Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1914-09-16
EVENING Chat

EvENlN0 Gf1Al
People connected with the State
government are specializing whether
| the assets of Father Penn will be
SZo,00O,000 or $5O.00O.000 or more
when the Pennsylvania Property
commission completes the inventory
OF What the State actually owns The
commission was created by the Gov
ernor some months after he had
Va1niy tried to find out what the Com
monwealth possessed in the way OF
real, personal and mixed property
he round million acres of forest re-
serves, several State institutions worth
million dollars or more, armories,
bridges and other things but no one
could approximate what they were
worth. The Governor wants to in
form the next Legislature just how
much the State is worth and to make
the point that it has all this and some
| thousands of dollars over and above
all its old notes and uncalled for
bonds in the State Treasury. The COM
mission has been working for weeks
on lists furnished by the departments
ana bureaus and hospitals and has
turned up some unexpected things.
| FOR instance on one State tract 1t was
found there was lot Of culm which
| is worth considerab BILE money and that
the Department of Fisheries has
property worth hundreds of thousands
! of dollars. Some of the farms owned
by State institutions are immensely
valuable and there is property scat
| tered through half the counties of the
State. The State owns more than a
| million dollars worth of armories,
which by the way represent an invest
ment of approximately but sixty per
| cent. of their value. The inventory
| is going to be one of the most inter
esting and surprising things that the
State. has known in long while and
meanwhile guesses as to what Is go
ing to aggregate are being made.
The hearings before the Public
Service Commission yesterday brought
some of the best-known lawyers of
| the State to the city and there was
more corporation laws floating around
! the Capitol than for a long time. Six
| of the attorneys here were represen-
| tatives of big railroad systems and
they followed the course of the hear
ings with much interest. And yet, in
spite of the magnitude of the ques-
| tions involved, the hearings made
scarcely a ripple on Capitol Hill.
DIR. Joseph Kalbfus,s secretary of
the State Game Commission, is keep
/ ing a sharp lookout on the returns of
|
| ment of bounties for the killing of
| foxes. wildcats and the like. 1t ap-
| pears that in a good many districts
the arms of the law are not as ia
miliar with the physical characters
| tics of noXious animals as they might
be and once in a while some one puts
something over" Not long ago the
doctor heard of a case wherein the
scalps of some birds were turned in
as those of hawk on which Father
Penn has put bounty. Not one of
| the scalps was from the bird which is
under the ban.
South Second street below Mulberry
! looks as though q cyclone had struck
city after an unusually severe earth
| quake a Belgian city after some
atrocities" had been staged, an Aus
| trian city that has been in the battle
zone or a Mexican municipality i'm
mediately following surprise visit
| by constitutionalists or Huertistas.
| There are some walls standing, but
they look as though the gunnery prac-
| tiee had been excellent Whole blocks
have disappeared and one can look
| from River street clear over to the
gasometers along the line of the old
canal without anything interfering.
| AS far as looking south is concerned
there is little more than lots left.
! This part of the city was one Of the
! fashionable residential districts one
hundred years ago, Market street be-
| ing more or less of a tavern district.
A good many people have been as
! tonished at the wide eXpanses of sand
and grass patches that have emerged
/ from the Susquehanna river in the
| last few weeks. The absence of rain
! I,a q ri m
| large areas have come to light. OPP
| posite Harris street, for instance,
! there is a gigantic sand bank that
| appears to be new and when its loca-
| ton is considered 1t is a wonder that
| some attempts have not been made
| to have it backed up by stone. Even
tually it would make fine addition
and which could be Joined and be-
come a second city park some day in
the far distant future. But 1t is worth
| looking at and considering.
Judging from some complaints
which have been made lately there
are some automobilists who are vent
| ing their wrath against the sign
boards along the State highways in a
| practical way Wherever the State
| has authority 1t has been refusing to
| allow signs to be erected, but there
are property owners along the roads
who are not as careful and they have
permitted erection of big signs close
to roads. Evidently, some of the auto
mobilists have been throwing rocks
at the signs.
| Speaker George f. Alter, who has a
southern Pennsylvania family connec-
| ton through the fact that something
| over 100 years ago one of his ances-
tors settled in Franklin county. and
DR.. Martin G.. Brumbaugh were talk
| ing over Pennsylvania in Pittsburgh
the other day and discovered that they
we're about forty second cousins They
were comparing notes far back and it
appears that in 1893, one Hans Graf
came to Lancaster from Switzerland.
J He became one of the county's big
men and he left numerous poster
| itv. He was a common ancestor of
! DR.. Brumbaugh and Mr. Alter, DR..
Rrumbaugh's middle name, Grove, be-
| ing an Americanization of the name
Graf" The relationship to Graf is
on DIR. Brumbaugh's mothers side and
Mr. Alters fathers side.
The loIly pop is great thing for
Young and old and more apt to be bad
| for young The other day doctor
was called to look after case of a
young sufferer. He had all the signs