Jasper County Democrat, Volume 1, Number 50, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 March 1899 — INDIANA'S ERRATIC RIVER [ARTICLE]

INDIANA'S ERRATIC RIVER

Crossed by More Railroads than Any Other in the World. “What is the name of that river?” asked a traveler on one of the trains on the Louisville division of the Pittsburg, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis the other day as it was swiftly going north. “White river.” Silence and the smoke of cigars prevailed for a little while, until another bridge and. apparently, another river was crossed. “White river.” Again there was silence and smoke, and the train ran a little farther, to cross another bridge and stream. Once more the query came: “What river is this?” “White river.” “See here, neighbor,” and the man, evidently a Kentuckian, sat up straight in his seat, “is every river in this d—d State called White river?” To the uninitiated traveler it certainly seems as if there were no less than a few hundred White rivers in Indiana, for this otherwise rather insignificant stream is crossed by more railroads and oftener than any other river in the world. The Louisville, the Indianapolis and various other divisions of the Pittsburg, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis cross it, some of them as often as three times. The Monon, the Indianapolis and Vincennes, the Baltimore and Ohio Southwestern, the Big Four, the Lake Erie and Western, among the north and south roads, not to mention a score of east and west*roads and divisions.. are compelled" to span it with their bridges, and have trouble enough with it, for it is a turbulent stream, although it is neither very long nor wide, and in the summer months far from imposing. Not many months ago it took a notion to get out of its banks, and the result was that almost the entire railroad system of Indiana suffered and hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage was done to embankments and tracks, not to mention wrecks and loss of life. It is usually supposed that mountain torrents are dangerous, but White river can give any mountain stream odds and take the trick, even though it flows through an almost level country, across the entire width of Indiana, from the Ohio line to the Wabash. The Wabash, Indiana's chief river, is celebrated in song and poetry, but in this respect it does not compare with the little White river. White river tries to keep up its reputation from season to season by taking along a bridge now and then or dumping a train from an embankment and making the crew take swimming lessons. Incidentally, it gathers up snch trifles as an occasional cow, a few shocks of fodder or manages to put down a gravel bank in a wheat field. It is full of fun. White river is almost exclusively a southern Indiana institution, since it does not extend its meanderings much north of Anderson.— Ghent Times.

State Items of Interest* Natural gas has been struck at Loogootee at a depth of 700 feet. Kokomo Elks will give a street fair next August. The county fair has given way to the Elks. ' John Street, Mnrion. was fined $5 for beating his daughter black and blue with a rasor strop. The late Mrs. Sarah U. Brown, Greensfork, left $3,000 of her $7,000 estate to Earlham College. Sidney C. Lombard, a pioneer insurance man, capitalist and real estate dealer of Fort Wayne, is dead. The State bureau of statistics is advised that wheat has come out of the severe winter in fairly good condition. Dr. A. J. Allen of St. Louis. Mo., died at Martinsville of cancer of the stomach, aged 62 years. He was for twenty-five years superintendent of the Presbyterian board of publication and was editor ,of the Midcentincnt.