WOMAN RULES A TOWN

Star (Christchurch), Issue 8779, 16 November 1906, Page 2

WOMAN RULES A TOWN

POPULATION ENSLAVED EY

HER COOKERY.

NEW YORK, September 12.— Never hat tho marriage of a reigning queen

aroused more interest and enthusiasm among her subjects than did the wedding yesterday of Miss Emma Sheppard, of tho town of Florence, South Dakota. She was Florence's only woman resident.

Florence in a newly-founded and rapidly rising town, owing its existence to the extension of a branch of the Minneapolis and St Loui6 Railroad. Its situation in the centre of a region rich in undeveloped resources offered such prospects that it attracted a lush of enterprising Westerners, with the resultthat the town acquired a population before it had streets and houses — but with the single exception of Miss Sheppa/cl, au entirely male population. She followed the rush to the new city in the hope of establishing a prosperous school, but, owing to the total lack of pupils or the likelihood of getting them, circumstances soon compelled her to make some more effective appeal to the needs of the community. Happily, ho;---educational equipment included a course of cookery and domestic economy in a western college, and eho established a restaurant.

From the moment she served the first meal th© entire population^ which had hitherto been subsisting on "'make-shift camp-fire cookery, became her abject slaves, and within a month she was dictator and law-giver of the community. She usfed her power firmly and wisely, and all disputes were submitted to \\\v arbitration, which the loser cheerfully accepted lest he should go hungry. She levied taxes for public purposes,, directed the public works, made and enforced laws and regulations, and became, in fact, by virtue of hm cookery, the magistrate, mayor and absolute queen of the town. Naturally from the 'first there was the keenest competition for tht hand of eo powerful a princess, but a young engineer named Austin was finally the