The Newtown bee., 1904-02-26
Kansas City,
Friday, February 5, 1904.

FRIDAY, February ., A5of.
We got into Chicago last night at
about LIS, apd after we gotsomething
to eat we started out and spent about
half an hour with our friends, and COM
ing back boarded our Sante Fe train
Got ,up this morning in Missouri.
Found an inch or two of snow on the
ground. By 10 O'Clock there was no
more snow to be seen, and there was
about an inch of water on top of the
ground. All black, heavy looking soil,
except about a mile Of sand where the
track crosses the Missouri river. The
river looks as if it were shallow, with
sand bars showing above the surface,
all the way across. After leaving
Kansas City we follow along the shore
of the stream that flows into the Miss
ouri just Always below the city, and
was responsible for the Kansas City
flood, of which the Eastern papers
were so full. In three places are the
remains of large iron bridges. Two of
the bridges have the great stone piers
left, but the iron work is torn off and
can be seen in sections for mile down
the stream. The largest irons in the
frame were twisted as one would twist
a small piece of wire in their fingers.
The lower bridge has the piers nearly
all gone, though they were made of
large blocks of hewn stone, set sOlidly
enough, lin all appearance) to stand an
earthquake. The conductor tells me
that the place where the tracks run
was torn up and the water was high
enough to have been over the tops of
the cars. The road had to run all
Of St Louis. The houses We have been
by this morning, have, on the whole,
been the worst l ever saw. All of
those in the country are one story
shanties, without cellars: some Of the
older ones with the floor timbers fiat
on the ground, and some of the newer
and better ones raised on stone pillars
one or two feet above the ground.
There are more mules than
horses, and the pigs are about
three fourths of them black
and running loose. Just before
we got into Kansas City woman
across the aisle announced that it was
"the most God-forsaken looking coun-
try she ever saw in her life.'
Corn seems to be the main crop. All
the stalks are left standing, and the
cattle are picking among it, which
seems queer to one unused to it. We
have just passed one large field where
the corn is cut as it is in the east. The
men are just overhauling and picking
it.. In fact there seems to be quite a
little unpicked corn through here. 1t
may be mighty nice farming country
but for living in 1 think a little of it
would go long ways. The houses
and everything around them look
"mighty shiftless.' No paint, no
fence except what looks ready to tum-
BILE down. Shingles missing, out
buildings with loose boards, some with
no shelter for cattle except rude shed
or two, open at the front and both
ends, with pigs, horses, cattle and
places this program is varied by the
chickens and pigs living under the
dwelling house. OF course | don't
suppose that all Missouri is this way
but this applies to all have been able
to see.
4.3O p. N.
We are still in Kansas, but it has
grown steadily warmer all day, till it
seems much like early April at home,
when we.have an early spring. In some
ways Kansas has been a surprise to me,
for l expected to see considerable reg
ular prairie, but while there are long
spaces Of perfectly level fields along
side the track, there are always low
hills in the back ground. For the last
hour these hills have been growing
sleeper, until now, on the northwest,
Ix, ol> l. c,l,,.