The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1902-11-20
AN OVATION
TO SCHLEY.
Annual Banquet of the X. C.
Commercial Club.
Concentrating the Signing of
John Jay Treaty.
NOTED GUESTS
Col. ROssingtOn Responds to
First Toast of Evening.
CA Message to Garcia" Respond
ed to by Capt. Rowan.

Kansas City. Mo-. Nov 2O.-Rear Ad-
miral Winfield Scott Schley was the
guest of honor last night at the annual
banquet of the Commercial club held in
commemoration of the signing of the
John Jay treaty. The affair was a no
table one and Admiral Schley was given
a decided ovation. the climax of day
of enthusiastic greeting to the naval
hero.
The banquet. held at the Midland no
tel, was most elaborate Plates were
laid for 500, the capacity of the hall
and among the guests were Captain A.
S. Rowan, U. S. A, of Atchison. Kan,
who Carried the message to Garcia"
General John c. Bates, commander of
the department of the Missouri and
aide de camp Captain H. M. Reeve:
Hugh Gordon Miller. of Norfolk. assist
ant United States district attorney of
Virginia; Judge J. c. Gavin, of Ration.
n. M; w. H. Rossington, Topeka; Gov
ernor w. E. Stanley of Kansas. and
Frank Strong, chancellor of the Uni
versity of Kansas
Following a parade upon his arrival
from Chicago in the forenoon Admiral
Schley and the other distinguished
guests were given a reception at the
Commercial club attended by several
hundred people. then a luncheon at the
Baltimore and finally drive about the
city. Preceding the banquet, an in
formal reception was held in the Mid
land hotel parlors, Admiral Schley shak-
ing hands with the half thousand ban
queters.
Toasts were responded to as follows:
Dreams" Col. w. H. Rossington.
"A Message to Garcia" Captain A. S.
Rowan.
Statehood for the Territories" Judge
c. ]. Gavin.
The Star spangled Banner" Hugh
Gordon Miller
The American Sailor" Admiral w.
S. Schley.
COL. ROssINGTON's ADDRESS.
The first toast. Dreams" was re-
sponded to by w. H. Rossington. He
said in part:
Il well remember my first si<fr$ Of
Kansas CITY: it was more than a cen
Grafton ago came in in the morning
on the old North Missouri railroad to a
little wooden station set down in an
almost empty Landscape, just west wof
that not less inconmodious structure OF
brick which Kansas City hopes soon to
see replaced by union depot worthy of
her vast needs and glorious expectd-
tons. The train was late. and there
was neither omnibus nor hack to meet
it. I had been advised in ST. Louis to
go to the Broadway hotel, which had
been just opened. A surly baggageman
told me I would find it Just over she
hill, and l could not miss it because it
was the biggest building in sight
had had no experience as Alpine
climber, but there was no place to go
but up, so l set my feet hopefully upon
goat path, which zigzagged up the
hillside. believing that 1 might soon
reach the hotel, and perhaps find a town
concealed somewhere among the ra-
vines beyond But my troubles had
only begun when 1 reached the crest
of the hill. There were sidewalks. 10
be sure, set upon the edge of precipices,
two planks placed longitudinally upon
the yellow clay. A recent rain HIS dis
tributed this clay along their surface,
and they were steep and slippery as
toboggan slides, as soon painfully dis
covered 1 descended gulches on rickety
pine stairways and assembled again, only
to skate down long stretches of ':lay
vanished planks at the peril of life
and limb. until at last, somewhat ex-
hausted, and like the Biblical image.
having feet and legs of clay, climbed
over pile of builders debris and en-
tered the Broadway hotel.
kansas City was then upon the ebb
tide of its first boom. It claimed 10000
inha bitants, and had perhaps 5000. A
men from Pennsylvania who were at
tracted here by the BOOM After few
days So1Ourn one of them decided to
return. and, in response to an inquiry
ing a place of such great promise, said
that he had no use for a counfr< where
the cows fall out of the Dastura. IT
would be hard to persuade any enc
who saw the place then that the AL
mighty ever intended that town, much
less a great commercial metropolis,
should be erected on such a site: but it
soon became apparent that the very
difficulties to be overcome served as a
stimulus to the city's rapid growth.
IA of n
average some forty or fifty feet nearer
the sea level than the Kansas City
saw in 1869. There are here assem- bled
tonight those who have caused these
hills to be leveled and these hollows to
be filled up and who, stimulated by
faith and enthusiasm, have here concen-
trated commerce and the instruments
of commerce of such provocative po-
tency that before another generation
shall pass there will doubtless here
stand city CT over half million peo-
pie.
Now is the appointed time to don
your dreaming caps and indulge vision
of the Kansas City that is to be. 1t
the dream be of the powers of light and
not of darkness; if it be vivid enough to
haunt your waking hours and to inspire
unselfsh effort it will not be all a
dream.
The figure of speech that have here
adopted is used to enforce the thought
that though we live in an age of unex-
ampl6d material progress. the WnOle
story of a city is not to be told in it's
bank balances and clearing house re-
ports, or even in its output of manu-
featured products and It's intake of
money and new commercial and manu-
featuring enterprises. If this brief mes
sage of mine be of any worth it must
be to press home the suggestion that
you are the trustees of the prosperity
that has come to you individually, to
the extent that you should give a share
OF your time and money for the COM
mon good: that your efforts in this di-
rection should not be merely cinfi1ed to
the promotion and increase of trade, or
your contribution to the satisfaction of
the tax gatherer- You and each of you
should make it your peculiar business
to see that the money you give volun-
tarily and the money derived from the