Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1886-1890, 1888-01-19
THE TWO KS.
Kansas Contrasted With Kentucky.
FRANKFORT. KY. !
Jan. 8. 1888. /


your city some years, and written some
for your. paper from this state-I again
intrude upon your good nature and
write you few thoughts for the benefit
of your many readers and my friends
from this Anticipated mud-puddle, of
which an old wag once said, to get into
you had to crawl through hole, and to
get away from, you had to swim the
river. This expression is almost liter
ally true to this day, of the old decaying,
muddy, Wondering, widowed, tumble
down. misshapen village which tries to
complacently call itself the capital of
the grand and glorious old poverty
strcken) commonwealth of Kentucky"
a state that should, and would
be today, standing in the front
ranks of the many prosperous states
that make up glorious nation, whose
ties were cemented by the blood and
bravery of her gallant defenders, who
beat down the aSsaSsip-like blades turned
TO plunge into the breast of their coun-
try, were it not SO miserably misman-
aged and misruled and plundered by
those who few years since tried to de-
stroy her. She is the richest state in the
union in coal, iron, tobacco, hemp,
grasses andsfine horses, not to mention
whisky, as there IS an immense over-pro-
duction of that stimulation of kentucays
giant intellect assembled here now to
look wise, take a ':toddy" and see if it
cannot execute or devise some new
scheme or means of taxing the farmers
and lahorers and the few manufactures
that have not already left the state; draw
their salaries from ''busted" treasury
if they can, and if not, take 1t from the
school fund and let the poor, half-paid
teachers wait till more is sqEeazed from,
the farmer before he has THE to sell his
crop. But the law makers and officers
and there are enough of them, / should
say-have no time to do anything toward
helping to develop the states immense
resources, for they must get their own
pay regardless Of coal, iron, etc., for
there is none in the treasury to pay her
debts, and the faithful, Woodworking
officers must get their pay for the great
brain waste and loss Of tissue by Srab-
bling deep down iuto the corners, cracks
and crannies of the old empty, busted
box first and Immediately. But they
are disappointed as usual, for poor old
Kentucky is ruled so miserably she can
not pay her notes and so let them 60 to
protest. Her auditor and treasurer
who by the way have been here in offices
since the revolution, or before-laSt year
were not growing as fast as usual on
account of the extreme embarrassment,
financially speaking, of the Old-''the
grand ld"-commonwealth, as the DEM
Ocrats holding or expecting to hold office
50 love to lawd her-just before election
to their dear, dear hearers and kind
fellow citiz ems. so they resolve on having
bill passed called the internal revenue
BILL to pay their salaries and possibly
put little into the treasury to help pay
a little on her debts and lool, little
more respectable. So that bill became
law, assessors We're paid so much per
head for assessing SO that he would not
forget anyone. The poor farmer was to
to return all his property at full cash
value or be fined 500 and the valuation
increased 10 per cent Then the super
visOrS of the countries Overhauled the
books to see if they had lied. Then the
books 90 before a recently appointed
state board of canyasserS to add more
per centage if there was not enough to
pay the officers. The citizen was forced
to pay tax on all he owned and all that
was due him. whether he ever got it or
not. For forsooth! must all this Her
cuiean intellect waste its rotten
ness on the malarial air of
Frankfort and be waited over
the river and hills and through the hole
by which you finally ''get there to low
ing, and ragged dear constituents in their
little old log cabin on the hill. and not
be paid promptly while moulding and
rotting in office from 20 to 80 years? No.
not if every woman and child (they have
kissed the dear little things for centur-
ies) in the GLORIOUS, &c" starves to
death.
Some of these officers have been in
Office so long that the memory of the
oldest topper runs not back to the first
election day when he drank quarts of
cheap rot gut and hallooed for ''Uncle
Dick Tate forever for state treasurer
and others. Some one has found in an
old, musty anchient history that our
Uncle Dick was discovered in office
about the time Frankfort was accident
ally found by hunter, who, in pursuit
of game, fell over the cliff and into
mud hole. from which he was hooked
out by a venerable old man who had
little place called a treasury built upon a
knoll. Yet authors disagree, and it might
have been during the food for no men,
ton is made of the hunters escape, and
it is to be presumed that he foated out
upon mud scow as the hole
in the ground was not then
built and nary bridge did the ''old
Kaintuk" foam and fret and growl
under.
But aside from this depression, for
which | hope you will pardon me, |
must say TINT as we went rafting and
tumbling along among the rocky hills
and hollows to be suddenly struck blind
by going into frowning black hole, to
he suddenly dumped into the heart of
town and saw the river surging through
the precipitous hills that surround
Frankfort, thought of the old wags
saying as being true now as then.
Yet | learn that there is a tradition in
regard to the formation of the tow that
again alludeS to the hunter spoken of
1t says that lat the time the unfortunate
hunter fell over the cliffs and was so
suddenly introduced to Uncle Dick
Tate. that he was doubtless the second
lllhdDitdHi OF the Capital anu llidt the
town grew to Its present proportions
from luckless hunters from time 10 time
falling over the cliffs. But when the
hole was built for the single rail
r"ad that enters the town many
OF her citizens sought more
congenial Chimes" This tradition may
be without foundation, but the peniten-
tiary is there and many of her inhabi-
tants could not escape by either route,
and some are sent there by the surround
ing counties as representatives who in
nocently 20 there To obiige their dear