The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1902-01-30
THE PLACE OF HONOR.
kansas Has Come Up Out of the
Swamps," Says Homer Hoch.

The place of honor on the Kansas Day
programme this year went to Homer
first toast of every banquet shall be on
Kansas" and a native from Kansas is
E. w. Hoch of Marion. candidate for state
printer. He is at present attending Baker
ft IS the Aeosfi le Paul. Rar believe who
in writing of his visit to those of the
a statement which reads something like
this: Brethren, was with you in weak
ness and in fear. and in much trembling
For some reason or other those words APP
peal to me just nov as being not only de-
usually significant and realistic Tn
Apostle Paul. insist. is not only the one
Indeed. contemplate the situation at
this PARTICULAR time, -, am lncll ,,,stiei 70
Brethren. candor compels me to confess
that | am not only with you In weak
and trembling. Relying, however, upon
your forbearance in my weakness. and
in my fear and trembling. bid you cheer
fully trust that this heartless infection.
date for ofrice. make no promises.
In my optimistic outlook 1 have not
forgotten the times when the sky was not
history when the strongest of our. citizens
grew fearfully weak-kneed in their nervy
have been times when the traveller from
Kansas was greeted in the fossiliferous
times when reference to Kansas east of
the cath meridian of longitude was calcu-
should wrinkle the Alleghenies and cease
not until swallowed up in the briny wa
the good old Popuiistic days when Kan
sas was looked upon abroad as a large
the Kansas Day orators must have been
men of unusual nerve and equanimity of
must must have afrorded about as promising
a theme for panegyric as the soapless ely ely
matter with Kansas was that a party
was in power which seemingly had erased
visited the world to look at the second half
through a high-power magnifying glass:
they whispered the 'Ad Astra' part and
howled per Aspera' through ten-foot
Kansas was going the other way. They
whined about the difficulties but forgot
PEELED to read by day a sad wall of
drouths and grasshoppers and endless ca
rest his wearied soul. he could feel in his
dreams the swish of long, invisible whis-
kerS and hear the low shuffling of sockless
feet. But. thanks to high heaven and the
Republican party, those humiliating days
was overthrown; dyspepsia is king
more. Kansas has come up out of the
longer wanders about with unclad feet
She has quit keeping company with the
She has discharged the mortgage auction
GERS and employed the captains of indus
of the hands of partiSanShip and incom-
potency and turned them over to the Re
publican management She has broken her
political friendship with Texas and Ar
kansas and is marching by the side of
Ohio and Pennsylvania. She is riding IN
the national band wagon and the Over
myers and the Clemenses to the contrary
notwithstanding. the voters of Kansas
will continue to keep her there. When we
read about Kansas today in eastern peri
odicals we do not find the old infamous
tale about poverty and failure and calam-
ity, but we read about corn and wheat
and school houses and the Helpful Hen
and the Beef Steer and His Sister and
alfalfa and zinc mines and oil wells and
salt works and apple orchards and col
1eges and the Twentieth Kansas and
'Bagbag' and the capture of Aguinaldo.
am aware. gentlemen. that there is one
item that omitted from that list. How
ever much might desire to do So have
not forgotten that Kansas has been made
the subject of comment in recent months
by the antics of a certain strenuous indi-
Vidual of the feminine gender, who has
been breaking the duh monotony of life
for those men who handle the goods that
made Milwaukee famous. Now, perhaps
in your pride and haughtiness of spirit,
you are sorry that 1 have called attention
to this tender subject by mentioning the
omission; and yet, members of the Kan
saS Day club, I can not tell lie; she did
it with her little hatchet.''