The Banner-Democrat. [volume] (Lake Providence, East Carroll Parish, La.) 1892-current, 1899-08-26
RUlNED BY AN EDITORIAL.
eyeat Boom Town Which Received &
Black Eye From Journalists.

NOiNEO Of AN COti OniHIs
sYeat Boom Town which Received .
Black Eye From Journsli0n.
Twelve years ago Wichita, Kan,
was the greatest boom town in the
West. The collapse of the boom in
Wichita was caused directly by an
! editorial written by Marsh Murdoch
and published in his newspaper, the
Eagle. That editorial probably
caused more commotion in this little
Western world than any other article
that was ever published, because it
knocked all the wind out of Wichita,
and the rapid panic that followed be-
came contagious and spread to every
Kansas town. 1t is question wheth.
er Mr.. Murdoch realized the possible
results of his admonition. He was
pioneer in Kansas State builder.
He started the first paper west or
south of Topeka in 1868, and he came
to Wichita before the railroad. He
loved the town more than any other
man in it. HIS ambition, his pride.
his hopes were all involved in its in
terests, and he did more than any
other man to create the fiction of Q
metropolis which he himself exposed,
and to inspire the delusions that he
destroyed. Nobody doubted his sin.
cerity. Nobody every questioned the
honesty of his motive, but it is doubt
full if wider or deeper or more vigor-
GUS imprecations were ever heaped
upon any other man. Thousands of
spectators who thought they were
millioniares were bankrupt the next
morning. Every line of that editorial
cost 81, 900, 900 to the town of Wich-
tia, and without doubt it was the most
costly article that ever appeared in
type.
But the boom would have broken
sooner or later. The balloon had be-
come so distended that it must have
burst within few months, and it was
that knowledge which prompted Mr..
Murdoch to "Call a Halt" Under
that title, in few impressive words,
he warned the people of Wichita that
they had reached the limit of human
folly, and in the name of honest citi-
zenship and ordinary business sense
he demanded that insane speculation
in town lots should cease, and that
the energies Of the people should be
employed in the fulfillment of the
promise and the development of the
resources upon which the boom had
been based. He called the attention
of the public to what was already
painfully apparent to every one-that
it would require half century of pa
tient toll to carry out the plans that
had been made for the improvement
of Wichita, and that there was not
enough money in the State of Kansas
to settle the obligations that had been
assumed in that town. He urged
his fellow citizens to abandon specu-
lation and settle down to business.
The Wichita Eagle had big circu-
lation in those days, and it has always
been one of the most influential pa
pers in the State. Murdoch was rec
oguized as a man of great power with
the pen, and strength of purpose
that never faltered. Hence when the
real estate spectators and the boom
ers read that editorial they realized
that it was the honest exhortation of
q man who could not be bullied or de-
ceived. They knew that Marsh MUIR
dock was actuated by conscientious
motives, and that the publication
which threatened their interests
would be followed by others of the
same sort. So everybody hurried
down town to sell his property for
the best price he could get, and
found that everybody else was
there ahead of him for the same pur-
pose.
What day that was in Wichita! A
of wild beasts in menag-
erie was nothing in comparison to the
panic of frenzied men whose fortunes
were vanishing before their eyes.
Property that would have sold for
hundreds of thousands of dollars
twelve hours previous could not be
given away. Men who had loaned
millions upon real estate mortgages
realized within the next few hours
that they were ruined, and consterna-
ton sat at every fireside In the town.
OF thousands of dollars
worth of half-finished houses upon
which the workmen were busy that
were left untouched for
years after, and one-third of the resi-
dences and business blocks were ten.
antless for the next six years.