Enid Daily Eagle. (Enid, Okla.), Vol. 8, No. 277, Ed. 3 Sunday, August 29, 1909 Page: 1 of 8
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Sunday Morning Edition
ENID DAILY EAGLE
Pages 1 7 to 24
fcNIli HAIL* KU.I.k SUNDAY, AKil ST Lit. tlMHt.
HARD TIME IN
EARLY YEARS
First Few Years After Op-
ening Were Trying
SCENES Of TWELVE
MRS AGO PICTURED
I. S. Drummond Tells of
How the City Looked soon
After Early Settlement
(By I. S. Drummond)
The first time the writer saw Enid
after it had been "located" by the
government officials was something
less than twelve years ago. At that
time the fight was "r on" between
the Rock Island R. R. Co. and the
town, but the worst of the rumpus
was over. There was still consider
able "feeling" but both parties were
getting tired.
At that time Enid had made a
good growth for her age. In fact she
felt rather bigger than she does now.
But she was still wearing short
dresses—very short—something like
the youngest in a large family of
girls in very warm weather. The
houses were not close enough to
gether to prevent the free circulation
of the breezes. Of course there were
a number of nice residences and a
few substantial business buildings.
The most prominent of the business
buildings, was the "Rex" hotel, on
the west side of Government square.
It was the king pin—the show place
to which the attention of strangers
was directed as they loitered round
the jjepot (Enid only had one depot
in those good old days), waiting for
the train to start. It was pointed
out as a specimen of the "large and
substantial brick blocks that were
going up all round the square. It
looked all right if you didn't look
too closely; but the "brick" were the
pressed sheet iron imitation brick
used these days to some extent for
barns and stables. But it "showed
all right.
The houses round the square were
mostly rather cramped and flimsy af-
fairs. In fact the east side of the
square wus the only side where all
the lots were occupied by buildings
of any description. On the north
side there were many lots unoccu-
pied; real building had scarcely be-
gun on the west side; and on the
south side were a string of wooden
WiJIiiA
Farm home scene near Enid. Scores of farmers in this section
have handsome automobiles.
News—in the same office. The Eagle Her handicap now is lack of|railroad
was located in a frame building near | facilities to the west. A railway
the southwest corner of the square
on the south side, and was owiu.l
by I. G. Conkling, who afterwards
sold it to W. I. Drummond. The
Democrat, owned and edited by
Eugene P. Moore, lately deceased,
had its location near the northwest
corner of the square. Th6 Wave,
the "great disturber," was squatted
on the west side of the square.
There were some other trade or class
publications, but their names are for
gotten.
Enid business men were then, as
they have been ever since, looking
for factories, trying to get any sort
of a manufacturing concern that
would induce people to locate here
and furnish them employment.
Among the first big things the com-
from here to the coal fields of New
Mexico will more than double Enid's
wholesale territory. It may take
nerve wrecking, heart breaking,
pocket scraping work to get a rail-
road outlet to the west, but it will
put Enid ahead of any other city in
Oklahoma as a wholesale town.
I. S. DRUMMOND.
Where Milton Wrote.
The last years of Milton's life were
spent in a house in Artillery Walk,
Hunhill Fields, London, Eng., where
he, while blind, composed and dic-
tated to his daughters "Paradise Lost,"
"Paradise Regained" and "Samson
Agonistes," and wheie he died in
1674, at the age of 6G.
Attorney D. M. alker tells
of Prospects
TO BE ivOTONI] GREAT
AS A TRADE CENTER
But in Those Things Which
Go to Make a City Worth
While as Well
Home of The Enid Daily Eagle which was founded September 16,
1893. The Eagle has occupied its present quarters since May, 1904.
mercial club caught on the flv were
a shoe factory and a steel bridge
plant. The shoe factory proved to
be a rather expensive luxury, and
being badly managed, failed. The
bridge factory did one good thing-—
it started a prosperous new addition.
The sidewalks were a fright. Even
around the square there were mere
apologies for sidewalks. Narrow
wooden sidewalks led out from the
four corners of the square, mostly
only on one side of the street, and
reached only a few blocks. There
wasn't a yard of paved street in the
city. The writer lived on East
By D. M. Walker, Attorney at Law.
While "In this sorry scheme of
things entire" no man may surely
pull aside the veil that hides the
future and know what lies in the
years beyond, still there is a certan
ogle in the development of cities,
countries, men and it is possible to
argue from cause to effect even
though the steps in the argument
cover several years. We have for
the first step our magnificent soil and
an ideal climate, which embraces in
their wide range the greatest variety
of fruits and products and offer the
finest stage for the development and
growth of all the animal world. For
our second step we have a popula-
tion that has the highest per cent
of white people in it of any of the
larger cities in Oklahoma, coupled
with an education and a civilization
that give the most complete line to
illiteracy of probably any point in
the United States; these endowments
of population and nature have al
ready produced great results and we
see them around us in our citizens,
our streets, schools, churches, bus-
iness and railroads; what has been
done is the logical consequence of
these causes operating in the past
and these causes which have operat-
ed so successfully in the past will
operate with added momentum in
Home of the iPoneer Telephone Company, occupied exclusively by
its Enid office. ,
going over the electric lines will do
their trading in the city of Enid and
her huge stores will spread out again
and again and still not keep pace
with the demands of her trade; as
her retail growth goes on, and as
the number of daily visitors within
her limits increases, the necessity of
offering these people something more
than the value of a dollar in goods
will start a civic improvement
which will produce beautiful, shady,
attractive parks in our midst to the
north and to the south of the court
house on the public square, a beau-
tiful fountain will scatter its spark-
ling beauty, the grass will be as soft
aud fresh and green as any lawn in
the Blue Grass Country; there will
be benches and walks and the public
square in the city Of Enid will de-
clare us to the state and to the world
at large as the prettiest place in Ok-
understanding."
Logical Sequences These.
These things which 1 see in the
immediate future strike me all as
the logical consequence of the peo-
ple and the land in which we live and
I have not tried to speak of any of
those golden things of promise that
every man may see for himself when
the hour of the dreamer is at hand
but only of those things which seem
to be the logical and inevitable con
sequence of what and where wo are
A King of Golden Keys.
By casting up our qualifications
for the future, finding us young, in-
telligent, level-headed, literate,
sturdy and Anglo Saxon, is it any
wonder that the alert citizen of Enid
feels that we have in our possession
a ring of golden keys with which to
unlock any store house the future
may hide behind its veil. To do so
The Loewen Hotel, Enid.
One of Enid's Modern Churches.
struct res called business houses—
I never knew why.
Enid had" no opera house, but
along in the late nineties a scheme
was broached to build "Schiller
Hall," now known as the old opera
house, on East Broadway. The
money to build Schiller Hall was
raised by selling shares, by subscrip
tlon, by lottery, or any other old
way. It was a hard pull, but at last
success crowned the efforts, and Enid
was ready to welcome theatrical
troupes, opera singers, or any other
old thing that offered amusement.
There were lots of newspapers
here in the late nineties. About
1899 W. I. Drummond came here
and bought the Sun of S. M. Weed,
now of Pueblo, Colo. He also bought
a couple of farm or class papers that
were printed in the Sun office to get
them out of the way. Thos. P. Hop-
ley also printed his paper—The
Broadway, east of the creek, and
sometimes during a rainy time it
was a pretty hard job to get across
Boggy and through the bottom to
get up town.
In looking over the townsite now.
after an absence of five years, we
can recognize the sites of many old
business buildings, but there are
very few of the old wooden shanties
left. In their places are large and
substantial business buildings and
^plendid brick and concrete blocks,
filled with magnificent stocks of
goods and merchandise of all de-
scriptions. Instead of waxling in
mud after a rain now. as we used
to do, if a fellow wants to get in the
mud he has to hunt around to find a
hole in the asphalt.
Enid has the reputation abroad of
being the whitest, cleanest city in
the southwest, and is getting to be
known as a good wholesale point.
Honesty and Happiness.
The world is getting much better
all the time and it is not so much by
process of law as through a growing
feeling by Individuals that they can
get no satisfaction out of life unless
they are true to themselves-.—Phila-
delphia Inquirer.
Wasn't Surprising.
An archaeologist lias discovered
the pomatum and other "makeup" of
an Egyptian beauty of 3.650 years ago.
The inventory shows no advancement
in feminine wiles up to a late hour
last night.-—New Yqrk Herald.
Swearing.
The real truth is that in a vast ma-
jority of cases swearing is simply a
vainglorious practice, through which
the blasphemer hopes to give weight
and authority to his statements. Or
it may indicate the weakness of un-
bridled passion.—Indianapolis Star.
the future. So it is not the idle
drifting of the romancer's pencil to
set forth many of the things which
the future offers to us only a year
or a few years hence.
The Railroad to the West.
With this apo.ogy for attempting
to say what is going to be, I believe
it is safe to say that the future of
Enid bears first of Its golden harvest
a long line of railroad stretching
straight as the flight of an arrow to
the west until it taps all of the fertile
untilled Panhandle west of us. A few
years hence will see a splendid pas-
senger and freight service complete
from Dalhart to Enid and that
freight service carriers with it a long
list of wholesale houses at Enid to
supply the population that, liappy
and prosperous, will be cultivating
every quarter section in that great,
restless land lying to our west, now
eager for the touc h of the plow. Of
great benefit likewise will be the line
of railroad which will stretch out
almost due east for as many miles
as our western line to connect with
a new railroad system which will
complete for this trade territory with
the three great lines which touch us
now; this line too will call into play
the warehouses, wholesale estabiish-
nients and central supply depots to
much the same extent that the west-
ern line will and Enid will inevitably
be the depot for farming implements
in Oklahoma.
The Great Trade Center.
The retail merchants of Enid will
reach out with slender interurban
fingers of steel and empty into her
prosperous trade channels the retail
business from the fertile country to
the northwest, which has no city of
its own, and of the populous country
to the south; Kingfisher, Noble
Grant and Kay County coming and
FIRST 10 COME
As Early as 1682 They In-
vestigated Here
TO TITLE LANDS
A Modern Enid Home, residence of J. B. Ferguson.
lahoma. A large free gymnasium
with a huge swimming pool, the
pronerty of the city of Enid, will
show that as intelligent people we
realize that one of the greatest es-
sentials for good citizenship is the
sound body for the sound mind, and
for the sound mind the University,
backed vigorously by the great re-
ligious denomination which controls
it, will spread out and enlarge and
increase its buildings until within its
walls it will offer instruction to the
young man and the young woman in
every line Ol no nest human endeavor.
Aii Intelligent Citizenship.
With these few steps of progress
which I have mentioned will go a
sounder, better, more intelligent cit-
izenship which will find its expres-
sion in homes that are mere stately,
that are surrounded by greener
lawns, that abound more in flowers
and vines, in laws which are better
kept and better enforced, and
churches and school houses Will con-
tinue to spread their increasing
leaven Into every quarter of the city,
growing in efficiency and number
with the growth of the city, for with
this intelligence, with the practical
far-sightedness which our people
have, always there will remain the
respect and regard for learning and
the "Wisdom that comes with much
we have only to forget the petty
jealousies, the petty benefit of today,
to gain the greater largess of the
future.
The Common Duties of All.
Enid must realize, and let her
realize fast, thai the prosperity of all
is the prosperity of the individual;
let her citizens realize that the in-
telligence. the honesty, the industry
of the multitude sheds itself over
the individual a^id that the boys
and girls who are growing up around
us now will grow up more or less
to the character of citizenship to
which we lead them. Let us strive
as a city to light the way for their
growtli in ability, in learning and in
honesty, giving them above all every
opportunity and inducement to de-
velop the sound mind und the sound
body, qualifying them to take up
the great work of building Enid into
.the noble city that the future seems
to make her and to continue the
i work of building this city into a
great community when other hands
grow tired and nerveless for the
task.
! The city of Enid must inevitably
become a great commercial center—-
let her likewise bend her energies
11 hat she may become equally a cen-
ter for honest, healthy men and wo-
' men. $ ]}
By Treaty With Spain-Ac-
curate Account of Oklaho-
ma's Early History
That portion of America now
known as the state of Oklahoma—
the forty-sixth to be admitted to
the Union—was first visited by the
white man, according to historical
records, in 1861, when DeSoto, the
daring Spanish explorer and adven-
turer, visited the great trans-Missis-
sippi region.
The region of country In which
Is now embraced the state of Okla-
homa first came under the some-
what nominal dominion of the white
man when. In 1682, La Salle visited
and took possession of it in the
name of Louis XIV of France.
Prom that time until 17G2 the en-
tire region was under French con-
trol and it was exploited by a num-
ber of gentlemen of France. De-
sultory explorations were begun
when Bienville founded New Or-
leans In 1706. Later about 1712
the French king granted to Anthony
Crozat for fifteen years the exclu-
sive trading privilege, with the fur-
ther right of Introducing the region
slaveB from Africa.
Tiring of the rf'ivilege, which he
found unprofitable, Cro2at. trans- -
ferred the provlnpe to that first of
the captain of high finance, John
Law, who expired from his specula-
tive pipe the great "Mississippi
Bubble," representing the first au-
thentic instance of stock Irrigation
on a vast scale—a speculative enter-
prise that, considering the fact that
high finance was then in the proto-
plasmic stage may be reckoned the
■most audacious In history. The
great enterprise failed, however, for
the reason that John Law's scheme
was premature by perhaps 140
years.
The observation may be here In-
jected that, were John Law living
today he would have a quit-claim
deed to the continent and Mr. Har-
riman would possibly be an assist-
ant in some village blacksmith's
atelier, a "hero to fortune and to
fame unknown."
Law's failure caused the return
of Captain Bienville, in 1723, and
it was with him Washington Irving
is believed to have visited what is
now known as Oklahoma in the
early thirties of that century.
In 1762 the French crown se-
cretly ceded the possession to Spain
and It was retained by that nation
for :18 years, in 1800 being restored
to France.
! It was during the Spanish owner-
ship that the greater pan of the
last region was thoroughly explored,
and It was planned to "build a cor-
don of missions, starting from the
Oulf of Mexico and extending
northwestward to the Pacific ocean.
The schemo was partially carried
I nut, but Spain developed a big treas-
ury deficit -probably having had a
billion dollar cortes in session ap-
propriating vast sums for a greater
navy to be employed In promoting
world peace or to intimidate the
Japs—and the enterprise was aban-
doned. Only a few grand old ruins
were left in southern Texas and New
Mexico to bear fruit a hundred years
later in the Spanish mission style
of architecture for Oklahoma rail-
way stations.
France, In 1803, disposed of the
region to the United States, for
115,000,000, violating its pledge to
Spain that it would not be sold to
another nation, but "Brother Jona-
than" drove a great bargain and
Napoleon Bonaparte expressed sat-
isfaction in the belief that he had
given C.reat Britain a foeman who
would sooner or later humble her
pride.
A Modern Enid Home, residence of S T. Goltry.
Willing to Be Fair.
"Blznis won't hunt for you behind
the door, but ef you are ready it will
meet you ha'f way ev'ry time.''
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Enid Daily Eagle. (Enid, Okla.), Vol. 8, No. 277, Ed. 3 Sunday, August 29, 1909, newspaper, August 29, 1909; Enid, Oklahoma. (https://gateway.okhistory.org/ark:/67531/metadc142629/m1/1/: accessed April 23, 2024), The Gateway to Oklahoma History, https://gateway.okhistory.org; crediting Oklahoma Historical Society.