The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1912-03-29
MR.. COOPER AND kEokuk

Waving for the nonce all prospects
for the future, a review of the recent
past shows that Keokuk has excellent
reason for much self-congratulation
Merchants in all lines report retail
business the like of which Keokuk sci.
dom or never saw before. Profession
al men show more symptoms of pros
perity than for many years. The peo
pie who try to counterbalance the
general high cost of living by renting
rooms or taking few family boarders
find that the demand for such things
is so great as to boost the prices OBJ
tanned over those of former years.
Not a wage Garner in the whole city
is out of work, unless it be his own
fault. The banks are bullying with
money on both the commercial and
the saving sides Everybody in Keo-
kuk from the local captains of finance
to the day laborer is participating in
the new and remarkable prosperity of
keokuk.
What is the cause of this new era
in keokuk? In the last analysis. as
Speaker Cannon was wont to say, the
answer is-Hugh l.. Cooper.
1t is true that Mr.. Cooper is hiding
behind tangle of corporate names,
purchasing agents and accounting de-
partments. But none of these cor
porations, and their subdivisions. and
their money, would be in Keokuk to-
day, if Hugh l.. Cooper had not by in
finite labor, great pains, superior ac-
complishment and the risk of his priv
ate assets placed them here-eyery-
body in Keokuk few years ago
knows that.
The company and fnanciers build
ing the dam in the Mississippi river
here, with its power house, the lock
and dry dock and other appurtenances
have been paying out something more
than a million dollars year here in
Keokuk, just how much more it is inn
possible to say without asking the
company-and nobody in the company
will know about this editorial article
asked. The point is. that the water
power company has been distributing
large amounts of money here, and are
bringing in a large number of fine
young men as residents, the Stone &
Webster corporation alone having sew
not to mention the large hydraulic
construction work and its employees.
These men and this money are what
lis giving keokuk its present prosper
ity.
And, on the other hand, not dollar
has been asked from the people o.
this city. Even the money spent by
local men for promotion which re-
suited in finding Mr.. Cooper was re-
paid to the last cent. Money appro-
priated from the treasury for promo
ton was put back in the treasury
when Mr. Cooper took over the fran
chise. He actually repaid the money
Keokuk spent to induce him to come
here and raise her out of the slough
OF despond into the seventh heaven of
anticipation and realization.
Aside from being the Napoleon or
water poNer-Or because OF that--Mr.
Cooper is a peculiar man in some re-
spects. He will not allow, if he can
help 1t, any praise of himself by
| speakers on, or writers about, the
great work he is doing here in the
Mississippi. Newspapers which value
f his friendship are handicapped by his
sincere and intense distaste for seeing
any praise of himself in print.
4 But all Keokuk appreciates that
Hugh l.. Cooper is the man to whom
she owes all credit for her present
prosperity: all Keokuk is constantly
saying this wherever men congregate
/ to talk; in expressing this feeling of
4 Keokuk here in few words, The Gate
City is only putting into type the
warmth of feeling toward him that
Keokuk feeIs-and If Mr.. Cooper OBJ.
jects TO this article, because of his
peculiar and remarkable modesty
well, we just couldn't help it, for il
1 is a plain duty to make a permanent
record of these truths written here