From the Lawrence Daily Journal-World for March 8, 1914:

• “An offer of $1,000 has been made by former Governor W. R. Stubbs and Mrs. Stubbs to the Department of Child Welfare of the University of Kansas to be used in bringing out a contest among second class cities that make the best showing as a place in which to rear children. The contest will close May 1, 1915. There are about seventy of the second class cities in Kansas…. They will be scored on five general points, namely (1) play and athletics; (2) school work and industry; (3) social advantages; (4) moral and physical safeguards; (5) local child helping services; (6) religious activity…. The city winning the prize will be asked to use the money in a lump sum for some such purpose as establishing a play ground or a social center for the young people, or instituting a child welfare library…. An effort to win the $1000 prize offered by Gov. Stubbs is to be made in the city of Lawrence. The Lawrence Playgrounds Association through its executive committee is asking the co-operation of the other institutions of the town in making Lawrence the best place in the state in which to rear children and thus get that prize.”
• “Storms in Kansas are not what they are in New York according to A. D. Weaver, who has just returned from a business trip to the east. In the big cities of the east business is paralyzed by a big storm and conditions become much more serious than they do out here in the west, he says. Mr. Weaver passed through the recent storm in New York City, and consequently his trip was not as pleasant as have been many of his former visits to New York. The business outlook, however, is very hopeful, he says. The east is feeling the crop failure in the west but there is no disposition to feel discouraged. Mr. Weaver stated today that he was able to secure all of the merchandise needed and wanted for his store here and that he would soon be showing a line of goods equal to that on the Chicago and New York markets.”
• “County Supt. C. R. Hawley is sending out a circular letter together with a pamphlet issued by the Rock Island Railroad to every teacher in Douglas County giving them instructions in testing different seeds. He expects the teacher to give a little time to this each day because there is so much bad seed this year that lots of grain and time will be lost in planting poor seed. The plan is to have the pupils study the germination of the seed and learn to construct the tester is shown in the pamphlet, and in that way can be of a great deal of use to their parents in saving the time that would be spent in planting poor seed that would have to be replanted in a few days and in that way make the crop several days late. Statistics show that if there is a healthy stalk of corn to each hill that the yield will be fifty bushels per acre, but the average in this part of the country is twenty bushels and by testing the seed a good healthy stalk is assured in each hill. It does not take very long to figure out that it pays to test your seed.”