Evening journal., 1911-09-16
OVERLOOKED
THE HOLLOW ROAD
By John S. Hamilton.

The writer hears occasionally from
authority that compels respect that
the railway properties leased and op-
Grated by the Wilmington and Phila-
delphia Traction Company are so
burdened with liabilities and obligs-
tions that if the people of Whining
ton do not submit TO the five cent Fat
fare something terrible will happen
to the company. The answer that the
writer always gives to this is that
something terrible is already happen
ing to Wilmington, and unless there IS
a change it only promises TO get worse.
The taxable property within the cor
porate limits of this city is now bear
ing all that it will carry.
The writer took occasion some time
ago to say to President Crosby
through the medium Of a newspaI or
communication that he, President
Crosby, had arrived in Wilmington
about ten years too late. When the
writer made use of this expression it
was no mere tossing of words. Neither
was it an expression of i'll feeling. II
was deliberately said after a careful
study and analysis of the situation
both from the point of view of Mr..
Crosbys company and the taxpayer
as we'll. He, the writer, warned Mr..
Crosby at the time and he repeats the
warning now that something was and
is going to happen to him.
! The writer can understand how Mr..
! Crosby who has won distinction as an
| explorer of the faraway and remote
/ regions of the earth, as we'll as In the
more accessible, less hazardous and
heretofore more profitable field of the
manipulation of Public Utilities would
look over the field here very carefully
and arrive at the conclusion from the
viewpoint he occupied that it did not
| look altogether like a bad PROPOSE
/ ton
Unfortunately for Mr. Crosby, how
ever. the writer thinks ne failed 10
take into consideration the one I'M
portant factor that manifests itself at
this time. If Napoleon Bonaparte had
! known of the existence of the hollow
road between his position and that OF
| the Duke of Wellington on the day Of
| Waterloo, the history of Europe and
probably of mankind for the past
century would have been a very diff
! ferent story But Napoleon did not
know and disaster and st. Helena was
/ the result for him, II Mr.. Crosby, who
can be excused perhaps for stopping
with an examination of the juice pro-
ducing possibilities of this community
| had for a moment only considered the
| fact that there was another squeezer
/ at work and il was one that would
not or could not be denied namely,
/ the municipality itself, the writer
/ thinks from what he has been able to
/ learn of the erudite and versatile
president of the Wilmington and
Philadelphia Traction Company, ha
would have hesitated long before he
/ would have assumed so debonairily
the liabilities and the responsibilities
that the writer thinks he will soon
find closing in around him to encom-
pass his destruction.
The strip ticket episode is only, the
writer thinks, happening by the way.
It is merely the skirmish line before
a great battle, the issue Of which
means the destruction of the out
rageous exactions of public utilities in
this community or the permanent
paralysis Of the city itself. or at best
a serious case of Municipal Locomo-
tor Ataxia. Self preservation being
the first law of nature the writer
thinks the city will win. He. the
writer, believes the city would win
even if it had a bad case, but in this
instance he has tried 10 be fair and
cannot discover where there was even
a suggestion of anything that would
II let the traction company out and he
has failed to find It, The imperative
I compelling necessities Of the munis
cipality itself, which Mr. Crosby must
have neglected to consider the writer
predicts will prove the factor that
will be as disastrous to Mr.. Crosby
company as was the hollow road in
front Of Hugomont to the fortunes of
Napoleon Bonaparteon the field Of
WaferlOO