Democratic Sentinel, Volume 20, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 April 1896 — Western Hospitality. [ARTICLE]

Western Hospitality.

People In the Eastern cities know not the meaning of the word “hospitality” as it is written in the dictionary of the Western ranchman. “Why,” eaid Senator Warren, of Wyoming, discussing some of the characteristics of the Western people, with a representative of the Washington Post the other day, “I would regard it as a personal insult if I went to a house on any ranch and found the door locked. The first impulse of the average Western man on such an occasion would be to break the door down.” “But how about locking up when the inmates go away?” Senator Warren laughed. “It would make no difference at all,” he said. "We all go on the general supposition that a man traveling through the country is hungry. If he has any food in his haversack, and finds nobody at home, he goes in the house, takes possession of the kitchen, and cooks his meal. If he has nothing, he helps himself to what he can find. He does it as a matter of course, and the family would feel that he was worse than a dude if he declined to share with them even the smallest bit of food that they happened to have in store.”