The Butler Weekly Times Newspaper, June 4, 1903, Page 4

Floads Greatest in History of the West ababitante of tree tops and roofs of | houses, and the water creeping up- ward and then slowly subsiding and alternately changing hope to depsair, the capital city has passed the mem- orable Sabbath day of its existence. To all this discomforting condition x . ae | ous interior Kansas pointe, 5,500; ) kansas City, Kan., and vicinity, 2,-| 500; Des Moines, 6,000, and Nebraska | pointa, 1,000. Thousands of persons, particularly at Topeka and throughout Kansas, spent Saturday night on housetops; ee ee ee ee ee ee Ae de is «°1T of affairs was added the preserice of a hundreds at Des Moines are withcut cold, dismal rain. lfood or shelter, and great suffering The ardor of the rescue work olf the! is being experienced all through the heroic rescuers was not abated in the | flooded district. least by the conditions which cone! Railway service, particularly west fronted them. and southwest from Kansas City, is For long, weary hours, knee deep ' demoralized, dozens of bridges reach- in water and sometimes in water up ing as far west as Manhattan, Kan., to their necks, they worked with'having been washed out and many Fifteen Drowned at Kansas City, Two Hundred at Topeka. Groceries YOU WANT, OR IS ITA New Bugey Property Loss Runs up Into the Millions a 20,000 Persons in Kansas City and 10,000 in Topeka made Homeless. GIGANTIC EXTENT OF DISASTERS IN THE PAST TWO WEEKS, 215 42 50,000 $2,000,000 $10,000,000 keep out the water being useless, Street cars are at a standstill, Most of the power {s furnished by the two big power-houses in the Kaw, Lives Lost in Flood in Kansas and Missouri Lives Lost by Tornado in Four States Persons Rendered Homeless by Wind and Water Property Damaged by Tarnado Placed at Property Loss by Flood Estimated at Kansas City, Mo., May 31.—With the Kaw River spreading from bluff to blufi, flooding even the Union De- | potsix feet deep; with great fires rag- The Union Depot by the rise of the flood to-day was rendered practical- ly useless, At one end the water was three feet deep and at the other it was afoot deeper. In the baggage- room baggage was fastened to tackle and suspended in the air out of the reach of the water. Two-thirds of Argentine, arailroad and manufacturing town on the south bank of the Kansas River, six miles from Kansas City, isinundated by ten to twelve feet of water, and probably $500,000 of damage has ing destruction to everything above water, fifteen lives lost and many more in danger, Kansas City has come to a stern realization of the dis- asters that have befallen Topekaand other towns in Kansas. The city is isolated. The bridges between here and Kansas City, Kan., were swept away tonight. One of them carried the main which brings the city its water supply, so that wa- ter is shut off. The electric light and power plants are also disabled, so that the city is in darkness and not a car is moving | been done, on any of the roads, Forty-five hundred of the 6,500 in- Twenty thousand homeless per- | habitants are homeless and nearly sons, driven from the low grounds in | 3,000 are destitute. the course of the day, are sheltered| Fivebridges have been sweptaway, in Convention Hall, in churches and | all the railroad tracks and factories in hastily erected tents on vacant | are under water and business is sus- lots, while the work of supplying | pended. them with food is under way. The river is full of wreckage and Meantime the city faces a food | crowds of people lined the banks to- shortage of the gravest character,|day, watching the procession of for supplies are not large and it will | houses, cars, trees and other debris be impossible for several days to ob- | that floated down. tain more, Three days of isolation, | Twelve bodies were counted as they it is believed, will use up all the sur-| floated past. In nearly every in- plusfood in the city, even with strict. | stance they were lying across pieces est care. of wreckage. On the roof of a cabin Fifteen persons have been drowned | that came swirling down could be in the west bottom to-day. seen the body of a woman and her a Kansas City is in the midst of the | child. worst flood of its history. West Kansas City is a scene of Besides the west bottoms, the | desolation. wholesale business district, already inundated by water from three to ten feet deep, is threatened by destruc- tion from fire, which, this evening, ! wae burning in five places. The Un- ion Depot is one of the structures in danger. It is depending on only two of its twenty-eight railroads for communi- cation with the rest of the world, and these lead to the South. FLOOD SITUATION AT TOPEKA S8UM- MARIZED. Thecity waterworks planthasbeen| Topeka, May 31.—Briefly stated, forced to shut down, as the water the present condition of the flood is has put out the fires under the boil- | this: ons. One hundred and seventy-five to The firemen are thus handicaped | 2©0 persons drowned. so that the efforts are practically| Eight thousand persons without fruitless. ee The Third Regiment has been call- Pot — dollars worth of prop- -ed out and 600 men with blankets | © + aro 40 A and service equipments, are on guard sors Persons missing, 200. yer. * property — oa Houses burned as result of fire in Thelr orders are to shoot on lumber from elaking lime, probal any one who attempts to loot. Their 00. ne » Probably presence is having a good effect. Banks collapsed, two. Five hundred houses from Armour-} Wholesale grocery stores flooded, dale floated down the Missouri River | two, this afternoon. The foundations,) Big business blocks almost ready weakened from two days of water, | to crumble, fifty. gave way. It seems likeacityasthe| Wholesale commission houses de- houses, most of them with all the| serted, six. furniture and other belongings of} Rock Island trains containing 150 might and main. To-night they can proudly point to 300 or more rescued ones who, otherwise, might have been swept away in the current. Leading men bave made a careful examination of the flood and all its conditions, and as a result of their investigation they give 250 as the probable number of lives lost, A more conservative estimate places the number of dead at 175 Two little steam launches are now puffing up and down the river, pick- ing up survivors. A wire cage has been stretched acroes the Kansas avenue bridge. To this was attached a sand dip and refugees were brought across in this manner, When the great Kansas river has subsided the truth of the awful ca- lamity in the loss of life and destruc- tion of property will be known. To-night 500 persons are known to be in the second stories of build- ings in North Topeka orto have been swallowed up by the raging torrent of water which covers that town to an average depth of twelve to fifteen feet, At least 500 of the 100,000 inhab- itants of North Topeka are not ac- counted for. miles of track being under water. A Timely Warning. By Col, Robert M, Yost, St. Francois Progress, Hon. J. D, Allen, of Bates county, Mo., a banker, an editor and u com- missioner of the State Hospital at Farmington, had the courage to tell the State Bankers’ Association at St. Louis that if the country bankers are not careful they might awaken some day soon to find their banking institutions in the hands of a bank- ers’ trust and themselves mere clerks in their own banks. He had the patriotism to say he disagreed entirely with President Roosevelt on this subject, belleving that there is no “good trust,” and that if the Republican policy were | carried to its logical conclusion the young man’s opportunities will be forever closed. | A portion of Mr, Allen’s address appears on the second page of to-| day’s Progress, and we commend Mr. Allen’s utterances to the thoughtful consideration of the people. The menace of trusts is too near and too apparent to be dismissed with par- tisan denunciation or illogical rant- ing. It is a subject for practical treatment by practical men. ee ee ee ee ee eee | A high plat of ground near Garfield park was considered safe and here nearly 100 refugees are shivering to night without shelter from the rain. When the imprisoned people in up- per stories and two-score who had been clinging to the roof of their homer, preferring to remain there than to attempt to cross the river in the small boats, learned that they were to be taken to places of safety in North Topeka, the outcries for help were heartrending. Only a half dozen good boats were at hand and not more than tive persons could be carried with safety. This moved the boatmen to greater efforts and to-night, with powerful searchlights and facing a beating rain from the north, which is almost turning to sleet, those rescuers are answering the appeals for help from men, women and children, who are suffering from hunger and severe ex- posure. E. L. Bailey and E M. Alexander performed some of the most heroic work of the night. In the darkness, about 3 o’clock this morning, at the greatest risk of their own lives, they succeeded in reaching one of the burning lumber yards and rescued a dozen women and children. One man-whimperingly tried to force himself into the already over- loaded boat to the danger line, but was sternly pushed back by the res- cuers. In some isolated instances men showed the white feather. In nearly every case, however, by their actions they showed the material of which true American manhood is made. Women and children were given the preference in the work of rescue. As the result, there arescores of fam- ilies on this side of the river this morning with no head. Anxious wives forgot to be thankful for their own rescue on account of this all- consuming anxiety for the husbands and fathers left on the other side of the swirling water. On the bulletin windows of the newspapers appear notices signed by twenty or more women asking that information be sent to them of their husbands as soon as their fate is known. Summary of the Flood Disaster. Morethan 160 lives have been lost, fully 30,000 persons have been ren- dered homeless, and financial losses including damage to houses and’ ‘ « St. Louls Republic, The question of truats was brought home to the financiers by J. D. Allen, of Butler, Mo., in a way to cause considerable comment. “You, gentlemen, may not rest in fancied security as presidents or cashiers of prosperous banking houses. Even now the tendency is to merge your banks into trusts with the head in one of the great cities of the country, and yours, as simple branches, with you as clerks. No line of business is safe from the trusts’ influences.” Such was the keynote of Mr. Allen’s addressed. He saved it for one of the last sentences of his speech, and when it had been pronounced Repub- licans and Democrats alike were set to buzzing—a minor note to the ap- plause which greeted perhaps the most important address of the day. q \ Sd, ad - Col, R, B. Speed in Nevada Mail. The address of J. D. Allen, of the Butler Times, before the Missouri Bankers’ Association at St. Louis several days ago, on the trust ques- tion, was a very able document and was well received. In its comments the St. Louis Republic spoke of Mr, Allen’s effort in a highly compliment- ary manner, and the Westliche Post, the leading German paper, printed the address in full with this signifi- cant introductory comment: “The President introduced Hon. J. D. Allen, of Butler, who made a strong appeal to the delegates to lend aidin curbing the exactions of aggregated capital. He called trusts the jug- gernauts of the commercial world and declared that they shut the door of opportunity to young men. Thia, in his view, was their greatest men- ace.” Mr. Allen is one of the ablest of Missouri’scountry newspaper men; and a gentleman of high social, busi- ness and political standing as well. He talked ably upon the important subject assigned him by the Missouri Bankers, and pointed out to them not only the dangers of the trusts to the common people, but even to the gentlemen themselves whose guest he was. Mr. Allen belongs to the prac the are the and the conditiuns which surround plainly of dangers from enroach- ments of the trusts, : ; The Best Washing Machine PROPERTY LOSS WILL RUN At Present the Conditions Are but Unfolding and Beggar Description K. ©, World. Kansas ity is today like a right | disclose the nature of the inventions. arm cut off at the elbow. greatest and practically destroyed, its army of workers out of employment, its vast network of railroads practically at a standstill, the city will be a year recovering from the effects of The property loss beggars imagi- nation. The thousands that lost their homes are suffering from the de- privation of jobs and with their household effects gone under the tide such a time as conditions again be- come somewhere normal. This is Added to this is the property loss of the vast industries that made this city @ hive. covered feet deep with swirling water, with the meat and the goods stored in their basements and first stories ruined; the stock yards, an enterprise years in building, now completely under the tide; the railroads, with freight and passenger cars rolling and tumbling under the fierce: cur- rents—30,000 cars wholly or partial- ly destroyed by the turbulent flood being buta single item; the mam- moth wholesale implement, grocery, paint and jobbers of a hundred branches of mercantilelife which have tical class of men who look at life housesin the west bottoese Sooded : to the second stories and their stock humanity as realities. He talked tn tende bt eeeien Of orthiaas-€0: brie floating idly at the insistance of the current—these and a thousand of and remember we are selling cheaper than any one else in Bates county. Our buggies are up-to-date in every respect and the prices astonish you, they are so low. We guarantee our $65.00 job as good as any you can find elsewhere at $75.00, and the best Spring Wagons on the market at $65.00, while others ask $5.00 to $10.00 more money for not so good a wagon, Single and Double Buggy Hames at prices that cannot be duplicated. We will still save you money on Farm Implements Others can’t touch them. on the market ; will sell you one and let you take it and try it, and if not satisfactory your money back. Grocery and Hardware Stock always:complete and at popular prices, G, H. CABLE 7 <2 2 2 2 2 o 2 © 2 oe ee ee evo arrangements are making to engage a third electrical expert, Prof. Michael I. Pupin, of Columbia uni- versity, inventor of the submarine telephone. The arrangements upon which kdison and Marconi join forces are not made public. Mr. Edison admitted that he was at work on certain inventions to be applied to the Marconi system. He declined to INTO MANY MILLIONS With its industrtries paralyzed FALLING HAIR Save Your Hair with Shampoos of Cuticura Soap and Dressings of Cuticura, Pant, Swett, Most fete and Eemnonica Remedies For Making the Hair Grow when Ail Else Fails, Prevent baldness and cleange the scalp of crusts, scales and dandruff with awesome inrush of waters, left practically to charity until loss that falls most cruelly. The packing houses. their owners, traveled St. Louisward. | passengers held here by high water. Nineteen men stood on the roofof} City waterworks plant useless. theSchwarzechild & Sulzberger Pack-| . The known drowned: CONTINUE Co " ¢ all morning] Karl Rupp. an foes gaining fleeh by waving coats, shirts and whatev-| Two Rupp girls. Scott’s Emulsion er else they could find. Finally they} @, H. Garrett’s four-year-old son. ‘ : Twenty unidentified bodies. _ Topeka, May 31.—With1750r 200] Lives are reported lost ce madhcndherse ty A ped and by other things not even thought of as yet, make a picture of ruin and des- olation such as seldom falls to the lot of a popnlous city. Edison New With Marconi.