One of the new
sayings of post-war Europe was, "Shot while trying to
escape," and it will be used a lot.
In January,
President Wilson was in Paris for a peace conference.
Upon hearing of the death of President Theodore
Roosevelt, one hell of a good man and a pretty damn good
president, Wilson merely smiled. All of the
belligerent countries on the winning side were there.
They won the war, but lost the peace, the reason, six words:
France, Italy, Wilson, England, Greed, Myopia. In
England sixty-five thousand men suffered from "shell shock"
caused by years under artillery fire, and would spend the
rest of their lives in and out of hospitals, mostly in.
America had a
similar problem. 200,000 men were seriously wounded.
Many, like Charles Mallinson, would soon die of wounds.
He was gassed. It is estimated that taking care of the
wounded would cost more than the war. Veterans were
paid between $65 and $100 a month in disability. Lots
of government sponsored vocational programs were made
available to the disabled.
Another
problem, on May 3, the 129th Regiment entrained in Kansas
City at Union Station. After the parade the uniforms
were discarded, or sold cheap. Many non-veterans paid
a dollar for a uniform, and dishonored them by going on a
criminal spree. After World War II, this problem was
solved. Every veteran's uniform received a patch
called a "ruptured duck". Most everyone wanted one.
Today, on ebay, a WWI uniform sells for $1000 or more.
To accommodate
the coming boom in automobile traffic, road expansion and
repair became the job of Jackson County. The first
order of business was to repair the rock roads with a thin
coating of oil to hold the rocks together and kill
vegetation. Much of the rock was provided by the
county Workhouse, prisoners breaking big rocks into smaller
rocks. Twenty three men were hired by the county for
the job, the job being to spread the gravel to repair the
existing roads, eight more than last year.
Ed Smith was
assigned to repair the Sugar Creek roads, while J. C. Farran
was responsible for Mt. Washington. At this time,
there as yet was no Fairmount community. The men were
paid $100 a month. The job lasted from April 1st until
it snowed. Last year's bill to the county was $12,000.
There are 400 miles of rock road in Jackson County.
In March the
county court took an automobile ride from Sugar Creek to
Cement City. All agreed that something had to be done.
Bids were requested. A local crook with political
connections, W. M. Spence, who had never built a road, came
in cheapest at $32,000 to grade and rock the two miles by
eighteen feet. Unfortunately, he ran out of rock, and
to make it to Cement City he had to knock off several feet
in width, so the road got skinnier the closer you got to
Cement City, to the disappointment of the many Mexican
Americans who were counting on an easier way to get to work.
Still the county began clearing for a road to connect Cement
City with Atherton and the ferry at Liberty Landing.
Two things the road was good for was dumping bodies and
parking autos in the Missouri River. On May 12, Larry
Lynch, and employee of Standard, saw something in the river.
it was an automobile. He pulled it out and notified
John Hayward, law enforcement officer. In August the
body of a lady was pulled out. They also pulled out an
automobile full of bullet holes. The car was shot up
by the Kansas City police.
The Riverview
School graduating class of 1919 again had three; Elizabeth
Hink, Helen Campbell, and John O'Connell. Col. E. M.
Stayton, former commanding Officer of the 110th Engineers,
spoke of World War One. Thirteen students advanced to
the high school. Among them were Doc Hink and Dora
Kominsky.
Fairmount Park
opened on Sunday, May 17. One of the people who would
have visited the park in 1919 was Walt Disney. Born in
1901 in Chicago. When he was five, his family moved to
a 48-acre farm near Marceline, Missouri. In 1910 Mr.
Disney moved to Kansas City. During the war, because
of his youth, Walt enlisted in the Red Cross and drove an
ambulance in France. When the war ended he returned to
Kansas City, where his older brother still resided. He
worked for Kansas City Film Ad Service. Later he would
start his own business, fail, and move to California, in
1923. He would, in the future, create Disney Lands all
over, i. e., super Fairmount and Electric Parks, memories
from his youth.
Again this
year, new amusements were numerous. There were 30 new
concessions. "The Mammoth Mountain Speedway", claiming
to be the longest ride in America. Several cars on
tracks were hoisted to the top, which was 60 feet above the
ground or so. Then gravity took over, the cars going
up and down in a 360 degree circle, ending the ride on terra
firma. 10 cents. Located on the north side of
the park. Also new on the north side, behind the
auditorium, was Puzzle Town. Games, rides, like the
Spinning Top. Rotating in a counter-clockwise
direction, like a large 33 1/3 record, it was a fight
between gravity and inertia, inertia winning, throwing
everyone off. They Crystal Maze was moved inside
Puzzle Town.
Opening Day
was the biggest ever, according to Sam Benjamin, manager.
Many young men were seen in uniform. Some were real
soldiers. The dance floor was enlarged, making it
Kansas City's biggest. Haley's Orchestra was back with
the addition of several new members, so was Montford's
All-American Band. This is the same dance floor where
Red Skelton will ply his trade in the near future.
Both the Mountain Speedway and Puzzle Town had lines from
2:00 to 10:00 pm, sometimes a block long. The ponies
for the kiddies was popular, games of chance like hitting
"the baby" with a baseball could earn someone a box of
matches or a ham. Once the weather warmed, around the
first of June, Mr. Carlisle decided to open the beach for
swimming at 6 am. Before the sun came up people were
in the lake, luring even more picnics and money.
Also in June,
was the wedding of Captain Truman and Miss Bess Wallace at
the Trinity Episcopal Church, still on Liberty Street in
Independence. Miss Wallace was very popular bridge
player, a game later played often at the Truman Home.
She was also very active in the local Red Cross.
Captain Truman's best man was Captain Theodore Marks.
The church was decorated in local flowers. The altar
was covered in daisies, pink hollyhocks, and pale blue
lark-spur, which is poisonous if consumed. When asked
where he was going to honeymoon, he replied, "North."
This is the
year Mt. Washington received a gift, Mt. Washington Road,
now Winner Road. Starting at Van Horn (Truman Road)
and running along the trolley tracks by Washington Cemetery,
adjoining the Kansas City road (Wilson Rd.) at $20,000 a
mile.
The Fourth of
July was hampered by rain, delaying the fireworks, and
ruining many picnics. It was the safest in years.
Hardly anyone hurt themselves and the fire department had
nothing to do. The reason? No booze. But
there were signs that things would change. In New York
City people were having too good of a time to be sober.
At Electric
Park fireworks, band concerts, and the Mid-Summer Review;
vaudeville with acts like Miss Vera Howard, the Dancing
Violinist, an act with more talent than you're bound to ever
see on American Idol. Mr. Jack LaFollette, songster,
Randall & Randall, some song, some dance, plus the sea beach
and natatorium.
Because of the
rain, the fireworks at Fairmount were delayed until Sunday,
July 6, but the Veterans of Foreign Wars, held it's first
picnic. Longview Farm had a horse show.
Association Park held boxing matches. Two actors
pantomimed the boxing match between the world champion Jess
Willard and Jack Dempsey in front of the Kansas City Post
offices. A wireless hookup from Toledo Ohio allowed
the actors to pantomime the fight blow-by-blow as it was
happening. Dempsey won in the fourth round, and would
hold the world champion title until 1926.
The steamship
Majestic made two trips from Downtown to Cement City and
returned. The reason for not going any farther
downstream was because of the huge horse-shoe in the
Missouri River. Swope Park had the usual stuff,
including a World War One military trainer airplane, flown
by a couple of WWI veterans. The plane would take off
and fly around the city, dropping coupons. Sadly, the
plane caught fire and crashed near a refreshment stand.
The pilot was pulled out of the burning plane and rescued,
but the mechanic, who was throwing the coupons, was killed.
There were a
lot of strikes in 1919. Railroad, coal, Standard Oil
of Sugar Creek. Mr. Rockerfeller was the richest man
in the world. A share of Standard Oil stock cost over
$700, six months pay. The trouble started in June,
when the company announced the organization of an industrial
relations board for its three refineries, Sugar Creek,
Whiting, Indiana (near Chicago), and Wood River (near St.
Louis). The object was for the employees with sixty
days on the job to elect representatives. In effect,
it was a union. Some of the concerns these men would
face were hours of labor, wages, employment and working
conditions, housing, domestic economincs, living conditions,
safety and accident prevention, sanitation, "health-works
practice", method economics, and anything else the 1,600
employees could think of. There would be monthly
meetings and an annual meeting chaired by the president of
the company.
On June 16,
most of the 1,600 employees voted on 36 candidates.
Only twelve were voted in. Water boys or anyone under
the age of 21 had no vote.
In May, the
800 laborers requested a 7 1/2 cent raise, to 57 1/2 cents
per hour, the union rate in Kansas City for laborers.
On August 1, while George Moffit, the boss, was in Chicago,
the employees struck. It was a wildcat that included
helpers, water carriers, and men who worked the stills.
With that, no gasoline was going to be made.
They met over
at the bank building, and dispersed for homes in both Sugar
Creek and Independence. Groups of men were seen
discussing the strike. August 2, a Saturday, the
strikers met again above the bank, overflowing into the
street. At 11 a.m., while the crowd milled about, a
striker announced that Harry Hoffman, county marshal, had
announced that the county would hire 100 men to guard the
plant during the strike. W. L. Ware, business agent
and strike leader, declared to the crowd, that if more than
100 men showed up, they should stop them.. The huge
crowd approved. Only 30 men guarded the plant, with
nothing to do. There was no violence.
Mr. Moffit
replied that yes, inflation had raised the price of food,
clothing, and just about everything else, by 78%, but the
wages had increased by 138%. Besides, he argued, the
union laborers in Kansas City worked 8 to 9 months out of
the year, due to the weather, whereas Standard's laborers
worked 12 months out of the year, allowing them to make more
money. He also didn't offer any compromises. The
company knew that kids would soon be going hungry.
The employees
were now ignoring the advice of the Industrial Relations
Committee, calling it a creation of the company, radicals
were temporarily in control.
It wasn't long
before there was dissention among the men. Many were
tired of the strike, many went looking for new jobs.
The refinery was shut down, and the men who were the skilled
laborers, carpenters, brick layers, etc., because it was
against union rules.
On Saturday,
August 9, a vote was held above the bank over whether to
continue the strike of Local 303. There were only 302
men who voted, out of 860, meaning 558 didn't care or were
tired of the whole mess. The men were called by name
and dropped a secret ballot in a box. When the votes
were counted, 208 voted to continue the strike, 94 to go
back to work. The next day Mr. Moffit again said that
the company would not compromise. The payroll for the
plant is $111,000 twice a month.
On Saturday
night, August 16, at 11 pm, the strike ended. This
time the vote was a lopsided 209 to go back to work,
23 to starve. The following Tuesday they returned to
work. After a talk by a Mr. Gill (Gill Street), from
THE UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF LABOR, he advised the men to
go back to work pending a hearing of the Industrial Labor
Relations Committee.
On August 29,
the committee voted to give the men a 10% raise, or 40 cents
a day, or 5 cents an hour. On hearing the news, Mr.
Moffit replied that he had been given permission to increase
the wages by 10% in Chicago. But the strike vote was
taken while he was on a train heading back to Kansas City.
In other words, had he flown in a Boeing 737, there would
have been no strike. A change was made.
Instead of
just 12 members picked by employees, the company also picked
12 to present its interests in any further problems.
One of the first things the committee did was to give
approval for a company-wide magazine called the
Stand-o-Line.
Meanwhile,
back at Fairmount Park, Sunday and Wednesday had fireworks.
Every night a different war hero's likeness. The first
was French General Foch.
Every weekend
day was potentially a record at the gate. In July
swimming events were held in the morning. In the
afternoon and evening Nancy Best Ruffner, an interpretive
dancer took the stage at the bandstand. Homer
Montford's All-American Band played off and on all day into
the evening. On practically every day there was a
good-sized picnic, like the Woodmen of the World, Retail
Grocer's Association, and the Irish-American Society, all
annual picnics for Fairmount Park.
Homegrown
chickens were the main course. Fried, boiled, roasted
or stewed. The hot weather of August packed the lake
with swimmers. The noise of machines and laughter
could be heard from a kilometer or more away.
Labor Day
proved to be rather interesting this year, because of
something called the Plumb Plan, the brainchild of a
troublemaker named Glen Plumb. The railroad union had
20,000 in 80 locals in the area. They ran the trains,
that were usually on time. The Plumb Plan would turn
the railroad over to the government, and the employees, so
that the trains would never be on time again. The
railroad union was for it, the Federation of Labor, or AFL,
had its doubts. The split came because of the Plumb
Plan. At first, two parades and picnics were a
possibility because of the animosity. The parade part
was worked out, but the railroad people went to Electric
Park and the AFL to Fairmount, where 48,000 played and 2,000
more listened to speeches denouncing Bolshevikism, and
debating the Plumb Plan, which lost.
Electric Park
had the Commies, but there were only 500 including the
unfortunate wives and children, or 1% of the Fairmount
crowd. These were the radicals, and they were for the
Dumb Plan. But it failed in Congress and everywhere
else.
Even by
today's standards, Woodrow Wilson was a poor president.
On September 6 he stopped in Independence on his whirlwind
tour of the Wild West, supporting his League of Nations.
Soon he would have his fourth stroke, the first in 1896,
then in 1906, and one in Europe earlier in 1919. His
train pulled out from Independence at 7 am on his way for a
parade and speech at Convention Hall. Very few people
were there to shake his hand. One was Mrs. L. B.
Elfea, who lived nearby. She said he looked fine.
His next two strokes, one on the train, would do him in, and
his league. His wife would soon be president.
The Riverview
School's second building got its start in August when a
$50,000 bond issue was voted in, 67-0. Excavation had
already begun, and will include a lunch room, auditorium,
workshop in the basement, and I will throw a brick through a
window and rob the science lab.
The do-gooders
shut down all the pool halls in Sugar Creek. They'll
get theirs.
The Standard
Oil Band of Twenty-Five gave its first concert for
Christmas. Mr. E. J. Cox is the leader. Mr.
Moffit gave a pep talk and said there would be a concert
twice a month. Mr. Moffit seems like such a nice man.
