The Stomach a Distillery

1895

What are the prohibitionists going to do about Kate Field? We find this aggressive and always picturesque woman thus assailing the cause:

"Atchison, Kan., under prohibition in one year spent $5,000,000 for groceries and $1,000,000 for drugs. Prohibition has ruined the inhabitants of the Aleutian islands, who now drink Florida water and perfumery and any vile concoction they can buy. Alcohol is in everything. The Creator understood his work, and let us accept the situation. In human stomachs undigested food ferments and alcohol results. Every dyspeptic is a walking distillery. Must they be abolished? If so, a goodly number of our American race must perish. Total abstainers eat great quantities of sweets These ferment, and the prohibitionists themselves form a grand cordon of illicit distilleries."

Think of the full import of this — General Dow an ambulatory tank, Miss Willard a whited distillery! Does Miss Field really mean all that she says? — Chicago Post.

Cockroaches Large As Mice

1920

Woman Catches Them With Mousetrap — May Try Cat.

TOPEKA, Kansas. — One Topeka housewife is offering a reward for some way to rid her house of cockroaches. She is wondering if any breed of cats will catch these pests. They have grown so large that she is catching them in mousetraps.

The other night she heard a suspicious noise in her kitchen. She set a trap. Next morning she found a cockroach which tried to steal the bait and met disaster. Thinking it was just a mistake on the part of the roach, she tried again, hoping to catch the mouse that had been keeping her awake.

The same thing happened, only the roach was twice as big — the size of a full-grown mouse.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Aug. 7, 1920, p. 4.

Kansas "Goat Gland Specialist" Missing

1920

Wife Tells Sheriff She Has Come to "Close the Deal."

MILFORD, Kan. — Indications are that the "bubble" formed here when Dr. John R. Brinkley, "goat gland specialist," put this small village "on the map" by his famous "discovery," which he claimed would restore youth to the aged thru gland grafting, has burst.

The "bubble" showed signs of weakening when Brinkley departed for parts unknown two months ago, followed shortly by thousands who had swarmed into Milford, seeking the "fountain of youth."

Following the arrival of the "specialist's" wife here with the announcement that she had come to "close up a deal," the sheriff of Geary County was called upon to take steps to block any move looking to the removal of the "gland hospital's" equipment.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Aug. 7, 1920, p. 4.

Kansas Wheat For France

1901

The enormous wheat crop in Kansas and Oklahoma is bringing grain buyers of foreign countries to Kansas, says a Topeka dispatch to the New York Sun. Alon and Jean Goldschmidt, importers of Paris, came recently to negotiate for shipments. They declare that there is little promise of a big wheat crop in France this year, and France always turns to the United States when her own crop is short. Kansas wheat is famous in France for good flour. It is the product of Russian seed, but the wheat of Russia does not compare with the Kansas product. The French importers will arrange for shipping by way of the gulf of Mexico.

Will Not Kiss Their Wives

1901

Thirteen Married Men of Mount Hope, Kansas, Form an Organization.

Thirteen men of Mount Hope, a small town near Wichita, Kan., are adherents of the belief that men should not kiss women, says the Chicago Record-Herald. All of the 13 are married, and they have just formed a club known as the Mount Hope Married Man's Anti-kissing club.

All the members are quite prominent in business circles of that place, and the organization of the club was kept under cover for three weeks, but the secret finally leaked out, In a statement to reporters President Wilson said:

"All this talk about our wives going to sue us for divorce because we have pledged not to kiss them is rot of the worst kind. We went into this with the understanding that it was to be carried out as an experiment, and we will stick to it if the women uphold us in it. Of course, every member has taken a pledge not to kiss his wife for one year, but there is a proviso that if we all get tired of the proposition we can disorganize the club and no one will have broken a pledge.

"I have been into it now three weeks and am perfectly satisfied with the arrangement, as is my wife. I find that kissing is a filthy habit and without it man can love a great deal more strongly."

Keep Time By The Sundial

1912

In Beautifying Its Forest Park This Kansas Town Has Added a Utility

Ottawa, Kan. — The big city has no corner on civic beauty. Nor are pretty parks and ingenious decorative schemes confined to estates of landed gentry. A country town can, and often does, furnish excellent examples of artistic treatment of bits of woodland.

Ottawa has no copyrighted system of boulevards other than its well paved streets, but the folks who make their homes here pride themselves upon their parks — there are two of them — City Park and Forest Park.

In Forest Park there are samples of the ordinary park embellishments, such as a fountain, cemented fish pond, lettered flower beds and sanitary drinking fountains. But the newest addition is a floral sundial. It is the town's latest civic pride.

J. H. Eason, park keeper for Ottawa, planned and constructed the natural timepiece this summer, it being an excellent summer for the use of sundials. He fashioned it according to he minutest directions of chronometer and sundial experts. As a result the dial is accurate to the minute when the sun's changes are figured — and Mr. Eason has provided a card with printed directions for each day of the year. The number of minutes the sun is "slow" or "fast," in comparison with the standard meridian, is placed in plain View Of park visitors. Anyone may read the card and set his watch the exact time.

The dial is fourteen feet in diameter and the indicator, a pointed post, is eight feet above the ground. Numerals of cement number the hours upon which the shadow of the indicator falls in turn from sunup to sundown. Lines of foliage mark the half-hours and the quarter-hours. Pigmy hedge forms a decorative design in front of the figures.

Plunges Into Dark Shaft

Missouri, 1915

Mrs. Fred C. Pettis and her 13-year-old daughter, Gladys, were passing thru a patch of weeds near a persimmon grove at Chitwood, Mo. Suddenly a reptile writhed in front of them. Frightened, Gladys ran. The mother ran to where the girl had disappeared and found the mouth of an old deserted shaft. "Gladys! Gladys!" cried Mrs. Pettis, frantic with fear. No answer. The mother fled to a nearby mining plant for help. Soon several men with ropes were at the mouth of the shaft. They got busy at once to find the body of the child.

A rope was fastened around one of the men and his companions were in the act of lowering him into the dark hole when the frantic mother screamed and then fainted. Gladys had stepped out of the shaft and coolly remarked: "Gee, but its cold and wet down there."

Altho the shaft is said to have been 200 feet deep, it was filled to within twenty feet of the top with water. The child had doubtless hit the water head first, and when her mother called she didn't hear her, of course. When the girl had come to the top of the water her hand had grasped a piece of the cribbing which is placed two inches apart all the way up the shaft and, using this makeshift ladder as a hand and foot hold she had climbed to the top. She was none the worse for her plunge into the cold water.


Get Letter From Roosevelt

BONNER SPRINGS, Kan., Dec. 16. — Ex-President Theodore Roosevelt has just sent a letter from Oyster Bay to Mr. and Mrs. J. H. Smith, congratulating them on the event of their sixty-fifth wedding anniversary.

Raises a Record-Breaker

It's a dandy — a regular lallapaloosa! Six feet and one inch in height. It's the biggest gourd raised this year, according to the man who raised it — Lewis Schultz, a farmer of Columbus, Kansas.

A gourd, says Webster's dictionary, is "a melon, pumpkin, squash, or some similar fruit of the family."

Bound and Robbed, Now Thought Insane

Kansas, 1911

Chester King, the young man was bound and robbed over in Graham county two weeks ago, has been placed in the county jail at Hill City charged with insanity. It is said he tried to purchase a gun with which he intended to hunt up the two strangers who tied and robbed him the week before.

This is the young man found tied in his own buggy at about one o'clock on the night of January 6th, near a country store known as Corrickville in Sheridan county. The fright and the cold which was intense that night was a terrible strain on the young man and his present condition may be the result of the awful experience.

He is seventeen years old and is the twin brother of Charlie King who was adjudged insane about two months ago for acting queerly on the streets of Hill City.


Got The Limit

Tuesday morning there were three cases before Police Judge Howell. One for selling intoxicating liquor and the other two were for vagrancy.

Oliver Penny was the guilty person in the case of selling "booze" and plead guilty to the charge. He was arrested Tuesday night for selling the "dope" to the soldiers that were going through here, by Marshall Davis and put in the lockup over night. He was fined $100 and thirty days in the county jail, where he was taken Wednesday.

The best thing that can be done with these unlawful people is to give them the limit every time they violate the law.

—Ellis Review-Headlight, Ellis, Kansas.

Puzzle Jugs

1896

Water or puzzle jugs were made in England as early as the seventeenth century, and at the beginning of the present century were still being produced. They are now seen only in museums or private collections.

These tantalizing vessels, though not always equally complex, have generally some features in common. In spite of their many spouts, a perforated neck usually prevented the abstraction of their contents in the ordinary way. But a secret passage for the liquor up the hollow handle and through one spout or nozzle afforded the means of sucking the contents. Of course all other spouts and a small concealed hole under the top of the handle had to be closed by the fingers judiciously employed during the imbibing process.

The inscriptions found on some of these puzzle jugs usually relate to the difficulty of getting at their contents; the following is an example, written in "scratch blue," on a salt-glazed jug: "From Mother Earth I claim my birth, I'm made a joke for man; But now I'm here, filled with good cheer, Come, taste me if you can."


Snow Experiment

Some experiments at Leavenworth, Kan., show that packed snow offers an excellent resistance to bullets.

Gossip About Women – "The New Woman"

Feb. 1896

Ella Wheeler Wilcox believes in reincarnation.

A training school for waitresses is a new Philadelphia institution.

Miss Helen Culver, of Chicago, has presented the University of Chicago with $1,000,000.

Mrs. Livermore has explained that when she called newspaper reporters a "pestiferous set" she spoke in a Pickwickian sense.

Victoria Morosini-Schilling, who started the fashion of eloping with coachmen, is now in St. Joseph's Convent, in Rutland, Vt.

Twenty-one sculptors competed for the statue of Sarah Siddons to be erected in London. The model chosen is by a Frenchman, Chevalier.

Mrs. Anna R. Aspinwall, a millionaire recluse of Pittsburg, Penn., has just died in Edinburgh. Her property is estimated at $4,000,000.

Annie Besant was a religious enthusiast in her early years and was inclined to become a nun, but compromised by marrying a clergyman.

Girls of sixteen are called "under buds" in fashionable designation, and have occasional social relaxations the way of a dance or a matinee theatre party.

E. W. Clark, of Nevada, Mo., tried to make Mrs. Caroline Stewart pay him $50,000 for declining to marry him, but the jury decided that he was undamaged.

The Society of the Daughters of the Holland Dames, Descendant of Ancient and Honorable Families of the State of New York, has been incorporated at Albany.

Two contemporary miniatures Joan of Arc, now in a private collection at Isenheim, in Alsace, are said be portraits of the Maid of Orleans, taken from life.

Miss Clara Barton is going to Armenia herself, to head the work of the Red Cross Society in relieving the distress of the Armenians. Five million dollars are asked for.

For several years a woman has driven the stage between Mancelona and Bellaire, Mich. She handles the reins as well as any man in that region, and has never been troubled with stage robbers.

It is reported that the Home Secretary of the British Government has consented to reopen the Maybrick case, and the friends of the unfortunate woman have high hopes of her at last gaining her liberty.

Mme. Dandet, wife of the French novelist, has a beautiful voice and thinks that this fact has caused the rumor that she was an actress before her marriage. She has never sung outside of her own salon.

The new woman is very much in evidence in Marcellus, Mich. The Town Council is composed of women, the local barber is a woman, the undertaker is a woman and many of the business houses are run by women.

Miss Melvina M. Bennett, a graduate of Boston University, has been appointed to the chair of Public Speaking and Vocal Interpretation in that institution. Miss Bennett is the first woman to gain a professorship in the university.

Girl ushers have just been appointed in the Arkansas City (Kan.) Opera House in place of men hitherto employed, There are six of them, and they are alleged to have been chosen from among "the handsomest young ladies in the city."

The Dowager Empress of China has been much affected by the Japanese war. She used to be a rather loud and violent person, who imagined that the whole world was created for her special benefit, but now she is quiet and humble and listens to advice from those who formerly dared not address her. She shows signs of aging rapidly.

Women in Hungary will henceforth be allowed to enter the Budapest University and become doctors and apothecaries, or study in the philosophical faculty. They must pass the same high school examinations as the men, however, and for that purpose the Government will provide them with opportunities to study Latin and Greek.

Kansas Chickens Meet Motor Trains

1910

TOPEKA, KAN. — In any one of 20 Kansas towns today one may see hundreds of chickens running and flying, with many squawks and cackles and calls, to meet incoming motor trains. At every station along the lines where motor cars are operated the chickens have learned to hike with all their might to the depot whenever they hear the sharp blast of the siren whistle of the motor cars.

Chickens usually run away from steam trains, but they run for the motor cars. The chickens are as regular about meeting these cars as the bus driver and the postmaster. Every old hen, pullet, rooster and cockerel not penned up answers the call of the motor car siren. This whistle sounds more like a fog-horn than a railway whistle, and can be heard long distances. When the siren sounds the chickens take the shortest cut to the station.

What's the reason? Grasshoppers, Just, plain, old, ordinary, tobacco-chewing, green, red, yellow, streaked, striped and spotted grasshoppers. Bunches of 'em, fat and juicy from feeding in Kansas corn and wheat fields.

All the motor cars have pilots, fenders or cowcatchers of a big scoop-like pattern. They are made of heavy steel bars and covered with a wire screening. As the cars go hiking through the country these fenders gather up thousands of grasshoppers. Going the six or seven miles between stations a motor car will often gather a bushel of grasshoppers on the fender.

These are the big T-bone sort of grasshoppers that are found only in the fields. They are the porterhouse and sirloin cuts of the hopper family and they make a very delectable repast for the chickens. The chickens cannot catch very many of them in the fields and gardens, as the hoppers are quick and make long flights.

The grasshoppers are not any more plentiful this year than in former years, but the chickens never had a way of catching them as they have this year, this being the first season of the motor cars on most of the lines. The chickens of the small town, when the whistle sounds, make a quick dive for the depot, ready to pounce on the hundreds of stunned hoppers lying on the fender.

Chase Coyotes Over Prairie With Auto

1920

When Coyotes Take to Rough Ground, Dogs Are Turned Loose

SMITH CENTER, Kansas — Rare and exciting sport is being enjoyed these days in the big pastures of western Kansas in catching coyotes by a recently devised method.

Seated in a small motor car with a pair of hounds in a crate strapped on behind, the hunter presses the coyote to its limit with his machine and, when the pursued animal reaches the rough country, for which it always heads, the dogs are turned loose, and being fresh, they soon overtake and kill the coyote.

Caz Mahin reports catching thirty-five of the prairie pests. For each one he got $1 bounty and $16 for the hide. Some of the coyotes killed were chased for miles over the level prairie before the dogs were turned loose for the finish.


Lump of Coal With Movie Ticket

BERLIN, Germany — Here is a side light on the German coal shortage. A "movie" theater at Uelzen, near Hanover, has a sign on its entrance reading: "In order to assure proper heating of the theater, tickets can be sold only to those who furnish a lump of coal per ticket."

Hungry Lad Is Shot While Seeking Food

Feb. 1920

Restaurant Owner's Bullets Halts Attempted Burglary

TOPEKA, Kansas — Hungry, cold and unable to sleep, John Ross, 10-year-old lad, who recently escaped from the Topeka Boys' Industrial school, got a bullet wound when at 2 o'clock a.m. he attempted to steal something to eat from a local restaurant.

The proprietor, hearing the noise, shot, and the boy made his escape. Making his way to the Rock Island roundhouse, before telling that he was shot, he asked the men to help him get something to eat.

Young Ross, who says his real name is John Guinness, beat his way to Topeka some time ago from Philadelphia. He says his home is in West Virginia, and that he ran away because he could not get along with his stepfather.

Physicians called to the lad's aid were unable to determine the seriousness of his wound.


Boy Swallows 50-Cent Coin

Nature Removes It After Hospital Surgeons Had Their Try

KANSAS CITY, Missouri — Old Mother Nature proved herself to be the best physician after all in the removing of the 50-cent piece swallowed by Francis Quinn, 14 years old.

The coin at first lodged itself behind the larnyx. An X-ray photograph was taken to determine how best to operate for its removal, but upon the development of the plate no trace of the coin was seen and physicians decided it had slipped down into the digestive tract.

The boy left the hospital with the silver half dollar tucked away in his deepest pocket.

A Two Day's Bride Insane

Kansas, 1879

July 13 — Mr. Oliver Mottier was joined in matrimony with a very estimable young lady of Williambury. On Tuesday, the 15th, only two days after her marriage, she became a raving maniac.

The first indications had of anything being wrong was her going into a trance, similar to that of a spiritual medium. Her talk appeared to be entirely with Minnehaha, or about her, she having previously read about her, then there appeared to be a struggle between Minnehaha and another, a male Indian, to get possession of her mind; the latter succeeding, she commenced going through the war-hoop and yells, and all other maneuvers incident to Indians starting out upon the warpath.

This part of the sad scene having come to an end, her ravings day and night were of a very promiscuous character, but showed very little symptoms of vicious or profane temper. Her father informed us that she had not been in the habit of reading or studying Spiritualism, and knew comparatively nothing of the subject. The woman was brought to Ottawa on Monday, where she was declared insane, and ordered to the Ossawatomie Asylum. — Ottawa Gazette, Kansas.

Snake Charmers Have Variety of Reptiles

1916

Kansas Boys Have Produced New Sensation In Vicinity of Home.

Salina, Kan.—Two small boys, Willie and Robert Shorl, the elder of whom is but fourteen, have produced a new sensation in the vicinity of their home at Five Mile, where they have a big cage full of writhing, twisting snakes of many varieties. They play with these reptiles without the least sign of fear, going through with all the stunts of professional snake charmers.

The snakes coil themselves about the boys' necks and bodies. The lads look in the eyes of their pets steadily as they play with them, and they handle them with the skill of a professional.

The collection consists of blacksnakes, blue racers, chicken snakes and three ugly looking "rattlers." On Saturday they usually go down on Snake Branch and hunt for more reptiles. However, these new reptiles are not placed with their "pets," but are kept in a separate cage and are usually shipped to owners of small shows and museums, from whom they get from $3 to $5 for each snake. Neither of the boys has ever been bitten.

The older boy gave a lecture on snakes before the pupils of the Shoal Creek school. He astonished teacher and pupils alike by his classification of reptiles, giving their Latin names and discussing the harmless or dangerous varieties, taking each from a box as he explained its varied habits.

The Speaker of the House

1903

"A few years ago," said Representative "Charlie" Curtis to a Washington Post reporter, "a man of my acquaintance was sent to the Kansas legislature by a rural constituency. He had promised that great things should be accomplished when he reached the state capital, and his constituents kept their ears close to the ground, listening for the rumble of thunders. He get lost the shuffle at Topeka, however, and was never heard from. When he returned home, after adjournment, a neighbor accosted him.

" 'John,' he said, 'I thought you were going to do great things down to Topeka. Why, you didn't even make a speech.'

" 'Well, you see, it was this way,' John explained, 'we decided it would take too much valuable time for us all to talk, so we selected Mr. Smith speaker of the house.'

"John's neighbors accepted this as wholly satisfactory explanation."

—Davenport Daily Republican, Davenport, Iowa, March 4, 1903, page 5.

Teacher Ousted for Allowing Dance Party

1922

SCHOOL HOUSE USED FOR DANCING PARTY

And Now the Lady Teacher at Eminence, Kas., Has Been Deprived of Certificate — Accused of Breaking Law.

By the Associated Press.

EMINENCE, Kas., June 7. — Not counting prairie dogs and jackrabbits, this western Kansas village had ninety- two inhabitants at last count, most of whom do not consider dancing sinful. But because she permitted a dance to be held in the school house, the school ma'am, Mrs. Clare White, has had her teaching certificate revoked by Miss Lorraine Wooster, state superintendent of education.

Eminence is thirty miles from the railroad, and though that is not as far as it was before the days of the flivvers, still amusements are not exactly plentiful. What there are the community has to evolve for itself and community dances were favored. Mrs. White says, however, that since she allowed a dance to be held in the school house and attended it, she has been informed by the state superintendent of education that she has broken Kansas laws, and trifled with the dignity of the commonwealth.

For that reason she has been officially informed that her teacher's certificate will not be renewed.

Mrs. White has written to the state board of administration protesting against the action. She says there was not a thing objectionable about the dance and it was a perfectly proper use for a school house outside of teaching hours.

—The Nebraska State Journal, Lincoln, Nebraska, June 8, 1922, page 1.

Ellis High School Alumni Day

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May Seventeenth -- Alumni Day.

Alumni Day for the Ellis High school has been set for May 17th. If you are a graduate of Ellis High school celebrate with us and become a boy or a girl again for a short half day.

At 1 o'clock we will meet at the old school, sing a few songs and get together once again. At 2 we go to the ball ground where we will try to show the present High school boys that the boys of yesterday can play ball better, run better and jump better than they can. Girls, be there to root and help us win.

In the evening we meet at the Opera house for an evening of enjoyment. Besides other specialties, the "Class of 1909" will present a farce, entitled "A Midsummer Madness." The Alumni orchestra will render "The Tune the Old Cat Died On" and other time-worn selections. Initiation of graduates will take place and there will be dancing.

Last of all there will be a banquet at the Ellis House. We expect this to be the most enjoyable event of the day and know every one will be there to do his part. There will be toasts and responses from the classes.

Please let the secretary, Miss Verna Martin, know whether you intend to come. If not possible to come send some word as we wish to make this meeting as representative of all classes as possible.

The Ellis High School Alumni association was formed last May for the purpose of bringing the gradu[ates back together.]

--The Ellis Review-Headlight, Ellis, Kansas, May 5, 1911, page 1.

The Glee Club Sings a Number

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Methodist Church Notes

The Revival services at the Methodist church increase in interest each night and much spiritual progress has been made. On Sunday night the pastor talked on "The Influence and Responsibility of Leadership." On Monday night the subject was "The Thirteenth chapter of Corinthians, the Sanctification Chapter of the Bible." This was a unique presentation of an expository sermon on that beautiful chapter.

On Tuesday night the Y.M.C.A. philanthropist, Mr. Arthur Pearson, of Topeka, gave a lay sermon, the subject of which was "Bible Study, Prayer and Personal Touch."

On Wednesday night the pastor held a special service for the Sunday School Board, giving an illustration of the Bible and its usefulness, by drawing a tree representing the Old and New Testaments.

Thursday night was used as "Official Board Night," and the pastor spoke of the Board as the Reflectors of a church or the pastor's eyes through which he sees things, and the church's torch by which they get light on how, what, and how much to give and do for the church.

Friday night is especially for the Young People, and the Epworth League. At the service there will be special music. The Glee Club sings a number, the Choir has charge of that contingent known as the "Epworth League Choir," who will also sing for the first time in public. Each member of the League is to wear a white carnation, and it will be something worth while.

On Sunday morning the pastor will preach on "The Dignity of a Son of God in Ellis," at night from this subject "The Things that Find us Out."

The services will be held every night next week except Saturday night, and every afternoon. There will be special singing every night and the choir will have charge. Every Christian man and woman in Ellis is invited to attend and help in this campaign.

--The Ellis Review-Headlight, Ellis, Kansas, January 1911.