The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1916-11-18

Salina, Kan, Nov. 17.-When John
P. Davis started the old Kansas Mu-
tual Life Insurance company in Hia-
watha something like a quarter of a
century ago-even further back, prob
ably. than that-the grand old man
was prompted by a vision of won
derful opportunities for life insurance
development in the Southwest which
seems not to have appeared to other
able and brainy business men of Kan
sas for years afterward-not, in fact,
until after what is alleged to have
been a political receivership, resulted
in the crime of driving this gentle
mans growing and perfectly solvent
company out of the state and into the
hands of Chicago institution.
Then Kansas began to yawn and
lazily rub her eyes.
Lately the state actually has been
hotfooting it. in order to make up for
lost time. Salina, Topeka, Wichita and
Fort Scott each is determined to pos
sess one, two or three of the leading
old line life insurance companies of
the United States; and as for Salina,
this central Kansas town never in the
wide world will be satisfied until it
has made just such an institution out
of the Globe Life Insurance company,
which was founded here by Felix
Broker, DR.. E. NJ. Miers, George
Ripke and their associates about eight
months ago.
Whole Soul in It
Candidly, the people of Salina at the
beginning were not enthusiastic
over the organization of the Globe
Life Insurance Company as they are
row, for Salina had not enjoyed the
same satisfactory experience with life
insurance companies as Wichita To-
peka and Fort Scott. Mr.. Herman
had built good company at Fort
Scott without half trying; Mr.. Sullivan
and his associates had done the same
thing at Wichita, and everybody who
had tried it in Topeka in late years
got along all right. But if there is
town of its size in the Southwest pro-
gressively as big as Kansas City, that
particular town is Salina, and when
Felix Broker without the aid of local
capital went to work like human
dynamo and chartered the Globe Life
Insurance Company, sold its original
S1O0,000.00 worth of capital stock in
a twinkle, added another 500. 100000
to this capital stock and got together
an organization which has sold nearly
three-Quarters of a million of inSur-
ance-the whole transaction requiring
less than eight months-then Salina,
as may be ina gined, warmed up to the
Globe Life Insurance Company like a
woman's foot to a hot flatiron.
To Salina, now, the prospect that
the Globe Life Insurance company
will write its full million of insurance
by the end of the 1916 holidays means
something. 1t means something to
Salina, to Felix Broker, Doctor Miers
and their associates, and to central
Kansas, but in n much broader way it
means volumes to the state of Kansas
and the southwest.
Need Home Companies.
1t means that the Globe Life In
surance company is one more effect
i've step towards remedying pecu-
liarly striking insurance situation in
the southwest which aggravatingly
has been dangling before the eyes of
thoughtful business men of this par
ticular section of America for some
time-the steady flow of insurance
premium money to the states east of
the Mississippi.
Even by counting the companies of
st. Louis. and the strong life institu-
lions of Kansas City together with the
six wide-awake life insurance COM
panies now operating in Kansas. it
cannot be figured out that home con-
Germs are writing more than about
8 or 20 per cent of the life insurance
business of Kansas and Missouri. And
at that, these Kansas and Missouri
companies have been going some.'
Kansas City and st. Louis each has a
company ranking in the $100,0 900, 900
class, and Kansas has helped to swell
the total amount of insurance written
by home companies in the two states
to perhaps, in round numbers $780,
100000.
But think of it! If this 100000