The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1901-05-02
SORE ON REPORTERS
Mrs, Lease ScoIds Those Who
Created Her.
CALLS EN- ALL LIARS
Mary Ellen Is Also Sore on
Kansas a Whole.

The New York Sun has had an inter
view with Mrs. Lease concerning Mrs.
Nation It IS funny and interesting. 1t
is as follows:
There ought to be a revision edition of
4! old saying and proverbs. Bring one of
them up to date and it would read:
"An things come to those who live in
New York"
Now there's Kansas. The lucid inter
walls Of Kansas are growing in length and
frequency. But even now it has relapses
when its editors DO verbal fiphaps and
its orators foam at the mouth in trying
to express their horror of this long suff-
er1ng part of the country. And yet Kan
sas cannot keep its brightest ornaments
from coming down here to pin them
selves upon the bosom Of the effete East
There, or rather here, for instance, is
Mrs. Mary Elizabeth Lease. Mrs. Lease
is more widely but not exactly better
known as Mary Ellen. She was born in
the east and christened Mary Elizabeth.
But Elizabeth was too something for
Kansas reporters. Nobody knows just
what, but Mrs. Lease wouldn't be sur
prised if it was too hard for them to
spell. She hasn't d high opinion OF their
powers in any line except that Of impo-
lite fiction
Kansas has said several things not of
complimentary nature about Mrs Lease.
In her quiet way Mrs. Lease returns them
with interest. For of the platform at
least she IS no ranter. Shs likes New
York and IT'S ways so well that she has
cut KaBas and all things wild and woody
The moEto Mrs. Lease seems 10 have
adopted in regard to the scene of her ex-
PLOTS is: Forget it!' She wants to
bury the past.
Now burying doesn't appeal to all the
daughters of Kansas. There is Mrs.
Carrie Ratchet Nation, who grew her
middle name out IN Wichita where Mrs
Lease got hers. Mrs. Nation doesn't
seem to want to bury the name, nor the
game. either. Yet there is one point of
resemblance between her and Mrs. Lease.
She. too, has a secret and longing for
New York. In view of this probable
conjunction of stars, d Sun reporter call
ed on Mrs. Lease to find out just how she,
as the e1s-strong woman of Kansas, re-
CARDS her successor, Carving Carrie. or
{. ne Happy Hatcheteer.
OF never saw Mrs. Nation, said Mrs.
Lease, and there was something in her
tongAle which suggested:
/ never saw a purple COW,
I never hope to see one,
But this I know, that anyhow
I'd rather Sc ethan have one
'rWhat do you think of her method Of
carving her name on the roll of fame?"
Mrs. Lease shook her head.
81 an a doubling Thomas about every
eport that comes from Kansas, If all
or half that has been said about her is
true, / thluk she is crazy. In any case
1 fancy an idea that if we could see her
we would md her a rather motherlA
comfortable woman, bat narrow and hIg-
oted after the fashion Of most Of the w
c. T. Z. wome q"
but about the hatchet?'
81 suppose" sighed Mrs. Lease. 'there |
must have been 4 Ratchet, but Ia almost |
have to see it and see Mrs. Nation WELD |
it before 1 would believe the stories that |
have been printed. The newspaper. re-
porters of Kansas would invent a hatchet |
in a minute il they could earn half |
dollar by that means. They viii ten any |
kind of story in order TO send off /
sensational dispatch to the newspapers. |
I've been interviewed in Wichita when |
wasn't within a thousand miles of the |
place. Kansas isn't a manU1acturing /
state except in the direction of lies, and |
then the center Of industry is in the town /
of wichita.
Mrs Nation has probably been nisrep- |
resented, and yet L suppose there is some
truth In the stories about her. I have |
no sympathy whatever with her methods,
for she is a Iawbreaker. even il she is
waging war against other lawbreakers.
She is religious fanatic. You know she
said she was only clod Of dirt that God
was throwing at the saloons"
DO you think she VIII come TO New
York;"
Not with her hatchet. There's meth
Cd in her madness. She won't break the
law except over the head Of a lawbreak-
err"
What do you think Of the women who
Joined herr"
Il was surprised that they did, but I
ought not to have been. The ". c. T. L.
out there is narrow and bigoted society.
I joined it years ago when it was first
started. but L got out when the Kelley
cure first came into notice. There was
q drunkar5 in our town and the ". c.
T. II. society had been especially inter
asted in his unfortunate family. We had
money in the societys' treasury. and
was so lar lost 10 a sense of what the
W. c. f. L. was Tor that suggested
taking this money and sending the drum
lzard 10 the Kelley cure.
Dear me- what tempest I stirred up
Send him 70 cure2 No. indeed One
woman said he ought TO be tied TO a post
aud fiogged instead. That woman was,
ana would praw SO loud and so long that
It ready seemed as II God must lee dear
OF gone on q journey when no answers