Cheyenne transporter. [volume] (Darlington, Indian Terr.) 1879-1886, 1884-01-28


and editors who have been consecrated
as monumental liars because they told
large and long stories about Kansas
and her possibilities, will never be
known by any, save, possibly, by him
who is to prepare the final record of
all things. So many and such highly
colored statements have they written
concerning this fair land Of ours that
the average looker-on from a distance
regards them as about all color; and
were it not that there is somewhere at
least reasonable grounds for little
fowery composition, Kansas would, in
deed, be very much overdone subject.
In the beginning, away back in the
long ago-say about twenty-five years
ago, and that is long time in Kansas,
when men and women rode over these
magnificent prairies and inhaled the
inspiring air, they looked across over
miles and miles of billowy plain and
prophesied unconsciously of things to
come. There was something in the
shadowy landscape, in the shimmering
atmosphere, in the painted earth, that
gave courage to men and hope to
women. To live under these genial
skies in those days of hallowed memory
was to revel in health made up largely
of hypothecations of future possibilities.
Name, If you can, the man who, after
being in Kansas week, was not will
ing TO wager everything that all his
friends and acquaintances ever owned
or expected to own that Kansas would
be the First State in the Union" in
ten years, and then undertake to tell
you how many corner lots he would
sell you for thousand dollars, throw
ing in his because its
you, you know"
Those brave old prophets of the early
Kansas time had faith strong as in
tha, of the Pilgrim Fathers. They be-
lieved in Kansas, but could urge little
that the outside world regarded as re-
liable evidence of what tho pioneers
believed with enthusiastic perse-
verance. They did tell big stories; no
body wants to deny il; and, whether
the world believed them or not we dc
not need to argue at this late day, for
we count ourselves more than a million
of people at this writing, and the show
ing we make of material progress is one
of the wonders of the world. The
strange thing is not so much that fabu
lous tales were told of this enchanted
land, but that so few of them were no.
true. Statistics of Kansas progress are
unequalled in the worlds history. L
you are curious to test the correctness
of this statement, look up the record
Lawrence and Topeka, Atchison, anC
the country round about, were pros
pected by the 'tirst settlers" in 1854 )
not thirty years ago. In 1861, our til s.
state governor was elected, snd oul
population was not quarter that o
Shawnee and Douglas counties now
SO little at that time was done; so lit
tie was it possible to do because of tn,
disturbed condition of society, tha
when Charles Robinson was inaugu
rated governor it was not knOwl
whether apples could be successful,
grown on Kansas soil, whether per
manent agriculture was assured, O
whether buffalo would not roam on th,
western plains.
That was twenty-five years ago, ant
the next four years were those of th
great war. Not until 1S65-'66 did W.
have a fair, uninterrupted start. Ii
1867 the Kansas Pacific railroa,
reached Topeka; in 1869 the Atchison
Topeka and Santa . reached Emporia
aad Topeka contained about ono fourtl
the population she now has. In 1874
'75-the grasshopper years, althoug
we had been growing with wonderful
rapidity, we were not old enough no
strong enough to contend alone agains
an army of locusts, out Kansas is big
ger now. Through courtesy OF Stat
Auditor McCabe, (whO, by the way,
very accommodating and pains-taAin
officer,) the Capital is enabled to pr,