The Newberry herald and news. (Newberry, S.C.) 1884-1903, 1890-05-22
BILL .ARP'S PHILOSOPHY.
The Character of Live Town-A Notable
Example Of Push and Pluck.

| X.
| "What constitutes a StateM We all
know that and can answer the poet,
but what constitutes a town or city? I
Was Illuminating over this while cruis-
ing around Americus in the electric
car. Three years ago was in Ameri-
Gus and it was nice little town of
three thousand people, and now it has
daily papers and electric street cars,
and waterworks, and gasworks, and an
ice factory, and oil mills, and COM
presses, and Il cotton factory, and fur
niture factory. and a planning mills, and
brick plant that makes fifty thousand
q day, and has many other industries,
and the population has increased to
5000 people, and there is a splendid
new court house that is paid for, and
an opera house, and they are building
hundred thousand dollar hotel. Beau
tiful dwellings have been erected all
along the electric line, and everywhere
you 60 here are signs of thrift and pros
perity. There are fifty men in Ameri-
Gus who are worth fifty thousand dol
lars and over, and they range as high
as half a million. There are four banks
and al investment company, with half
Il million capital, and the stock is worth
$500 a share.
What did all this? Who did it, and
how was it done? Every aspiring town
in tic State would like t. know. It is
said that agriculture is the basis of all
prosperity, but the lands of Sumter
County are no richer than they used to
be, nor do they produce any more cot
ton, or corn or oats to the acre. What
has given such stimulus to Ameri-
Gus?
There is good old maxim that
"heaven helps those who help them
selves" Colonel Evan Howell came to
our town two years ago, and told our
people that same old thing, and recited
one of old ~fIsop's fables, about the par
fridge and her young ones in the wheat
field, and how the young birds were
alarmed when they heard the farmer
say he was going to invite the neigh
bors to- come and cut his wheat the
next day, but the old bird wasn't at all
alarmed, for she knew that the neigh
bors were not coming.
Our Gainesville people are still wait
ing for the neighbors, but these Ameri-
Gus people have acted on that good old
maxim, and they had a leader who
opened school and took up the whole
community as scholars. I verify be-
lieve that if Colonel Hawkins had not
lived in Americus the town would
have been what it was three years
ago.
n progressive leader is great boon
to town. Colonel Hawkins built a
little railroad about fifty miles long and
wouldn't let it connect with anything,
but stopped it in the woods, and he
built it without capital, or bonds or
syndicates or state aid, but he built it
and it brought trade to the town that
it had never had before and gave it a
start, and then he organized various
Improvement companies and built an
other railroad, and everything that he
touched prospered, and the people got
to believing that he couldn't make a
mistake and they followed his lead,
and very soon his spirit of enterprise
infused the whole community, and
now when anything new is started the
first inquiry is, "What does Colonel
Hawkins think about it?n or, "Is Col.
Hawkins in it," and that is all they
want to know. Hislucky star is still in
the ascendant. He has made no blum
ders. He has built over three hundred
miles Of railroad, and they all point to
Americus. He is now worth half mil
lion of dollars, and nobody has suffered.
Nobody is worth any less because he is
worth more. He has added to values.
He has increased the taxable property
of Sumter County not less than three
million dollars in the last five years.
Towns have characters just like indi-
viduals. The young men of Americus
have more life and more business en-
tcrprise than any I know of. They
don't loaf around in the day nor go to
the billiard saloon at night. They are
all doing something, and have q good
bank account. 1t is not popular to be
doing nothing in that town. The ia
theirs and mothers are happy because
their children are doing we'll. My wife
says the ladies don't put on any style,
but are home-like and kind and social,
and can walk a quarter Of a mile to
church or to pay visit. That is just
splendid. All / want to know about a
woman is that she has to have the car
riage and horses and driver brought out
to take her to the church that is only
two or three hundred yards away.
Southwestern Georgia is looking up.
Her fertile lands and delightful climate
are attracting visitors more than ever
before Good farming lands are in de-
mand all over the South. Shortly af-
ter the war the yankees gave us a
bureau for refugees and abandoned
lands, but that bureau has been trans
ferred to Vermont. The truth is that
good farming is paying business at
the South. Mr.. McLendon's careful
examination of the tax returns proves
beyond all question that the farmers Of
Thomas County are prospering. I have
had little patience with all this bun,
combe talk about the poor, down-trod.