In the fall of 1896 Charles “Frenchy” Juneau and Carl Sandburg went to see William Jennings Bryan get off the train and speak from a platform on Mulberry Street near the Q Depot. When Bryan visited Monmouth, the boys road the cowcatcher of a Q engine to and from the city on a cold October night so they could hear him speak again.

Bryan was running for president on the Democratic ticket. He had been nominated after giving a resounding speech at the convention in Chicago on July 7^th. It later became known as the “Cross of Gold” speech and was reprinted in most of the newspapers of the day.

Sandburg read it several times, as well as the other speeches Bryan gave during the campaign. He was convinced Bryan spoke for ordinary people, told the truth and had the best ideas for bringing the nation up from the depths of the depression which had begun in 1893.

Bryan took his message to the people by traveling the network of railroads in the country. From September 11, 1896 until two days before the election on November 3^rd, Bryan traveled from town to city to countryside speaking twenty or thirty times a day. The people were interested in the campaign and had read about his speeches in the newspapers. They knew his arguments, but wanted to see and hear him in person.

William Jennings Bryan traveled to twenty-seven of the forty-five states and gave an estimated six hundred speeches to some five million listeners. It was expected that he would win the South, the Rocky Mountain states and rural sections of the Midwest.

The Democratic Party raised about half a million dollars for the Bryan campaign. Their opponents in the Republican Party raised $3.5 million (more than $96 million in today's money and a larger percentage of the national economy than any campaign since).

The economic problems caused by the Panic of 1893 increased political division. Many farmers could not repay their loans. Unemployment was near twenty percent. Women and children were forced to go to work to help support their families, but their wages were half those of men. Nearly twenty percent of children between the ages of ten and fifteen were forced to find jobs in the factories, mills and other places where labor was dirty and strenuous.

Carl Sandburg even had nerve enough to argue with his father about the campaign. He had studied the newspapers and discussed the issues with his friends so he was familiar with the arguments. August Sandburg voted with the Republicans as he always had.

William McKinley, the Republican candidate, sat on his front porch in Canton, Ohio, and greeted the people who came to see him. His wife served cool water to the crowds. McKinley won the election with 7,204,779 votes and 271 electoral votes. Bryan received 6,502,925 votes or 46.7 percent of the popular vote. He carried twenty-two of the forty five states.

Next week: The campaign of William McKinley.