The Advocate and news., 1898-11-09
The Port Arthur Route.

uctS they nave 10 sell. Inere Is almost
no limit to the amount Of farm products
which the farmers of Kansas can raise.
What they want Is the best prices pos
sible for the stuff they have to sell.
Every cent bushel added to the price OF
wheat this year gives to the farmers OF
Kansas more than half million dollars
and every cent bushel added to the
price of corn gives them more than a
million and half dollars Foreign mar
kets must to a great extent fix the prices
for our surplus products, and the cheaper
we can lay our products down in these
distant markets the more will the pro
ducers receive for them. The money
saved in transportation would be added
to the profits of the producers. The At
lantic seaboard cities have always been,
until recently, our shipping ports for
European markets. 1t was a. long and
costly haul by land from Kansas to BOs-
ton or New York and at several inter-
mediate points charges must be added to
pay horde of commission men, tnspec-
tors and other officials until by the time
it reached its final destination there was
hardly enough left for the sun Drowned
farmer to pay the actual cost Of produc-
ton. Millions and millions of dollars
have been expended by the general gov
ernment in building and maintaining
those eastern harbors, and consolidated
railroads have established continuous
lines from the great central west to the
Atlantic seabord cities until the mer-
chants at those Jmarts were led to believe
that for all time to come the surplus
products of the fertile West must pay
tribute to their gateways for export
trade. But this Is now rapidly changing
A new gateway for export shipment is
being developed. The long haul by land
is being cut in two in the middle. Within
the last two years the Port Arthur rail-
road has been completed from Kansas
City to the Gulf of Mexico and deep
water harbor is being constructed at Sa-
bine Pass where the largest ocean steam
ers can be moored and loaded for Euro
pean markets This places Kansas City
only 767 miles from ocean shipment and
this short haul must mean millions OF
dollars to Kansas farmers. II One-half
the freight from Kansas City to New
York can be saved and added to the prod
ucts which the Kansas farmers have to
sell it will insure them many millions Of
dollars more in the future than they have
had in the asst. The water in Sabine
Pass is twenty-five feet deep and the
Port Arthur railroad company is con-
structing a short ship canal 1873 feet wide
at the top, rs feet wide at the bottom and
% feet deep that will bring ocean ves-
Ixy tC tbAis 70 r6c nd o1ountnrC
This plan is perfectly feasible and the
work is now nearly completed A large
elevator has been built that will hold
half a million bushels of grain and capa-
BILE of transferring to ocean vessels 10000
bushels an hour. The company has al
ready expended twenty millions Of dol
lars in building this road and developing
this harbor. A. fine city is well under
way at Port Arthur. Hon. w. G.
Edwards, ex-Secretary of State and one
Of the greatest workers who ever lived
in Kansas has the immediate charge Of
the development of this young and rap
idly growing city and his skill and
energy are everywhere manifest in the
rapid progress which the city is making
1t is located on the shore OF Lake Sabine,
DeduIllul uOuy VI WdI6I LSu mlleS WluS
and thirty miles long and in which the
tide from the gulf ebbs and flows twice
in twenty-four hours. This new road
and deep water harbor on the Gulf must
mean much for the people of Kansas
They bring ocean transportation so near
that the prices for our products must be
perceptibly increased because of the
lower freight rates to their ultimate mar
kets. The road runs through delightful
scenery all the way from Kansas City to
Port Arthur, varying from the prairies
In eastern Kansas to heavy pine timber
in eastern Indian Territory, the noun
tains and valleys of western Arkansas,
the immense forests in the Red river
valley of the South festoOned with mis-
tletOe in endless variety, through the
lumber camps in the long leaf pine and
across the Drairie Dlains that skirt the