Dakota farmers' leader. (Canton, S.D.) 1890-19??, 1910-08-19
Kansas--Where he Laws
Are Enforced.

|
gan to gather up the drinking glasses
whats the matter now, George?'
| asked the fat man in the corner seat
"Jes' gittin ready for Kansas
Captain" the darkey grinned.' y
| Every feller's got to furnish his own
drinkin' glass in Kansas. y
"Huh!" snorted the fat man. ''Lot
damned cranks. Who ever heard of
such fool notion!"
An old man with ragged gray
beard and a shrewd blue eye looked
up from his seat in the armchair.
81 take it you're from New York?''
he asked, innocently.
Eyes" growled the fat man with a
contemptuous glance. "Im from
New York"
"Well' went on the old farmer, "de
you New York fellers each have his
own tooth brush? Or do all of you
scrub your teeth with the same
bruSh?"
The New York man sputtered in
speechless indignation.
"You see," the farmer went on
mildly, "a drinking glass that is used
by everybody is just as bad as public
tooth brush. So we cranks out here
in Kansas, passed a law forbidding
them in the state.
cat in the brotherhood of States.
Fifty years ago its present place on
the map was marked by shaded rec
tangle with the legend "Arid Plains. +"
In more recent years Kansas has suf-
fered from plaques of grasshoppers,
Populists, whiskerS, mortgages, hum
orists and fiction writer's of the Dodge
City and Sod House schools. So that
to-day when the man in the street
thinks of Kansas he winks at himself
in the mirror and gfins Kansas!
What a joke!
Getting off the train at some small
Kansas town with visions of cyclone
cellars and sod houses in his eye he
will be met by smart page in buttons
who carries his suit case across the
street to a handsome hotel in the
English timbered style, where the
service and table is within five points
of perfection. Then when he orders
his cocktail before dinner he will be
told that Kansas is prohibition
state. And presently one of the most
startling and important things about
yuil fn 0p,
him:
Kansas is one state in the Union
where the laws are actually enforced.
The casual guest winks at the page,
hands him quarter and says that of
course he knows Kansas is a prohi-
bition state but that he wants a cock
tail just the same. Deity pocketing
the quarter, the page regrets that a
cocktail is impossible. His statement
is endorsed by the manager of the
hotel. The prohibition law is really
enforced in Kansas. So are the other
laws. No wonder the state has a
reputation for crankiness!
What other people, for instance,
ever produced state official who de-
clined an appointment as United
States senator because he preferred to
stay at home and write poems on
pork, odes on oats and sonnets on al
falfa for circulation among lot of
farmers? f. d. Coburn is the Kansas
Horace and the bulletins which are
issued by the Kansas State Board of
Agriculture under his direction, are
SO. different from any other similar
documents as to raise all sorts of
suspicious in the commonplace mind
of an ordinary dry as-dust agricultur-
al expert Coburn's productions are
bound and printed In the style of art
booklets and bear such alluring titles
"Alfalfas Affinity" ''The Hog
Happy Habitat" and "The Lay OF
the Helpful Hen, y also the convincing
facts and figures which Coburn knows
so well how to present, are spiced
| with bits of verse-all, like the hogs
| and poultry, native products Of the
Kansas soil. First is printed table,
showing that according to the nation.
al government an average Kansas hog
is worth more actual cash than a
porker from any other state in the
Union. Then just below the figures
Walt Mason, the Emporia bard
bursts into song:
Kansas: Where we've torn the shackle:
From the farmers leg;
Kansas: Where the hen that cakles
Always lays an egg;
Where the cows are fairly achin'
To go on record breakin'
And the hogs are raising bacon
BY the keg."
| From Those Kansas Cranks, b.
Henry M. Hyde, in the Technica
World Magazine for September.
/ There is much complaint about
reckless auto driving in the country
No ,,oooh;no S1o,,1J - for,aI ract .