The Chandler News.
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ELEVENTH YEAR.
FIRST PAPER PUBLISHED IN LINCOLN COUNTY. H. B. GILSTRAP, EDITOR AND PUBLISHER.
CHANDLER, OKLAHOMA, MARCH 6, 1902.
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NUMBER 25.
A Live Issue in Lincoln County All the Year 'Round—'"McJce Better Roads"
County Roads.
THERE are other things Chandler has to
have, equally important as new railroads.
It is far more essential to the success of the city
that there should be something in the city for the
railroads to haul out than it is to have a demand
for the things the railroads haul in. Without
wagon roads, railroads are not needed. There
are roads leading into Chandler that are entirely
impassable during a wet season. In the Deep
Fork bottoms, farmers within a few miles of
town, are for months deprived of a Chandler
market and compelled to drive long distances to
• other towns to do their trading. During a long
wet season Chandler merchants lose thousands
of dollars' worth of business every month from
this cause alone. On other main traveled roads
there are hills so steep that farmers are com-
pelled to double teams in order to get heavy
loads into town. In still other localities the
• sand is many inches deep, and it is with difficulty
that loads can be gotten through. • In nearly all
roads are stumps and trees that make frequent
sharp curves and turns necessary. There is,an
old story that in Arkansas when farmers go out to
work the roads they take axes instead of shovels
and brighten the blazes on the trees—three
blazes for a county seat road, two blazes for a
postoffice village, and one blaze for a private
road. In Lincoln county there is only one blaze
on the trees along the main traveled roads—made
by the doubletrees of passing wagons. In this
respect Arkansas has the advantage in that it
directs the traveler by the number of the blazes.
In some places bridges across ravines'are washed
out or rotted out until the roads look like some of
Dante's word pictures of inferno. To men
from prairie countries these roads would kill the
sale of the best land in the county. Residents
have become accustomed to dodging trees and
driving down into hidden ravines and up again at
some point farther down, pulling through deep
sand and across bottoms that threaten to engulf
them when high waters come. It is a condition
and not a theory that confronts the citizens of
".Lincoln county. In the statistical report of Okla-
homa" Pottawatomie county is rated the chief cot-
ton producing county of the territory. Lincoln
county produces more cotton every year than
Pottawatomie, but on account of the roads the
cotton of the eastern and southeastern part of
Lincoln county is hauled to Shawnee, the metrop-
olis of Pottawatomie county, thus giving that
county not only the advantage in reports, but
what is still more important, the advantage in the
trade of the cotton growers who deliver their cot-
ton in Shawnee. Every dollar of this cotton
money rightfully belongs in Chandler and will
come here if the roads are put in condition for
hauling cotton over. The regular levy for road
purposes is not sufficient for the roads of Lincoln
county, and to make a greater levy would work
a hardship on many in paying taxes. Improve-
ments must be made from private funds. These
who are to receive a dire?t benefit must be the
ones to subscribe.
How To Do It.
DOAD work must be done intelligently,
* scientifically and by a road building engi-
neer who is conscientious and honest—so built
that they will last for ages, and when other work
is begun it can be commenced "where the first
work left off. Thus in time all roads will be in
good condition. Spasmodic work, patching here
a little and there a little, is money thrown away.
If Chandler can raise $25,000 in three days to
get a railroad built into the city, Chandler can
raise $25,000 to get wagon roads into the city.
True, it is unfortunate that the the town is locat-
ed as it is, and it is equally unfortunate that so
jpuch money is required to make the town what
it should be, but that is crying over spilled milk.
Tlje condition exists an'd must.be met if Chandler
is to compete with other towns for trade. The
new railroads are going to make new towns in
the county to farther draw away Chandler's
legitimate trade, and without Chandler
men bravely meet the conditions all clearly
foresee, Chandler's sun will set to rise no more.
The remedy is at hand and must be applied now.
It is now or never—now, before the new towns are
projected. This matter can be arranged to avoid
any semblance of partiality in where the first
roads are to build. I^et a committee from the
commercial club be appointed to make the selec-
tion, let money be raised to put that particular
road in good condition, then talk about some
other road. One road at a time will put four
good roads into Chandler from four directions.
The fund can be raised in many ways, but this
can safely be left'tothecommercialclubcommittee.
There is an agitation now going on for the rais-
ing of money for a big hotel, another for a new
opera house, and others for divers other pur-
poses, but the condition of our wagon roads is
the paramount' issue, for without good roads the
hotel and opera house will lack the necessary
patronage and Chandler will remain a village.
Hotels and opera houses are good things, but
they do not help farmers. As the county seat of
the richest county in Oklahoma, Chandler owes
it to the farmers to give them the best possible
means of getting their products into the county
seat market. It is a credit, to the farmers that
they have not begun this agitation. The place
for it to begin it in the county seat. It takes
brave self-sacrificing men to meet unusual con-
ditions, but the business men of Chandler have
shown themselves equal . to any emergency
and when they start in this matter they will be
surprised at the hearty assistance they will
receive from the farmers. Good roads w 11
make Chandler the metropolis of Eastern
Oklahoma. With good wagon roads the rail-
roads will come lo Chandler to get her business,
instead of building up sfnaller town? around her.
Immediate action is necessary. With the
promises held out to Chandler for the future, to
delay now is to' be criminally negligent of
the best interests o' the town. Get to work
and do something. The work done in this way
will pay a handsome and gratKying dividend.
He Will Not Run.
HOWEVER much the decision may be regret-
ed, there can no longer be any doubt as to
the determination of Delegate Flynn to retire
from congress. When it was first announced
that Mr. Flynn would not be a candidate for re-
nomination this year there were many in Okla-
homa who would not believe it. Friends by the
thousand hesitated to accept the statement as
true because they hoped it was a false report;
political enemies were reluctant to rely upon it
because they thought it too good to be true.
When the editor of The News was in Washing-
ton recently he was assured by Mr. Flynn in
language that admitted of no misunderstanding
that the free homes champion would not accept
a renomination this year under any circumstaces.
At that time letters were pouring in upon him by
the hundred from Oklahoma urging him to 're-
consider the matter or withold his decision and
offering every conceivable argument*to influence
his action. He arrived in Guthrie ^ast Sunday
to look after some business matters, and showed
at once that all the pressure that had been
brought to bear upon him had failed to change
his mind, by giving to the press a positive state-
ment that he would not be a candidate for con-
gress this year. This bught to settle the matter.
This paper would have been glad if Mr. Flynn
had ponsented to accept one more term as delegate
from Oklahoma territory, but. certainly his
wishes are entitled to some consideration, and,
from his standpoint, he cannot blamed for
wishing to retire. A state with the population of
Oklahoma would have three congressman and two
senators to look after her interests, but Flynn has
nad this to do all alone. All the campaigns
have been harder in Oklahoma .than in any con-
gressional district in the Union, and in 1900 ^he
exertions and exposure incident to the traveling
and speech-making taxed even the strength of
Mr. Flynn almost beyond endurance. He has
desired for several years to return to private life,
but has not felt until now that he could do so
without seeming ingratitude to the party and to
his many personal friends. .Now that he
has accomplished the mafn objects that he
| had in view, and with a good prospect
| that before the close of 'his present term the
statehood bill will become a law, he feels that he
is entitled to consult his own wishes in the inat-
j ter. His friends need not be despondent or his
enemies too exultant, for, in private life, as in
official service, he. will be the same Dennis
; Flynn, loyal to Oklahoma, to his party, and to
his friends. Flynn has exerted an important
influence upon Oklahoma affairs during the for-
mative period of the territory, and .his work is
by no means completed. His unparalleled rec-
ord in congress will not be forgotten by the peo-
ple of Oklahoma. He says that his retirement
from congress is not a retirement from politics,
that he is ready, as ever, to do all in his power
for republican success, and that he believes the
republican nominee will be elected this year.
Flyhn's present term will expire March 4, 190.3.