The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1907-04-19
City will Asphyxiate the Tax
less Victims.
Death Box TO Be Used by Dog
Catcher.
o MORE SHOOTING.
Brutal Method of Dispatching
CANNES Abolished.
Fanciers Protest Against the
Holiday Ordinance.

The stray dogs of Topeka will no
longer be put to death by shooting. In
stead they will sink into lethargy and
from that slip into sleep that knows
no awakening.
Natural gas is going to work that
change.
Asphyxiation with natural gas is the
plan which has been evolved by Mayor
Green to take the place of shooting.
There has been so much in the way
of protest against the old way of killing
that thought it would be a good idea
to get some painless way of killing
that would not seem so brutal and yet
be effective.
81 think by using natural gas we will
have method that the people will ap-
prove Of" said the mayor.
A box two feet deep, nine feet long
and four feet wide will be constructed
The box Will be air tight. The dogs
Will be put into the box a stream of
natural gas will be turned in and old
Tige will fall asleep and be in the
Elys1an fields of dog-dom as quick as
thought. For ease and comfort of
travelling it will have the ordinary Pull
man beat several country blocks.
It's cheap, too. The box will hold ~
cubic feet of gas. Natural gas is rs
cents a thousand and the cost will be
less than two cents per dog. The dog
under the former system the officer
would start out and hunt his dog. He
would try to catch him and bring his
captor to the dog pound. Sometimes he
failed in this and would try to shoot the
dog in the street. About seventy-five
per cent of these efforts resulted disas-
trously for the dog officer would only
MAIN his victim instead of killing 1T
outright The dog would run bowling
over the city and sometimes crawl away
under a porch and die there after pro-
longed suffering.
Even when they did get the dogs in
the pound it was not guarantee that
a painless death would enSue. The
dogs would lunge around and several
shots fired the dogs would howl and
people would protest.
Dog Officer Core welcomed the new
plan of the mayor
you see it's this way" said he.
THE dogs usually sit on their hunkers
and you get ready to shoot at them.
Maybe they twist their heads q, little
to one side and you miss them. just
burning them little on the side of the
head. Then they howl. They amt
hurt much but they howl just like
they was anyhow Maybe you miss
them and the ball may hit somebody
anyone of course, but you done. hit
EN- and probably kill EN-. They's a
wall back there in the pound and you
might aim just SO and the ball strike
I don't like this shooting but this gas
business is all right,
C. K. Holiday has brought down
upon himself the wrath of the Topeka
Kennel club in connection with the
ordinance he has introduced providing
against the running of dogs at large in
the city. The dog fanciers of the city,
the Topeka Kennel club and the Fos-
ter Humane society. have set meet
ing for this evening at the National
hotel to discuss the proposed ordinance
and combat its passage in the council
The meeting will be called to order by
Herbert Hackney John G. Harmon
of the Topeka Kennel club has filed
a protest with the city clerk against
the ordinance and suggests that the
dog officer be paid a premium on each
stray dog that is killed. Harmon be-
Iieyes that there are 5000 stray dogs
in the city whose tax is unpaid; Kill
these, says Harmon. and you will have
no trouble with the dogs. He thinks
that a tax should protect the dog and
that the evil is not from the dog that
has a master as much as the dog that
hasn't one.