J. W. Coleman, publisher of the Effingham New Leaf, having conceived the idea that a string of local papers along the Central Branch, would be the motive power to land him in a fat political job, came here to negotiate with me for the Spectator. My paper was not for sale. The doctor and the political boys combined to persuade Mr. Coleman that a second paper would be preferable. It would seem the MD and PB’s did not want to crush me on the spot—or maybe it was their idea of one huge joke to let me die a slower death. In either event, it was the wedge that pried me loose from The Spectator. I sold to Coleman. I did not permit this to cause me to break with the Doctor and my political friends — as there was the outside chance that they might have been misquoted by the over-anxious purchaser. And then, too, it was not long before I really liked it. It afforded me time to give my full attention to other more congenial matters — for getting married, for instance. The wife said it was a great stroke of good luck for me.
I had weathered one brief, and I may say clean siege of competition, which had proved that the town was not large enough to support two papers. P. L. Briney, with his two daughters, Bertha and Olive, wholly on their own—that is, without MD’s or PB’s moral support—established and published the Enterprise for about one year. Unable to make a go of it, Mr. Briney sold the whole outfit—exclusive of the girls, of course—to me for $125, his first asking price.
Mr. Coleman did not last long enough here to do the political boys any good. He got off on the wrong foot in an early issue. He attended a recital given by Edith McConwell’s music pupils—and ridiculed it. Our people did not like to have their kiddies ridiculed—nor their music teacher either, who was once a kiddie here herself. However, after a few issues by Coleman, Art Sells, also of Effingham, took charge, and gave the people—not the politicians—a very satisfactory paper. Coleman gave up his political aspirations, sold his two papers, and took the job of City Editor for the Atchison Daily Globe. However, Coleman’s successor, W. F. Turrentine, held forth twenty years longer than the fourteen years that I had published the Spectator before giving up the ghost about five years ago. The idle plant is still in Wetmore.
To give a clear picture of the grain situation I should explain that Mr. Baker, of the Greenleaf-Baker grain firm, of Atchison, had asked me why would it not be a good idea for me to build an elevator here? I told him that I did not think there would be business enough, from year to year, to justify me in so doing—which, I might say, was a fact fully demonstrated in later years. I pointed out that with the large feeding interests here; and in the north territory, particularly at Granada, where the Achtens sometimes bought as much as one hundred thousand bushels of corn for feeding cattle and hogs; that practically all the south territory was in pasture land; and with two elevators at Goff and- two at Netawaka, we could hardly expect to draw trade away from them without making costly inducements, as we were now doing in our track buying.
Mr. Baker said, “Well, then, I’ll build one for you. It will save you paying a premium to get the corn, and make it more convenient for you to handle it.”
I think the Board members did not know this at the time of organizing. But the committee, composed of the man who had a canning factory building to sell, and the doctor who wanted a competing newspaper with political slant, both uncompromisingly for the Goff man, and two other men who had a tendency to view things in their proper light, met with a representative of the Greenleaf-Baker firm in ‘the opera house here. The spokesman for the committee told Frank Crowell, Mr. Baker’s brother-in-law, and member of the firm, that they preferred to locate their man Reckeway, because it would bring another family to town and consequently make a bit more business for the local merchants. Mr. Crowell told them that we would like to have their friendship and co-operation—but, regardless of whether or not they located Mr. Reckeway, that his firm positively would build the elevator as planned. The two silent members on the committee packed power enough only to delay action.
As it is now all water over the dam, with not even a trickle of cankerous aftermath, it is not my purpose to show up the old Board of Trade boys in a critical light—but it was evident that they were not being guided by the Golden Rule. They knew the Greenleaf-Baker people were going to build an elevator, when they located their man. They knew also that in normal crop years there would hardly be business enough here to sustain one elevator. As a sort of excuse for them pulling for the Goff man, the spokesman said to me, “You know, if we don’t get our man located this year, we may never get an elevator. We have never had a corn crop like this before, and we may never have another one.” It was not strictly a Christian act—and I suspect they never had any regrets for having turned the trick. It was apparently their way of building up the town—and, incidentally, securing a buyer for an old canning factory building.
The Canning Company, a local organization, having failed to bring in the expected returns, and having accumulated debts in excess of its ability to pay, had liquidated, the building going to the highest bidder, one Theodore Wolfley by name—uncle of Editor Theodore Wolfley. Then, later, it was planned by the holders of the worthless canning factory stock—and others—to try to recoup their losses by the establishment of a cheese factory, with an eye on the old building as a prospective site. It was then that the present owner hopped out and bought the old canning factory building, hoping to turn a neat profit. But the cheese factory promotion fell by the wayside. It was then patent to the purchaser that he had over-played his hand. Knowing these facts, one can better understand his sudden anxiety for an elevator—for the good of the town.
Their prospect, W. M. Reckeway, who had been operating the Denton elevator at Goff, likely misunderstanding the Committee, gave out an interview in the Goff Advance, saying that they had bargained for the Worthy dump, and that it was his intention to build a modern up-to-date elevator in Wetmore, but J. T. Bristow had slipped in and bought it away from them—the inference being that the good people of Wetmore who had longed for an elevator for lo these many years, would now have to take what they could get—something less than would have been the case had Bristow behaved himself.
Had this been true—the way I look upon such matters — it would have been both shrewd and legitimate business on my part, though it would have left an ominous smirch on Mr. Worthy. But it was far from the truth. The Board Committee had not bargained for the Worthy dump.