Thomas County cat. [volume] (Colby, Kan.) 1885-1891, 1886-02-18

tured, sober, iaw-respecting civilization.
Labor saving machines sweep majestically
through fields of golden wheat or sprouting
orn: blooded stock lazily feed in meadows
blue stem, timothy or clover; comfortable
houses dot every hill top and valley; forests
orchards and hedge rows diversity the love-
iness of the landscape; and where isolation
and wildness brooded, the majestic lyric of
prosperous industry is echoing over 81 600
square miles of the loveliest and most fertile
country that the sun, in his daily journey,
lights and warns. The voiceless sphynx Of
gallery of the continent The oppressed
territory OF 1855, the beggared state Of 1874.
has become prince, ruling the markets Of
the world with opulent harvests.
THE FAcTs OF THE CENSUS.
am not, in thus exalting the growth and
prosperity of Kansas, speaking recklessly, as
I shall show by statistics compiled from the
census and agricultural reports of the United
States and our own state. Figures are al
ways dry, know. But when they tell the
pleasant story of the march of civilization
into and over q new land, surely they cannot
fail to interest men and women who have
themselves marched with this conQuerin9
army of industry and peace.
THE GROWTH OF KANSAS WITHOUT PARALLEL
The growth Of Kansas has had NO paral-
lei. The great states of New York and
tanning population Kansas has reached in
thirty years. Kentucky was eighty years,
Tennessee seventy five, Alabama ninety,
Ohio forty-fve, and Massachusetts,, New
Jersey, Georgia, and North and South Caro-
lima each over 100 years, in reaching the
present population of Kansas. Even the
marvellous growth Of the great states of the
illinois was organized as q territory in 1910,
and thirty years later had only 691 1872 inhAhs
itants, or not much more than one-half the
present population of this state. Indiana
was organized in 1900, and sixty years later
had population of only 1850, 428. Iowa
at that date. q population of nearly 1000.
In 1870 it had only IL 4,O2O Inhabitants.
Missouri was organized in 1872, with pop
ulation of over 10000, and fifty years later
had only LII ,0l2. Michigan and Wiscon-
sin, after fifty years of growth, did not have
as many people as Kansas has to-day; and
Texas, admitted into the union in 1s45, with
years later. only SIS, 579 inhabitants.
In 1861 Kansas ranked in population as tho
thirty third state of the Union; in 1870 it was
the twenty ninth; in 1880 the twentieth; and
is now the fifteenth. During the past quarter
of century Kansas has outstripped, Oregon,
Rhode Island, Delaware, Florida, Arkansas.
Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut,
Nldiucy NuluuoSOtd, MdVyittuo, NlISoloolppl,
California, North and South Carolina, Ala
bama, Wisconsin and New Jersey-all states
before the 29th of January, 1864. OF the
northern states only eight, New York, Penn
sylvania, Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Masachu-
sets, Michigan and Iowa. and of the south-
srn states only six, Georgia, Kentucky, Ten
nessee, Missouri, Virginia and Texas, now
outrank Kansas in population. At the close
Of the present decade Kansas will, am con-
hdent, rank as the eleventh state of the
American Union, and will round out the
nineteenth century as the sixth or seventh.
In the following table the population of
Kansas, as shown by the first census of the
territory, takea in January, 1856, and the
official enumerations made every five years
hereafter, is shown. The figures also ex-
nibit the proportion of white and colOred,
md of native and foreign born inhabitants;
he increase of population every five years,
nd the density of population per square mile
# territory at the close of each period. The
state census taken in 1865, however, did not
show the proportion of native and foreign
born citizens: