The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1901-11-16
THE JOKE OF THE WEEK.


| election. Sheriff Cook went out to
arrest some escaped convicts and was
| himself clumsily captured ThereupOn
| the chief of police was sent for. While
Pauline was entirely outside of his
| jurisdiction, he could not well decline
| the summons. When he arrived, the
| sheriff being within his own jurisdiction
ordered that the convicts be allowed to
pass through mis- lines, and stated that
he and others would lose their lives If
the order was not obeyed. Everybody
any other course than the course he did
take, he would have been unanimously
condemned by friend and foe, and the
Journal would have been more savage
than anyone else in its denunciations.
In spite of this the Journal contains ma
licious little slurs in every issue at Chief
force. And all this because Colonel
Hughes, when a member of the council
did not vote to give the Journal the city
printing.-Topeka Capital
The joke of the week was the capture
and intimidation of Sheriff Cook, Chief
of Police Stahl, and his squad of armed
patrolmen by two wounded convicts
who escaped from their hands and from
the Winchesters and shotguns of about
one hundred other farmers.
1t is today the savory bit of diversion
from one end of the country to the other
and has been the talk of Topeka, the
state and the nation the past week.
Nearly everywhere and by nearly every
paper and person has the humor of the
thing been appreciated, except within
the dull precincts of the office of our
esteemed contemporary, the Topeka
Capital Even Chief Stahl, Sheriff Cook
and the police have scented something
humorous in it. or had their attention
called thereto, but have hardly yet re-
covered themselves with sufficient COM
posture to crack a smile. The State Jour
nal in connection with the rest of the
world has had its fun out of the cpl
sode, but in all it has said it tried to be
good humored and good natured.
The incident is really so funny that it
bids fair to be heard from for many
day. and the chief participants will
have to go back and sit down. at the
gatherings of their friends as time goes
on. The Journal can scarcely conceive
of less clumsy capture than the
unique reception which the two convicts
gave our sheriff at the Worcester farm
house. 1t was grace itself. Perhaps our
contemporary is as blunt to the nimble
play at Pauline. as it is to the humor
of the occasion.
Few people criticise Sheriff Cook for
his action after his own capture and
before his release. Being the sheriff,
more diplomacy and skill were expected
from him than from a private citizen
The convicts got the drop on him with
the utmost ease. The sheriff was in
box. Let us pass over the time he was
in this receptacle. He got out. Then
came more humor. He was Immediate
ly surrounded by Chief Stahl and his
armed men and by fully a hundred
armed farmers and congratulated upon
his escape. The two wounded captors
were in earshot. Did he proceed to
surround them and capture them? No.
Although he had his own posse, one
of the best which could possibly have
been organized. What did he do? He
went to a telegraph office and tried to
get someone else to organize another
posse and capture the crippled crimi-
nails. Let it be conceded that the
criminals should pass through the lines,
what about the high sheriff and the
chief then? The best information at
hand shows that the MANNED convicts
lay low in the orchard near Pauline
while the sheriff wired his astounded
constituency that he and the chief had
escaped and then proceeded, with the
rear well protected, on the memorable
retreat over the Shunganur1ga to the
lights and strongholds of Topeka.
When the Leavenworth gentlemen
asked Mr.. Cook, with a piece of cold
steel as an interrogation point, whether
he was the sheriff, and the sheriff look
ing into the forty-ffve opening. prevari-
Gated and replied, 81 am not" the con-
victs believed him. Can our esteemed
contemporary see any humor in this?
If not, please see the label at the top
of this article.
The chief got into the pursuit with
great credit and alacrity He got out
of it with equal alacrity but less credit
We really do not see what the city
printing has to do with the supreme
and disastrous efforts of the sheriff and
the police to capture the convicts 1t
has been so long since the Journal has
had the city printing that we had for
gotten about it The last time it was
up no effort was made on the part of
this paper. 1t went by default The
city printing worries our esteemed con-
temporary with it more than it does
US without it The Topeka Capital.
which has the official state printing, the
official county printing, the official city
printing. and wants to be state printer,
has enough patronage to be good ma
tured, and not get mad about it if Sher-
iff Cook and Chief Stahl did escape with
a whole skin from the convicts who
were manned by the sheriff's revolver
the times it went off.
If there is any additional patronage
that can be raked up for our greedy
neighbors, in heavens name let them
have it, if they will but laugh and grow
fat over it, and quit being so grumpy
and cross.
So far as Colonel Hughes is con-
cerned. he did away back in times past, |
volunteer to vote for the Journal for
the city printing. but when he found |
that the Journal was not for him any |