News from 100 years ago
The following news items were taken from the Mail Tribune archives 100 years ago
August 19, 1922
APPROVED EXHIBITION AT THE GREAT MEETING
Mayor Gates Urges Jackson County People to Support Project – Big State Benefits Claimed – Visitors Praise Local Landscape and Medford Mayor
The concert of the band of the Elks band and the program of the members of the Oregon Exposition Caravan, which arrived yesterday afternoon from Crater Lake, were well attended last night. Several hundred cars were parked on the streets bordering the park.
Speeches, carried to very distant points by the portable radio broadcasting apparatus carried by the motorcade, were delivered by prominent Portland men and by Mayor CE Gates of Medford who introduced the members of the motorcade.
The mayor welcomed them to the city and was enthusiastic in his praise of the exhibition they had planned. He praised the state of Oregon and the Rogue River Valley saying he doesn’t know of any other place he’d rather live. He stated that Oregon had everything a human heart could desire but that it was necessary to increase the population of the state and that the great fair would do this for its attraction of tourists to the state. Tourists coming to the state, Mayor Gates predicted, will find it irresistible and settle here.
He informed the crowd that Portland wasn’t trying to sell them anything, he wasn’t trying to tax them to fund the fair, he was just asking for their help with the ballot to change the state laws so that Portland would have a permit to prevail to finance the fair.
He was so enthusiastic about the fair before he finished his speech that at the end someone in the crowd remarked that he had yet to be a member of the fair’s board. This comment drew laughter.
Gates is praised
At the end of his speech of welcome to the members of the caravan, Mr. Gates turned the meeting over to President Fred L. Carlton, who introduced AH Lea, secretary of the fair association and director of the 1925 Exposition, who declared Mayor CE Gates to be one. of the best men that ever stood on the board of the fair, and who always responded in a short time when called upon to do more than his share. He then explained the objectives of the promoters of the fair and stated that they do not want to turn it into a world fair, since foreign countries are not in a position to build buildings and hold exhibitions, but they want to limit the fair to the United States and Canada. In closing, he stated that he hoped Medford would be unanimous in its support of the 1925 Exposition.
— Alyssa Corman; acorman@rosebudmedia.com
