The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1905-10-02
OuR ExPosITION

Already the proposed Kansas semi
centennial exposition for 1911 is being
exploited in the eastern press. Incl
dentally some of the papers are. poking
a little Of the customary fun at KAN
sas' advertising proclivities. Among
these the New York Commensurate
vertiser refers to it as "the latest de-
vice of the gentle art Of Keeping kan
sas in the headlines" but it gives
Kansas a good send-off just the same.
1t continues
kansans have never been back
ward, nor has Kansas news been slack
of late-what with bumper crops and
experiments in oil and domiciliary
visits by Miss Tarben; but from now
on all the loyal men, women and chill
dren of the commonwealth have call to
Increase their press agent activity.
NO doubt sthe work Will be we'll
done a true Kansan. as soon as he
discovers speech, begins audibiy to
congratulate himself on the place of
his birth The passion for advertis-
ing is SO ingrained that state booming
is the broad road to fame. William
Allen White was an unknown prairie
editor the friend of country produce,
until he turned the hmelght on him
self by his editorial What's the Mat
ter With Kansas and now look at
himi The familiar of presidents and a
judge in prize story contests. So
thoroughly have Mr. White and his
fellow laborers worked that the more
of less legendary reputation of Kansas
extends to the worlds remOtest cor
ners. Where is your home? asked an
Fnglishman of an American in a Lon
don hotel one evening. I came from
Kansas replied the questioned, en-
deavoring to preserve a modest de-
meanor 'Ah, yes commented the En-
glishman. the largest state in the IN
and vet. despite the digs of the en-,
vious. Kansas has good reason to be
proud of her people. They are. as has
often been said, the most pureis
American of any state, containing
the smallest admixture of recent for
eign blood. Behold, says Kansas, the
typical American state-the traits and
the spirit others will have when time
shall have consolidated their popula-
tons. Although reproached with
changeableness and a mercurial liking
for extremes, at any given time KAN
sans are habltually in deadly earnest.
NO languor of stagnating sophistica-
Indifference of an over-old civilization
paralyzes remedial activity. They are
quite sure the world can be made over,
and, forever undiscouraged, are busy
at the task Was this seriousness in
troduced by their Puritan ancestry, or
was it indigenously developed in the
days when the slave raiders galloped
over the Missouri borders, and gaunt
10 str ~
hard for freedom. and when Quantre'l
swooped down on the devoted town OF
Lawrence? However it came, there is
this heroic side to Kansas charaetee,
although it has sometimes seemed as
if the Kansas conscience was some
what blunt. with respect to mortgages,
in distinguishing between meum and
teum. In palliation. however, it is to
be rem EN- ered that a combination of
.grasshoppers and drought and hot
winds and high freight rates is calcu-
lated to deceive the elect.
But while Kansas is noted for the
earnestness of her citizens. and for her
corn and her wheat and her live stock,
the product which really 1ourishes in
rankest profusion is her pride. No
breezes blow so soft or so hard as Ger
the plains of Kansas. Her zephyrs are
the mildest and her cyclones are the
widest. No coal is such a lustrous
black and no snow is such a spotless
white as hers. The word Kansas is
more than mere geographical desig
nation-it refers to very definite and
by no means unconscious social and
institutional entity. When Kansas
throws open the gates her fair may not
equal in size the mighty aggregations
at Chicago or st. Louis but it will bear
the stamp of an intense state fndivid-
uality, and as such win justify the
traVelar,s iourf1av,,