, 1897-03-06

duly mortgaged TO u Boston capitalist
who is today the happy possessor Of a
"first-class university" unincumbered
by either students or professors. How
so many institutions were to be support
ed nobody stopped to inquire. 1t was
enough to know that land in the neigh
borhood OF Cambridge and Oxford, Har-
ward and Yale was valuable; and. II II
like Institutions could be set going in
Wichita, it was to clear for argument
Of sight" So the good work went n
About this time a company was organ-
lied to manufacture watches. and far
u on the prairie. remote from the
haunts and habitations OF man, arose a
grand. four-story stone structure, de-
signed to be the home OF the new indus
try. But the frosts OF adversely nipped
the enterprise; and that lonely watch
factory, wherein no watch was ever
made, stands today a monument to the
zeal and hopefulness Of that marvellous
era. In like manner vast carworks
were built, now silent as the tomb; and
a mighty pillow works wherein never a
pillow was made. The city was filled
with strangers; money was plentiful be-
You'd all precedent; and the populists,
who arose two years later to howl about
the lack of money per capita" would
then have been laughed to scorn.
The boom eliminated in 1887. and
there vas a sudden cessation OF sales.
Vainly did 700 licensed real estate
agents explain that this was only a for
tunate breathing spell" The good old
days never returned. As time rolled by
The dealers closed their offices m by
one. and slowly. but surely. the convic-
lion fastened itself upon the most en-
thusiastic that the bottom had dropped
out, and that houses many miles from
the business center. which nobody
torn to pieces by thieves and vandals,
were not worth the lumber that was in
them.
So ended the famous Wichita specu>
lation, and soon after came to a close
the great Kansas boom, of which the
Wichita boom was a part. Wichita still
has perhaps 10000 people, and possess
es undoubted commercial advantages
but many OF the smaller cities further
west, having no longer a reason for ex-
~istence, followed their Blooms into -ob-
livion and some have totally disappear
ed. The losses were SO vast and varied
as to elude all accurate estimate. The
good results are confined to a highly
valuable experience now possessed by
many people. Another result is the un-
precedented low price OF much good and
profitable property, even In the best
part of Kansas. When the pendulum
again swings the other way, as 1t some
day must. the buyers of land at present
prices will gather in for themselves a
share OF what was lost by the victims
OF he great boom.
The political results were immediate.
Short crops. the wholesale collapse II
values and a general maturing of boom
debts produced an inevitable and genu-
inc scarcity of money. in sudden and
amazing contrast with the preceding
abundance. Then came the heyday of
the populist. No easier task ere con,
fronted a calamity orator. He wanted
to prove that crying evil OF the day was
the lack OF circulating medium, and he
could always prove it by simply bidding
his hearers put their hands in their
pockets. The argument was then clos
ed.
Other auses contributed to the
growth OF Kansas populism, but OF
themselves would never have produced
the wonderful harvest of PETERS, Simp-
sons. Leases, ct id genus omne. A well,
distributed rain in Kansas in July, 1890,
would in all probability have saved two
United States senators t 0 the republic
can party, have prevented the repeal OF
the Mckinley law and thus changed the
whole course OF recent American his
tory.
GEORGE L. DOUGLASS.
Those people next door are still in