The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1909-07-10
KANSAS COMAENT

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WORK FOR THE TOWN MARSHAL
rms is the season of the year
When the town marshals in Kansas
besln TO get busy and earn more than
tneH salaries. For nine months in
the year Kansas probably is the most
lalW-aDldlng state in the Union but
when harvest time comes there is an
excuse for the hobo and the crook to
appear IN any small town under the
gulse OF a harvest hand. The town
marshal cannot run them away or
lock them up on the charge of
Vagrancy, and so the list of burglaries
and robberies in this state runs highest
during the time the binder is hum
ming in the wheat fields.
In the average Kansas town the
marshal knows all the residents both
IN the city and in the surrounding
country. If a crime is committed he
is almost certain to know the culprit
The criminals he watches for nine
months In the year are bootleggers
and chicken thieves, but with harvest
tune ne becomes different man and
looks for larger game than the
petit thief or the vender of rotgut
whisky The town marshal knows
that 10000 strangers will be scat
tered all over the state during the
next three months and while almost
all of them are men who really want
work in the fields. a small per cent
are crooks who come to get what
they can without work 1t is the
makes. the town marshal get a bit
nervous.
In ordinary times a tramp can't
alight from the blind baggage at the
water tank in any Kansas town with
out the knowledge of the town mar
shall and if he has heard of
any crime committed in his part of
the state the marshal holds the tramp
good talk he is told to take the
next train out But this canrot be
done when the harvest hands are
coming into the state in passenger
cars, in box cars, on the drawbacks,
on the brakebeams and on foot. The
marshal is handicapped and both he
and the crook know it.
The marshal sees strangers in worn
clothes alight from a train and he
doesn't know whether they are college
students or are from the crook re-
sorts of Kansas City or Chicago. He
can't tell whether their bundles con-
tain "jimmies'' and skeleton keys or
a change of underwear. He simply
redoubles his efforts to see that the
doors of stores are locked at night
and he walks oftener through the
help in the harvest fields was sent
out He also asks the city council
for more assistance, and visits the
depot and the box cars on the siding
than he~Gid in the lazy days of the
fall when the appearance of dirty
looking stranger would pc reported
promptly to him at the livery stable.
Truly harvest time makes work for
others than the farmer who gathers
in the golden grain which sells for
S135 a busheI.-Wichita Eagle.
THE THAW WOMAN
A fool story was printed in a New
York paper that Mrs. Evelyn Thaw
lately appeared at the Waldorf-Astorial
and that while sitting in the lobby,
her pet snake escaped, causing a COM
The story was telegra pied all
over the country. If we were the edi-
tor of a big paper. and New York
should telegraph such a |
story as that, we wosIld discharge him. !
And how the papers love to adver-
tise the Waldorf-Astoria, as though all
the jays are dying to stop there, and
see the noted guests. and fee the noted |
walters. So far as we are concerned, |
we'd rather eat meal at home than
at the Waldorf-Astoria. We country |
people don't think half as much of
New York as New York people think |
we do. Out in the country, we are |
much more prosperous, sane and content |
than New York people think we are. |
Why should Evelyn Thaw be kept in |
the lime light? She was never promi- |
nent except as the mistress of tough |
men. She was on the stage, but not |
because of talent: she had nothing to |
her except a pretty face
and shapely legs. She was the cause
OF a brutal murder. Why should such |
a woman be exploited in the papers? |
Why not drop this Thaw woman, and
exploit worthy girls ?-Atchison Globe.