Beno tdpan.
INK SLINGS.
—There seems to be very much
more pink eye in the community just
now than there is “red eye.”
—It doesn’t matter much whether
his hogship sees his shadow tomorrow
or not. We have had so little winter
weather that most every one would
welcome six weeks of the real thing.
—While the speculators in New
York were greatly excited, on Satur-
day, by the rise in the rails, steels and
coppers the spectators in Washington
were electrified by the Fall in Tea-
pots.
— Maybe the late President’s idea
of “normalcy” was to restore the con-
ditions that developed the Whiskey
scandal during the Grant administra-
tion and the Timber scandal of the
Taft regime.
—Isn’t it funny how everybody is
tramping on somebody else’s heels?
The financial pyrotechnics of those
Woods boys no sooner got onto the
front pages than the sons of Teddy
came trampin’ them off.
—“Jackie Hill Crest,” the experi-
mental baby at The Pennsylvania
State College, was just beginning to
steal a large share of Jackie Coogan’s
popularity when he was torn from the
arms of those twenty-five embryonic
mothers and put into a real home,
where he stands a better chance of es-
caping the misfortune of developing
into a spoiled kid.
—The announcement that Mrs.
Fleming Allen, of Williamsport, would
accept a place on the Democratic slate
for delegate-at-large to the National
convention will surely please a lot of
Democrats in Centre county. Mrs.
Allen has been here twice, and on both
occasions her sterling Democracy, ex-
pressed in such fascinating manner,
completely won her audiences. Won
them so completely that we feel al-
most secure in the belief that Centre
will be moved to demand that she be
given a place on the ticket.
—It would be too bad if State
chairman McCullough should permit
the use of the machinery of our party
organization in furtherance of any
particular aspirant for presidential
nomination. Mr. McCullough has
done much in the way of moulding
our party in the State again into a
cohesive, militant body. No one will
gainsay him the right to have a per-
sonal preference in the pending con-
test, but as the chairman of the
whole party he would inspire greater
confidence in his leadership by not us-
ing his position to give strength to the
cause of one candidate when there are
others in the field whom some mem-
bers of his party might favor.
—Editor John F. Short, of the
Clearfield Republican, has announced
his aspiration to represent this Dis-
trict in the Democratic National con-
vention. We understand that Mr.
Short is for William Gibbs McAdoo,
but we haven’t been advised as to
whether he will run on a “pledged to
McAdoo” platform. However that may
be the “Watchman” sees no reason
why Mr. Short should not prove very
acceptable to the Democrats of the
District. © He has been foremost
among them in service to his party
and we feel certain that his interest
in its welfare is great enough to ac-
tuate him to support the candidate in
New York who shall generally be be-
lieved to have the best chance of elec-
tion; whether the aspirant be Mr. Mc-
Adoo or any of the others who may
enter the race.
—Dr. B. E. P. Prugh, chairman of
the Pennsylvania State Prohibition
party, has delivered himself of the
conviction that William A. Anderson,
superintendent of the New York Anti-
Saloon league, isn’t “straight goods.”
Mr. Anderson is in trouble. He is in
court to defend himself against
charges that he has grafted the
League’s funds. Personally we don’t
know Mr. Anderson. Nor have we
met Dr. Prugh. We heard him once.
That was enough. On a September
Sunday morning in 1918 this Prugh
man, this bombastic egotist, stood in
the pulpit in the Methodist church in
Bellefonte and said “If I were Pres-
ident of the United States * * * we
would have better government than
we have today.” Woodrow Wilson
was the President at the time. He is
revered by the Nation today. Dr.
Prugh is only heard of when he pub-
licly declines to cross the road to
throw a cloak of charity about one of
the fallen workers for his own cause.
—Casting about over the State for
some Republicans upon whom we
might cast a fleeting glance of admi-
ration we happened to lamp the ven-
erable Dave Lane, of Philadelphia; Ed
Kenna, leader of the Second, and P. J.
Sullivan, leader of the Sixth wards of
Pittsburgh. Of all the satellites who
yet think they reflect a little of the
scintillating leadership of Penrose
they are the only three who have the
courage to stand right up on their
hind feet and tell the world they won’t
support Pinchot, even if Mellon, and
Pepper, and Reed, and Baker do in-
clude him on the organization slate.
Out of the maize of subterfuge, pus-
sey-footin’, bombastic declarations
and ignominous retractions that have
characterized the making of a Repub-
lican slate for Republican National
delegates it is refreshing to discover
that there are at least three Republi-
cans who know where they're at and
have the courage to say so. Neither
Mellon, Pepper, Reed nor Baker are
any more for Pinchot than are Lane,
Kenna or Sullivan. They haven’t the
makin’s of leadership else they would
go to the mat and beat Gif or get |
licked and come up smilin’!
>
fo
aR"
el
STATE RIGHTS AND FEDERAL U.
VOL. 69.
BELLEFONTE, PA.,, FEBRUARY 1. 1924.
Responsibility is Firmly Fixed.
Under the leadership of President
Coolidge the Republican press and
politicians are trying to shift part of
the responsibility for the Teapot
Dome oil scandal upon the Democrats.
Mr. Doheny, they say, is or was a
Democrat and at times has contrib-
uted to the campaign fund of that
party. This statement is based on
testimony given by him before a Sen-
sometimes he contributes to the Dem-
ocratic fund and other times to the
Republican treasury, accordingly as
his interests are served. It will be re-
membered that the late Jay Gould
made a similar confession once. “I
am sometimes for the Democratic
candidates and sometimes for the Re-
publicans, but always for the Erie
railroad.”
But even if Mr. Doheny were an ac-
tive and earnest Democrat there
could be no division of the responsi-
bility for betraying the government
of the United States by fraudulently
disposing of a source of fuel supply
essential to the mantenance and ope-
ration of the navy. Mr. Doheny was
not an officiel charged under oath to
defend and protect the interests and
resources of the government. He was
a speculator in oil property as Jay
Gould was in railroads. Governments
are organized and maintained to pro-
tect the people and public from men
of the Doheny type and government
officials are the instruments by and
through which this result is to be
achieved. If the government is de-
frauded through the venality or in-
competency of its agents the agents
are responsible.
If this claim of divided responsibil-
ity had been set up by some petty-
fogging lawyer to shield an obviously
guilty client it might be dismissed as
an insignificant and unimportant in-
cident. But coming from the Presi-
dent of the United States, morally re-
sponsible for the conduct of his su-
bordinates in office, it assumes a much
graver aspect and compels the im-
pression already widely prevailing
‘that luck rather than merit is respon-
sible for the elevation of Calvin Cool-
idge to the high office he is striving
to prostitute. Former Secretary of
the Interior Albert B. Fall; Secretary
of the Navy, Edwin Denby, and Attor-
ney General Harry M. Daugherty are
responsible for this outrage, and there
can be no shifting.
——An esteemed contemporary de-
clares that either the tax reduction
bill or the soldiers’ bonus bill must be
“be just rather than generous.”
Pinchot Dealing With Vare.
Governor Pinchot has opened nego-
tiations with Congressman Vare, of
Philadelphia, in order to secure a rat-
ification of his deal with chairman
Baker for a seat in the Cleveland con-
vention as a delegate-at-large, accord-
ing to gossip. The rumors of opposi-
tion in all sections of the State have
alarmed the Governor and admonish-
ed him of danger. He probably imag-
ines that Mr. Vare can stem the tide
and thoroughly understands the meth-
ods of reaching Vare. Spoils of of-
fice are the only currency that appeal
to him, and since the gubernatorial
primary of two years ago appear to
be the only “medium of exchange”
known to Pinchot.
In the bargain with Baker to get a
place on the slate for delegate-at-
large the Governor is believed to have
placed an irredeemable mortgage on
upward of five hundred choice places.
He had already disposed of a consid-
erable number and Philadelphia has
its full quota. There is trouble in
Pittsburgh, Scranton, Wilkes-Barre
and Pottsville, so that it will not be
age of those sections. Of course it is
possible that the offer to Vare, like
the agreement with Baker, is simply
to retain in place those of his friends
already fixed. In that case, however,
it will be necessary to disappoint a
during the primary campaign.
Whether the Governor succeeds in
his ambition to sit in the convention
as a delegate-at-large or not it must
be admitted that he has broken all
records as a commercializer of poli-
tics.
vania has so openly traded in prom-
ises of office or in actual spoils to half
the extent that he has. During his
primary campaign, it is alleged, he
supplemented his promises by actual
cash payments with a liberality that
surprised his friends and appalled his
enemies. But since that he has de-
pended entirely on patronage to meet
his political obligations and in doing
so has betrayed nearly every promise
made befere his nomination and elec-
tion.
——It may be safely assumed that
the recent developments in the Teapot
Dome scandal are not worrying Sen-
‘ator Hi Johnson very much.
ate committee when he said that
defeated. That is not necessarily a |
fact but even if true it is a duty to
advisable to cut much into the patron-
good many who were promised places |
No other Governor of Pennsyl-
The Entire Bunch Involved.
| The public will cordially agree with
Senators Walsh and Robinson that
Secretary of the Navy Denby, and At-
torney General Daugherty ought to
be forced to resign their offices on ac-
count of their connection with the
disgraceful oil scandals. Secretary
Denby inherited from his predecessor
in office an immensely valuable asset
in the shape of oil deposits in reserve.
This splendid asset was acquired by
| Secretary of the Navy Daniels as a
i guarantee of fuel for the navy in fu-
| ture emergencies. Secretary Denby,
| with the help of Attorney General
Daugherty, gave it over to Secretary
Fall to administer and he apparently
used it as a pawn to induce specula-
tors to loan him money without secu-
rity.
It has been suggested that Secre-
tary Denby was deceived by his col-
league in the Harding cabinet. Pos-
sibly that is true but it is not an ade-
quate excuse. If he is so stupid as to
be thus made a victim of such trans-
actions he ought never to have been
given the opportunity to betray his
trust. The same excuse cannot be of-
fered in the case of Daugherty. He
is not a great lawyer but he has cer-
tainly a sufficent knowledge of the law
to restrain him from a glaring mal-
feasance in office, and the question of
the expediency of shifting the control
of the property from the Department
of the Navy to that of the Interior as
well as the legality of the lease was
submitted to him.
The truth is that the entire Hard-
ing administration was involved in
this scandalous transaction. It was
repeatedly discussed at sessions of the
cabinet, with all the accused members
and President Harding and Vice Pres-
ident Coolidge present. The shrewd
oil speculators who had visions of
hundred million dollar profits to urge
them on either deceived all the mem-
bers of the administration or de-
bauched them as they admittedly did
Secretary Fall. There was no bi-par-
tisanship in the matter at all. All
the public officials involved were, and
those still living are, orthodox Repub-
licans. Mr. Coolidge cannot shift the
responsibility and it will be hard for
him to persuade thinking men that he
is blameless.
—We may be just seeing things,
but it looks to us very much as if
some powers were working under cov-
er to depreciate the franc to the point
where France will be so economically
crippled that she can’t force Germany
to pay.
Hiram Johnson’s Great Chance.
“Ill blows the wind that profits no-
body,” Shakespeare wrote long ago
and it is, or ought to be, verified in the
nasty scandal now being revealed in
Washington. That filthy mess, in-
volving as it does all the members of
the Harding cabinet as well as Calvin
Coolidge, who “sat in” as a represen-
tative of the “best minds,” ought to
be a boon to Hiram Johnson, of Cali-
fornia, Mr. Coolidge’s only competitor
for the empty honor of the Republican
nomination for President. President
Coolidge’s hysterical effort to divert
public attention from his part in the
transaction will not deceive anybody
with an unprejudiced mind, and his
identity with it is likely to make par-
ty managers look for another candi-
date.
{ Thus far Senator Johnson is the
only other candidate for the nomina-
tion. If in his anxiety to get a seat
in the Cleveland convention Governor
Pinchot had not given a solemn pledge
he will not allow his name to be in-
troduced, the delegates might have
| turned to him as the available sub-
| stitute for Coolidge, the slated candi-
date. But unfortunately for himself
| Pinchot is tied up and locked in so
completely that he can have no hope
of acquiring freedom to act. The ma-
' chine managers might release him if
: he had anything to offer in the way of
recompense. But in his deals with
Baker and Vare he has probably mort-
gaged all his patronage to the limit.
With Coolidge thus discredited and
Pinchot thus tethered there would
seem to be a great opportunity for |
Senator Johnson in this State. As |
we have heretofore said, there is a:
good deal of kindly feeling for him
among the rank and file of the party
in certain sections. Wherever the
memory of Theodore Roosevelt is
fondly cherished the voice of Johnson |
would arouse a thrill, and Hiram takes |
his voice with him wherever he goes. !
While we are not authorized to speak
for him, therefore, we feel at perfect
liberty to say that he may turn his
attention to Pennsylvania any time
between now and the primary, and if
he does there will be a “rattling of |
the bones” wherever he appears. |
A As.
——Of course every sane person
| favors tax reduction, but there is a
vast difference between a tax reduc- |
tion that benefits a few and one that
helps millions of men and women who
work for the property taxed.
to the Pennsylvania organization that
Chairman Baker’s Wise Deal.
Many of those Republicans of Penn-
sylvania who are opposed to Gover-'
nor Pinchot are inclined to censure
Mr. W. Harry Baker for yielding his
assured seat in the Republican Na-
tional convention as a delegate-at-
large, in the interest of harmony, to
the Governor. Nothing could be more
unjust. Mr. Baker is essentially a
politician. As the official head of the
party organization his personal as
well as his political estate is promo-
ted by harmony. Therefore if he had
no other reason for his apparent self-
abnegation than preserving harmony,
he is fully justified in a step obvious-
ly necessary to his purpose. But as a
matter of fact Mr. Baker was influ-
enced by a vastly more compelling
reason.
The Baker-Beidleman machine has
its home as well as its hopes in Har-
risburg. In the nomination of Gifford
Pinchot, for Governor, two years ago,
it received an exceedingly hard jolt.
The State government gives employ-
ment to upward of five hundred of the
adherents of this machine residing in
Harrisburg. Removing this force of
supporters from the pay-roll would
paralyze the machine. Mr. Baker,
therefore, relinquishes an empty hon-
or which he has previously enjoyed
but secures the tenure of office of his
followers. In fact he strengthens his
hold on the party fvaors, as is shown
by the record that two or three of his
henchmen have had their salaries in-
creased since the bargain was struck.
Besides there is something more
than an even chance that his little
“deal” with the Governor will not ma-
terially benefit Mr. Pinchot nor hurt
the organization. Mr. Baker has sim-
ply given up his place on the slate and
inferentially pledged his personal
support to the Governor at the pri-
mary election for the party favor so
highly coveted. The other leaders are
not obligated by Mr. Baker’s abne-
gation and the indications are that
the tide of opposition already formi-
dable will increase to preportions that
will sweep Pinchot out of the running.
According to current gossip at Har-
risburg even the benefitted followers
of the Baker-Beidleman machine will
east their votes against the Governor.
l
{ —Mellon, Pepper, Reed and Baker
probably know that you can catch
more flies with sugar than you can
with vinegar. What they don’t seem
to understand, however, is that the
Governor ain’t one of them candy
hounds. Also, that reminds us to stop
| at the gossip counter long enough to
| see if we can find out how the guber-
| natorial apostle of righteousness and
| the senatorial vestry man are going
| to square that purely political confer-
ence in Pepper’s Philadelphia office on
Sunday afternoon with their own con-
sciences and the really good folks of
Pennsylvania. If they don’t know
how to do it, we might suggest the
extenuating truth that both their
horses were in the pit.
| Conference to Discuss Law Enforce-
ment and Legislative Condidates.
Miss Rebecca Naomi Rhoads has is-
sued a call to members of the Anti-
: Saloon League, W. C. T. U., and all
persons interested in law enforcement
(in Centre county to meet for an all
| day conference in Bellefonte on Tues-
, day, February 5th.
| The conference will convene in the
ly M. C. A. here at 10 o’clock, a. m.
| It will be open to the public and the
| presidents of all local W. C. T. Us, as
‘well as an adult member from every
| Bible class and every church in the
county are specially urged to be pres-
ent.
The topics for discussion will be
law enforcement, candidates for the
| primaries, methods for electing dry
candidates and ones who are in sym-
sympathy with the Governor's en-
| forcement program.
——1It looked for a while on Wed-
‘nesday as if the “Watchman” office
might be in for another ducking, but
| fortunately it quit raining in time to
avert the danger and let us hope that
it will never threaten again.
Tax free securities are not
entirely without merit either. They
enable cities and boroughs to make
improvements and employ labor and
afford safe investments to “old
maids,” male and female.
——Probably the mysterious per-
son who gave William H. Anderson,
of the Anti-Saloon League, $25,000 is
the same man who “struck Billy Pat-
terson” many years ago.
Thermometers in Bellefonte
dropped to 8 to 10 degrees below ze-
ro on Monday morning, which stands
as the record cold snap so far this
winter.
stm mor
——Henry Ford got into the Cool-
idge band wagon at an inopportune
time.
NO. 3S.
| Not a Daugherty Job.
' From the Philadelphia Record.
The first duty of President Coolidge
in relation to the oil land scandals, as
we see it, is to give the country ade-
quate assurance that he appreciates
their enormity and will so deal with
them as to establish at once the pur-
pose of the government vigorously to
prosecute those who are tainted with
the odor of corruption by the revela-
tions at Washington. This assurance
is not conveyed by the emanations
from the White House as formulated
by the newspaper correspondents in
their own language, which represent
the President as observing the course
of the proceedings, resolved to punish
any possible violators of the criminal
laws, and determined to investigate,
but “loath to believe that any one has
been guilty of criminal intent.”
The conditions uncovered by the
Senate investigating committee are
shocking. They indicate the existence
of conspiracies to corrupt a public
servant and to despoil the government
on a hitherto unheard-of scale. The
evidence already adduced is damning,
and convincing attempts to explain it
away can only be made, if at all, in
courts of law. The people demand
not only that those who tossed around
enormous sums of money in the bar-
ter and sale of naval oil reserves shall
be prosecuted, as promised, but that
they shall be prosecuted by a govern-
ment agent in whose zeal the public
may have the utmost faith. We have
seen enough of Fall’s friends in this
business. It would be absurd, prepos-
terous, to put another of them in
charge of the government’s punitive
measures. Attorney General Daugh-
erty is Fall’s personal friend. That
fact should disqualify him from di-
recting the prosecutions or exercising
any authority over those who may di-
rect them. And that is the point
which the President does not seem to
appreciate.
There is no partisanship in this
matter. One might think there was
from the studious abstention of most
Republican organs from denunciation
of the scandal; from the attempts of
one local contemporary to establish
the status of Doheny, contributor to
the campaign funds of both parties,
as a Democrat; and from the ridicu-
lous effort of the Republican Nation-
al committee to throw a smoke screen
around the bribery and jobbery by
vague talk about unproved war scan-
dals under Democratic adminizfgation.
Crookedness is not a party monopoly.
| The party allegiance of the culprits to
whom this investigation points is be-
side the mark. The only partisan
question involved is whether a Repub-
lican President who exercises supreme
power in the premises shall see and
do his full duty.
We trust that President Coolidge
will appreciate the pressing necessity
for placing an independent prosecu-
tor in charge of the civil and criminal
actions that are bound to eventuate,
and for immediately apprising the
public of his intentions to that end.
This is not a time for the soft pedal.
Attorney General Daugherty is not
. the man to clean up this mess.
|
| Knows No Politics.
{ From the Philadelphia Public Ledger.
| E. L. Doheny is a recognized Dem-
| ocratic leader of power and party in
i the southwest and his voice is potent
iin his party councils. Harry F. Sin-
| clair has been a contributor to the war
| chest of both the Republican and the
| Democratic parties. Albert B. Fall is
a Republican who has stood very high
in the inner circles of his party. Gav-
in McNabb, a Democratic war horse
of the Pacific coast, is doing what he
can to wipe the dark, oily smears
from both Republican Fall and Demo-
cratic Doheny.
i One of the significant revelations of
| the oil scandal is that the oil business
knows no politics. As a matter of
fact, Big Business has no politics. In
its secret heart it is as nonpartisan as
a balance sheet, but it is by no means
non-political. All is grist, or nearly
‘all, that comes to its mill. Its net
| takes all manner of political fish. Big
Business cares little whence its favors
come just so they come.
There is a wealth of classical in-
stances, but one will serve. When
Mark Hanna went down the line “fry-
ing out fat” he took them as they
came. A Democratic contribution was
neither more nor less acceptable to
| the Ohio boss than a Republican do-
nation. It has been the fashion in
rails, steels, mines, finance and man-
ufacturing, as well as in oil, to play
the game both ways from the middle
and both ends to the middle.
There also is a kind of bipartisan-
ship, long existing, among men of
large affairs, who ‘sometimes find
themselves working with either par-
ty. Such instances are not always
shouted from the political housetops,
although there may be nothing secret
about them.
By and large, political lines tend to
' disappear in the worlds Big Business.
When business empires are at stake
or even when a minor principality is
threatened, Big Business does not
concern itself with such external mat-
ters as party labels or political insig-
nia.
——0On the principle that “a lie well
stuck to is as good as the truth,”
Governor Pinchot continues to claim
that he is saving the State $40,000 a
day.
——There was no necessity for an
alienist to pass upon the sanity of a
woman who had seven living hus-
bands.
i SPAWLS FROM THE KEYSTONE.
—Milton’s newest industry, the oxygen
plant of the United Oxygen Manufactur-
ing company, was placed in operation late
last week. The capacity of the plant is
25000 cubic feet per day.
—An iron box, containing from $20,000
to $25,000 was found buried in the roots
of an aged tree by a woodcutter of Little
Valley, not far from Bedford, Pa., accord-
ing to a story current in that region. Rob«
ert Boyer about 45 years old, says the re-
port, found the box.
—Six men, all residents of Mainville,,
Pa., were arrested on Tuesday by detec-
tive Kurtz, of Wilkes-Barre, a former
state trooper and Troopers C. J. Brennan
and Mazonky of Troop B, state police, om
the charge of burning the breaker and dy-
namiting the commissary of the Beaver
Valley Coal company in Columbia county.
—Suit for $3000 damages was brought
against the town of Bloomsburg, on Mon-
day, by William Frederick, driver of an
automobile which went through a bridge
over a mill race there several months ago,
when William Yocum, his companion, was
drowned. Yocum’s widow filed suit against
j the town for $10,000 damages a few days
ago.
—Mrs. Matilda Myers, aged 70 years, was
burned to death in her home in Lock Ha-
ven Thursday afternoon, when her dress
ignited from an oil stove she was lighting.
| She lived alone and when the neighbors
! saw smoke coming from her windows they
! investigated. She was found lying dead
| near the door, which she had evidently
tried to open.
—While he stood at a distance of 200
yards waiting for the explosion of a charge
. of dynamite at a clay bank near Martins-
| burg, Blair county, Irvin Dilling, aged 50
years, was almost instantly killed last
Wednesday, when a second blast behind
him hurled a shower of earth and stones
at his head. Dilling was not aware a
charge was being sent off near him. He
was married and is the father of six chil-
dren.
| —The will of the late Mrs. A. F. Boyn-
! ton, of Clearfield, provides that annuities
| of $400 each shall be paid to her nephews
| and niece, Ira M. Showers, of Philipsburg;
J. Emmot Harder of Clearfield, and Mrs.
Emma Boynton Craig, of Philadelphia.
The balance of her estate, amounting to
$100,000, is given to the Missionary socie-
ty of the Methodist church, incorporated
by the Legislature of the State of New
York.
—Frank Stalker, employed at an oil-
pumping station at Guffey, fifteen miles
from Kane, had his right arm amputated
at the Summit hospital on Monday as the
result of an accident last Thursday. A
pipe, through which oil was being pumped
at high pressure, burst and a stream of
oil was forced through Stalker’s hand and
into the muscles of his arm. Physicians
declared they have never treated a simi-
lar case.
—A contract for the erection of two new
steel bridges across the north branch of
the Susquehanna river at Sunbury, has
been awarded by the Pennsylvania Rail-
road company to the Bethlehem Steel com-
pany. Work will be started about Ieb-
ruary 1st. The bridges will make availa-
ble three tracks from Sunbury to the
| Northumberland classification yards as the
old bridge will be retained for single track
traffic. The piers for the new bridges
were built last year.
—“I am going to take one more dive and
then go out,” remarked Anna Elizabeth
Cornelius, 17 year old Senior in the Mo-
nessen High school, to companions who
were leaving the swimming pool last Wed-
nesday afternoon. It was noted fifteen
minutes later that she was not in the
dressing room and her body was found at
the bottom of the deepest part of the pool.
Miss Cornelius, who was a daughter of
Dr. George T. Cornelius, was considered
proficient in swimming and diving.
—Mrs. Frances Chamberlain the only’
woman automobile salesman in Williams-
port, was fatally injured when she was
struck by a Pennsylvania passenger train
at a street crossing in Williamsport last
Friday afternoon. There had been a con-
gestion of vehicles at the Hepburn street
crossing and Mrs. Chamberlain’s car had
been the last to get moving again. The
engine of the Pittsburgh-Easton flyer,
eastbound, struck the car, shoving it fo
one side and crushing the woman as she
sat behind the wheel.
—Dorothy Wellover, aged two and a
half years, daughter of George and Mary
Fields Wellover, of Mount Union, was fa-
tally injured on Monday evening when she
was run over by a large truck as she was
crossing the street in front of her home.
The wheels of the truck passed over her
abdomen. The child was taken to the of-
fice of a physician, but died on the way.
The little girl had found a penny and was
crossing the street to purchase candy
when she was struck. The parents and an
older brother survive.
—Patrick Walsh, of Phoenixville, plead-
ed guilty to manslaughter in the criminal
court at West Chester, on Monday, and
was sentenced to serve six months in the
Chester county prison. During a drunken
orgie in a shed at Cromble near Phoenix-
ville, on December 1, 1923, Walsh secured
a shotgun, and to show his control of the
weapon shot the hat from the head of
Frank E. Walter, a guest. He then placed
the hat on the head of his brother-in-law,
Michael O. Toole, but his aim had grown
unsteady and he shot off the top of the
head of the wearer of the hat.
—With the depositing in the bank at
Oil City, last Thursday, of approxi.nately
$10,000 in currency, Henry and Joseph
Rhoades, farmers of Canal township, Ve-
nango county, who were robbed of mon-
ey a week previous when their home was
ransacked by three men posing as prohi-
bition agents, announced that the robbers
had several times stepped right over the
hiding place of the hoard of bills without
discovering them. The Rhoades brothers,
bachelors, had no liking for or belief in
banks, but after this experience decided
the safest place for their money was a
financial institution and the cash was ac-
cordingly deposited in the bank.
—When women of East Rockhill town-
ship, Buck county, saw constable E. L.
Benner call for bids on a flock of thirty
chickens that belonged to a woman who
had refused to pay her taxes, resulting
from equal franchise they weakened and
paid up. So did Mrs. D. Frank Hendricks,
owner of the chickens. When Mrs.’ Hen-
dricks refused to pay her taxes Constabie
Benner levied on thirty chickens she own-
ed. When the advertised sale was called
last Friday, many women and men were
present. Up to the last minute, the wom-
en believed the constable was bluffing.
However, when they found that he was a
| serious-minded officer, they stepped up
and paid their taxes.