Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 301, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 December 1911 — PERRY GWIN WRITES ABOUT EL PASO, TEX. [ARTICLE]

PERRY GWIN WRITES ABOUT EL PASO, TEX.

Is Now Working ns Reporter on the Paper of Which John Walker’s Brotlier is City Editor. El Paso, Tex. Gentlemen: I stopped off in El Paso five years ago on my way to California and to say that I ,\yas surprised in the m >ny changes that had taken place would be putting it mild. El Paso, the now, has lost none of its glamor picturesqueness of El Paso, the old, with the old adobe low-roofed buildings on the banks of the silvery Rio Glrande. The contrast has been sharpened by the development of the new city from one story adobes to towering concrete and steel buildings. The progress of El Paso has been largely due to geographical conditions, El Paso, as the name implies (the gateway) is the gateway to Old Mexico, New Mexico, and Texas. There is not a city half its size within 600 miles. It is the shopping, qenter of the southwest The retail stores and wholesale houses carry a line of goods that for completeness of assortment is not equaled by any other American city of the size of El Paso, 45,000. El Paso and vicinity, the Rio Grande valley and highlands and the mountains . adjacent in all directions, possess geographical and topographical features the best for health. It has an altitjide of 3762 feet which, combined with abundant sunshine, atmospheric drypess and perfect natural drainage, makes possible a pleasant and satisfying residence, with an absence of all unhealthful influetifces.

El Paso has a ceuntry road built of asphalt that is 54 miles in length sCnd runs up over the mountains and down into the valley below that is a paradise for motorists. , A very nice diversion is to go across the Rio Grande river over into Jaurez, Old Mexico, and see an old adobe town that has all the quaintness of medieval Mexico as was seen by the Crusaders. The guides will point with pride to the Cuestra Senora De Guadalupe old mission, that has stood for centuries, its outline unchanged, with its bells calling the faithful to worship as was done in the days of Spanish monks. The old mission was barricaded during the recent war and was the main point of attack by the Insurrectos Other sights of interest in Jaurez are the market place, the plaza, the bull ring, where four bull* are killed every Sunday before a large crowd of lace-gowned senoritas and gaily clad officers and cavaliers. In the narrow streets bf Jaurez you will see the picturesque Mexican woman wearing her mantilla and the men wearing high sombreros and highly colored blankets thrown oyer their shoulders. A large race track has been recently built at a cost of 9300,000 which is now having racing by the thoroughbreds and gambling wide open. You can see 200 qnd 300 people playing keno at one time in Jaurez and all other forms of gambling. I am pretty sure there will be another Insurrection in Mexico, for the people are starving down there and the only way they can get anything to eat is to insurrect and plunder. The property is controlled by 3,000 people In Mexico and they are well educated, and indolent I am reporting on the El Paso Herald and Norman Walker, a brother of John Walker, is the city editor on this paper. The Herald is the leading paper of the southwest with a daily circulation of 18,000. - , With kindest regards to my friends in my native village, I remain Yours very truly, A. PERRY GWIN.