The Railroad President Who Said No to Olympia

“First of all, the news,” has been the motto of The Tribune ever since it started, and that The Tribune will print the news without fear or favor is pretty generally understood in this community. That was the motive in printing the dispatch from Ocosta yesterday which said that Col. Fred D. Huestis, the well-known railroad builder, was authority for the statement that Jim Hill had told him the Great Northern road would not be built through Olympia. The Tribune is aware that Mr. Hill said this to Mr. Huestis, and it is also aware that Mr. Hill has made the same statement to others. We are sorry that the president of the Great Northern, without visiting Olympia, should have made such a statement, and it is to be hoped that he may be induced to change his mind when he comes on the Sound again in May or June. Mr. Hill is known to be a shrewd man in the railway business. So is Mr. Oakes, of the Northern Pacific, and it was to secure business that the latter road, through Mr. Oakes’ recommendation, determined to come to the capital of the state and continue on to the Pacific Ocean. The country hereabouts is fast filling up, freight traffic and passenger travel is increasing by the development of new industries, and by the time the Great Northern is ready to commence through business on the Sound, there will be plenty of business to justify it in following the route marked out by the Union Pacific, the old road-bed of which is nearly intact. To this end the citizens of Olympia should bend all their energies and induce Mr. Hill to come through Olympia.