pay the loss. No allowance is made by the
commission for such contingencies.
The Traction Co. may want to extend
a line, or build a new one. The prelim
inary survey, field notes, etc., cost sayr
$5,000. This the company must pay in
cold cash. It is not considered in the
physical valuation upon which the com
pany is 'allowed to pay dividends, yet it
certainly is a part of the actual cost of
building the new line. Any wonder the
company is slow to make extensions or
build new lines.
As remarked in the beginning, Will Mau
pin's Weekly holds no brief for the de
fense of the Traction Co. It is desirous,
however, of having a settlement of the
continual dispute between the corporation
and the municipality. The public and the
Traction Co. have so many interests in
common that it is vitally necessary for the
two to work together in harmony. This is
impossible while the municipality on the
one side is imposing intolerable condi
tions, and the Traction Co. on the other is
unable to make headway. The city is de
serving of better street railway facilities.
There is need for extension of lines now
operated, for quicker service on some
lines, for better cars, for better roadbed.
How can these things be secured when the
Traction Co. is assessed for more than it
is allowed to pay dividends upon?
Is there not some amicable basis uxoii
which we may get together to enable the
Traction Co. to make a decent profit while
giving the city the service the city so
much needs and should have?
Suppose we wipe the slate clean of all
animosities and get together without prej
udices or personalities for the sole pur
pose of working for the best interests of
Lincoln.
TIMBER IN NEBRASKA.
When the Argonauts were trailing
across Nebraska the only timber they
found consisted of a few sparse growths
of cottonwoods and box alders along the
rivers and creeks. "A country that will -not
grow timber will not grow anything,"
said these pioneers. History informs us
that the first settlers of Illinois and In- ;
diana thought the same thing and re-'
fused to settle upon the prairies; In-
stead they laboriously cleared the tim- '
ber lands and made their farms. These .',
Argonauts and early pioneers little :
thought that the treeless prairies were
the most fertile sections. ' .
Nebraska is no longer a treeless plain.
On the contrary, it is one of the best tim
bered states in the Union, although the
timler is not of commercial value for 1
lumbering purposes as yet. But within
the next quarter of a century Nebraska '
will be selling millions of dollars' worth
of walnut timber annually.. Already
large groves of walnut are a the com-
mercial stage groves set out by the, '
homesteaders who took advantage of the
homestead laws twenty-five or thirty
years ago. . It may surprise even Ne.
braskans to know that "treeless Ne
braska" won the gold medal at the Louis
iana Purchase Exposition for the best
forestry exhibit. The government has
set aside a vast forest reserve in the sand
hill region in northwestern Nebraska,
and already it has been demonstrated
that this section is the natural habitat of
the pine and spruce. In a few years these
forest reserves will be filled with com
mercial timber. The chief danger has
heretofore been from fires, but the forest
rangers, with their splendid organization
and fire fighting plans have obviated this
danger.
"Arbor Day," now a world-wide anni
versary, was established first in Ne
braska by J. Sterling Morton. It gave
tree planting its greatest impetus and
was one of the chief causes that trans
formed Nebraska from a treeless plain
to one of the best timbered of the states.
Literally millions of trees were planted
as a result of "Arbor Day." The cotton
wood, which was a godsend to the early
settlers because of its quick growth, has
almost disappeared, making way for the
elm, the wralnut, the oak, the maple and
the catalpa. While states rich in natural
timber have been devastating their for
ests, Nebraska, naturally treeless, has
been growing vast forests.
IT IS WELL TO KNOW.
Good friends in the east, honestly
there hasn't been a buffalo running at
large in Nebraska for more than thirty
years. There are more Indians in the
state of New York, not counting the
Tammany Braves, than there are in Ne
braska. Dress suits and evening toilets
no longer attract attention in Nebraska,
not even as far west as Sidney or Chad
ron. Our eastern friends may visit any
section of Nebraska and wear silk hats
without being in the slightest danger of
haying the aforesaid tiles shot from their
heads by exuberant cowboys. Buffalo
Bill's Wild West show is as much of a
curiosity to Nebraskans as it is to New
Yorkers, Washingtonians or Boston
ians. A "cowboy" dressed, in "chaps"
anjrt wearing a "six-gun" on each hip
wduld be followed down the streets of
aiy Nebraska town by a jeering crowd
of i boj's and be the laughing stock of
staid business men. The cowboy of the
wejst exists today only in the imagination
of ithe fiction writers and among the
scions of the rich easterners who come
west under the mistaken notion that they
are entering a "wild nad woolly coun
try." Candidly, good eastern friends, many
Nebraskans "dress for dinner," dress
suits are common at our theatres and
we have in the Brandeis theatre in Om
aha as fine a playhouse as any in Boston
or Philadelphia, and perhaps as fine as
any in Gotham. The only "bad men" we
see are in the melodramas, and the only
"cow girls" are found in the same en
vironment. And Nebraska is not "out
west," thank you! Omaha is nearer the
center of population of the United States
than Boston; and Omaha, too, is nearer
to Boston than it is to San Francisco. We
Nebraskans are not "out west" until
after we have crossed the Rocky Moun
tains, and starting from Omaha or Lin
coln we have to travel fifteen hours by
fast train before we are in sight of even
the foothills of the Rockies.
Commercial Clubs are maintained in
two score thriving Nebraska cities, and it
is easier to sell a "gold brick" in Wall
street than it is to sell one to a Nebraska
farmer or business man.
Automobiles? We no longer turn our
heads when one goes by, because they, are
as common in Nebraska as in Massachu
setts. The Nebraska farmer no longer
hitches up the old gray mare and "Bill"
to the farm wagon when he goes to town
to do his marketing. Not he! Mr. Ne
braska Farmer puts the wife and babies
in the rear seat, stowing the butter and
eggs beneath, jumps into the front, seizes
the steering wheel and whizzes off to
town in fifteen minutes instead of jolt
ing along for two hours as of yore. The
next day, it may be, he jacks up the rear
trucks of his auto, throws on a belt and
uses the machine to run his corn-sheller,
or his hay bailer, or his stacker. "Believe
us, the only difference noticeable be
tween a Nebraska farmer in town and the
resident of the city is that the farmer is
usually the better dressed man oi' the
two.
NEBRASKA IN LITERATURE.
Nebraska has furnished the world with
several literary stars. William R. Ligh
ten is a Nebraska product. George C.
Shedd, is another. Keene Abbott started
his literary work in Nebraska. Walter
Wellman learned the printer's trade at
York and engaged in newspaper work
there. Frank Spearman, whose railroad
novels have delightd thousands, laid up
the materials for those stories while prac
ticing law at McCook, Nebraska. Elia
W. Peattie was a resident of Nebraska
for many years. Kate M. Cleary, whose
stories of pioneer Nebraska are classics,
lived for years in a little Nebraska vil
lage, and there performed her literary la
bors. THE PLATTE RIVER. m:
The Platte river has its source in the
foothills of the Rocky mountains near
Denver, and flows eastward for 600
miles and empties into the Missouri river
near Plattsmouth, Neb. Its most south
erly point is at South Bend, Neb., and its
most northerly point is at North Bend,
Neb. Its bed is wide and sandy, but it
is a shallow stream: Also it is very de
ceitful in its looks; you may not think it
is running much water, but it is. The
Platte "underflow" is one of the won
ders of the scientific world. The Val
ley of the Platte is as fertile as the Val
ley of the Nile, and far more beautiful to
the eye, . .,
