The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1913-11-18
FARGO AS A
CITY OF HOMES
PRESIDENT EMERY URGES TOWN
cRIERs TO ADOPT THAT MOTTO
--PREsENTS SOME FACTS AND
FIGURES THAT ARE STARTLING
IN THEIR SIGNIFICANCE.

The Town Criers held their Novem-'
Der meeting last night at the Metro.
pole hotel and it was one of the best
meetings of the year. A supper pre-
ceeded the programme and about for
ty members partook Of the repast.
The first speaker Of the evening was
]. P. Hardy, secretary of the Fargo
Commercial club, who spoke on who
should pay for the advertising Of the
community. He said that when the
matter was reduced to the fnal anal
ysis the paid for 1t and the
main feature Of his talk was on who
this purpose. He contended that the
medium for the distribution OF the
fund. His talk was in his usual vein
and illustrated by anecdotes. He also
told what the club in Fargo had been
doing the PAST year.
Col. Morton Page was the next
speaker and he talked on what the
city ought to advertise. He urged that
the city advertise the things that they
had for the people and that they be-
careful not to draw the long bow in.
telling the people of the world about
their town. He said that the fact that
we had religious and charitable. insti-
tutions was secondary to other points
CtIlh tld SlI1AASop ~SAAAS
with the advent Of population. He said
that the people Of Fargo should pro-
vide amusements for the people who
came here and commended the park
board for their action in the past
year in giving band concerts in the
park without charge. He was optf-.
mistic in regard to the future and pre-
dicted the division Of the farms into
smaller tracts and the coming of q
great population. =,
President Emery of the city COM
mission was the next speaker n he
began his address by stating that he
had made a personal study of the
causes that made cities grow In rela-
lively the same location and gave
what he considered the reason why
one city would go forward by leaps
and bounds while another nearby
would apparently stand still. He cited
San Francisco and Los Angeles as one
instance nj contended that the for
mer was a city for business on &C
count of it's harbor. while the otheli
was a city of homes on account Of its
climate and surroundings. He said
that the people went to Los Angeles
because they wanted to live there,
while they went to San Francisco as
a business proposition. He also called
attention to- the two cities of st. Paul
and Minneapolis and said that from
the start OF minneapolis the Iued lldU,
been to make it a city of homes and,
as a result, it had outstripped its
neighbor who had years the start in
the race for supremacy. In our own
state he called attention to the growth
Of Grand Forks that had for a decade
kept pac with the growth Of
Fargo and told how he had
investigated that city and had
spent days studying that city.
and said that in a business way we
had the advantage Of Grand Forks
but In the matter Of growth we had
not nearly the same percentage of ad-
vantage. He said that in the course
Of his study of the city doWn the Red
he had found that the people talkes1
first, last and all the time Of the Uni
versity Of North Dakota and that it
had become considered the city Of
homes. He said that about two years
ago he had kept track of the people.
who had moved from this city in one
year and found that 1t was astonish-
ing. During that year 1908 people
had departed from Fargo to other
places and not a hand had been raised
to stop the exodus. At the same time
our commercial club had been trying
to induce people to come here and es-
tablish homes. He stated that the
high cost Of living had been partially
responsible but that it was impossible
to build cities unless the man VINO
performed the labor could house him
self and his family in comfort. He said
this condition was changing and that
today there were more homes owned
in Fargo han ever before and al
though the cost of building had adj
vanced in the past year to unheard of
heights, more homes d been erected
for the occupancy Of the builders this
year than ever before. He urged that
the members of the Town Criers
adopt and work to the motto Of Far
go a City Of Homes. Il
After a short discussion Of the
points brought out, the club adjourn
ed for the evening. The next meeting
will be a moving picture show Of ad-
vertising prepared by the big men of
the advertising world and will be held
in December in the commercial club
rooms. The retail merchants will be-
invited to attend this meeting and it,
will be very interesting. +,
The three able papers were dis,
cussed by Claude NUgent, Manager
Hubbell of the Midland Produce Co.,
M. G. Boecher and J. N. Southland, ad-
vertising manager of The Forum.