University Daily Kansan
Page 3
Blast Gains White Fame
By Gary Noland
On August 15, 1896, William Allen White, then the young prolific editor of the Emporia Gazette, in a fit of anger, sat down and wrote "What's the Matter with Kansas?"
The next week, fame found its way to the country editor at Emporia whose birthday anniversary is being honored here today on William Allen White Day.
Kansas farmers, rallying under William Jenning Bryan's famous "Cross of Gold Speech" demanded the free coinage of silver, an inflationary policy which they hoped would relieve their debts.
The hard-moneyed interests in the East were for the gold standard. The young Gazette editor was an emphatic believer in the gold standard, and he was unalterably opposed to free silver. Emporia Republicans delighted in the Gazette's stand on the silver issue, but the Populists boycotted the paper.
The episode which provoked the editorial that became one of the most widely distributed campaign documents of the McKinley-Bryan campaign for the Presidency is as interesting and amusing as the editorial itself.
THE KANSAS AIR in 1896 was stifled with politics. The heated controversy boiled down to a battle between creditors and debtors, between the money interests of the East and the indebted farmers of the West.
ON HIS WAY to the post office one day, White was cornered by a group of Populists who proceeded to tell the editor what they thought of him. White describes the scene in his autobiography:
Wednesday, Feb. 10, 1965
"Anyway, they ganged me—hooting, jeering, nagging me about some editorial utterances I had made. I was froggy in the meadow and couldn't get out, and they were taking a little stick and poking me about. And my wrath must have flamed through my f-ee. Finally I broke through the cordon and stalked, as well as a fat man who toddlers can stalk, down the street to the office. I slapped the bundle of mail on Lew Schmucker's desk and sat down to write for Monday's paper an editorial, and I headed it, 'What's the Matter with Kansas?'
THE EDITORIAL SHOWED, as White said, "conservatism in its full and perfect flower." With acid language, White ranted on how Kansas was losing "wealth, population and standing"; how capital was being scared out of the state because of the populists; and how the populists wanted "something for nothing."
"WE ALL KNOW; yet here we are at it again. We have an old mossback Jacksonian who snorts and howls because there is a bathtub in the State House; we are running that old jay for Governor. We have another shabby, wild-eyed, rattle-brained fanatic who has said openly in a dozen speeches that 'the rights of the user are paramount to the rights of the owner'; we are running him for Chief Justice, so that capital will come tumbling over itself to get into the state. . ."
Mark A. Hanna, chairman of the Republican National Committee, quickly grasped the impact of White's editorial. Copies were made and distributed across the nation. Nearly every Republican newspaper printed it, and the country editor from Kansas suddenly found himself a national figure.
A few sentences from the editorial will illustrate the zeal with which the author attended to his work:
"What's the matter with Kansas?
ALTHOUGH KANSAS elected the Populist ticket, Hanna told White
Peace Corps Work Has Spiritual Rewards Also
One may not make a lot of money in Peace Corps work but he can get many spiritual and social rewards from making friends and dancing the "twist," agreed four Peace Corps staff workers and returned volunteers in an interview held here last evening.
The four staff workers, at KU this week to explain Peace Corps projects and to recruit volunteers, are: Jim Kelly, a Boston College graduate who taught English in a Ghanian Peace Corps project; Jane Beemer, a Trinity College graduate and her husband Halsey Beemer, from Colgate University, who both worked in the Philippines, and Enid Coel, New York City College, who taught French in Nigeria.
THE FOUR returned volunteers made it clear that a Peace Corps project is not all work; there are lighter moments for recreation.
"We were always a part of everything," Beemer said. "The Filipinos often had fiestas where we were and they always asked us to judge their 'queen contests' and to choose the most beautiful girl, or the best singer, etc. At one fiesta we were asked to dance the 'twist' but we didn't do a very good job of it."
THE STAFF MEMBERS divided their social adjustment into two stages—reception and acceptance.
"The amount of time to move from one stage to the other varies with the individual." Kelly said. "It requires sincerity and hard work however."
"ONCE WE WERE accepted on a professional basis," Beemer said, "then we were accepted on a personal basis a lot quicker."
Miss Coel said, "I found a warm response from my students after we got to know each other better and before long I started a French club and had them singing 'Alouette' and other songs. But if I wanted people to know that I was from the Peace Corps I had to pronounce the 's' so that they would understand what I meant."
"The people were happy everywhere we went and that made us feel more comfortable," Mrs. Beemer said.
UNLIKE OTHER student work projects abroad, the Peace Corps pays all of the expenses of its participants during their service in the Corps, the four staff members said. Although the volunteers don't earn large salaries, they are given an allowance for living expenses and $75 for each month of service.
"THE ALLOWANCE," Kelly said, "that one receives is equal to the amount that a citizen of that country, working in the same profession, would earn. Our medical expenses are also taken care of—there are special Peace Corps doctors for our convenience."
Tonight the staff workers will participate in a forum at 7:00 p.m. in the Kansas Union. The forum, entitled "Peace Corps: A Fellowship in the Humanities," will follow a Peace Corps banquet also held in the Kansas Union at 5:30 p.m.
that the editorial helped significantly to elect William McKinley and a Republican Congress.
White later adopted a much more liberal philosophy and wrote editorials advocating the same ideas he had criticized in "What's the Matter with Kansas?"
Summer Group Flight To Britain
Approximate dates:
Depart New York June 15
Return New York Sept. 10
Fare
$325
round trip
The nationally known Emporia editor died in 1944 at the age of 76. In that same year, the William Allen White Foundation was established with the aim of "widening the scope and services of the William Allen White School of Journalism and Public Information at KU."
Save $120 or more
Those interested should immediately contact Professor E. E. Harris Philosophy Department
Civil rights will be discussed at the Young Democrats' meeting at 7:30 p.m. Thursday in the Sunflower Room of the Kansas Union, Bob VanCleave, Kansas City junior and publicity chairman, said last night.
CYD to Discuss Civil Rights Act
Robert Mollon, acting assistant professor of political science, will be featured speaker and will discuss the political and legal implications of the Civil Rights Act. VanCleave said Mollon will also elaborate on the Supreme Court's decision to uphold the Public Accommodations Section of the December 1964 Civil Rights Act.
A second speaker, Samuel Jackson, Topeka lawyer and Chairman of the Kansas Civil Rights Council, will present the Council's views on civil rights. Also Jackson, an attorney for the NAACP, will discuss their civil rights policies and recommendations.
VanCleave said that the remainder of the meeting will be devoted to the selection of the Nominations Committee in preparation for the election of officers on March 4th.
Our 108th Year SALE of BOOKS
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16
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Pub. at $2.50                                                                  'Now 99c
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