Page:Final Report of the Northwest Territory Celebration Commission.pdf/4



When Northwest Territory Celebration was planned, it was contemplated that there would be no printed report of the affairs of the Northwest Territory Celebration Commission; that, in the interest of economy, only a typed official report be prepared and submitted to proper government departments. So many printed reports, often prepared quite elaborately and at considerable cost, serve mainly to glorify and pamper the vanity of people concerned, and thereafter to gather dust in library archives, that this Commission figured to do its work, report officially and pass out of existence.

However, the progress of Northwest Territory Celebration has developed some new phases of history commemorative procedure, and so many requests have been received for the complete story, or for that of some special phases, of the Celebration, that the Commission deems it most economical to prepare the facts in form suitable to this purpose and available for other times and places where these experiences may be of interest and possible value.

No attempt is made herein to elaborate on the printer’s art, or to do otherwise than preserve and convey essential information.

In this spirit the less fortunate features of the celebration plan are discussed as well as those which proved most successful.

While it is necessary, for purposes of space, to abbreviate many of the incidents, the report, we trust, epitomizes essential phases of Commission and Celebration activity.

Effort is to give this report the atmosphere of a running story rather than mere academic recitation.

Respectfully submitted,



E. M. Hawes, Executive Director

NORTHWEST TERRITORY CELEBRATION COMMISSION