Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1886-01-29
MEDICINE LODGE sOOMs.

hSDlCINE LODGE B00MS.
She Eas a Kansas City Road and Is Glad Of
It-A Town That Trades Almost Exclu-
sIvely IN This City Prosperous Barber
county-Future Flattering Prospects.
Especial Correspondence Kansas City TimcsD
MEDICINE LODGE, Kan, Jan. 49,
The Southern Kansas railroad is now
completed to this place and regular
trains are running. One can leave
Kansas City at 10 o'clock in the even
ing and at $40 the following afternoon
be III Medicine Lodge, S37 miles away.
This is better than the old way of COM
ing to Harper on the train and then
riding forty miles in rough coach in
order To get here. Kansas City should
appreciate this new arrangement, for it
will be the means of throwing thous-
ands of dollars into that city where but
hundreds fell before. When but a
country town, with no railroad nearer
than thirty miles, Medicine Lodge
could not be classed as a jobbing town,
but from now on it will be. Here will
be the distributing point for territory
extending twenty-five miles north, fif-
teen miles east, seventy-iive miles south
and sevemty miles west, reaching into
Clark county, and covering all of
Comanche. The merchants, lumber
men and coal dealers are making their
arrangements accordingly, and already
there are no less than 500 car loads of
freight ordered for here.
Several months ago the Times pub
lished a statement showing that the
business done by Medicine Lodge for
the year ending July l, 1855, amounted
to LOCO, 900; in Your paper next fall
you can quadrupe those figures and re-
main in the bounds OF truth, your great
ambition. AS estimated then Kansas
City supplied three-fourths of the
merchants for this city. From now on
it IS more than likely that it will supply
nine-tenths. We feel that we are more
closely connected than ever before with
your thriving metropolis, and certainly
cur people will be there more frequent
ly, now that they can go through with
out change of cars.
There is talk now OF getting up an
excursion from this place to Kansas
City as soon as winter breaks up, and
when this occurs we will turn loose not
less than 400 people in your city. They
will not be wild and woody" COWBOYS
or backwOodsmen who have never seen
city, but class of people as intelli-
gent, as refined, as we'll TODD as any
community in Kansas can boast Of
Why, here in Medicine Lodge, town
that has labored under the disadvant-
ages mentioned in the first pant of this
letter, there are now 200 people, four
church organizations and regular Sc
vices, a graded school with an enroll
ment of nearly 500, a four room brick
school building, eighteen lawyers, five
doctors, two banks with a combined
capital of over $500, COO, two brass bands.
a standing amphitheatre with a circus
and variety performance every night,
with troop of twenty performers; two
good newspapers, dozens of loan agen-
cies, the most solid mercantile firms TO
be found in the state, a sixty-room four
story brick hotel, Kansas drug stores
and open saloons, magnIficently
equipped opera hail, of course a skating
rink, a driving park and race track, aud
in short, everything needed for comfort
and luxury. All these things were here
when the railroad arrived, and SO what
may not be expected during the year
1885? This was for ten years the centre
of a vast grazing district, but the cattle
have been corralled and are now in
pastures. Three years ago agriculture
was an experiment. To-day it is a grand
success. Then the breeds of cattle
were confined to the long-horneG
Texans; now our herds are graded up
with the finer blood of Missouri and
Kentucky short-horns, Galloways,
Polled Angus and Jerseys.
The unfenced stock range is now en-
closed and in cultivation, the temporary
dugouts or shanties have been turned
into granaries or stables and the ranch
man now lives in modern house, sur
rounded by all the comforts to be found
in prosperous country.
Barber county, with population of
but 1900 in 1888, had 1880 in 1885, and
in 1886 we calculate on 9,0OO. The tax
able wealth last March was 81 500, 600,
and the assessment to be made this
year will show at least $780, 900.
Three-fourths of the county has been
taken 10y pre-emptors, and while most
of the best government land has been
proved up, there are thousands of acres
that could be utilized for stock farms,
orchards, vineyards. etc. This county
is not the garden spot of the world, .
but it is the best for combined agricul-
ture and stock raising in the state. 1t
has more miles of running water than
any county in southwest Kansas, and
its climate is as mud and healthful as
any in the west.
The severe cold spell of January 2
and and since that time visited here,
but with nothing like the disastrous
effect our western and northern neigh
bors experienced. The mercury bodied