The Lake County times. [volume] (Hammond, Ind.) 1906-1933, 1907-01-24
LOOK THIS WAY, CONGRESS.

At each session of congress men
the appropriations for rivers and har-
bors are made the people of the Calu-
met region in Indiana are accustomed
to peruse the list of cities which have
been benefited by the all-wise legis
islative body that opens this barrel of
pork each year and wistfully wonder
why they do not get their share.
The Calumet region is now one of the
most prosperous industrial regions in
the United States. The next census
will show that the population has more
than doubled in the past ten years.
Capital will have spent millions of
dollars in converting a barren waste
of sand dunes and scrub oaks into
a humming, pulsating, industrial COM
munity.
1t is safe to say without exaggera-
ton that there is no place in the United
States where there are as great posi-
bilities for river and harbor improve
ments, where there is a river parallel
to the shore of Lake Michigan which
If connected by the three harbors al
ready projected. would provide forty or
fifty miles of dockage and make avail
able hundreds of ideal factory sites.
Yet it is a fact that the little Mich
5000 inhabitants, with not one hun
dredth of the actual or possible indus
trial development that there Is in this
region is enabled year after year to
secure governmental help in improving
a harbor that is seldom used except by
excursion steamers in the summer
Ludington. a struggling Michigan
town which few years ago was moth
ing but a lumber camp. and which is
now only connected by rail with a stub
line of the PIERRE Marquette railroad
city that will not reach the stage OF
development that Hammond has
reached in twenty years. was given
$sss,0s7 for harbor Improvement.
Saugatuck. which is only village al
the mouth of the Kalamazoo river and
never pretended to be more that q
sleepy summer resort, was allotted
$4,000 for for deepening and widening
of its harbor.
There are others in the list. many OF
them, and the people of Hammond
East Chicago, Indiana Harbor and Gary
are asking themselves why 1t is thai
the head of the pork barrel is Away:
opened towards these favored citie.
while the Calumet region gets only
what It is able to pull through tn,
bunghole.
II there was but one reason for tn,
amalEamation of the cities Of the Calu
met region and that reason was tina
the cities working together might Sc
cure a more liberal appropriation from
congress for the Improvement of tn
harbors OF the Calumet region, tina
reason would be sufficient.
And if there was but one reason 70
making the occasion OF dedicatini
the federal building amalgamation da
and that reason was the opportunit
mat would be afforded to secure a con
cert of the cities of the Calumet regio
for the purpose of demanding fror
congress our share of the rivers an
harbors appropriation that reaso
would be sufficient.
The reason for this condition Of az
fairs is said TO be the fact that tn
government will not contribute to i'm
nrovement of rivers or harbors unles
they are OF Interstate or internationg
Importance but 1t will take a long tim
to convince the people of this porto
OF Indiana that this is not an eXcus
and a subterfuge rather than reS