[no source, April 1, 1941]
LAND OWNERS’ SESSION
WITH CLARK HALTED
April 1, 1941
Senator Leaves
Hurriedly Yesterday Following Word Son Had Undergone Operation.
Senator
Bennett Champ Clark, meeting in St. Louis yesterday afternoon with a committee
of unpaid land owners from the TNT area, halted the conference and departed
hurriedly for Columbia after receiving word that his son, Champ, had undergone
an emergency operation for appendicitis.
The farmers
had gone to Hotel Mayfair to confer with the Senator relative to payments for
land in the TNT area optioned and occupied by the government.
The Senator
said the physician reported his son, a freshman at the University of Missouri,
was in good condition following the appendectomy.
Senator
Clark had previously accepted an invitation to address a meeting of the unpaid
land owners in Evangelical church hall at Weldon Springs at three o’clock
yesterday afternoon. Circuit Clerk Earl R. Sutton, a member of the committee,
received word early yesterday afternoon that the Senator could not attend
because he was ill.
Suits Are Filed
As the
committee met with Senator Clark yesterday, about 250 people gathered at Weldon
Spring to attend the scheduled meeting with the Senator. The committee, it
seems, did not have time to call off the mass meeting.
The crowd
of farmers, formerly of the TNT plant area, milled about on Highway 94 for
three hours before returning to their homes.
While the
Senator spoke with the committee yesterday, Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson
was filing notice of taking of the property of five of the unpaid landowners in
the United States District Court at St. Louis. Checks representing what the War
Department believed was “just compensation” for the land were deposited with
the court.
[one or more lines missing] 10 acres of Grover Silvey; $7604
for the 170 acres of Dr. and Mrs. O. L. Snyder; $3860 for the 94 acres of Merta
Calloway; $9120 for the 161 acres of Tarlton Woodson, and $5100 for the 52
acres of Mr. and Mrs. George C. Willson.
The
government had options to purchase for $109,768 the five tracts for which it
deposited the $27,559 with the court. Individual option prices were Silvey,
$5,000; Snyder, $30,395; Calloway, $10,888; Woodson, $31,485; and Willson,
$32,000.
Morris
Muschany, a member of the committee which visited the Senator, said; “People
out there are getting riled up and downright hostile.” He urged speed in paying
for the land.
