these industries, which in the last analysis form the foundation of all prosperity, the town will continue as in the past to derive the nourishment on which it is to develop. It was agriculture that made Cairo the wonder of Egypt and the envy of the world. It was agriculture that made all the great cities of middle Europe. It was agriculture that made Chicago, St. Louis, Minneapolis, Omaha, Kansas City and others of the most prosperous cities of this country, and it is to agriculture that Wichita owes the greatest measure of its present success and to which it must look for much of its success in time to come.
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The fertile lands of the territory surrounding Wichita for a dis- tance of two or three hundred miles are sufficient to produce grain and stock and fruit and hay sufficient to supply the needs of a territory that is great in extent. A large proportion of these products find their way by natural channels to this logical center of trade, where they are manufactured into usable form or ex- changed for other necessities. In this way the surrounding coun- try is not only benefited, but Wichita is made to grow. It is to impress upon the people of the Southwest something of the im- portance of this interdependent relation which ought to exist be- tween the citizens of the more remote sections and this natural distributing center, that these excursions by the business men of Wichita have been organized and sent out year after year. Wichita is dependent upon the country with which it is sur- rounded, but at the same time as it becomes more and more pros- perous it is in position to aid in making other portions of the country prosperous. A proper recognition of this fact will do much to make Wichita all that present-day prophets predict for it and make it a city of 100,000 within the next five years.
CIRCUS DAY IN SEDGWICK COUNTY.
The old time circus in Sedgwick county, always held at Wichita, used to draw a great crowd. Wichita has always been a great circus town. It used to be said that in the hard times and during the dull times, when the crops were short, that the farmer sold his cook stove and came in to the circus just the same. Sells and Floto with their circus always draw a big crowd in Wichita; Ringling Brothers with their acres of canvas always draw for miles around ; Buffalo Bill always held that Wichita was one of his big show towns. One of the greatest accidents con- nected with the Rock Island railway was the night of the last show of Buffalo Bill in Wichita. A heavily loaded bus of people headed for the Buffalo Bill show east of the railway tracks was crossing the Rock Island tracks on East Douglas avenue, and this bus was run into by a swiftly moving southbound Rock Island train. Several people were killed outright and many were severely injured. Texas Jack with his aggregation of cow- boys and buffaloes and his girl riders and broncho busters always drew a big crowd, and Oklahoma Harry Hill organized here in Wichita an aggregation which bid fair to rival the great show
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of Buffalo Bill. Joe Rich went into this game as the manager and regrets it yet. One of the early shows of this town was organized by Bob Neff. In the early days of Oklahoma, Bob went to Black- well, Okla., and opened a law office. He was afterwards elected probate judge, but the call of the boards was too strong for him ; he again donned his broad-brimmed hat, let his hair grow out long and again took his favorite character of "Lollypop." Wichita has always been a good show town; Sedgwick county has always patronized the shows, from an all around railroad show or circus, with its acres of canvas and trained animals, to the barnstorming company from the kerosene circuit.
THE NORTHWEST CORNER.
Until the building of the Kansas Midland railway in 1887, the northwest corner of the county, north of the Arkansas river, was without a railroad. A large portion of this land in Eagle town- ship was within the Santa Fe land grant, and it was sold upon payments and its development was correspondingly slow. Acres and acres of this fine land for many years laid out in pasture and without cultivation. The settling of an English colony west of Valley Center and the building of the railroad gave the country a new impetus, and the land was rapidly put under the plow. The Zimmerman neighborhood, the Oscar Winters farms, the Biggs neighborhoods and the holdings of Uncle John Williams proved most valuable. It was discovered that the northwest of Sedgwick county was within the corn belt. At this time there is no better land, no better producing land, nor a more prosperous portion of Sedgwick county than this same northwest. Among the prosperous farmers of this locality may be mentioned A. Cos- son, Matt. Biggs, H. H. Hanson, Norman Calhoun, J. M. Ragan, Wesley Biggs and Albert Campbell.
THE HEART OF WICHITA.
What would ultimately be the business heart of Wichita has for a long time puzzled the old-timers and average citizen of Wichita. For many years North Main street seemed to have the lead on business. The corner of Main and Douglas avenue, known in frontier parlance as the New York corner, has always appeared to be the hub of the town. This has always been a prominent business corner, but as the town grew it gradually
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dawned upon the residents of Wichita that the city would cease to revolve around that corner. The building of the postoffice building to the south and upon Market street, the city hall, and more than all of the elements combined, the building of the Smyth building eastward at the corner of Lawrence and Douglas avenues has served to disturb conditions somewhat. The Smyth building, being at once occupied by a large retail store carried on by Inness & Co., has had a great influence in moving business to the east- ward. The town has become too large to revolve around one cor- ner. It is spreading out. The Forum, built by the city, is upon Water street; the Eagle building is upon South Market street, and most of the depots are eastward on Douglas avenue. A great improvement has lately been noticed on the south side of Douglas avenue. As the principal business street, Douglas avenue now has and will likely keep the lead. So that the real heart of Wichita is at this time at no particular corner, but Douglas ave- nue is the main artery of business, and upon Douglas avenue is now transacted the principal business of the city. From the bridge across the great Arkansas river to the Santa Fe depot is today the heart of Wichita.
AN OLD LANDMARK.
The people who go south from the courthouse along Market street will recall the ancient Gothic house facing east two doors south of Central avenue. The whole place has fallen into decay and is generally unkempt and forlorn. Yet at one time this was one of the fine places in Wichita and was formerly the home of the mayor of the city. Some years ago and during the boom this house was the home of Mr. Brown, the junior member of the firm of Aldrich & Brown. Later on Mr. Brown left the city and located in Chickasha, Okla. But when Wichita was young and the cowboy was a daily sight upon our streets and Wichita was on the great cattle drive from Texas, this old house was the home of Jim Hope, the mayor of Wichita. In those days when a stranger came to Wichita he was taken in hand by Uncle Billy Griffenstein ; by him turned over to Otto Weiss, his nephew, and Otto was always instructed to show him the town and especially show him this old house, which was then the proud residence of Mayor Hope. A few short years and this old house will forever
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disappear from the face of the landscape and finer and more com- modious buildings will take its place.
THE ARKANSAS RIVER.
It is a trite saying that large streams always run past big cities. If this saying holds true, Wichita is destined to be a large city. Col. Marsh Murdock used to claim that Wichita would be great because located at the confluence of the two rivers. The streams which run past Wichita have little bearing upon its com- mercial supremacy. The Big Arkansas, while it is one of the large streams of the North American continent and is 2,100 miles long, carries no commerce upon its bosom. No argosies from Spain ever enter the port of Wichita. The Arkansas river rises in the fastnesses of the Rocky Mountains and flows easterly through Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma and southward. It waters a noble valley, and from its source on the great Continental Di- vide, where it bursts from the rock a limpid spring, and for fifty miles it is a beautiful trout stream. Its first contamination is at Granite, Colo., where a huge tail race from a placer mine pol- lutes its pure waters. At Pueblo it gathers other impurities which imparts its yellow colors to this stream for many, many miles. Through eastern Colorado and Kansas it has a distinct underflow, and it blesses all of the surrounding country. There was a time in the early eighties that congress appropriated the sum of $35,000 to explore this river. A boat was constructed at Wichita and manned by engineers and the river was entered at this point and the boat poled and pushed down this stream. Enough time was wasted to use up this appropriation, and that was the last of navigating this portion of the Arkansas. About this time Bent Murdock, who lived at Eldorado, Butler county, jeered at Wichita and its claims to being the head of navigation on the Arkansas river. He said "that the Arkansas river at Wichita was navigable only for channel catfish and that any boat which could run on a heavy dew could run on the Arkansas river at Wichita."
THE LITTLE ARKANSAS RIVER.
"Here the rank thistle nodded in the wind and the wild fox dug his hole unscared."
The Little Arkansas river forms a confluence with the larger
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stream within the corporate borders of the city of Wichita. The Great Arkansas is a larger stream and flows from mountain to plain for 2,100 miles, but in no sense does it possess in Kansas the attractions of the smaller stream. The smaller stream makes a beautiful and fruitful valley, stretching from its very source in Rice county to its junction with the larger stream in the beautiful park system of the city of Wichita. There is no more attractive spot in Kansas than the junction of these historic streams. A fine expanse of water, a magnificent stretch of woodland, nature and art combined, the natural forest combined with the skill of the landscape gardener, present a most pleasing picture to the eye. The native timber has been preserved with infinite care and the rich alluvial soil yields to the florist the most pleasing returns. On the elegant drives and along the banks of this stream, where once the Indian warrior woed his dusky mate, the speedy roadster with the rubber-tired buggy and the luxurious automo- bile now take the road. Northward from Wichita along the Little Arkansas river are located some of the most fertile farms in the entire state of Kansas.
THE WICHITA BOOM.
By THE EDITOR.
During the years 1886 and 1887 occurred the Wichita boom. In its trail it left a track of devastation, which lasted for a decade and more. A period of wild speculation was on the entire west- ern country. It was not confined to Wichita but took in the in- terior West and the Rocky Mountain region. It was a disease like the "milk sick" in Indiana. It had to run its course. It was a ยท microbe which was inhaled in the air and the most conservative men in the East who came to Wichita at that time, either for permanent or temporary purposes, "who came to scoff, remained to pray," falling under the influence of the deadly parasite, in- haling the microbe, in one week they became as wild as their fel- lows and joined the maddening crowd. It was a "fool's para- dise," complete in one chapter, and it was followed in 1888 with a reaction which jarred business in Wichita and the West to its very foundations. During this boom, which was a wild, unrea-
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soning craze, men lost their reason, went into the wildest specu- lations, projected new lines of railway, built new buildings mostly on mortgages and borrowed capital, turned stores and business houses into real estate offices, and acted the fool generally. As a result, when the reaction came, Wichita woke up to find itself a wreck. Many fine pieces of property went for the taxes, many more went under the hammer of the sheriff, mortgage foreclosures clogged the court docket, and distress was broadcast over Sedg- wick county and all over this interior West. To recoup their fallen fortunes men seized upon other and what they supposed were lesser dilemmas. The grafter was abroad in the land and his harvest was a bountiful one. Wildcat stock in corporations capitalized a hundredfold and in most improbable localities found ready sale. All kinds of stocks in mines, manufactures and kin- dred schemes were floated upon a long suffering and deluded public. Finally a halt was called. It came as the result of a sober second thought. The bubble burst, the idol was shattered, the stock looked like money but would not draw a dollar at the bank. It finally dawned upon our people that the same money invested in Wichita property or Sedgwick county lands would bring far greater returns. The light of reason broke.
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