DOWN THE RIVER WITH TAFT.
Steamboat Chester Will Carry Kan-sas Cityans to New Orleans.
At a meeting held yesterday afternoon the directors of the Commercial Club enthusiastically accepted the invitation from St. Louis to send a steamboat representing Kansas City with the flotilla which will escort President Taft down the Mississippi river from St. Louis to the big waterways convention at New Orleans in October. Secretary E. M. Clendening was instructed to send notification of Kansas City's acceptance and to ask that the Kansas City boat be assigned a good place in the formation of the down-river fleet.
The steamboat Chester will carry the Kansas Cityans to New Orleans. It is the intention to begin the trip at the home dock, make stops at the towns down the Missouri river as far as Jefferson City and join the flotilla at St. Louis. This scheme, it is thought, is preferable to making the start at St. Louis and besides it will afford the Kansas Cityans an excellent opportunity to campaign for river improvement at Lexington, Glasgow, Boonville, Jefferson City and the other towns down the Missouri between here and the state capital.
The Chester has capacity for sixty passengers, and from the way applications for berths are coming in it is probable that they will be engaged long before the trip is to be taken. A band will be on board the boat, which will be gaily decorated. H. G. Wilson, transportation commissioner of the Commercial Club, will be in charge of the arrangements.
The boat will probably leave Kansas City on the afternoon of October 21, will reach St. Louis October 25 and will arrive at New Orleans October 31. It will be used as a floating hotel for the Kansas Cityans while at St. Louis and New Orleans.
