The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1903-09-21
WHAT THE SHIFT KEY SAID.
Work OFTHE WONDERFUL LEVER
OF ZEN DEANS TYPEWRITER.
A Ship Canal Argument Thrust Into an
Essay Intended to Boost the Shallow
Dargeway Scheme-Let's Spend SlOI,.
OOO,O 900 to Show Uncle Sam He Ought
to Build . Deep Waterway. Says He.

In searching Chautauqua county for senti-
ment favorable to the l,O0O-ton barge
canal, the promoters found Ben s. Dean,
the lawyer Journalist Of Jamest own, who
most accommodatingly wrote an interview
with himself
Mr.. Dean has long held the admiration OF
pamphleteers for his skill in rounding cor
ners. 1t was a distinguished Justice OF
the Supreme Court from his own grape
belt who said: ben Dean has shift key
on his typewriter He writes an argument
on any theme you suggest. Then he throws
lever and the machine produces counter
argument which meets every point adj
vanced by the first one
After pounding out thousand words
or so about the glorious hist Dry of the canal,
the menace to the commerce Of the port
of New York, railroad rates and their varia-
tions, Mr.. Dean threw his lever, accidently.
perhaps, and the machine emitted this
paragraph:
The auessteSn 3aturalIy svsgssss isse
struct and maintain a canal around the falls
in st. Mary's River. in the State Of Michigan,
at cost OF more than s1l 100000 and spend
S ss ss along G1snt maxine
passa geway for the largest Lake vessels from
| Duluth to Buffalo. and refuse or neglect to
nav Y fmF # r IS INNATE use Of
tonal funds to construct and maintain n
canal in, Michigan is there, any reason why
in the State of New York; or course the work
| Is larger: but its importance to the nation ls
larger. or. rather, the full benefit OF the st.,
been done in the Hudson River and along
the Great Lakes cannot be realized to the
| nation without bringing the Erie Canal up
to the highest efficiency. thus completing a
| practical waterway from Duluth to the sea-
| board.
Now, that is as sound an argument for a
ship canal, and therefore against the shall
low bargeway, as John A. Collier Wright
of Rochester could produce in the shades
of Butternuts.
If the Erie Canal is properly part OF the
great national waterways and should be
brought to its highest efficiency as a prac-
teal route from Duluth to the seaboard
why should SOL 600 900 be wasted on a
step-down system which requires the
transfer of cargoes at Buffalo?
The Ben Dean typewriter will not recant'
so when Ben got the shift key moved again
he evolved this theory:
While it is. therefore. clear that the canals
of this state, and, especially the one con-
Meeting Buffalo and Albany. belong properly
to the national system Of waterways. it is
| OBVIOUS lHul tne nlten SlHleS Is HOt yet
ready to undertake this work. though 10 seems
highly probable that the time is coming
when this will be done, If we but do our duty
at the present time. The surest way to get
the United States to engage in this project
is to demonstrate its value, and the way tc
| demonstrate it's value is to construct the 900
ton barge canal honestly and economically
maintaining il as free waterway for the
barges of $50 tons or less but restoring the
power to the Legislature TO fix tolls on an
| equitable basis for the larger boats
Merely $40. 900 600 to demonstrate to the
Federal Government that 1t ought to build
a ship canal?N
Therefore, if the Government should be
convinced, when the bargeway has been
built. say fifteen years from now, IL must
be torn apart and built all over again to
make a deep waterway,
There's an inexhaustible line Of figure
keys on the Ben Dean typewriter, and its
operator likes to play with them. They
do say he wrote the election returns from
Chautauqua last November, a bit belated
in coming in but giving Odell a larger
plurality over Coler than Mckinley had
over Bryan in 1900.
ChautauGua county gave plurality o!
1900 against the 1895 proposition to spend
50 900 600 on the canal,
1t ought to do much better this year.