What Stocktonites Were Doing 98 Years Ago
Greater than Watts, Morse, Edison, Bell or Marconi will be the mechanical genius who can bottle up this Kansas heat for use next winter!
Mr. Burlin, secretary of the Fair Association, reports that the Salina Retailers Association intends to make a good fellowship tour in September and that their party, numbering about 100, will spend the afternoon and evening. They will have a band and a big radio outfit and will make a great demonstration at the fairgrounds. The party will come in autos and will stay all night with us. Fifty rooms will be necessary, so the Chamber of Commerce and the Civic League are asking citizens who have spare rooms for the occasion to notify W. F. Hughes, president of the C. of C., or Mrs. Bess Adams, president of the C. L. We trust many Stockton homes will be opened for these gentlemen.
It takes more than a little failure to discourage our wheat raisers. Practically every team and tractor has been engaged for weeks in pulverizing the soil of Rooks County for the next crop and when seeding time comes in September, it will be found that our acreage has been diminished. While wheat-raising is something of a gamble with Dame Nature, it is not more so than with other crops. The past year has been woefully short in moisture over a considerable territory. All the rains have been local with no long drawn out general soaking. Several of these are sure to come this fall and winter. Those who place the bets this time will do it on a sure thing.
H. N. Dancer was in our office Saturday. He informed us he and his sons had just finished plowing 170 acres for wheat. Mr. Dancer is 74 years old, and he took in hand by himself last week and broke two colts that had never been harnessed. He managed them very successfully hitched to plows with the thermometer ranging around the 100 degree mark, the work soon taking out all surplus pep. The real subduing was done by kind treatment, no whip being used. Not many men of his age and rheumatic leg would have undertaken such a job. Mr. Dancer is a very active man and will not live in town knowing he would soon go to pieces with nothing to do.
Two amendments under consideration by the state Children’s Code Commission for presentation to the 1923 Legislature are exacting considerable interest. One would require a registration of intention to marry by both contracting parties in the probate court ten days before a marriage license may be issued. The other amendment to the marriage laws which may be introduced would require a physical examination of both parties before marriage. These amendments are intended to cut down the number of runaway marriages and hasty unions, which take place on the impulse of the moment.
Harvell Wright, 40, for the last few months editor of the Smith County Journal at Smith Center, was instantly killed at Lebanon when the car he was driving stalled on the Rock Island track and was struck by a fast passenger train. He was the son of the late Joe Wright, a power in Populist council, while that party was in power in Kansas during the 1890s. He is survived by a widow and two children.
The name of the Farmers State Bank of Stockton has been changed and said Bank will hereafter be known as the Citizens State Bank of Stockton. M.L. Breon, President
Ted Penny, the well known Stockton barber, is now earning big money at Omaha making parachute jumps from airplanes. That’s a job few barbers are qualified for.
The roof of the new school building is on and one is able now to realize the bigness of the structure. The auditorium roof is carried by large metal and wooden trusses. There are 18 large classrooms sufficient to accommodate all our school population. The big furnaces and boilers have been enclosed in brick. There are lots of workers on the building and all are hustling under the drive of the contractor to get the work done as soon as possible.
More ground is being plowed than before, and the usual acreage of wheat will be sown. The farmers of Medicine are taking their medicine all right.
F.C. Gager had a very serious disaster by losing his barn and contents by fire. The cause is not known.
Miss Rae Maris went to Kansas City Saturday night to buy goods for the Maris Store. She returned Thursday morning.
The contract for the new girls dormitory at the Fort Hays Normal School has been let. It will cost $90,000.00 and will house 72 girls. The dormitory will be finished in time to relieve the congestion for the spring and summer terms. In the meantime, plenty of rooms will be available for the students this fall.
I am making sweet cider from choice apples. Cider is might nice for jelly as well as a good wholesome drink. I have apples of all kinds and can deliver them anywhere in town. Frank McMannis.
One of the Dudly Brothers of Luky Creek was out looking for stock hogs last week.
Phillip Hartman has moved to the farm recently vacated by James Johnson.
