1909-Celebration Preparations

Charlotte Daily Observer 5/17/1909, p. 7

SHOW BEGINS TO-MORROW

  TROOPS COME THIS AFTERNOON.  

The Spirit of the Celebration This Week Rapidly Gaining the Ascendancy in the City—Troops of Cavalrymen, Infantry and Army Band Will Arrive Late This Afternoon on Two Special Trains—New York Concert Band to Play To-Morrow at Noon While the Firemen’s Exhibition is Under Way—Some of Those Who Will Occupy the Reviewing Stand With President and Mrs. Taft—Electric Lights to Be Turned on To-Night.  

Supremely unique in American life, without counterpart in North or South or East or West stands the event which concentrates the attention of a vast sweep of citizenship on Charlotte for a trio of days this week.  It is not alone the intrinsic merit of the attractions which will interest and amuse a pleasure-loving people who will come to be liberated from the monotony of routine existence.  It is not merely the promised presence of the country’s Chief Magistrate and his welcome consort, though the fact of their coming constitutes the crowning feature of the event.  

Wherein, some people are asking, lies the moving power of the document’s name?  Wherein the secret of the surpassing fame it has attained?  It is in the fact that the search-lights illumining human history nowhere have brought to the surface a similar occurrence, in which a band of a few unterrified freemen, their fearless spirits goaded by a succession of acts of oppression, have boldly dared the consequences of the charge of high treason and have thrown down the gauntlet to a world-power.  

The lines on lines or Stars and Stripes and bright tri-colored bunting which Charlotte buildings wear this week create an atmosphere which is challenging attention and analysis.  People find it somehow hard to grasp the idea that the occasion, while local in one sense, is, in another, as broadly national as a thing could be.  It is not the celebration of a piece of creditable work done by a company, a battalion, a regiment, or even a Commonwealth, as a spoke on a dominating wheel.  The jubilification does not come as the result of the obedience of orders from a skilled superior.  

On the contrary its distinctive element is the bold originality which marked a step which, when afterwards taken by the other Colonies, became, of all the chapters in American history, that which is prized most dearly.  It is because of the belief that on Mecklenburg soil was sounded the first challenge to the sovereignty of George III.  It is because the act stands so magnificently alone, on such a peak of exclusiveness, in such an atmosphere of transcendent hardihood that however highly one prizes the act of the Colonies who, a year later, banded in a confederation of thirteen, made a similar declaration, he can hardly deny that the first stand exhibits even a higher brand of courage.  

LET EVERYBODY DECORATE.  

Will Miss Charlotte be arrayed for glory when her guests arrive?  She will, but her maids of honor have a busy day or two before them ere she shall be properly attired.  In particular must the householders throw themselves into the breach in these latter days.  Flags can be purchased for almost nothing and it is assumed that all people who are representative Charlotteans will throw the Stars and Stripes to the breezes from their homes.  Some of them have not yet realized the import and the magnitude of the affair.  It is to be taken for granted that no home on the more public streets at least will sound a discordant note in the harmony of spirited patriotism which the city is to breathe forth.  Silence is not possible.  

The management of the assemblage of townspeople and visitors rests in a way, of course, largely on the police.  Theirs is the responsibility for the preservation of order, about which there is not likely to be much trouble.  A more taxing problem will be that of maintaining reservations of space at the public events which will draw throngs.  At the exhibitions by the fire department, the manoeuvers at the Fair Grounds, the band concerts, the great parade of Thursday and the speakings by President Taft mounted policemen will probably be necessary.  Thirty or more officers from out of town have been invited to be present and assist the local force.  In addition to these about 20 extra men will be secured from the city.  This will bring the number of men available to an approximate total of 80 or more.  

PLENTY OF BEDS.  

No difficulty is anticipated in providing lodging for the visitors who stay over night.  The five principal hotels alone can sleep, it is estimated, between 2,500 and 3,000 people without a great effort.  Every inch of room space will be brought into service.  The Democratic convention last year served to show the locals what they can do when they have a mind.  At one hotel during that occasion 1,800 meals were served in one day, showing an average of 600 guests at each of the three.  The dining room hour will be extended so far as becomes necessary, even if it becomes a continuous performance.  Finely equipped and capably managed, the hotels may be depended on to render a good account of themselves.  

Then there are boarding houses by the score which may easily be reached.  Several hundred private families have agreed to entertain guests, furnishing both board and lodging.  The Greater Charlotte Club has general charge of this field and visitors calling at its office in the Selwyn will be given information and directions.  

Quite a large percentage of visitors on big days in any city, though, accept the complete responsibility of taking care of themselves and scorn assistance.  They make their own foraging expeditions as soon as they arrive, find for themselves a harbor which suits them, negotiate terms and sink their anchors.  They will find the people of Charlotte hospitable and courteous.  

The facilities for obtaining food are almost unlimited in Charlotte.  Four or five modern restaurants in the heart of the city are noted for rapid and accurate filling of orders.  At the corner of South Tryon and Third streets, on the lawn of the First Associated Reformed Presbyterian church; across the street at the old Baird place; on West Trade street near the corner of Poplar street; probably further on down nearer the Southern station lunches will be served by the ladies of the various denominations for the benefit of the different religious or charitable causes and purposes.  These will add vastly to the speed and convenience with which a hungry populace may be fed.  

AND PLENTY TO EAT.  

And these will be but a beginning.  Everybody who has been here on circus day knows the number of independent lunch stands which will line the streets up-town, at the carnivals and farther out still onto the Fair Grounds where tens of thousands will daily loiter.  No one need go hungry for a moment, if he has but a moderate price.  Soft drinks may be obtained at twelve drug stores and in bottled form from perhaps a half hundred wayside venders.  

It would take a mathematician or a prophet to compute the number of drinks of soda water in different forms which will be imbibed, say on the 20th.  The dispensers will get not a breath of rest from the opening to the closing gun of each day.  This being peculiarly the age of the soft drink, the influence and effect of the unusual occasion, and one, too, which predisposes to thirst, will be reflected in this department of business with especial clearness.  

Charlotte, always strikingly a city in her urban aspect in the nocturnal period will banish night for the nonce this week.  However, the other decorations may compare with those of three years ago, it is certain that the electrical display will outshine any previous attempt by 100 per cent.  The spectacle will be one to tempt the visitor to remain until after dark at least.  The lights placed by the business establishments will be turned on to-night for the first time and it will be a sight worth seeing if one can be imagined.  The scene presented Saturday night when the South Tryon arch and the reviewing stand were illuminated was an eloquent prediction of what is coming.  

CARNIVALS GALORE.  

If those who like merry-go-rounds and ferris wheels and the stentorian tones of the side-show spieler cannot find amusement in the city this week they will be hard to please.  There will be three of the first-named and some forty of the latter in full swing until 11:30 o’clock each night.  That means that sidewalks will be full up-town through the diminutive hours.  The advance guard of home-seekers, carnival people, have already begun to arrive.  The element of undesirable citizenship which is to be expected has found some slight degree of representation in the early comers.  

The high electric work car of the Charlotte street car company has been secured by the motion picture man who comes from Petersburg, Va., and on this he will make the circuit of the city, making pictures of such scenes as appeal to him.  Another film house will be represented here, too.  

Brandeman’s New York Concert Band will play at the reviewing stand to-morrow morning, beginning at 11:30, during the exhibition by the fire department, which beings at 12.  An admission of ten cents will be charged to the stand, the money to go to defray the cost of its erection.  

The hour for the performances of the May music festival at the Auditorium have been changed, owing to the multiplicity of attractions, from 2:20 to 2 o’clock and the night hour has been changed from 8:00 to 9.  This is in order to allow festival patrons to attend concerts, receptions and so forth without missing any of the musical programme.  This shift will be welcomed.  

Easily the most interesting happening of to-day will be the arrival of two special trains of about 14 cars each bringing troops and horses.  At 6 o’clock Central time, or 7 Charlotte time, the first will leave Atlanta bearing the regimental band of the Seventeenth Infantry and the third battalion of that regiment.  Coming from Fort McPherson they are expected here at 5:30.  The cavalrymen with four or five carloads of horses probably left Chattanooga last night, coming by way of Atlanta, and will arrive about simultaneously with the infantry.  As soon as these trains pull in things will begin to happen.  What person, be he red-blooded or aenemic, can resist the appeal of guns, brass buttons, bands and well-ridden horses?  Nemo.  

WITH PRESIDENT TAFT.  

While all three days will be outstanding ones, the most important will be President’s Day, of course.  This is Thursday.  Perhaps the most noble mark of honor that can be conferred upon any person in the city during the entire celebration is a place within the stand designed for the use of the President and Mrs. Taft.  Invitations have been extended only to a few, the greatest degree of care being exercised by the committee in charge.  Among those who will occupy seats on the rostrum, aside from the President and Mrs. Taft, will be Mrs. Stonewall Jackson, Governor and Mrs. W. W. Kitchin, Senator and Mrs. Lee S. Overman, Senator and Mrs. F. M. Simmons, Congressman and Mrs. E. Y. Webb, Mr. D. A. Tompkins, Mr. J. P. Caldwell, Major J. C. Hemphill, Mr. W. C. Dowd and Mr. Wade H. Harris.  Others will be named probably to-day.  The reserved space will accommodate about 30.  

Aside from the several just mentioned, a few of the distinguished guests coming for the celebration are: Senator A. B. Cummings, of Iowa; Senator Joseph F. Johnston, of Alabama; Senator Joseph M. Dixon, of Montana; Governor John F. Johnston, of Minnesota; Lieutenant Governor Thomas G. McLeod, of South Carolina; Lieutenant Governor J. Taylor Ellyson, of Virginia; Hon. Joseph G. Brown, Governor-Elect of Georgia; Major J. C. Hemphill and party; Congressmen John Motley Morehead, Charles M. Cowles, John H. Small, John G. Grant, Robert N. Page, Claude Kitchin and Charles R. Thomas; Judge James E. Boyd, of Greensboro; Hon. George W. Vanderbilt, of Asheville; Mr. Thomas Settle, of Asheville; Mr. Thomas M. Argo, of Raleigh; Judge J. C. Pritchard, of Asheville; ex-Judge W. P. Bynum, of Greensboro; Mr. J. Elwood Cox, of High Point; ex-Judge R. D. Douglas, of Greensboro; Mr. E. C. Duncan, of Raleigh; ex-Judge Spencer B. Adams, of Greensboro; Dr. E. A. Alderman, of Charlottesville, Va.; Rt. Rev. J. M. Horne, of Asheville; Rt. Rev. Robert Strange, of Wilmington; Rt. Rev. Leo Haid, of Belmont; Rt. Rev. J. D. Cheshire, of Raleigh; General Julian S. Carr, of Durham, and others.  

The press will be represented by Mr. Robert Small, of The Associated Press; Mr. Weightman, of The New York Sun, and a dozen other of the best known staff correspondents of the country.