Source: The Daily Mining Journal, Merquette, MI
January 6, 1891 Tuesday

Going to the Inauguration

A carload of more or less happy democrats will leave the
upper peninsule today to attend the inauguration festivities
at Lensing. A buffet sleeper has been chartered for the
trip and it is safe to say that the buffet will not be
empty. The car will start from Ishpeming on the regular
afternoon train, will take aboard e contingent there and
then speed away for the straits, gathering up ocettered
members of the unterrified along the line. The car wili
speed south over the Grand Rapids & IMdiana and the Detroit
Lansing and Northern road leaving molasses express of the
Michigan Central to squirt along as it may. Northern
Passenger Agent Wilbur of the South Shore says he is
assured of a full carload of jubliant democrats for the
trip who will take advantage of the excursion rates
offered. a

 

VDSSEA Rye
Passenger
pe 2 The Delta's Dictum, Jan. 6, 1891

They know and the officials of the South Shore know, that
there is all ready one railroad in there and it doesn't get
business enough at Gladstone to pay for the wear and tear of
stopping trains at that lonesome way station. They also
know-being generally well informed on these matters-that of the
8,160,619 tons of ore sent to market by water from Lake
Superior mines in 1890, 4,296,756 tons went from the ports
of Marquette, Ashland and Two Harbors, all of that enormous
quantity having been carried in the class of vessels which
the Delta speaks of as "canal hookers and scows," had having
passed through the Soo canal- the conditions that effect
Marquette for the purposes of the lake traffie equally
affecting every other port on Lake Superior. And while

on this point, it may be well to remind the Delta that the
freight business done by the vessel lines at any one of
Lake Superior ports is very largely in excess of that done
at Gladstone and Escanaba combined; that the commerce

using Lake Superior ports is growing with such rapidity
that the government has recognized its importance by
practically giving General Poe carte blanche to go ahead
and complete the new locks at the Soo in the shortest
possible time consistent with reasonable economy in the
prosecution of the work and the day is close at hand when
the largest carriers on the lakes can load at Marquette to
the limit of their capacity without fear of getting so deep
in the water they will be unable to get through the canal.

The Mining Journal is at a loss to understand why the
Delta should take the ground that Marquette must suffer the
extension to Gladstone of the South Shore, unless that paper
imagines that the stagnation incidental to lake of
enterprise is contagious. The city was not damaged in the
least by the construction of that line through Superior
and Duluth. Indeed Marquette has never grown more rapidly
than being given direct connections with the flourishing
cities at the head of the lake. If the South Shore is
willing to build to the hamlet in Little Bay de Noc, the
people will wish it luck ef the venture, and trust that
the advent of a line and well managed railway may give
give Gladstone a fresh stert,Marquette does not own the
South Shore and expects nothing from it but good service.
That it is getting. If the road goes to Gladstone it
will no doubt help its business somewhat, but the Gladstone
people will discover after they have had more experience
with railways that it takes more than the passage through
of railway to transform a sleepy village into a thriving,
prosperous city.

If the entire ore traffic of Marquette were to be
transferred to Gladstone there would something more to be
required to make that an important business place. very
thing helps but no one thing suffices to develop a "point"
into something more tangible as numerous sites for »orojected
cities are discovering in our day.

WSSkA Ry.
MStP&SSM Ry.

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