The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1915-10-23
TOLD IN WHISPERS
Political Dope Made Daily in
Old Copeland Hotel.
Hush Conferences of Old De-
scribed by Henry Allen.
FLOCKED FROM OVER STATE
"COpeland County" Birthplace
of Many Local Ambitions.
L. s. Senators and Governors
Elected From Scopes" Place.

Of all the hundreds of editorials in
Kansas newspapers following the
death of the late Cope Gordon, none
told the story of copeland County
life better than an editorial in the
Wichita Beacon from the pen of
Henry J. Allen. Probably none of the
Kansas editors knew the story of the
old Copeland hotel better than the
Wichita editor and in the recent death
of Gordon, Allen recalled some of the
big political deals which were staged
in the famous hotel
1t was in Copeland County that
United States senators and governors
were elected and political records
were made or ruined as the result of
a single conference Allen mentions
some of the events that made the Cor
don hotel worthy of the name of po-
litical headquarters.
Allen does not mention the fact, but
in the palrny days of the big hotel,
he himself was one of the
familiar figures in the lobby.
1t was in the days of Copeland Coun-
tvs glory that Allen served as a mem
Der of the old board of charities. 1t
was following a conference in the no.
tel that the AIlen-Clark combination
was made, the state print ership dead
lock was broken and E. w. Hoch was
defeated.
House of Whispers.
His tavern was the political head
quarters of the state in day when
1t meant much TO be the pCHtlcal
hea duuarters,'' says Allen in recount
ing the days of passes when politicians
fIocked to Topeka and held whispered
conferences iT the hotel at Ninth
street and Kansas avenue. I'm the
comfortable rooms of the hotel prac-
tically all of the Republican senators.
governors, members of the supreme
court, congressman and other state Of
ficials were made prior to the direct
primary day in this state.
fn NTr0i Ph Il 70
publican aspirants came in their day.
The feet of every man who had pO-
litical aspirations trod across the little
white-and-brown tile of its big office
floor.
1T was in one of the bedrooms of
this famous old hotel that Ike Lam
bert formed the combination against
Burton which elected Lucien Baker,
and ii was in the same room six years
later that Lambert surrendered to a
combination which beat Baker. The
same connecting bedrooms adjoining
the hotel parlor were used by Senator
Long when he took the senatorship
from Governor Stanley and Senator
Charles Curtis.
Curtis Took Honors.
'It was in these same upper regions, |
while the crowd of legislators and po- |
iitical leaders herded together in tire |
big office below, that Curtis secured |
the senators hip when he ran against |
Murdoch. Bristow. Benson. Calder |
head, Bowersock ard others. 1t was |
in the dining room of this old hotel, |
a room made flashily elegant by plate |
mirrors on the piers which supported |
the roof that the Kansas Day club |
met Here long line of modern Re- |
publican heroes, 'uding Henry Ma |
son, r. A. Burch, Silas Porter. now |
members of the supreme court, and /
Frank Nelson. Tom McNeal. Tom |
Noftzger Senator Long. Jim Trout |
man, Willis J. Bailey, Ed. Madison, |
Billy Morgan, and others too numer- I
Gus to mention, got their first start
toward the honored designation as
wheel horses of the G. o. p.
Took Convention Away.
''In the long narrow writing room
on the first floor, looking out toward
the state house. they always had the
meetings of the state central commit
tee. and here is where the AlbauSh-
Leland faction gently took the state
brought it to Wichita No building
in Kansas has made so much political
history as Copeland County and it
was part of vital history, because it
was the headquarters of the Republi-
can party when the Republican party
was predominant.
by a strange irony of fate it
burned when its use fulness as politi-
cal headquarters had passed away.
During a legislative session after the
direct primary had taken away from
the politicians the duties of running
the business of the party, the Cope
lard hotel caught fire and burned to
the ground. The event was made
tragic by the death of Isaac E. Lam
bert, WHO was q victim of the fire,
and who. as one of the brilliant man.