The Laurens advertiser. (Laurens, S.C.) 1885-1973, 1916-06-14
NEW USE FOR TOWN MARSHAL
Kansas Town Solves Municipal Prob
lem by Means Of Advertising.


Iuray, Kan. has solved the para.
mount problem Of the country town.
says the Chicago Tribune. The re-
sourccfulncSs OF O. l. Stevenson. city
clerk; members OF the city council and
n want al. did It. Luray wanted Il
town marshal, but there was no one
there who would fill the bill, and so
City Clerk Stevenson put an nd. in
Kansas City paper. Forty mon an
swercd. One OF them. George II. Arm
strong OF Newton, Kan. was selected
for tho place. He is an experienced
police officer and IS making good not
only by way of keeping the peace in.
tact, but by the satisfactory perform.
ancc of many other and 80 led duties
He virtually is city manager
The life of city marshal in I.lirny IS
no sinccurc. Iuray was confrortcd
with the same difficulty that TRUSTS
itself into the life OF every other cotln.
try town-thc enforcement of town
ordinances and finding q man to per.
form the many municipal tasks, no
one OF which is of sufficient volume
to require all of his time but which
in the aggregate make up an impor.
tant and responsible posit ion The
former marshal was born on the town
site. and he knew everybody. and cv-
crybody knew him. How could he nr.
rest anybody fu: Il violation Of the
town ordinances: Why, the idea.
Tho town never gctS particularly
Ia, Il
1t moves along at the same Old pace,
REGARDLESS of city ordinances that ~.
rc"t the personal atmosphere OF tho
old home town. Luray was M against
that worry proposition. Describing ia
solution, O. J. Stevenson. city clerk,
said
Here We are 4 small country town
of 900, situated In the wheat bel, o.
WcSt central Kansas. I.uray probably
IS no better nor no worse than the
average country town OF its size with
the same natural surroundings or
course out here everybody knows cv-
crybody clsc, and all arc ncighbcrS
There is almost no social tlistinc.
ton But, us is the case in every town.
large or small. there are two clements.
the other usually as the law and order
element
I'm our little town we have always
had some difficulty in enforcing our or.
dinanccs. owing to the fact that our
marshal has been one OF our own
townsmcn. and everybody knew him.
AS all were his ncighbOrs, hc wouldn't
do anything unless they got pretty bad
we found that some OF the PEOPLE
woull so further IN even little things if
they had no officer except Il ncighbor
whom they called by his first name be-
cause he would be slow in taking any
action against them.
"Thcn we tried getting along without
marshal, but that didn't work Mt all
Finally we thought of advertising for
man. We put Il little want al. In tho
Sunday edition OF the Kansas CITY
Star, and ! received forty replies. We
selected Il man WHO came here person
ally and applied for the position We
pay him 500 a month He has had cX
pcricncc In police work and in the Sc
crct service department OF railways
Ills duties arc many and varied. We
have q municipal water systcm, ana hc
looks after that ami collects the water
rent. lie acts rs street commissioner.
tax collector and peace officer. The
job takes up 50 much of4s time that
he doesn't have opportunity to pitch
horScshocs or go fishing.
"1n other words, we plan that this
one man shall do about all the actual
work the town rcquircs-cXccpt the
team work on the streets. If he is YER
satilc enough to do all these in n satis-
factory manner we will have found tho
solution to the problem that has trou.
bled the town council"