The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1895-03-23
KANSANS GREAT READERS.

The free labrary and reading room
was formally opened at Independence,
Kan. the other night. 1t is an I'M
usual week that passes without the
opening of such an institution in some
Kansas town. Kansas has always been
reading community. The first frame
building erected in the average Kan
sas town is a school house. and scores
of Kansas newspapers issued volume
one, number one" outside of walls, in a
tent upon the open prairie. These pio-
neer school houses and newspapers are
notably common in eastern and CEN
trail Kansas in the earlier days. In
western Kansas the bonds were voted
for the 10000 brick school house and
the three story brick newspaper build
ing with the zinc cornices went up as
soon as the sod was turned. Before
the first crop was harvested high
school clas3 was graduated and
boom historical edition of the news
paper with photo engravings was print
ed on the power press" to celebrate
the first anniversary Of the towns
history Thus it was that Kansas was
called the child of Plymouth Rock"
100 towns-it is said-that are not equip
ped with a public library. When Kan
sas is one-third as old as Massachu
sets, there will be less than 100 towns
without libraries.
The public library is a Kansas in
stitution. Kansas was settled with
that kind of people. Not one town in
ten in Kansas ever had a regular
tough element. The average Kan
sas town was settled and governed by
law abiding people from the east, from
Ohio, Illinois and the Middle states.
There is as good blood in Kansas as
there is in Boston. And blood tells. II
is blood that keeps the best people in
the average country town abreast of
the times-hunting for something new
as the Pilgrims were. In the book store
in the Kansas town of 200 or 5000 peo-
pie. every month there will be n score
of leading eastern magazines on sale.
Every week the leading semi-literary
weekly papers will he on the counters.
Every day 200 daily papers from Kan
sas City, St Louis and Chicago are dis
tributed by carrier over the town. In
the book store there is always small
shelf where new books may be found.
The Kansas man has read "TTilby."
He knows as much about The Man
Xman" as the New York man does. At
the Woman's Reading club, which is
the component part of every Kansas
town, the yellow book" and the Chap
book" and Mr.. Beardsley and all the
latest things in art and literature are
discussed just five days after the burst
from Boston. The eastern man who
sends his old magazines to his benight-
ed kin in Kansas should know that the
Century. Harpers, The Atlantic Month
ly and Scribner's are put upon sale in
Wichita, Emporia and Garden City as
soon as they are put on sale in the
east. The free reading room is fur
nished with these publications and the
free library obtains the new books
about as 500 in Hiawatha or Topeka
or lola as they may be had in the libra
ries of New York
This spirit of progression in Kansas
is one of the things the fastener can
not understand. He gets the idea that
the west is cowboy and rowdy and
all that sort OF thing OF some Of the
west this may be true, but not Of Kan
sas. Kansas. men and brethren. is the
child OF Plymouth Rock, and she has
the strawberry mark upon her right
arm TO prove her ancestry.-kansas
City Star.