, 1886-06-30
OUR DOUGLAS LETTER.
Answer to Inquiries from Professional
Men--Commercial Confederation


Answer to Inquiries from Professional
Men--Commercial Centcr--Location
Special Correspondence of THE LEADER.
DOUGLAS. Wyo., June 26.-Hund- e6s
of personal letters received by myself and
other citizens, virtually asking a guarau-
tie that the writers can do well here, may
be answered by wholesale. This is a good
place to come to open a saloon. OF course
you can make money; there is a saloon
here now to every twenty inhabitants,
and scarcely one person IN twenty drinks.
But as you undoubtedly sell better whisky
than these fellows keep, your average of
the custom will be large. So come right
on. Douglas experiences a long felt want
for another saloon.
There is room here for another lawyer.
There always is-above. If you are hover
ing zeal the tail of the bar in your own
village, of course you can expect to ride
the storm to the front here.
We need one more doctor. The coun
try is remarkably healthy, but the Asiatic
cholera may reach us next year, and we
want to be prepared. Come prepared
Ito stay.
Seriously, there is room for everybody
to open business. There is room in this
region for quite Il city; but no one can tell
what the Northwestern railroad is going to
do for this place. They are r%eticent on
the subject simply because they don't
know what they will be able to accomplish.
Their policy is controlled largely by the
movements of other lines, They may be
relied upon to keep ahead of all rival
roads. They are going to grade seventy
miles beyond here this fall, so as to be
ready to lay that amount of raj. early in
the spring and rush far to the front next
year. If the Union Pacific were
to decide to push the Cheyenne &
Northern to this point before the snow
flies -Il--
( nave no doubt that when it gets
here, it would find the actual terminus
of the Northwestern fully $50 miles to the
westward.
But there is certainly nothing in all his
talk that the principal town on the
Northwestern system in Wyoming is not
going to be at Douglas, but will be located
in the vicinity of Fort Casper, some sixty
miles further west. The argument in
favor of the theory is that Casper is
nearer the geographical center of the ter
ritory; that it is contiguous to the coal
and oil fields, and that it is a better point
than Fetterman for a branch to the Pow
der river country. Such considerations
are very plausible, but they are mislead
ing. In the first place the geographical is
seldom the commercial center of a state.
The drift of trade, in the Far West espe-
cially, is from east to west. 1t does not
radiate from the geographic center as
spokes from the hub. Draw a line in
closing the trade territory of any flourish
ing Western city, and the city itself, far
from being in the center. will be found
lust inside the eastern border of its circle.
Kansas City is the metropolis of Kansas,
not OF Missouri; St. Louis of Missouri,
and not Of Illinois; Omaha of Nebraska,
and not of Iowa; Chicago Of the West.
and not Of the East. All the inhabited
part of Colorado is west Of Denver. Chey
enne jobs westward along the Union Pa
ciiic, but scarcely at all into Nebraska.
So with this point. Its location on the
eastern side of the territory places it geo
graphically in precisely the right place for
a commercial center. 1t is too far west
rather than too far east. 1t annot sell
goods back over the direction they came
to the region that will be supplied by
Lusk. A commercial center at Casper
would ever be shut off from the
trade of the eastern half of the
territory. Furthermore, Douglas is
forty miles nearer to the Powder river re
gion than Casper, and the route is more
feasible. Branch roads cannot strike
squarely off at right angles, but must run
%diagonally if their trade is not to be cut
off bysrival diagonals. Lastly, commercial
cities are seldom at coal banks or oil wells.
The fostering railroads don't want them
there; they prefer to haul the coal and oil
in. In short, there is every reason for
believing that Douglas will be the iobbing
point on the line of the Northwestern,
Just the same as Cheyenne is the iobbing
point on the Union Pacific. Certain it is
that the Northwestern people are encour-
aging their strong business friends
throughout this section to locate here.
Certain it also is that this point will be the
end Of a division, and the location of the
machine shops.tor all the Wyoming lines.
That is enough for a starter.
Several new houses start every day, and
teams are fairly pouring in from Nebraska.
No date for the sale Of lots has yet been
fixed. LErT
Disseminating the Calf Round Up.
The calf round up has been discontinued
by a large number of the outfits this year,
the calves being branded on the spring
and fall ronnd ups. BY this arrangement
the young stock are mole thoroughly and
completely branded, there being hardly a
calf that is not bran led at the end of the
season. The calf round up was made in
the middle of the summer, and as many
were dropped in the latter part Of the
summer and fall, they remained unbrand-