The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1906-03-09
c. H. SPEARS REMINISCENT.
Tells of the Early Railroading Days
in Kansas.


Kansas City, No, March 9.-Ches-
ter II. Spears, general passenger agent
of the Colorado & Midland railway
with headquarters at Denver, Col, and
who was employed in the general Of
fees Of the Santa Fe in Topeka from
1884 to 1887. was a Kansas City Wis
itor the other day and drifted into a
reminiscent mood as he sat in the Of
noes OF 5. G. Warner, general passen-
ger agent Of the Kansas City Southern.
A reference to his age started it.
Sam" he said. 1T was twenty-eight
years ago that I began railroad work
in Kansas City. 1t was in the building
which still stands at the northwest
corner Of Sixth and Broadway, the
headquarters then of the old Boston
the Missouri River. Fort Scott &
Gulf, later the Kansas City, Fort Scott
& Memphis, now a part of the Frisco
system; the Leavenworth, Lawrence &
Galveston, now the Southern Kansas
division of the Santa Fe; the Atchison
& Nebraska, running from Atchison to
Lincoln, now part of the Burlington
& Missouri River, and the Kansas City,
St Joseph & Council Bluffs, now Of
the Burlington system.
These four roads were operated by
one set of officers. In the general pas
seEger department there were but
three employees. E. Lockwood, gen
eral passenger agent. who continued
III tlidL DOSILlO4 with the Fort scout
road until 1t was absorbed by the
Frisco a few years ago; Ben L.
Winchell, assistant general passenger
agent, now president of the Rock
Island system, and myself. I was chief
clerk, rate clerk and office boy My
salary was $15 per month. and it was
paid in four checks@one for each Of
the four roads of the Boston syndicate
The Atchison & Nebraska check was
for S2.37 each month, and the monthly
~eF oil
total I'D to SIS"
Mr.. SDeers is son of the late
Thomas NJ. SDeers, for almost two de-
cades chief of police of Kansas city.
He left the Fort Scott road in 1884 to
go to the general office of the Santa
Fe at Topeka, where he remained three
years as assistant rate clerk, chief rate
clerk and chief clerk, and in 1887 went
to San Francisco, where he was pas
senger agent and assistant general
passenger agent of the Santa FEES At
lantic & Pacific line until 1896. That
year he returned to Kansas City and
became secretary of the local passen-
ger association. and later the same
year went to Chicago. where he had
charge of the mileage bureau Of the
Western Passenger association until
1901. when he went to the Colorado
Midland at Denver.
In the charac teristic, convincing
language of a general passenger agent
600 miles from home, he talks of the
country along the line of the Colorado
Midland, where. in the Grand river
valley. land sells at $500 per acre
and is cheap at the price. 'sSale act
ually made Just the other day at that
price he. tells YOU in reply to your
questioning glance, -and-then he gives
you the name of the man whoahouglat
it and who expects to clear SO, 900 to
$4,000 year upon an investment of
$4,000. The land is irrigated and in
fruit. Raw land in that district sells
lat $3.50 per acre. Winter water
melons, produced from seed coming
from Russia, were grown in the Grand
river valley last winter and sent to the
Wa1dorf-Astoria in New York about
December the entire crop, two car
loads, having been bought for that
hosiery at about Z cents a piece.
These are expected to become a staple
product.