The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1900-01-14
Railroad Policy Which Meets
Aspiring MetropoIiSeS.
EVOLUTION OF THE TOWN
From Wagon lrade Bonanza
to Railroad Center.

| ChIduoHld RAILROADS. anu one RnlCn
while not based on a defined agreement
among the railroads, is still determin-
! ate because each railroad works in its
own way. and for its own benefit, to a
result sufficiently beneficial to ALL
| In more than one corner of Oklahoma
| during the last twelve month the rail
| road fight has stirred up a community.
| man has come to town with a railroad
! proposition. The town has had one or
! perhaps no railroad. Part of the eoulmu-
! nifty has proved eager to- accept the pro-
motors proposition, but part of the com
munity has stood back with the stubborn
| contention that the town didn't want the
| railroad, that it could afford to pay the
railroad to stay away. The latter fac
ton is made up of men who have had
| considerable experience with towns which
| have prospered OIL wagon trade. Some of
! Of them quote the wagon trade of early
Wichita declaring that in the seventies
when Wichita had but one railroad the
main street of that city was jammed with
country wagons all day long. The wagon
trade of many Oklahoma cities has been
enormous. Forty miles west of Kingfish-
er, Hennessey or Enid it is possible to
! find farmers who consider themselves in
the zone of or sphere of One of these
! three towns. Scenes on busy days in
| the cities with big wagon trade the streets
damned with farmers wagons, are the
photographers delight and the boomers
joy. A section not penetrated by null
tiplicity of railroads is strangely enough
a country of few towns The wagon
trade centers in these few towns, and
the merchants who supply that trade
dwell in the sweetest variety of clover.
Now the construction of railroad sys-
TENS means the distribution of this wag
on trade, and as a distinct, single, big
thing its dissolution The railroads rule
that the townsite promoter shall not get
the towns along d given line OF railroad
closer than eight miles to one another.
As a rule the town-site promoters get
the towns ten or twelve miles apart
These towns are strung out without in
terruption all along the new line. In
each are little stores, and above all else
a pOst-office. The little towns each soon
creates its own sphere, its own territory.
Most of the farmers in that sphere trade
at this point all get their mail there.
With ten towns, newly created, each with
its share of the farmers trade, the single
large town soon finds that its wagon
trade is gone to a large extent. 1t is
this circums lance which causes a faction
to spring up when a town talks about
another railroad to strenuously oppose
it. If this faction proves strong enough
it will slowly but surely wreck any town
in prAqt alton +bic tho tour, I,OOy,
ers get out and oppose the anti-railroad
men with voice, scheme and if necessary
muscle. The editor of the local paper,
rarely with the anti--railroaders, turns
Loose logic and exhortation in his columns
promising great things for his little city
and roundly scoring the unprogressive
spirit which would stand in the way of
its prosperity He says nothing about the
wagon trade for it is not an easy mat
ter to explain that its loss will be
benefit
But the truth is and the editor knows
it, that the railroads are extending into
his territory, that they will extend into
it whether his town favors the extension
or not, and that even if his town opposes
the road, another town will get it, the
spring up, the wagon-trade will as a
whole, disappear and the town with the
most railroads will have captured val
liable prestige
This prestige is a strange quality in the
history of towns and cities Many city
has existed on it for a year or two when
there was scarcely anything else in sight
1t is often the one sustaining solace af-
ter period of railroad building. when all
the stimulus from the last railroad boom
has died down. Every man who has
passed twenty years in any western city
knows what a dreadful thing this re-ac-
ton is. Temporarily the old anti-rail-
readers have term of joyful satisfaction
in seeing the men who called themselves
progressive" sweat But this satisfac- /
ton is short-hved because they soon find !
themselves sweating with the rest. In /
time the town RECEIVERS, either by going /
after another railroad or through the /
more natural and much healthier process /
of a general increase of population. In |
the influx Of population the prestige |
which comes with number OF railroads /
becomes a valuable thing The smaller (.
railroad-creatcd towns grow. but not as I
fast as the larger town which they rec /
ognize as their central point, The natur- /
al trend of population is in the direction 4
OF the larger cities. The larger town /
which was deprived of so much trade by /
che smaller and new towns begins 10 7.
grow because Of its central location,
fact settled by its centering railroads and 4
begins 20 acquire large trade not indi- +
vidually with the farmers. but with the
towns which the farmers patronize. The .
country having become more thickly pop
ulasei the trade from these smaller
towns IS much greater and more salts Z
factory Than from the old wagon-trade. !
and in time the anu-railroaders ara 81 /
fenced forever.
Having reached this point the railroad T.
city aims az metropolitan dimensions. All /
che larger cities Of Oklahoma .oday have.
more or less expressed. this ambition and +
this aim. And at this point they meet the (.
general railroad policy a. equi-sized .
towns and the railroad opposition to ne /
tropolises IN the first place one Of the .
stock arguments made by the railroad (
boomers in securing towns support for I
extension Is thai the more roads the town
mas the more competition in rates it viii 4
have and the greater the benefits Il VIII
derive Waen the railroads have all been
secured. the towR wakes Up 10 the fact
that the promised competition ta rates
only meagerly materlalizes aud thas rates
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