sing wild in the South sea islands, but
duced it into cultivation at Avila,
REFRIGERATION
EFFICIENCY
By KATHERINE G. CORNELL
Director of the Kelvinator
Domestic Institute
$C IRST plan your work, then
F work your plan,” said some
wise person. And his advice
is good in every undertaking, whe-
ther it be the building of a battle
ship or the correct use of an elec-
‘tric refrigerator.
A working understanding of the
mechanics of the refrigerator will
make it a much simpler matter to
get the very best results. First,
one should learn all one can of its
construction, and study its insula-
tion to see whether it may easily
be kept clean and immaculate;
‘whether its doors close securely
and quietly, and. whether the cor-
ners in the food chambers are
rounded so that no bits of food
or unpleasant odors may be har-
bored there.
Dry Cold Air Best
The type of atmosphere and the
temperature of the inside of the
refrigerator are of tremendous im-
‘portance also. A dry- -cold atmos-
-phere is preferable to a moist-cold
:atmosphere, for the reason that
‘moist air, unless it is very cold
(45 to 50’ degrees F.) will engen-
.der mold; and mold is the first
step toward the formation of bac-
teria and decay.
Delicate berries; fragile, green
vegetables; meat, milk, and eggs
all require dry-cold air for their
safe-keeping. Cooked foods also
require the dry-cold atmosphere of
the electric refrigerator if they are
to retain their nutritional quali ties | -
and their flavors.
Proper storing of foods is the
next step toward complete refri-
qrerator efficiency. And when we
vemember that cold air drops,
while warm air rises, we have the
=
:
key to the entire situation. There-
fore, all the more perishable prod-
ucts such as milk, butter, meat,
milk dessertsy and soups should be | or
placed on the lowest shelf.
Remove the wrapping paper
from the meat and place it in a
covered container. Keep butter
and milk also in covered recep-
tacles.
On the next to the bottom shelf
store cooked foods and the left-
overs, always closely covered. Al-
so the fruit desserts that are be-
ing chilled or congealed.
Fish on Top Shelf
Lettuce, celery, and other fragile
vegetables; the salad dressing,
eggs, etc, come néxt. And on
the highest shelf should be placed
the cheese, fruit, melons, fish and
strongly. flavored food.
any
Store berries, cherries and simi-
lar fruits in ventilated containers;
and do not wash them until just
before using them. Wrap pie dough
cookie dough in waxed pa-
per and place on the top shelf of
the refrigerator all ready to roll
out when needed.
Air Circulation Important
It is well to leave a space be-
tween the food containers and the
walls of the refrigerator to allow
free circulation of air.
circulation of cold air in the re-
frigerator that preserves food.
You will save electric current in
operating the refrigerator by open-
ing the door into the food chamber
only when necessary.
foods ready to place on the shelves
at one time; and when preparing a
meal,
salad and fruit at one opening of
the refrigerator door.
It is the
Get all the
take out the butter, mill,
How the Useful Plants
Came to Mankind
By T.E. STEWARD
‘WNU Service
The Sweet Potato
HE sweet potato is one of the
most widely dispersed of vege-
tables, being raised for food in places
as far separated as Japan and Vir-
ginia, in China, the islands of the
South seas, and in South America and
the southern United States.
Novels tell of sweet potatoes grow-
there is no final scientific evidence
that they grew there in an original
wild state, rather than escaping from
cultivation to find friendly climate
and soil in the fields and woods.
Many botanists have set the sweet
potato down as a plant of American
origin, due, in part, to the fact that
of 15 varieties of the genus batatas,
of which it is a member, 11 are found
in America alone, while the other four
are found both in America and in the
Old world.
The geographer, Humboldt, quoted
another authority as saying that
{Christopher Columbus, when he ap-
peared for the first time before Queen
Isabella, offered her sweet potatoes
among the fruits and products of the
‘New world which he brought back
with him. Oviedo, who wrote in the
Sixteenth century, had seen the sweet
potato cultivated by the natives of
Santo Domingo and had himself intro-
Spain. Early writers said also that it
was from Spanish America that the
sweet potato was taken to Manila
and other eastern islands, whence it
spread into the Malay archipelago
and the South seas.
It is ‘also an argument on the side
of those who see an American origin
for this useful plant that no Greek,
Roman or Arab name for it has come
down to us from ancient history.
But there are also potent arguments
that it was known long ago in the
Orient. Breitschneider, the German
scientist, discovered references to it
in a book published in China as long
ago as the Second or Third century
of the Christian era. And there is
about as much authority for saying
that it was a native of Tahiti and
other South sea regions as for the
claim that it was introduced there by
the Spanish.
The old argument that the plant
would have been spread throughout
the civilized world much sooner than
it was, had it been a native of Asia,
gives added support to the claim for
American origin, as does the fact that
its principal spread in Asia and Eu-
rope has come since the discovery of
America.
As yet the true sweet potato has
not been found in an undoubted wild
state on the American continent. Yet
its cultivation in Virginia and the
southern part of North America be-
gan very soon after that region be-
gan trading with South and Central
America.
(@. 1928, Western Newspaper Union.)
What Flavor? “Emily, is there
anything you want in the town this
morning ?”’
“Yes; you might buy a jar of that
traffic jam I’ve been reading about.”
Puss!—“‘Don’t you
like a lovely flow-
Puss! Puss!
think Mary looks
er?”
“Yes; like one of these century-
| How the Useful Plants
Came to Mankind
By T. E.STEWARD
WNU Service
Rice
ICE, the principal food of the
teeming Eastern peoples, is na-
tive to China and to other warm,
damp, regions in the eastern and
southern parts of Asia, including
many parts of- India. As a cultivated
grain, however, it is the gift of China
to the world. For many centuries be-
ior Christ it was cultivated in China,
Siam and India, and much more re-
cently it spread into the Near East,
and thence into Egypt. At the time
of Alexander’s expeditions into India,
about 400 B. C. rice-growing had
reached Mesopotamia, but probably
not Egypt.
In the annual ceremony of planting
instituted by the Chinese emperor,
Chin-nong, in 2800 B. C., rice plays
the principal part among the five
food plants sown, which are rice,
wheat, sorghum, millet and the soy
bean. All of these were presumed by
Chin-nong to be native to China. Cer-
tainly rice was, as was the soy bean.
In a treatise on the origin of rice,
De Candolle reports that, “the Old
Testament does not mention rice, but
a careful and judicious writer, Rey-
pier, has remarked several passages
in the Talmud which relate to its
cuitivation. These facts lead us to
suppose that the Indians cultivated
rice after the Chinese and that it
spread later toward the Euphrates,
earlier, however, than the Aryan in-
vasion into India. A thousand years
elapsed between the existence of rice
cultivation in Babylonia and its
transportation into Syria, whence it
was introduced into Egypt only after
the interval of two or three centuries
more. There is no trace of rice
among the grain remains in tombs,
or any depiction of it in the paint-
ings of ancient Egypt.
A wild rice that belongs to the true
family grows abundantly in_ certain
districts of the northern United
States. Wild rice also grows abun-
dantly in some parts of India.
It was inevitable, however, that a
country so well adapted to agricul-
ture conducted by irrigation as Egypt
was, should eventually adopt rice. It
was carried into Spain by the Arabs
during the Mocrish domination of the
Iberian peninsula, but was not culti-
vated in Italy until 1468. About the
middle of the last century it was
brought to America as a field crop
and planted in Louisiana, where it
now flourishes, as it does on some of
the adjacent lands in southern Tex-
as, along the gulf coast.
The Sanskrit name for rice was
erunya, the ancient Greek, oruzon,
the Arab name, rouz or arous, from
which came the Spanish arroz. It
can be seen that the English ~ord
bears a clese relationship to these.
(©. 1928, Western Newspaper Union.)
Information Wanted—De Long—I
understand you are taking a course
in memory culture.
Shortleigh—Yes, that’s right.
De Long—Have you got far enough
along to remember that $5 you bor-
rowed of me last summer ?—Boston
Transcript.
Two girls, sisters, had their wed-
ding ceremonies performed in an air-
plane speeding over Baltimore. But
then they had to come down to earth,
plants.”—Yale Record.
just like all brides.
How the Useful Plants
Came to Mankind
By T.E.STEWARD
WNU Service
Wheat
Ma and wheat seem always to
have been tegether. Wheat is
in the picture of the life of mankind
at the earliest point at which science,
research and investigation have
been able to give that picture an out-
line. Its cultivation in China goes
back at least 2700 years B. C. In the
remotest civilizations of the Valley
of Mesopotamia of which any record
has been obtained, wheat was a
staple crop and staple food. The |
scientist Unger found grains of
wheat in the bricks of a pyramid at
Dashur, Egypt, which is believed to
date from 3359 B. C. and wheat
grains of the same form have come
from Stone age remains and rubbish
heaps in the Swiss lake country and
in Hungary.
Whether Aryan, Chinese, or Stone
age European of a type long since
disappeared, mankind has had wheat
at every point at which science has
revealed anything accurate of his
life.
The distribution of wheat, there-
fore, and the manner in which it was
spread from one country to another
cannot be described. The dispersal
of this immensely valuable fcod grain
had been accomplished by the most
primitive men before history begins
to depict them.
From this situation it might seem
probable that| wheat, ages ago, grew
wild at a it many different places
and was brought under cultivation by
man, not at ane isolated spot, but at
different places about the globe. This
assumptien is probably a wrong one.
The best evidence obtainable, which
is slight, together with the greatest
probability, which is very strong. is
that wheat i3 a native of the Meso-
potamian region.
That wheqt did originally grow
wild in Mesdpotamia was stated by
one Berosus,|a Chaldean priest, whose
statement hag been preserved by the
historian Hefodotus. The “Odyssey”
of Homer, tglling of the travels of
Ulysses, relates that wheat was found
wild in ancignt Sicily. Others have
made the safe claim, but as yet it
remains unstbstantiated as far as
modern scien is concerned.
Wheat is frequently referred to in
the Hebrew scriptures. Ancient
Greek and Ilalian writings attribute
its origin td some deity, such as
Ceres, afterfjwhom the cereals are
named; Isis @r Triptolemus,
There is mo exact proof of the lo-
cality in whith wheat originated, but
the best guess if guess it must be, is
that it camg from the principal re-
gion of ancidit civilization, the Meso-
potamian diftrict between the rivers
Tigris and Eiphrates.
(©. 1928, Western Newspaper Union.)
-—
His Only Rfuge—“I'm glad to see
you come t@ church so often with
your wife,” %id the minister.
“Better nal give me too much cre-
dit, parson,”’fwas the reply; “it’s the
one place were my wife keeps her
mouth closed and lets some one else
do the talkifk.”
Got a KickOut of His Job.—“What
became of phat hired man you got
from the cit§?”
“Aw, he ed to be a chauffeur,
and one dayhe crawled under a mule
to see why ifwouldn’t go.”
MEYERSDALE COMMERCIAL, THURSDAY, JANUARY 3,1929
Grow Plants For Early Use In
Sash Greenhouse
It is quite a problem for many veg-
etable growers, who operate on a
small scale, to obtain economically
early plants properly grown, free
from diseases and insects, and from
the best known seed sourses. Hot-
bed plants are not early enough and
southern-grown plants have not prov-
ed satisfactory.
Seeking a solution for this pro-
blem, W. B. Nissley, vegetable gar-
dening extension specialist of the
Pennsylvania ' State College, three
years ago designed a small sash
greenhouse for growing early plants.
This house is 10 by 18 feet in size
and is heated by an old discarded
coal stove, or by gas. The greatest
cost of the structure is 12 standard 3
by 6-foot hotbed sash. For the
framework 2 by 4-inch lumber is
used. The sides and ends below the
glass are closed up with plain boards.
These are covered with single-ply
roofing paper and weather boarding
placed on the outside. The posts
and much of the other material can
be found as scrap lumber on the av-
erage farm. The actual cost of con-
structing such a house averages $75.
When built according to this plan the
house will be cheap, very tight, and
thoroughly practical for the small
grower.
About 30,000 plants can be grown
in this house each season. The first
sowing of seed generally is made
about the middle of February. A
month later plants from this seeding
are placed in the coldframe for hard-
ening. Immediately the house is fill-
ed again with transplanted plants,
which in about another month will
be transferred to the cold frame.
The plants are grown in flats about
three inches deep and of convenient
size. This makes it easy to transfer
the plants to different parts of the
house, to the cold frame, or to the
field for transplanting.
Plans for the construction of this
house may be obtained from County
Agent C. C. McDowell or directly
from the Department of Vegetable
Gardening Extension, State College,
Pennsylvania, They are so simple
and concise that the average person
will have no difficulty in following
them.
Milking Results Tell: Which Feeds
Pay Best
“Bossie” must pay for her feed if
she is to return profits to her owner.
One of the greatest savings possi-
ble in dairy feeding comes from feed-
ing according to a cow’s production.”
A low producer should not be fed as
much as the cow able to produce a
large quantity of milk. Fed the
same, the low producers will wipe out
the profits of the good milkers. Feed
the good cows all they need and cut
down on the feed of the low produc-
ers. One pound of grain for 3 to
3 1-2 pounds of milk daily to Guern-
seys and Jerseys and one pound
grain for 3 1-2 to 4 pounds of milk
daily to Holsteins and Ayrshires, is a
good rule to follow. The grain mix-
tures will vary depending somewhat
on the breed of cows, the kind of
roughage on hand, and the home-
grown feeds available. The Agricul-
tural Extension office will help any
farmer work out a ration for his
cows if information on breed, rough-
age, home-grown grain, purchased
feeds and their prices is furnished
him.
There are many commercial feeds
on the market put out by honest and
intelligent manufacturers. These
should be purchased on quality and
feeding results. In fact, any ration
whether home-mixed or commercial
should be judged by actual feeding
results. The only person who can
exercise this judgement is the one
who feeds the cows and the only way
he can tell is by keeping some simple
records which show what feeds re-
turn the greatest amount of milk per
dollar expended.
Use Shrubs To Set Off Home
Grounds
Shrubs have a place of their own
in landscaping the home grounds.
Use shrubs for border planting
along property lines, for screening
and separating the different areas of
the property, for hedges, for founda-
tion planting at the house, and as
individual and group specimen plants
at different points on the grounds.
Endeavor at all times to arrange
shrubs in groups and use several
plants of the same species in each
group. Let these groups, in turn,
unite with each other to form mass-
es, for example, at the foundation of
the house.
Too many free standing single spe-
cimen plants should never be used on
the lawn, especially on small areas
as this tends to clutter up and make
the area appear even smaller. Two
or three well-chosen and well-placed
specimen plants generally are suffi-
cient on the average home ground.
Taller growing shrubs are used to
emphasize certain important points,
such as entrances and corners of the
house. This will give varied height
to the planting and form what is
‘Uncle S Sam Printer
The Red Wing, Minnesota, Repub-
lican said editorially, November 12,
1928:
“Uncle Sam’s Post Office Depart-
ment, which it is ‘estimated will have
a deficit of $100,000,000 during the
present fiscal year, will continue in
the business of competing with local
printers in the furnishing of printed
envelopes, having recently awarded a
contract involving more than $15,000,-
000 in this connection.
“This means that one concern will
have a monopoly of this amount of
this amount of gross business, a large
portion of which will be diverted from
country publishers, who are practi-
cally the only class of business men
with whom the government competes
in this manner.
“The injustice of this practicess all
the more marked because the print-
ing is done for an additional charge
of only a few cents a thousand over
the cost of the plain envelopes—a
charge so small that it covers only
a fraction of the cost. The envelopes
alone are priced higher than neces-
sary in order to cover a portion of
the loss on the printing, but the cus-
tomer thinks he is getting a bargain
because of this juggling of price guo-
tations.
“Having been victims of this un-
fair competition for half a century,
it is little wonder that country edi-
tors are practically a unit in opposi-
tion to government operation of busi-
ness enterprises. All fair-minded
business men should assist the Na-
tional Editorial Association in its ef-
forts to eliminate this Socialistic and
un-American practice.
“There would be as much justifica-
tion for the operation of retail stores
by the government as there is for the
retail sale of printed envelopes in
competition with local printers.”
BLOOD-RED LAKE
Bakersfield, Cal., Dec. 26 (Auto-
caster)—A blood-red lake fifteen
miles South of Maricopa is a phenom-
enon attracting the attention of stu-
dents for miles around.
WALKS UNDER LADDER
Evanston, Il1l., Dec. 26 (Autocaster)
—Mrs. A. F. Krieter was not super-
stitious, so walked under a ladder
leaning against a building. The lad-
der fell and fractured her skull.
known as “skyline.”
Whatever you do in planting, do
not take everybody's word for it.
Find a good example but do not copy
it. Adjust it to your own home
grounds.
C. C. McDowell, County Agent.
ELECTRICITY BRINGS
SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
In gpite of the steady increase in
recent years in the amount of elec-
tricity produced in the United States,
the number of generating stations in
operation is 543 less than in 1920, ac-
cording to the United States Geolog-
ical Survey. Small stations of un-
certain efficiency, are being replaced
by large stations serving wide terri-
tories.
An electric company can adequately
serve a single community only when
it can reach a large closely settled
population. In sparsely settled see-
tions, the area served must be suili-
ciently large to overcome the small-
ness of the population. To meet this
need, pooling of power resources
through interconnection of {ransmis-
sion lines, was [Rovsted, and - with
outstanding success.
The result of this system is shown
in an important agricuitural state.
Fifteen years ago a public utility in-
vestment company acquired nine
plants in as many small towns and
connected them into a unified system.
From year to year more plants were
added until the total, at present, is
140 in towns with average populations
of 1800.
Previously, 46 of these towns had
no electric service and many of them
would have none today if they still
were forced to depend on local plants.
Of those which had electricity, 33 had
only night service, and the remaining
communities were served by small
plants with limited facilities and at a
high cost. Now all the communities
receive continuous high-grade service.
Industrial decentralization, farm
electrification and social development
of small communities are to a great
extent the result of uniform distribu-
tion of electricity.
“Let there be light,” murmured the
raven haired beauty as she drew
forth the peroxide bottle.
WITH THE POPULARITY OF
GOLF, SOME, LINKS PERSUADE
HEAD GEARS AND BULLET
PROOF VEsTs!
Jade
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2 An Independent Paper a
[=v . : Ws
x For the Reading Public 2S
=3 £
hI . vin A
2D This paper solicits your patronage on no other =
5) basis than dollar for dollar value. The popular SH
5 subscription price of $1.50 a year will appeal to =
= those who take no county paper and to those Ge
who desire to add the Commercial to other =]
papers that are coming into their homes. &3
Lo The advertiser will find the Commercial a con- ool
= venient medium for reaching the buying public.
BG Clean, newsy and attractive in appearance, the
a )
= literary part of this paper will enhance. the
nS value of the advertisements that will adorn its
AD
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BE]
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229