PAGE SIX UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN, LAWRENCE, KANSAS THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 1950 The Editorial Page- Mississippi Mud A Mississippi family watched an 18 year old Negro die in the electric chair in the Jackson courthouse. Permission was tendered them by Governor Fielding Wright. The reason: the Negro had slain a member of the family. What an aura of satisfaction must have shown from the faces of the onlookers! Their every fiber must have tingled with anticipation as did the Romans' at the carnal orgies of their day. Ah, what a rare treat to watch the slayer of one's kin twist and strain as 25,000 volts of electricity burn through his writhing body. Imagine an 18 year old boy waiting to die in the electric chair; waiting, secure in the knowledge that he will die in the sight of his victim's mother. Torture refined to its most fiendish degree could not exact more from the mind of a man. The family wanted "to see for ourselves that justice was done." What better way could the honorable governor of Mississippi assure the bereaved family that justice would be done, than by putting them in a chamber so they might watch a dying murderer sob out his last breath. We are looking forward to seeing a stadium filled with gladiators. Governor Wright will be checking a list of invitations to the noble citizens of an enlightened civilization.—Robert Day Growing Plains The migration of industry, spurred by defense plans and advocacy of decentralization, is beginning to assume healthy proportions in the Great Plains states. The result for the seven states, Kansas among them, is carrying them into a position of a balanced economy for the first time. Growing factory payrolls, high farm income, and increased home building are swelling the bank deposits and purchasing power of Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska, Minnesota, and the Dakotas. The "Heart of America" may well be on the way to performing the function of a country's heart. The growth in the Plains states is in marked contrast to the decline, industrially, of eastern states. Curiously enough, however, the Plains region has lost ground in the population rise. Bigger and better farms in this still predominantly farming area partially explain the failure to keep up with population trends in the country as a whole. Kansas, an integral part of the area, ranks fifth in the nation for gains in the value added to materials by manufacturing. Nebraska is sixth. Only Missouri, Iowa, and the Dakotas lost some of their percentage shares of industry. Factory employment increased in all but the Dakotas at a greater rate than the nation as a whole. Kansas in eight years has more than doubled its factory-employed population. The trend is continuing in Kansas as well as the remaining states. The increase in family incomes in the Plains area is far above the national average. Nebraska has headed the nation in these percentage increases three times within the last 10 years. Naturally, retail trade has increased in the area. Within the past 10 years retail trade in Wichita, Topeka, and Hutchinson has increased more than 200 per cent. All this points to a healthy shift from a strictly agrarian economy in Kansas and other states, to a balanced economy of agriculture, manufacturing, mining, trade, and service. If the trend continues, Kansas will have a stiffened backbone to meet crop failures, and future dust storms, if any. In addition, an added burden is imposed upon the residents of this area. The proper application and assimilation of these new industries is important. The future of Kansas depends upon a sensible adaption to a more diverse way of life. —WFS Green (Cough) Room The Green room in the new addition to Watson library is greener than you think! The walls are tinted in a beautiful pastel shade, and most of the student faces are likewise coated with an aura of green. More delicate in shading perhaps, but green. The reason; smoke. Not that we disapprove—smoking should be allowed in most rooms in the library—but, in a room with no adequate form of ventilation the result is appalling. The answer: a ventilating fan. For a very reasonable sum a small fan could sweep clear the sleep-producing and nose-irritating fumes. No miser is closer, nor tavern smokier than the Green room. The only one angry at such a purchase would be a man named Gibson, who said, "Smoke up the joint, man, so I can breathe." —WFS 'Small Things' A scientist says that barring atomic or bacteriological war our new world should be here by the year 2000, and he doesn't explain just what we'll do with the old one. "Sweethearts Heartily Received" says a headline, and probably it meant by the dear hearts and . . . Henry C. Turk, instructor in German, has been admitted to Watkins hospital after being transferred from Municipal hospital, Stillwater, Okla. by ambulance Tuesday. German Instructor Enters Hospital Mr. Turk is recovering from injuries received in an automobile accident Sunday near Stillwater. He had been attending a Lutheran student conference at Oklahoma Agriculture and Mechanical college. University Daily Kansan News Room Adv. Room K.U. 251 K.U.376 Student Newspaper of the UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS Member of the Kansas Press Assn. National Editorial Assn., Inland Daily Press Assn., and the Associated Collegiate Press, Represented by the National Advertising Service, 420 Madison Ave., New York City. Editor-in-Chief Warren Sas Managing Editor Kay Dyer Asst. Managing Ed. Doris Greenbank Asst. Managing Ed. Dale W. Fields Asst. Managing Ed. Oak Leah Asst. City Editor Francis Kelley Asst. City Editor John S. Hill Asst. City Editor Robert Sigman Asst. City Editor Edward Chapin Feature Editor Oak Cow Society Editor Alix Neville Asst. Society Ed. Faye Wilkinson Asst. Society Ed. Elaine Elvig Telegraph Editor Norma Hunsinger Asst. Tel. Ed. Ralph Hemenway Nat. Adv. Mgr. Robert Wren Asst. Tel. Ed. Harrison Madden Sports Editor Nelson Ober Asst. Sports Ed. Richard Dilsaver Asst. Sports Ed. Robert Leonard Business Manager Bob Day Adv. Manager James Shriver Nat. Adv. Mgr. Robert Honnold Clr. Mgr. Dorothy Hogan Classified Adv. Mgr. Forrest McMorrow Nat. Adv. Mgr. Brett Cranney The rugged beauty of Martin Imported Heather Grain leather, incomparably styled with stormwelling, plus the solid comfort of Bates "invisible extra width across the ball of the foot..." That's the combination that won our Campus Advisory Board's quick approval for these sturdy, attractive PHI BATES... 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