pr ———— Dewar Matcha “SYP. GRAY MEEK. INK SLINGS. —Vote for FRANK SMiTH for Register. —A vote for ARTHUR LEE for Sheriff means a vote to put a man in office who deserves it. —We need a District Attorney who knows the people of Centre county; and who knows them any better than PAUL FORTNEY? —The rebellion in China isn’t a circum- stance to the rebellion that is going to occur right here in Centre county on November 7th. —PauL ForTNEY knows the law. He also knows Centre county like a book and would make the better District At- torney because he does. —Good plumbers are scarce and WiL- Liam H. BRowN is a good one. Let him go back to the trade that needs him and put FRANCIS SPEER in that office, for there are not many jobs FRANCIS is physically able to fill. —Not a word derogatory to WILLIAM H. Brown. He can earn four dollars every day of his life at his trade of plumbing. Look at FRANCIS SPEER, real- ize his condition and then vote for him | for Recorder. —Yes, dear Gazette, the stock of the Pennsylvania Railroad is less secure than Centre county bonds. The security is not to be found that is more gilt edged than a Centre county bond and we doubt whether there are very many as good. —Let us have a Democratic Treasurer in Centre county next time so we can find out just what that court house job has cost us. There is a lot covered up up there, but it can't remain so if a Democratic Treasurer is put into office. —Have you seen JOSIAH PRITCHARD campaigning? He drives a fine sorrel and a very fancy yellow wagon. JOSIAH is a fancy man, suave and enticing, but not the kind who ought to be Treasurer of Centre county. Just now we need a plain, common man like JON MILLER for Treasurer. —The entire county sympathizes with FRANK SMITH in the hour of his great sorrow. The recent loss of his beloved wife must certainly leave him with little heart for his campaign for the office of Register. If he has been unable to get to see you personally remember that there has been a sad reason for his not doing so. —An interesting side light on one of the effects the location of the penitentiary in this community would have was revealed VOL. 56. STATE RIGHTS AND FEDERAL UNION. BELLEFONTE, PA. OCTOBER 27, 1911. Duty of Centre County Democrats. What It Was to Cost and How It Was Brought About. There are only seven secular days be- : tween the date of the issue of this paper and the election. If every moment of that time is used to the best possible pur- | pose much can be accomplished in prep- aration for getting out the vote. But | even at that the time is none too long. The campaign has been unusually | quiet but it has been earnest. The can- didates have been active in a quiet way | but energetic and it may safely be said | that they have completely fulfilled their | obligations to the party and to the public. During the remaining time at their com- | | mand they will not default. There will | be neither cessation of work nor abate- | ment of energy on their part. | But the burden of the campaign : should not be put entirely upon the can- | didates. The personal and peiitical | friends of the candidates have also obli- | gations to meet in this connection. They | should put their shoulders to the wheel | ! and help to keep up the forward motion. | | The young men of the party are also in | duty bound to help. In the future they will carry the standards of the party and they should see to it now that the stand- ards come to them free from the embar- rassment of defeat. Then we of the older element have our part to perform. We | have enjoyed the fruits of victory in the past and in so far as it is possible should | strive to convey those benefits to those | who come after us. | | Centre county is as certain of a Demo- \ | cratic victory this year as Berks, if every | | Democrat performs his full duty. Every | voter has influence to a greater or less | | extent. This influence is not measured by his prominence in business, profes- | | sional or industrial life. It depends upon | | his fidelity to duty and the energy of his | | efforts. We believe that every Demo- | crat in the county may easily bring to | the support of the admirable candidates of his party one or more votes in addition | to his own. i | If that result is achieved our victory this year will be an epoch in the history of the county. ! $60,000 Vs $122,000. The WATCHMAN last week referred to the influences, that were alleged by the Gazette. to have principally dictated the action of the County Com- missioners in their extravagant and reckless expenditure of the people's money about the court house, and held that if those two gentlemen could be so easily induced to squander the public funds that fact alone was proof positive of their unfitness for the position they are trying to retain. Since that statement was printed the entire facts relating to it have come out. These only place the Commissioners in a worse plight and make them solely and ALONE RESPONSIBLE FOR MAKING A SIXTY THOUSAND DOL- LAR COURT HOUSE cost the tax payers ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS, as they now admit, and which by the time that debt can be paid, compounding interest on the payment, will run into the enor- mous sum of TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY-FIVE THOUSAND DOL- LARS! Following are the facts. These will be verified by every member of the bar present at the meeting at which the improvements to the court house were decided upon, and whom, our friend of the Gazette who now speaks for the Commissioners, has tried to hold responsible for the extrav- agance that characterized the job from beginning to end. It was a gathering of the members of the Bellefonte bar at the resi- dence of Judge ORvVIS, to examine the plans and specifications for the im- provements contemplated. These had already been drawn up and complet- ed by the Philadelphia architect, who afterwards oversaw and directed the work. At that meeting a majority of the members of the bar were present. Messrs. ZIMMERMAN and WOODRING were there. They had with them, presumably as spokesman, Mr. J. THOMAS MITCHELL, who afterward claimed credit as the originator and accomplisher of the thirty-year bond outrage. They had with them also the elevations, drawings and specifica- tions showing the court house as it now is. As related to us by Col. Davin F. FORTNEY, these plans and papers were carefully gone over by the gentle- men present, some approving, others criticising and others offering sugges- tions for changes, but all fearing the amount of cost their adoption would entail. After a complete understanding of them was had the question was asked of the Commissioners what these improvements, just as specified and shown could be made for? Speaking for the Commissioners Mr. MITCHELL replied, “the architect’s estimate says $43,000, they won't cost over $45,000, and we have the archi- tect’s assurance that he stands willing to put up such a bond as may be asked, that he will find contractors who will turn over the job completed in every detail as to both building and furnishing for $60,000.” And this statement both Mr. WOODRING and Mr. ZIMMERMAN verified. it was with this understanding that the lawyers insisted upon going on with the work and it was with this promise that the Commissioners began the job. Let us all strive to accomplish that re. | by an old Benner Twp. farmer on Wed- | It is easily within reach. nesday when he remarked: “State prop- | sult. erties pay no taxes. Exempt four thous- : . —R. T. ComLEY spent $508 during a acres of the best Jae In Benner the primary campaign, and he declares wp. from taxation and it is gOINg tO |. pe will spend half that much more make the burden muc h heavier on the to show the Republican organization that rest of us.” He was right, too, for there | he can't be turned down with impunity. In place of $60,000 they have made the building cost the county over $122,000 (possibly nearer $150,000 when all is known, for there is much that is hidden and kept hidden yet.) And for all this additional increased expenditure, they don't even have the poor excuse that plans were chang- ed, or additions made, or any kind of improvements added that were not shown at that first meeting. will be just as many miles of roads to keep up and just as many schools to maintain. —Let us clean out the Commissioner's | And if what he alleges is true, he cannot | and Treasurer's offices and find out exactly what that court house has cost us. It looks a little funny to have the Auditor's statement tell us that the court house had cost $122,000.00 and then in another column to have the Commission- ers tell us that they would need $10,000. 00 more money during 1911 for “improve- ments to county buildings.” Let us lift the lid by putting MILLER in the Treas- urer’s office and NoLL and GROVE in the | Commissioner’s. —Talking about the Centre county Court House being a monument to Com- missioners WOODRING and ZIMMERMAN, what had they todo with its architecture? The beautiful part of the Court House is the front elevation which was erected long before either WOODRING or ZIMMER- MAN knew that there was such an office little financially positioned people who | as County Commissioner. And they stuck their $122,000.00 improvement back in the hill for the very reason that the architect knew he couldn't improve on that old front. Monument, indeed! It will be the same kind of a monument to their befuddled business ability that the Pennsylvania capitol is to that of SAMUEL PENNYPACKER. —Listen Mr. HARTER. The reason the conservative people of Centre county might have preferred taking county bonds at 4% interest to buying P. R. R. or Bal- timore & Ohio stock that would net them 5% and 6% respectively is this. When a bond of Centre county comes due the county will pay absolutely its face value. The share of any railroad stock you may buy today may be worth far less on the day you want to sell it and, furthermore, the interest rate paid on it may be chang- ed at any time the directors of the com- pany elect. We grant that P. R. R. stock is regarded as an investment security in Pennsylvania, and is, therefore, less of a speculative issue, butit is speculative just the same; as the person will tell you who bought it for $51.75 in 1907 and can now sell it for $61. Or the fellow who bought it at $75.50 in 1909 and can get only $61 for it now. Plenty of Centre county money is out now on first mortgages at 5%, and some even lower, when it might be invested in speculative securities that would yield from 7% to 10%. Why? Be- cause there is a vast difference in the character of the investments. Conserva- tive peopie are after the greatest security and, invariably, the greatest security pays the lowest rate of interest. | Even the offer of the appointment of mercantile appraiser was not salve enough | to soothe Mr. COMLEY's ruffled spirits. | be blamed, either. ! i That Highest Financial Positioned Man. —_— A certain man in Bellefonte who occupies the highest financial position in Centre county, and who is a Democrat in politics, this week in talk- ingto a Gazetle representative said: “I do not see any wrong in the loan the County Commis’ sioners made for remodeling the Court House.” Keystone Gazette of October 20th, 1911. The high financial positioned gentleman probably meant that he could see no wrong, morally. If that is what he meant we agree with him. But if he intended to help bolster up the blundering financing of the expense of remodeling the court house then we disagree and call to witness the common have the taxes to pay. | Any one of them can take a pencil and paper and figure out that if they take $1100.00 to any bank in Centre county and leave it there on a certificate of de- posit for six months at 3% interest and add $1100.00 more to it; getting a certifi: cate for six months for that amount, and keep on adding $1100.00 and the accumu- lated interest every six months for thirty years, THEY WILL HAVE $109,182.93 AT THE END OF THAT PERIOD. Commissioners WOODRING and ZiM- MERMAN have entered into exactly this arrangement to save up enough of your money to pay for the bonds they sold to raise part of the money for the remod- eling of the Court House. But when who- ever happens to be the Commissioners in 1940 pay the last installment of $1100, 00 into their sinking fund THEY ARE TO GET ONLY $100,000.00. Who gets the other $9,182,93 that you or any other private citizen would get were you to follow the same plan? And the high financial positioned gen- tleman says: “I do not see any wrong in the lean the County Commissioners made for remodeling the Court House. ——Really Mr. BRYAN'S complaints about the Supreme court are tiresome. A man who could pack a convention as he did that at Denver, in 1908, by throw- ing out members of the Pennsylvania delegation who were legally elected, is entirely without judicial temperament and ought not to be considered a fit critic of any court. then draw it out with the interest and | In fact it was understood at that time that the entire court house corri- dor was to be tunneled, so that the steam or hot air, water and electric | light could be distributed through the building from this tunnel and that when repairs were necessary to these, they could be made without tearing up or destroying the walls or ceilings. This idea, after the letting, was abandoned, and a temporary makeshift of carrying these pipes under the plastering of the ceiling of the corridor adopted, thus cheapening the job to the extent of several thousand dollars. i And here you have it Mr. Tax-payer. A court house renovated and im- proved, for it was not rebuilt, that you were promised for $45,000 and ! was not under any circumstances to cost you over $60,000, footing up the extravagant sum of over $122,000, and part of that indebtedness so financ- enormous outlay of $255,000.00. 1 1 come. ed that by the time you get it paid, including what you have to pay yearly ! for thirty years, and the inferest upon your payments, you will figure up the Think of it tax payers, and then think of continuing men in charge of i your affairs who are the principals in this great wrong upon you and your i children. Men whose management of your interests have plastered a $100,000 mortgage upon your homes and your farms and upon every dollar's i worth of property that you own and can be taxed for THIRTY years to Surely when you go to vote you will not cast your ballot to endorse this manner of doing the public business—this thirty-year mortgaging of all you have,—by giving your support to either Mr. WOODRING or Mr. ZIMMERMAN. A Clean Ticket. There is one thing we are convinced of and one thing that even our Republican friends have not or cannot dispute, and that is, that if Centre county were to be hunted over from Wolf's Store to Philips- burg and from the Karthaus bridge to Potters Mills, twelve cleaner men, mor- | ally, or twelve more accommodating, bet- ter qualified or more deserving citizens to occupy the public offices could not be found than the twelve whose names are found on the Democratic ticket. | There are plenty of other men who are | just as reputable, deserving and would | doubtless make just as good officials, but an that the ticket is away above the average and our Demo- cratic voters have reason to feel proud it is so. There is not a man upon it against whose purity of character a whisper of suspicion can be heard; there is not one among them whose actions are charge- able with any offense that would cause the blush of shame to cover the cheek of any citizen; there is not one whose life could not be laid as an open book before all men, without fear that any action of theirs would create criticism, or offend the most moral minded. Can the same be said of all those who are striving for the public places inthe county? The WATCHMAN does not intend to throw dirt, but it asks the moral voters of the county to know for whom they are voting before they mark their ballots! Not the Issue. The Bellefonte Republican and Gazelle may continue from now until doomsday publishing columns of what prominent men have said about the Court House but they can’t throw dust in the public | eye that may ever befog the issue. The Court House is vastly improved. | No one disputes that. Nor it is charged that either of the Commissioners profited a cent in the remodeling. They are both recognized and considered honest men. But as to their judgment in business matters and the reckless manner in which the tax-payer’s money has been used and the public interests cared for. These are on the improvements of the Court House and they actually did spend over twice as much, or $122,000.000. Then they tied the county up in such a way that the debt of $122,000.00 will amount to $255,000.00 before it can be paid off. If you think Commissioners;who take such liberties with your money as to spend twice as much as you authorized them to do are safe business men, then vote to keep them in office. If not, vote for NoLL and GROVE. —~Subscribe for the WATCHMAN. SPAWLS FROM THE KEYSTONE. i i . Hof 2 —About 8,500 bushels of potatoes have been | shipped into Lock Haven in the last month. They { have sold at 80 cents a bushel. | —L. M. McMasters, of Westover, hauled over | twelve bushels of chestnuts to Houtzdale where he sold them for $2.50 per bushel. —One of the finest lots of young trees in this part of the State is flourishing under the care of Father Ferdinand Kittell, at Loretto. | —According to farmers in certain sections of Schuylkill county, an army of young rabbits is destroying the cabbage crop this season. —Pottstown people are now drinking filtered Schuylkill water and give it credit for the ab- sence of contagious disease in their town, —Samples of milk lifted from dairies in various sections of Chester county are reported pure and | coming up to the standard set by the State law. —Many Pennsylvania farmers who delayed the sowing of their wheat until October have been still further delayed by the copious rains of the month. —The Pennsylvania anthracite coal region has a miner in the person of James Cowire who has worked in the mines for sixty-three vears. The man is 75 years of age. ~The Young Men's Christian Association build. ing in Warren was totally destroyed by an early morning fire on Saturday which also badly damaged an adjoining four-story structure. —~Former Congressman Monroe H. Kulp, of Shamokin, is dead at his home in that town at the age of 53 years. He was twice elected to Con. gress as a Republican in a strong Democratic district. ~~Trapper John Swope, of Huntingdon, has so far this month received premiums from the coun- ty commissioners for seventy-nine skunks. The premiums amounted to $19.75 and the pelts are worth $2 or $3 each. —Chambers Besore, a wealthy, middle aged farmer of Greenvillage, Franklin county, is said to be dying from glanders which he contracted from his horses. All his horses have been quar antined and will be killed. 9 _ NO. 42. The Catlin Commission. From the Philadelphia Public Ledger. 1f the Catlin Commission is to continue | its wholesome work of turning the light upon the dark places of past and present municipal misrule it must be with the assistance of that portion of the commu- nity which resents being described as | “corrupt and contented.” Whatever may have the intentions of those who ‘ called this inquiry into and how- ever they may now wish to be rid of it, | the Commission itself has refused to play ' the role, originally assigned it, of the tool of a partisan faction, and has demonstra- | ted its willingness to remain in session as long as there is evidence in readiness along the lines of i A Thus far the revelations before the | Commission have been made solely , through the labors of the T: p | Committee, of which M. Bullitt is : chairman. t com has borne | the burden of the investigations of which iven the shameful t was at their cost | tion 0 of So 5 he dunia —Philipsburg had a pleasant surprise a few i tion was eliminated the city defraud- days ago, when the mendrilling an artesian well | ed, and the amazi revelations of land- for the Hoffman. iS cleat HGtory. sevidh a Tioh ! damage extort been vein of coal at a depth sixty-one feet. It is the public. ion have been laid before | | "Ch hat the entire region is underlaid with this vein. —The Indiana Bent Rung Ladder company, which the board of trade of that town saved from . Bullitt now makes the explicit statement that the field of inquiry has by hausted, but that the committee's resources been, with | financial disaster, has secured a large order that the result that unless the public comes to | will keep the plant busy for five years. Improve: its immediate the Catlin Com- | ments will be finished and work begun in the next ten days. —Anthony Wyland, aged 62 years, residing near Barnesboro, went to the office of a physican in that place to get some medicine for heart trouble and died in the office. He is the fourth farmer in that region to die in that way within the | the past week. —While the wood alcohol industry has not assumed the proportions expected, itis making some progress. Tanners Falls, Wayne county, is to have a new factory for the production of this substance. The buildings are to be solid concrete and will cost about $100,000, —Work on an order of 500 steel hopper cars for the Allegheny River Mining company, as well as that of 1000 box cars and 300 automobile cars for the Erie railroad, will start in the Berwick publicity, toward routing out the para- plant, either October 23rd or October 30th, with ir Eg upon the public | work resumed in the wood car shops Novemktar “ " beyond sanguine | —With a view todoing away with the middle- hopes of its mem and the most effec- | men's an ph hundred farmers in the tive yay in wii of | vicinity of Harrisburg have organized a produce Philadelphia : | company on the co-operative pian, through ciation of what has already in | which they will market the products of their fields their behalf is to provide the committee | with ample means to continue its re- : searches until every chapter of the story of ft and corruption shall have been aid bare. and orchards. Organization will be effected in Harrisburg. —Seven hundred creditors of the defunct Glazier bank at Huntingdon were in line to file their claims with the auditor at the time he appointed for that purpose. The meeting was adjourned to the court house and the auditor worked all after- noon and next morning, then adjourned for a week, when the work will be completed. —A burglar inthe wee small hours of the morn- ing was helping himself to the contents of a re- frigerator at the home of Dr. D. S. Rice, of Hast, ings, when the doctor appeared on the scene with a revolver in hand. The burglar did the disappearance act in quick time and managed to evade the shots the doctor sent after him. —A subway is being built under the Pennsyl- vania railroad tracks at Alfarata to enable the Federal Refractories company to reach the rich ganister deposits on Tussey mountain. The company will bridge the river and install a mountain climbing engine. Work on the new line will be completed as soon as possible. —Owing to three cases of typhoid fever in Ebensburg. samples of the borough water have been sent away for analysis. One of the victims is thought to have contracted the disease else” where, but the other two had not been out of town for months. The water has always been pure but the authorities are not taking any chances. —A daring hold-up robbery at the point of a revolver was perpetrated by a lone bandit in the Taylor avenue hotel, Falls Creek, late Saturday evening—at 10:27 o'clock to be exact. The indi- vidual, concealed behind a handkerchief for a mask, stepped into the hotel, covered everybody in sight, took about $25 in bills from the bar register and escaped toward DuBois. Hearst Comes Back. From the Harrisburg Star Independent. | William Randolph Hearst appears to have an idea that he can go cavorting about and kicking his heels into the face of any political Sarty which he permitted to ally itself with him once upon a time, and then calmly announce that the party may join him again, and thus end the in- cident. That is “practical politics” as he | understands it. Mr. Hearst takes himself as a great re- former, but so far as anybody can follow his curves, he has been a reformer in | preachment rather than in practice. It lis remembered with amusement rather than resentment that when he had him- self conspicuous by his absence instead of | by his labors as a missionary among the | representatives of a benighted e who | elected them for their own undoing, as he | thought. Since that day he has been | everything by turns and nothing long by | way of politics. | Mr. Hearst announces that again he hy Deoe, a Core opporE unity to get into t in. He is going | to fight against Boss Anal and Tam: many. He is going to put out of | business, and Pg ns himself to the | Democratic party in order to do it. But | does the Democratic party want to get i of Tammany and Murphy? It ight | be somewhat em! ng to Mr. Hearst : if he drive them into oblivion and then | —Harry Smay. charged with stealing a horse learn that the party wanted them and belonging to A. I. Bloom, near Curwensville, is could do nothing without them. Besides, | in the Clearfield county jail, awaiting trial. When some of the uential members of the the theft was discovered, a posse was formed and party might refuse to regard Mr. Hearst started on the trail of the horse, which Bad & ot more of peculiar shape. The man was rec! 28 desirable than Mr. Murphy or for New York State and had traveled a consid- Tammany. they should receive him in erable distance before he was overtaken. | But maybe a broad spirit of charity, for he appears! _ag the result of alarge number of cases of scarlet rash having developed at Mill Hall in sev- | willing to forgive the party for whatso- eral different sections of the borough, health | ever he has done it. | — officer White, as a precautionary measure ain ryan’s Texas Farm. the further spread of the disease, decided to B 4 Tem close the public schools, public amusement places and discontinue services in the churches for the next two weeks, It is hoped at the expiration of declared that the Republican Presidents that time the danger of an epidemic will no longer had been robbing him for and had | be such as to make it necessary to continue the stolen 16 of his choice poli issues. He | order. intimated that he was becoming a little weary and might get even by refusing to raise any more issues. About the same time a was sent out from Texas that Col. Bryan was raising onions on his Texas ranch and piling up in 40 he was threatened iS —Although the deer hunting season hasn't opened yet, the engineer on the Northern Central passenger train that left Williamsport at 7:10 Saturday morning put a buck weighing 175 pounds out of business. Possibly it would be more cor- rect to say the engine did the iob, for the big deer as the latter was into the millionaire class. That Jecouionive Reick te about a mile and a-half now fake. Col. spove Trout Runand threw it lifeless to the side i jas buen robbed of Mis amionNS: | of the track. The game warden ol tha. district i 3 was notified and at once had the deer taken i ess leader, informs the Pioneer-Press | 1 Trout Run, where it was dressed, the venison that the onion story was sent out bY | shipped to Williamsport on the noon train and some person interested in the sale of | , ocented to the hospital. ‘lands in Texas; that Col. Bryan only has | —Liverwurst for breakfast came very near ‘a tenant on his farm, but no other em- i and that he has no intention of causing the death of Frank Coup and his three i a ranch out of the money he children, William, Arthur and Hazel at their home raising onions, and furthermore, | at Milton on Saturday. Shortly after eating the | that he has not raised onions enough on meal the father and the three children became the place to season the beef stews. | violently ill and a physician was hurriedly sum- | ——When PENROSE is “ripped” out of the “rip” worth speaking about, and that | SLE torovery. *it is ot knows. whether j event is within the range of the naked 'the or eye. !
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