Elgin Courier and Four County News (Elgin, Tex.), Vol. 69, No. 29, Ed. 1 Thursday, October 1, 1959 Page: 4 of 14
This newspaper is part of the collection entitled: Elgin Courier and was provided to The Portal to Texas History by the Elgin Public Library.
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PAGE 4, The Elgin Courier, October 1, 1959
ghAMEHICANWAY
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the character, standing,
the columns of this
EDITORIALS
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Broken down, sales were divided as follows:
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Who is losing money according to these figures?
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DOES YOUR FARM QUALIFY?
Who will profit first and last, least and most?
TEXAS POWER & LIGHT COMPANY
$3,782,000
528,000
624,000
391,000
364,000
2,564,000
1,191,000
698,000
403,000
individual published in
According to SALES MANAGEMENT, the magazine of market-
ing, this is the picture of sales in Bastrop County for 1958
along with some additional pertinent information about the
buying power of this area. According to these figures, Bastrop
County shows the following:
Food
Eat & Drink Establishments
GenT. Merch.
Apparel
Furniture
Automobiles
Gas Stations
Lumber-Hdw.
Drugs
A population of 16,800 - about half rural and half urban.
There are 4,800 households indicating about 3.5 persons per
household.
The effective buying income of the population was $18,573,000.
This amounts to $1,116.00 per person or $3,869.00 per family.
The retail sales for 1958 were $11,370,000 or $2,369.00 per
household.
This indicates that at least $500.00 that every family spends
goes out of town.
*oo
......sgg
We seriously doubt that there is a merchant in Elgin that
wouldn t improve his zest for living and being in business
by having a business volume pressure that kept him on his
toes instead of wiping cobwebs off from the entrance door
and dusting off merchandise that has been around for months
and years.
$95
HAROLD H. AND ROBERT L. BREDLOW, Owners and Publishers
MRS. LENA FINCH, News Editor
CARROLL HOLLIDAY, Mechanical Superintendent
LOOK! XNFU,THEY'RE HAVING SOME KIND OF
EXCITEMENT ON TERRA FIRMA!!
ILLUMINATING STATISTICS
I
This is the sign of good forming ...
profitable farming.
If your farm is
ALL-ELECTRIC
e HOME HEATING
e COOKING
e WATER HEATING
e FARM PRODUCTION EQUIPMENT
e AIR CONDITIONING
• REFRIGERATION
you are qualified for TP&L’s new “Gold Medallion
Farm” sign now ... complete with your name.
Call your local TP&L Co. Farm Service Advisor
for complete details.
WHAT IS THE SHARE OF ELGIN BUSINESS
MEN IN THIS “POT OF GOLD”?
ee
and why they attract local people to their stores and meet
and beat them at their own game.
WHAT IS ELGIN GOING TO DO ABOUT
THE NEW SCHOOL ISSUE?
e)
Any erroneous reflection upon
More power to those local merchants who are trying. We
are for and with you 100%. You have given us the hope that
one day Elgin will move together as a team and take over the
business leadership of this area. The recent bank hearing
cleaily indicated that Elgin has spirit and determination.
As a reader of the Courier you can help bring about a trans-
formation that will put dollars into your pockets. Tell the
merchants that you deal with in Elgin, regularly or once in
awhile, that you would like to read about their offerings in
the Courier each week. If you convince them you will find
that most of the things you spend hours of time and travel
expense to obtain in other towns, can be had in Elgin for the.
same price, or less and you’ll save the travel cost and time.
Equally important, when something goes wrong, service is
required or adjustment to be made, you will find your local
merchant handy, he’ll readily know that you madethe purchase
from him and he will be ready and anxious to make good.
233:
Sewed By
TEXAS POWER A LIGHT COMPAI
We would say that every Elgin business man who fails to
fully pi omote his business by seeking more customers and
more volume, constantly. Where is the proof for this? We
suggest that any doubter take a good look at Q & S Market.
or reputation of
Backed by a dozen other merchants with equal vision, courage
an confidence, even Q & S would realize more from their
advertising dollars. It will take the combined efforts of a
majority of the local business men to make Elgin a real
outstanding shopping center.
IA
In the face of these circumstances we are asking the members
of the School Board, as a group and as individuals, to frankly
express their opinions in writing to the Elgin Courier so that
they may be made known to the community as a whole.
We uige every other citizen of Elgin having a constructive
opinion on the subject to also give us their thoughts so that
we may publish them.
Moth Ball merchants would be obliged to stock new merchan-
dise in greater quantity, better quality and wider selection.
They would be obliged to awake from their slumbers and price
their merchandise to move rapidly, instead of being content to
wait until the person comes along to pay top price. They
would have to become alert to what other towns are offering
Subscription Rates: 1 year, $3.00; 6 months, $2.00; 3 months, $1.00,
payable in advance.
any firm, corporation, or
We sincerely believe that all children of the community,
regardless of their race, color or religious beliefs are
entitled to equal opportunity to learn to become good citizens
of the future. We recognize the law of the land as interpreted
by the supreme court with respect to the ultimate integration
of the schools of the nation. We regard the accomplishment
of this, in due time, as being inevitable and as being in keeping
with the principles of democracy and Christianity. There
are those who would twist such beliefs into vile and vulgar
interpretations. We pity them, we do not fear them.
8.
Where a new school should be located in Elgin should be the
final decision of the School Board and they should be made
fully alert to the desires of all of the people concerned
with this problem. It will be a serious and damaging disgrace
to the community if this issue is “kicked around’’ and finally
settled by a “vested” few. We deplore those of influence
who seek to have this decision tailored to their wishes and
convenience as a small minority. The recent election re-
flected public apathy in that only half of the qualified voters
of the school district cast votes on an issue that will involve
bond payments for many years to come.
■AS VIEWED BY
£2
The Elgin Courier can place you in direct, economical
contact with more than 1,600 households or families in this
are a week each. That represents more than $6,000,000.00
in buying power.
ehm/959------
TEXAG-7 PRESS ASSOCIATION
______AY __________
In our humble opinion, expressions are not worth uttering if
the individual making them lacks the courage to have everyone
concerned know exactly what they said and how they feel.
The objective of the Elgin Courier is to arouse public in-
terest in helping to determine the right and proper course to
be followed in providing, at public expense, adequate school
facilities for the years ahead. We have no desire to impose
our conclusions upon the community. We have certain basic
opinions and beliefs and the courage to express them herewith.
What we seek is a true cross section of the wishes and desires
of the people of Elgin as a whole. Will you help us?
Lest we be considered ungrateful, we acknowledge with
sincere thanks, the growing use of the columns of the Elgin
Courier by local merchants. It is gratitude for what they
are trying to do that prompts our appeal to additional local
merchants to “join the bandwagon”.
are some “illuminating” statistics regarding the ,
States Power Co. of Minneapolis, Minnesota.
From what we have been able to gather on this subject, there
is considerable indecision and confusion. And, once again,
we are facing the problem of people in Elgin who are very
vocal on any subject, but who refuse to come out in the open
with their opinions. In other words, folks who speak very
emphatically about what should be done and then cancel out
what they have said by insisting that we cannot quote them.
Even a casual study of these figures reveals the weakness of
oui sales effoits as a community. The spendable income far
exceeds total sales in the face of our knowing that automobile
sales, for example, reflect many sales to out of town buyers.
Sales of eating and drinking establishments are out of pro-
portion to those of other counties of comparable size. Food,
and food alone, seems to be the one category in which sales
r each some proper proportion of buying power.
0′4
9z2
Let this be our goal. To settle this issue in a manner that
will afford the community a clean conscience, a wholesome
reputation among cities and a total lack of reason for guilty
regrets in the years ahead.
Entered as second class matter at the Post Office at Elgin, Texas, under
Act of March 3, 1879.
newspaper will be cheerfully corrected when brought to our attention.
We do not hold ourselves responsible for the views of our correspondents.
In case of error or omission in advertisement, we do not bind ourselves
liable for damages further than the amount received by us for such por-
tion of advertising as may have been rendered useless.
You can do your part by sitting down today and expressing
your opinions and giving your suggestions. While the final
decisions will not please everybody, we can make very sure
that they will reflect the wishes of .a good majority of the
people of Elgin.
YOUR NAME
k HUNTSVILLE -8888388
' _U eg
-
s,
Aie we talking about a loss of business and profits to an
element of backward merchants alone? Not by any means.
Elgin, as a community, suffers, a serious loss. An important
slice of every dollar local people spend is going toward
paying profits, as well as taxes and payroll, for out of town
mer chants. These are the dollars that leave town and never
return. Spent locally they would create more jobs, more
buying power, more taxes, more support for our schools and
benefits for the community as a whole.
88’ ..Lne68esgg
7
CROSSETT (ARKANSAS) /
NEWS OBSERVER (Dem.) 9/17/59, says:
... Just as in 1957 when the Russians launched their first
Sputnik, we suppose a great deal of criticism will now be
leveled at our educational institutions because they haven’t
produced the brains to duplicate the Red’s feat. If and when
such a criticism comes it will pay us to remember our
schools reflect only the image we have made. If they are
second rate it is because that’s all we have been willing to
pay for. If they are shallow in their approach to learning
it is because we have put great emphasis on brawn and little
emphasis on brains.
GOLD MEDALLION 8
3, .6,
wemus9•
__
Here
Northern
In 1958 this company paid total taxes of $38,701,000-this
amounted to $45 per customer.
The government, without any investment, got more than
twice as much out of NSP as did its common stock share-
holders - and that government take was greater than the
total operating payroll of the company and 2.31 times the
cost of all the fuel for its generating stations.
Those taxes took 25 cents out of every dollar that its cus-
tomers paid the company.
Now let’s take a look at some Tennessee Valley Authority
statistics in comparison.
Only 2.270 of the TVA revenue dollar goes to pay taxes as
compared with the 250 paid by NSP.
NSP taxes are nearly 7.3 times as great as the taxes of
TVA, although NSP revenue is only 66 percent ofTVA’s
revenue.
Compared to the $45 which NSP pays in taxes per cus-
' tomer, TVA pays only $3.52.
We ask you: Is it any wonder that TVA is able to sell power
at a lower rate than the investor-owned companies?
We cannot say exactly about any other business. This much
we do know and can prove. The publication of a sixteen page
paper each week filled with inviting advertising from a ma-
jority o local establishments would net us a modest profit
in contrast to many weeks when we publish at a loss. The
real result would be spread among all of the merchants and
the community at large. A twenty to thirty percent increase
in local business would create a number of jobs in local stores.
It would keep more people at home to work, earn and spend.
It would cause many folks from the surrounding territory
o spend their money in Elgin instead of several neighboring-
towns, thus enriching our community.
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Finch, Lena. Elgin Courier and Four County News (Elgin, Tex.), Vol. 69, No. 29, Ed. 1 Thursday, October 1, 1959, newspaper, October 1, 1959; Elgin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1562416/m1/4/?q=%22%22~1: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Elgin Public Library.