The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1926-02-19

criticise any one who regards the
welfare of his home town as hi!
own personal business.
If Indianapolis fails ultimately K
make the most of herself. to become
the town she can become, no MAI
can deny to me the right to regart
this failure as my own persona
fault, and 1 accede to all Of you ex
actly the same privilege.
There are honest men who today
do not believe that Indianapolis car
ever be made a city of a million
people. By the same token, there
are honest men who do not want tc
see indianapolis ever become a city
Of a million people-artistically an6
esthetically, they rebel against ever
living in a city of a million people
And l can quite understand their
point of view.
PrOpOrtionate Growth
We are in the path of progress
twenty-five years from now a city OF
100000 people will not, by com
parison with other cities, be so very
large. twenty-five years from now
Indianapolis with 100000 people
will be proportionately no larger
than she is today.
She must get 100000 people or
fall back and let America go on
without her.
,.v.nbIa.,N1 Af kI.A NEsIIsA.,
lation Club and of all of us becomes
enc not of getting a million people
for Indianapolis, but of so preparing
ourselves and organizing our city
that we can absorb an ultimate pOpu.
latiOn of one million people with
out losing any of the charm and of
the homelike characteristics which
have for so long distinguished In;
dianapolis from inferior towns of
greater size.
1 suppose there were many heart
aches when the cow pastures north
Of Sixteenth st. were plowed up and
the noise Of saws and of hammers
disturbed the pastoral solitude of
happy novels.
AT the Traffic Club some time ago,
promised that almost Immediately
somehow, someone would evolve a
plan and would present it. for better
or for worse, to the citizenship of
Indianapolis.
Plan Not Perfected
There are many respects in which
this plan is not yet perfected but 1t
is sound in it's fundamentals and en-
joys the distinction of being the only
indianapolis plan that anybody ever
stuck to long enough to finish.
Either this plan will be accepted or
it will not.
The decision rests with Indian
apolis.
T warn you, however. that all In
dianapolis for the first time in her
history, is now at white heat-that
we will never again get behind us
this same enthusiasm-this same I'M
animous spirit Of cooperation, and If
we go back to sleep this time we de-
serve our reputation of slowness, of
indifference and Of municipal incom-
potency.
Essentially, this plan is hypothe-
Gated on the idea of helping the
whole town, not just a few politl-
clans, or few merchants or any
group, cult or class. bu, all the peo-
pie. 1t will help the laborer because
it will give him steadier work, bet
ter income and a happier home. 1t
will help the man who employs la
Dor because it will give him better
financial support. better operative
conditions, q better reputation for
his goods and in the aggregate, bet
ter business.
Will Help Everyone
1t will help the jobber because it
will raise him and his house and
his point of distribution, far higher
in the esteem and confidence Of his
market; for one Of the principal re-
suits of this plan will be the crea-
ton of a new confidence in and a
new respect for Indianapolis-to
make merchants far and wide more
willing to buy from indianapolis.
1t will help the retail merchant
because it will give him more custo-
mers. He can certainly sell more
goods to 100000 people and later to
100000 people and eventually to
100000 people than heaean-now to
100000 people, percentage of
whom, due to our restricted manu-
featuring activities, are out Of work
and, therefore, out Of money.
1t will help the banker because It
will increase his deposits and, what
is even more to be considered, it will
increase his fiscal usefulness and
give him wider field and a wider
opportunity for contribution to the
welfare of humanity, which, after
all, is the bankers real function as
well as the function of all of us.
simultaneously, it will help the
man who owns and the man who
sells Indianapolis real estate because
it will create in Indianapolis for the
first time in our history a perma
nent, active and growing demand
for Indianapolis real estate.
1t will help the home, for the
business of this Million Population
Club is to awaken and to keep alert
our civic consciousness, so that mis-.
rule and abuses by organized mi
norities become impossible. And
incidentally, it is going to put behind
Butler University enough additional
power to give Indianapolis one of
the greatest institutions of learning
in America.
You get $4,000 indianapolis people
to thinking in a straight line and
you will begin to see an abatement
of our smoke nuisance, of crime and
of all the abuses that have so in
sidiously crept into our Indianapolis
life.
For Better Schools