The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1915-09-24
WHERE IS MONEY
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! marshal and he was stationed at the
city hall for months to maintain
| peace and stop fights between city Of
J ficiaIs.
! Sessions of the city council were
| marked by bitterness and arguments
were punctuated with fists, and this,
explained Mr.. Cofran, is one reason
the city clerk did not keep any rec
ords of proceedings. The proceedings
were simply 100 strenuous. he
couldn't keep up with what happened
Kept Note Book
HE did have note book and tried
| to take notes with the intention of
TRANSFERRING them into the regular
| minues of proceedings said eX-Mayor
| Cofran.
This note book is probably the one
Miss Eta Covel1, city clerk, discov-
! cred in a store room at the city nail
/ Thursday. 1t contains lot of inter-
esting ancient history of the city, but
is noticeably lacking in information
/ concerning the construction of the
Sixth street viaduct and a $4,000 is
sue of bonds in connection.
! Some Iolose ballots of a special cleo
ton which was held to vote upon the
momentous question of whether street
cars (mule cars) should be permitted
| to travel faster than six miles an hour,
and some newspaper clippings We're
| found in the book, put only entire
| leaves missing or in part cut out give
any explanation of the absence of in
| formation concerning the bond issue,
and in the official record book the
pages are vacant coving the period of
note book and a considerable space of
time besides.
Cofran Explains 1t
Eyes, 1 was mayor when the bond
election was held" said Mr.. Cofran
| today Il remember that it carried.
1t was under my administration that
plans for the viaduct were prepared.
| The city engineer was a man named
| Neeley and he was a good engineer,
but as soon as Metsker succeeded me,
he was ousted and for several months
thereafter John Carter, who was city
marshal, was kept stationed at the
door of he office to throw Medley out
should he attempt to enter.
Real Tin Bridge
zone of the first things which the
administration which succeeded me
did, was to discard Neeley's viaduct
plans The various bridge companies
were permitted to submit their own
plans and bid on heSe plans Naturally
the plans calling for the nearest to
nothing in the way of material ac-
companied the lowest bid and the city
got real tin bridge.'
1T was a cat-hauling time all the
| way through that administration. L
| remember the $4,000 bond issue was
to pay the cost of building the APP
prOaches, and we had trouble with
the railroads because a 900 foot strip
\ of land between the Santa Fe and the
Missouri Pacific was owned by private
| parties. The railroads wanted the city
| to pay for building this section of the
viaduct. If a remember right, con-
promise was reached and the rail-
| roads paid some of this-a little
New Light on Bridge.
So it seems that while the impress
sion has prevailed for twenty-eight
years that the railroad companies
| built the Sixth street viaduct, the city
paid $4,000 for the approaches and
/ then built the greater part of the soc
of the l 1882 feet of the structure, and
w. G. Tandy city commissioners of
streets, now declares that the entire
structure should not have cost more
| than 100000
| Less than a year ago c. w. Kouns,
general manag ger of the AtcI1isCn, To-
peka & Snta Fe railroad. wrote a let
| ter which was published in the state
Journal in which he said that the rail-
roads had paid the initial cost of
building the viaduct. Naturally the
question arises, if the railroads also
| paid for building the Viaduct, did some
one get paid twice?
No Records Whatever.
Although search is still being
made of the city records, nothing has
yet been found as to the time the
bonds were issued after they were
| authorized. There is nothing to show
what price they Drought, nor what was
done with the money No records
have yet been found showing that the
| contractor who built the structure
ever received a cent from the city.
Such records may exist, or may have
at one time existed, but they have not
| been found.
In the bond registry, however,
which is kept by the city treasurer,
| the records show that on January Is,
1900, the first years interest on these
bonds was due and was paid. So
| probably the bonds were sold year
prior to this, which indicates that a
period of nearly two years elapsed be-
/ tween the time the bonds were author
lied and the time they were sold,
which would make the date of their
sale fall within the Metsker admins
tration.
Mr.. Cofran remembers nothing
about the bonds ever having been
sold. He does remember, however,
that there was considerable agitation
concerning them. The thought sug-
gestS itself that the bonds, all ready
to be sold, might have been held
while the agitation against the sale
lasted, and were later disposed of after
the public's attention was no longer
directed toward them.