Show RACE TRACK PLUNGER BURIED half under an oilcloth blanket lodged in a common express wagon the casket of alley grannan racetrack race track plunger of national renown was carted to an improvised memorial chapel a variety theater at the rear of a rawhide saloon there congregate da throng in silks and corduroys women of metropolitan costumes minors covered with high grade grime prospectors suntanned sun tanned brokers bankers merchants owners of saloons bartenders gamblers again as always in mining camps class was forgotten all men were equal saloons were closed and tho streets wore silent throughout the service at its end u solemn cortege trudged with the remains destined to travel by automobile thirty miles to schurz there to go aboard the cars to brother in kentucky unique beyond experience and dramatic beyond compare was the eulogy pronounced by H W knickerbocker once a clergyman then a mina operator of later a rawhide pioneer hardly orthodox but wholly in keeping with the scene and wh the mute desires of the dead was tha orators appearance the once pulpit and now peoples exponent stood hi aide the llly cajen bier his eye be dimmed with honest tears his voice choked with a fraternal emotion shod in the high boots and clothed in the rough garb of a miner A stenographic report of the eulogy follows miners eulogy 1 I feel that it is incumbent upon me to state that I 1 now occupy no ministerial or prelatic position I 1 am only a prospector I 1 make no claims to moral merit whatever or to rell bious authority except it be the re llalon of the brotherhood of man I 1 wish to be taken only as a man among men feeling that I 1 can shake hands and style as my brother the most humble of you all if there may come from a word of moral admonition t springs not from a sense of moral superiority only from thor depths of my experience alley grannan was benr in paris ky but forty years a go he cherished all tho dreams of boyhood dreares found their in phenomenal success financially I 1 am told that from the position of bell boy in a hotel he arose to bo celebrity of world alde fame alloy grannan was one of the greatest plungers tho continent has produced he did before yesterday at rawhide that is a brief statement W have bis birth and the day af pf djs demise who can nil the interim not I 1 who can tell hs hopes aad tears who knows the mystery of his quiet hours not I 1 alley grannan was born in the sunny southland of kentucky he died in rawhide that Is the beginning that la the end Is there R this a picture of what ingersoll said at the grave of his brother whether it be near the shore or in mid ocean or among the breakers at the last a wreck must mark the end of one and all dorn whore brooks and rivers run musically through proUn cHoU where magnolia stars glow in a firmament of green where lakes dot the green sward and tho hottest bummer tap waveless wavelets wave lets where tho aid Is resonant y with the melody of a thousand sweet sliced So iced birds and re solent of the per fume of blooming flowers that was the beginning alley grannan died in rawhide whore in winter the tops of the mountains aro clothed in garments of aco and in summer the rays of the sun beat down upon tho skeleton of the desert Is there in this a picture of universal life sometimes when I 1 look upon the circumstances of life there comes to my lips a cursa I 1 relate to you now only roy views it those run counter to yours believe that what I 1 say Is sincere when I 1 see the ambitions of man defeated when I 1 see him struggling with mind and body to accomplish his end when I 1 see his aim and purpose frustrated only by a fortuitous combination of circumstances over which he can exert no control when I 1 see his outstretched hands about to grasp the flag offic tory and to seize instead the emblem of defeat I 1 ak what what is life dreams awakening death life is a pendulum a smile and a fear ife Is baua momentary halt within the waste anu theotho then tho nothing we set out fram allfeis a shadow a poor player that and frets his hour upon the stage and Is heard no more lite is a tale told by an idiot full of sound signifying nothing life Is a child blown but reflects the shadow of its environment and is gane a mockery a sham a lie a fools vision its happiness but dead sea apples its pain the crunching of a tyrant s heel if I 1 had gauged his character correctly ho accepted the circumstances surrounding him as the mystic officials to whom the universe had delegated its whole domce concerning him he took defeat and victory with equal equanimity he was a man of placid exterior his meteoric past shows him invincible int spirit and itis not irreverently that I 1 proclaim him a dead game sport when I 1 use that phrase I 1 do so filling it as full of practical human philosophy as it will hold alley grannan fully exemplified the philosophy of those fugitive erses verses v its easy enough lo 10 be happy when life goes along like a song but the man worth while is the man who will smile when everything goes dead wrong for the test of the heart is trouble and it always comes with the years and theomile esmile th that Is worth uio homage of earth is the that shines through tears there are those who will condemn him they believe that today he is reaping the reward of a mis spent life they are those who are dominated by medieval creeds them I 1 am not addressing they are ruled by the skeleton hand of the past they fail to see the moral side of a character lived outside their puritanical ideas riley Gran nana goodness was not cf a type that reached its highest manifestation in ceremonious piety jt found its ox in the handclasp of friendship it found its voice in the word of cheer to a discouraged brother ilia were deeds of quiet charity his were acts of manhood alley grannan lived in the world of sport my are not minced because I 1 am telling what I 1 believe to be true it was the world of sport sometimes of hilarity sometime worse he left the impress of his character upon us all and through tho medium of his financial power he was able with his money to brighten the lives of all who know him he wasted his money so the world saya but did it to you that the men and women of euch class upon whom ho wasted it are yet men and women A little happi brought into their lives means as much to chehi as happiness carried into the lives of the straight and the good if you can take one ray of sunshine into the night life and thereby carry a single hour of happiness you arc a benefactor grannan did this god confined not his to the nourishing of potatoes and corn his scattering of sunshine was prod igal contemplate ho flings the beauties round the cold shoulders of the north he hangs the quivering picture of the mirage above the tating heart of the desert he scat tors the sunbeams like shattered gold upon tho bosom of a myriad of lakes that gem therode the robe of nature he apan agles the canopy of night with star jewels and silvers the world with the reflected beams from on high he hangs the gorgeous crimson curtain of the occident across the sleeping room of the sun god wakes the coy maid of the morningto step madly from her bou dalr of darkness to climb the steep of the orient to fling aside the gates 0 the morning and to trip oer the landscape kissing the flowers in her flight she arouses the birds to herald with their music thoa coming of her king who floods the world with effulgent gold these are wasted sunbeams arp they I 1 say to you that the man or woman who by the use of money or power Is able to smooth one wrinkle from the brow of human caro or to change one moan or sob into ai song or to wipe away a tear and to place in its stead a jewel of joy is benefactor such was alley grannan did you eastop ev stop to think that ahta old world of ours Is dawning nil the time down the grooves optime of time this earth flung by the hand of god with every revolution is meeting an eternal dawn that may signify our hope of life in the development of the human soul as it swings toward its we constantly near the sun the tim elias come to say goodby good by for the friends and loved one not here ito aay the word let roe aay goodby old man wo will try to exemplify the spirit of your alfio as we bear the grief at our parting fall me hore let these flowers alley with their lips and perfumed breath speak in beauty and fragrance anosi sentiments too tender for words goodby good by |