By John T. Bristow
In the preceding article I mentioned an illegal contract literally shoved down my throat. The purpose of this article is to shed further light on that incident—and to show how it got me pulled into court, as star witness. And then too, as a whole, the article gives a “bird’s eye” view of a small town pulling for the good of the town—according to selfish individual tastes.
There is no malice in this writing, no sore spots. But there are some blunt facts. To leave them out, or gloss over the bluntness, would destroy the comedy — then the writing would have no point. There are some “humdinger” situations in it—and I don’t aim to lose them. But, believe me, there is no chip on my shoulder. When one approaches the cross-roads where he can go no farther, when his interests are all centered around the stark grim business of clinging to life, he wants nothing so much as tranquil waters on which to drift leisurely down the remaining days of his existence. I repeat, this article is not meant to be critical.
Starting out with the grain trade in Wetmore, I will say Michael Worthy had been a shipper before I got into the business. He owned and operated a small grain elevator connected with the flour mill originally built by Merritt & Gettys, and later owned by Doug Bailey, G. A. Russell, and Littleton M. Wells, on the south side of the railroad. After the mill and elevator were destroyed by fire in the eighties, Mr. Worthy built a small combined crib and grain house, with a long high driveway, on the location of the present Continental Grain Company’s elevator, west of the depot, north of the tracks. There had been a minor accident on that high driveway, and Mr. Worthy had abandoned use of it. This reduced him to the status of a track buyer.
In the meantime I had bought the Grant Means corn crib—capacity ten thousand bushels—on the north side of the tracks, east of the depot, and filled it with ear-corn, for speculation. When I moved that corn, I saved some money by shipping it myself. And that’s how I got into the grain business, as a side line, in competition with Mr. Worthy.
About this time, the Kansas Grain Dealers Association was born. The Association did not recognize track buyers. In fact, its members fought them whenever they came in competition with the elevators. Just how my competitor, with his inoperative dump, got into the Association in the first place was, of course, his own business. I didn’t care to join the Association—probably couldn’t have got in anyway, as I had no blind dump.
But I was shipping to a house in Atchison that had been forced into the Association to hold its business. I think Mr. Baker had come in only on one foot, however. Anyway, he was sending me sealed bids, and buying my corn against an Association rule which said he must not do that. It took Mr. Worthy nigh onto two years to find this out. And then, of course, it was his duty to report the matter to the Association.
I had a friend in the Mo. Pacific Agent, and whenever I would bill out a car of corn, Ed Murray would give me the waybill which ordinarily would have been placed in a box by the door on the outside of the depot for the trainman to pick up along with the car. I watched for trains, and in event the car had not been taken out, I would put the waybill in the box after I was sure Michael would not snoop.
Mr. Worthy was a devout Methodist, a religiously just man who would not knowingly do a wrong—a wrong according to his lights. He attended prayer meeting every Thursday night. His home was a half mile south of town. On a Thursday I had two loaded cars on track. That Michael had something unusual on his mind this day there could be no doubt. He had stopped by to chat a bit with me while the cars were being loaded. He handled coal in connection with his lumber business, owned coal-bins close by, and had the grace to putter around them a bit before leaving the scene. I hung around on the fringe of the depot that night until Mr. Worthy drove by, as always, in his one-horse buggy, with lantern hanging on the dashboard. I allowed time for him to drive to his home, and a little extra—then dropped my waybills in the box. And that was the night when I should have stood vigil until the wee hours.
Michael snooped. Two A. M.