The Lake County times. [volume] (Hammond, Ind.) 1906-1933, 1908-05-01
WATERWAYS MEETING
WAS POORLY ATTENDED
!
Twelve Persons and Two
Reporters Hear the
Lecture.

The address which was given by s.
A. Thompson, the field secretary of the
National Deep Waterways association,
under the auspices of the Hammond
Business Mems association at Wefs hall,
attracted just twelve persons, incIud-
ing two reporters.
Mr.. Thompson is one of the greatest
authorities on the subject of deep wa
terways I'm the county and he has such
a wealth of facts and figures at his
tongues end that he could easily Sc
cure large amounts for his lecture on
the subject.
But Mr.. Thompson has been hired by
the National Deep Waterways assoc
citation to cnrry campaign of edu-
cation over the country and because
his lecture in Hammond was free, only
few attended.
Instead OF advertising Mr. Thomp-
sons lecture, as was expected in a
community which has so much to ex-
pect in the way of deep waterway de-
velopment, the printing of articles in
the newspapers was all that was done
to secure the presence of a crowd.
massmeeting was to have been
held. Instead, a family circle was
formed. The president was absent and
so the meeting was not even called to
order All of the business men drew
up their chairs around Mr.. Thompson
and he talked to them as he would to
crowd in a parlor.
Mr.. Thompson's pride and dignity
was not hurt He was not made angry
by the fact that after coming all the
way to Hammond to deliver a lecture
before the only organization of a civic
nature in this city, he found that or
ganization did not take enough in
terest in the matter of deep water
ways to get out a corporafs guard at
the meeting.
He did not even pity an industrial
community which showed such a la
mentable lack of interest in a ques-
ton that ought to be of such vital in
terest to it. He simply proved his
caliber by taking the small oppor-
tunity he had to spread the gospel of
water versus any other kind of trans
portation and did it cheerfully.
His hearers, the faithful ones, sat
around in open mouthed wonder at the
array of facts which were presented
to them and it was regretted time and
again that the number of hearers could
not have been 200 instead of a dozen.
Mr.. Thompson showed conclusively
the value of water transportation ia
cilities compared with those by animal
power, by rail and all other means, and
his illustrations of the points he was
making were remarkable.
"One dollar" said he. will carry a
| ton of freight in a wagon drawn by
horses on stone roads, four miles.
counting the time Of the driver: it will
carry a ton on rails. drawn by horses.
| 20 miles; it will carry ton of freight
on a railroad 200 miles, and it will
carry a ton OF freight in boats on the
water 1900 miles.
That was but one of the illustra-
tions he made and the others were just
as remarkable. Mr.. Thompson offered
to return to this city in about a week
and give his lecture If crowd could
| be secured, but the members of the
Hammond Business Mems association
who were present did not offer any
! suggestion as to a date for the meet
| ing, and so Mr.. Thompson left this
sleepy hollow, feeling that he had had
one of the experiences of a lifetime.
A community with the greatest posi-
bilities for waterway development in
the world positively uninterested in the
subject of waterways development.
Some of the facts as given by Mr..
| Thompson were as follows:
Cost of transporting one ton one
| mile by different methods: Horse and
| wagon, Is cents; English steam lorry,
| cents; average of u. s. railroads, 7.4s
| mills; average of selected L. S. rail
| roads, mills; Erie canal, 8 mills; GER
| tain European canals, ~ mills; aver
| age on Great Lakes ("Soo" records)
81 mills; coal on lakes and on Ohio
| river 1-3 mill.
Miles of transportation which car
be bought for 81 at above rates:
! Horse and wagon. ............
| English steam lorry. ........... 20
| Average of L. S. railroads. 49,. 1894
| Average of selected railroads.. 200
ERIE cahal 49,. ...-.....- $50
| Certain European canals. ...... 669
| At average rate on Great Lakes 1870
At rates for coal above given. 3 900
The cost of transportation deter
mines the distance over which com
merce can be profitably carried on. Tht
United States must provide transporta
ton facilities as good as those uset
by it's competitors for the commerce O
-