Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1894-03-02
GHOST OF GOOD TIMES
A CITY BUILT BUT NEVER OC-
CUPlEO.
Costly Houses and Stores Are
Now Unsenanted.

few hours ride OF the metropolis Of
North Dakota there was q town with
substantial buildings, streets and side
walks. handsome residences, expensive
stores, ETC., vacant, absolutely tenant
less, he would scarcely credit,tlse story
if he did not know the teller to be a
truthful man. Yet the Steel County
Ozone says this is a veritable truth.
The town or "city" is there, deserted
abandoned, going to decay; no traffic
goes on in its streets nor business in
its stores; no homes are in the dwell
ings. The streets are graded and side
walked and trees and shrubbery -four
ish in the yards surrounding the resi-
dences, but all is silence and loneli-
ness. This place is the town OF West
Lynne, in Manitoba, opposite Emer-
son, just across the line from St. Vim
cent. There on two eides Of the Red
river and within an area OF four square
miles are four towns, Emerson, West
Lynne, Winston and Pembina. West
Lynne is on the west bank OF the
river. The history Of the place is one
of the romances of town building in
the boom period of '76 to 'SI-when
Winnipeg was the metropolis of the
north.
Some schemers, with more fertility
than scruples, plated and exploited q
city on the Red river at point where
they claimed the Great Northern was
to cross. Eastern capitalists were be-
coming interested and money WAS
plenty. There was no sham about
the construction of the town-it was
not another Arizona desert farce
only in the minds and on the plats
OF it's projectors-but a substantial
reality. A man named Murray, OF
Chicago, WAS the agent. He sold lots
at auction in Chicago at 5000 each.
While he would be selling, q telegram
would come notifying him of the sale
of certain plat, and it would be with
drawn. Then he sold adjoining lots
at way up prices.
Meantime building was progressing.
No board shanties, sod walls or canvas
shells, but handsome structures Of
brick or lumber, thoroughly finished
in approved style; and to-day the
town is handsome but useless monu.
ment to the credulity of some aud the
hsrdihood Of others. At least in 1891
there was not . citizen in the place,
not human being save the two who
went over to see what it was like. Not
even cat was seen summing itself in .
warm nook on that September day,
and nobody had ever lived there.
From the day when the carpenters
had left the buildings not store had
been opened, not . dwelling occupied.
Our friends party drove over the silent,
grass grown streets, past handsome
blocks of brick stores with plate-glass
windows and ornate iacades-but all
we're tenantless. There were resi-.
dences in that town which cost 5000,
tasteful and spacious, indicating that
people of refinement must at some
time have intended occupying them.
They were scattered in clusters in this
or that addition and surrounded with
trees and shrubbery, now grown rank
and unkempt. The fences are falling
to pieces and the grass and weeds en-.
croach on the pavements and ap-
proaches. This town is capable OF
holding population of 1900 people.
Across the Red river is q steel
bridge built for railroad and wagon
traffic, on which no engine nor trains
have ever rolled, and probably never
will. The wagon track is used, how
ever. The structure must have cost
500, 900, as there is q great deal of
piling and trestles in the approaches.
Our informant was in st. Vincent in
81 and received word from q Louis
vile, Kentucky, man to inquire what
property in West Lynne was worth, as
he represented the syndicate which
purchased most Of it. He thought
they had held it long enough to sell
and make \ good thing, as the rise in
value through the natural growth of
the place must have made tidy profit
Inquiry developed the fact that if the
land Ivy in one parcel it might be
worth S. per acre, but scattered as it
was it was worthless. The buildings
and other Improvements did not count
at all, as they were of no earthly use
where they we're. The town stands
on fiat sandy stretch, where the
overflow is so bad and continued that
no crops can be planted with safety.
Across the river, in Emerson, is the
custom house, and the business OF the
district is conducted there. Even in
Emerson there is brick block, three
stories in height. the entire length Of
q square-375 feet, with q basement
under the whole, 140 feet from front
to back-French plate glass fronts in
the fourteen spacious store fronts, and
all the expensive accessories of stylish
business block-and there is not q
solitary occupant in the building!
Eighty five thousand dollars was the
outlay for that. Here you have cur
ious illustration of the force Of human
credulity. Why people would invest
money in such enterprises, which they
had never looked over in person, and
why the money, which is go skittish
in good investments, should freely
flow to create and carry out such hair
Drained ventures, is indeed mystery.