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More Than
T
No Time For SLACKERS
It is difficult to understand the lethargy of the average
.v farmer. He admits his dissatisfaction with the price he
sives for his milk; he is, most of the time, completely be-
ered by the complex price schedules by which he is paid,
| he complains that he cannot show a profit but he scarcely
fts a finger to help the handful of leaders who are trying to
nt his case to the public.
Since last spring the dairyman in this section has had a
tting organization which has, with limited finances and
agre co-operation, done an amazing job of winning conces-
s from the State Milk Control Board. For the first time,
producers here have a good opportunity to unite solidly
d conscientious leaders who are ready to lead the attack
‘a long-standing problem. These leaders (Clift Space of
allas is one of them) have already spent more time and money
: they can afford in pushing the dairymen’s cause. They de-
re a better support from the men for whom they have been
ing.
One way a dairyman could prove that he is willing to carry
share of the battle would be for him to turn up at the meet-
g to be held by the Milk Producers’ Association at Scranton
xt Wednesday. What he will learn there will be well worth
5s rip. »
CHEERFUL NEWS
Well, it looks as if a merry Christmas indeed is in store for
and wholesale merchants, and their customers, too.
There's a handsome bulge in consumer pocketbooks result-
from the sharp upward course business has followed of late.
‘least 1,600,000 persons have gone back to work in non-
ultural industries since May. Though normally industry
sins to slack off seasonally around November, it didn’t hap-
) this year. In fact, employment gained slightly during the
nth. Also, for 11,000,000 or so investors in stocks of Amer-
n corporations, better business means bigger dividends;
ably more in 1939 than last year. And this is the week
1 Christmas Clubs begin to lay on the line the $350,000,000
ed by some 7,000,000 depositors during 1939. ina
‘These ‘are some of the factors which indicate that retail
; of holiday merchandise will be the best in 10 years.
: No Last FRONTIER
Our last frontier is gone,” sigh the historians who read
history of America as the pushing forward of the frontier
e Atlantic to the Pacific. That offered to ambition and
rprise a field of unlimited opportunity. And now that we
achieved the conquest of the continent, what are we to
Are we to lament with Alexander that there are no more
‘to conquer? The westward march of our frontier meant
w lands to make fruitful, to plant with wheat and corn or to
rive out the buffalo and replace them with domestic cattle.
I he historians are right—that frontier is no more.
Yet there are other frontiers which are beyond their cal-
culation. These frontiers are not geographical. They are not
mea they are the frontiers of knowledge and of
vention. The frontiers of the new sciences which year after
and high
ation into actualities. Our old frontier had a definite
measured in miles;
ear are being advanced from the realm of pure theory
"That limit was reached. But the frontiers of the mind of
‘man have no limits and no measure.
Qur great-grandfathers saw steam revolutionize the world.
in our day have seen the marvels of the automobile and
: Have our people come to their Pacific when we
say surely that progress is stopped? Not at all. Our genius
airplane.
invention means new frontiers for us to push forward, great,
, and as yet undreamed of worlds to conquer. We are not
static people. . We never have been content to sit down and
atisfied that all has been done that man can do. The great
ing in our history has been our inability to stay put. We have
always been pushing forward to new and larger fields of en-
savor. There is and can be for Americans no last frontier.
A SIGNIFICANT AWARD
~The Nobel Prize situation this year attracted an unusual
amount of attention because there was no peace prize awarded.
That, of course, was only natural, since war was blazing all
around the prize-giving country.
Interest in the peace prize story, however, unfortunately
listracted attention from the other prizes. One of these point-
ed a very interesting moral.
The award in question went to Professor Gerhard Domagk
or his discovery of a cure for pneumonia, meningitis, and a
umber of other of man’s most “difficult” diseases. And there
was one particularly interesting fact about the situation which
was more or less lost in the shuffle. It was the fact that the
ward was made to a man who conducted his researches, not
ith the aid of some university or hospital, but with the aid
‘industry.
5
javie aiche
SECOND
THOUGHTS
Headaches have been trans-
lated almost completely out of
their meaning of physical pain.
If you accept Alexander Wool-
cott’s dictum that the only cure
for a hangover is suffering, or
if you prefer Westbrook Peg-
ler’'s more tragic pronounce-
ment that the only cure is
death, that’s the end of the
physical side of the problem.
Your radio will offer other pal-
liatives, but don’t believe it.
Your correspondent knows a
gentleman who recently sub-
scribed to belief in the remedial
administration of so mild a
thing as aspirin, then spent all
of a night in subconscious
wandering through mazes of
dreams in technicolor. But
pity for him is secondary to
sympathy for the man or group
of men who must undergo the
ordeal of budget-balancing in
Luzerne County. There's a
headache for you.
For instance: Looking in up-
on John A. MacGuffie the oth-
er day was an experience that
might be best depicted by one
skilled in photomontage. Every
time the president of the Lu-
zerne County Commissioners
lifted a paper from the file on
his desk he was met by a new
poser, a new problem, a head-
ache whose cure is readily
available in only that which
MacGuffie like to avoid, a tax
rise.
In your county set-up you
have the spenders and the sav-
ers. What's to be done when
in the last month of a budget
year your judges decide to add
$500 to the pay of each court
attendant? And what about
the related certainty that for
the next budget there will be
demand that clerks assigned to
the courts be placed on at least
'a pay par with the uniformed
group whose most severe men-
tal labor is in waking up to a
ten o’clock roll call?
Your courts can upset a bud-
get, if the judges are so in-
clined. They've already done
so. A job created by the Bench,
or many jobs so created, need
only the magic words “by order
of court,” with a jurist signa-
tory thereto, and the effect is
the same as that produced in
| medieval times by a command
from the throne.
On MacGuffie’s desk lay a
bill for $2,400. It is more than
two years old and it represents
a contract entered between a
publishing house and the late
William Swan MacLean, when
he served as president judge.
There can be no question that
the judges should have each a
set of Vail’s Law Digest; but,
what about the further fact
that the price per set is $400?
The county commissioners
must ask bids on every expen-
diture of $300 or more.
The Legislature of 1939 re-
jected proposals that the coun-
ty business heads be given a
salary of $7,500. Imagine!
Corporations dealing in a busi-
ness with resources of four
| hundred million dollars would
pay a secretary that much. The
man at the head of a sales or-
ganization producing a profit
of more than a quarter million
dollars a year would get ten
taxes for an equal result in
only one department of your
county structure, a department
operated at an overhead cost
lof $17,000.
WINTER
His breath like silver arrows pierced the air,
The naked earth crouched shuddering at his feet,
His finger on all flowing waters sweet
. Forbidding law—motion nor sound was there;
Nature was frozen dead,—and still and slow,
‘A winding sheet fell o’er her body fair,
Flaky and soft, from his wide wings of snow.
FraNCES ANNE KEMBLE.
Yet, in the Dallas district,
i the Sixth district, only a few
more than seventy per cent
| of the enfranchised citizens
| thought enough about county
| economy to go to the polls and
| vote.
*
Well, life is funny or tragic,
according to the way you live
it. What amused this scrivener
| most one night this week was
| to listen to a conversation in
! the home of a very fortunate
| citizen. A dreamy-eyed young
* *
lady, a) college graduate, was
Howarp W. RisLEY
HoweLrw E. Regs
times the pay accorded from
Hla
A Neswpaper — A Community Institution
THE DALLAS POST
EstaBrisaEp 1889
A Liberal, Independent N ewspaper Published Every
Friday Morning At The Dallas Post Plant, Lehman
Avenue, Dallas, Penna, By The Dallas Post, Inc.
Entered as second class matter at the Post Office at Dallas, Pa.,
under Act of March 3, 1879.
General Manager
Managing Editor
Mechanical Superintendent
2,
affairs.
THE POST’S CIVIC PROGRAM
1. A modern concrete highway leading from Dallas and
connecting with the Sullivan Trail at Tunkhannock.
A greater development of community consciousness
among residents of Dallas, Trucksville, Shavertown, and
Fernbrook.
3. Centralization of local fire, and police protection.
4. Sanitary sewage systems for local towns.
5S. A consolidated high school eventually, and better cos 5
operation between those that now exist.
6. Complete elimination of
7. Construction of more sidewalks.
politics from local school
T THINGS FIRST
a; 2
= = Dll < N
Uh eoNERWNCY £2
=
—y
Edith Blez
THE SENTIMENTAL SIDE
Somewhere several years
ago, in a biography written by
a young English poet, I came
across a line or two which have
stuck in my mind ever since. I
can’t remember the exact
words but I do remember that
the writer expressed the long-
ing to be able to go back some-
where in the recesses of his
mind, and walk up a very fa-
miliar garden path, open the
door of his boyhood home, and
find upon opening it some of
the pleasant things he used to
do when he was growing up.
* * *
I wonder if many of us do
not feel the same way. When
we begin getting to the age
where life seems to be nothing
but work and the business of
earning a living, wouldn’t we
like to recapture some of the
excitement, and some of the
realness and sweetness of the
things we never suspected were
important when we were doing
them. It is strange, too, what
things we do remember when
we think back. We never seem
to remember the unpleasant
things, we never seem to re-
member the big things, but it
is the small unimportant hap-
penings which pop up so unex-
pectedly. Sometimes it almost
seems that they have been
waiting patiently, somewhere
in the dim background, to be
lived again.
*
* *
I wonder if any of you re-
member some of the things I
remember? Can you think
back to the grand feeling of
waking up on Saturday morn-
ing and knowing it was a day
to play and not a day to go to
school and sit quietly for four
or five hours. Saturdays were
much better than any other
day of the week. They even
began differently. There was
a strange excitement in the air.
There was nothing to do but
play unless, of course, someone
in the house had other ideas.
But even a few chores around
the house didn’t seem to make
any real difference. Saturday
silent in the din of exchanged
opinions on war. Others dis-
counted Hitler, Stalin; a cou-
ple preached the merits of So-
cialism, but always there was
war as the keynote.
And on the way home, the
dreamy-eyed young lady turn-
ed to her escort and said:
“What war was it they were
talking about? I didn’t know
there was any fighting going
on.”
was a gala day, a day which
was always too short, a day
filled with a sweet freedom
which never seemed to come on
any other day of the week.
* * *
I like to remember the first
spring evenings along in the
last part of April and the first
of May when the days were
growing longer and we were al-
lowed to stay out a little long-
er in the evening. We tried to
rush through supper and we
couldn’t understand why the
big folks lingered so long. The
gang gathered to play hide and
seek or hop-scotch or some-
times it was jumping rope and
jacks. Games always seemed
so much better on the first
spring evenings. We were not
weighed down with heavy
coats and the new warmth in
the air brought visions of sum-
mer and swimming and pic-
nics. We always hated to hear
the door open and hear some
one say. ‘Come on children,
you have been playing long
enough. It’s time for bed.”
* * *
Then there were the days be-
fore Christmas. Those days
when Santa Claus was a reality
and we spent long hard hours
trying to cut a long list of
things we wanted but knew
we couldn’t get. It was a lot
of trouble to make the list
short enough. Then we be-
gan counting the days, the
minutes, then the seconds.
Each night when we crawled
into bed it seemed cruel to
have to wait another day.
Sometimes it snowed and when
the storekeeper began stack-
ing tall, fragrant trees outside
the store windows it was al-
most too much. We felt sure
we couldn’t wait another min-
ute. There were always
strange packages coming to the
house. Then the final night
arrived and we couldn’t get to
bed fast enough. We closed
our eyes but sleep refused to
come. Somewhere outside we
could hear people singing and
downstairs there was a lot of
moving around and whisper-
ing. Then somehow we fell
asleep and in the first light of
dawn, long before anyone else
was awake, we crept down-
stairs to catch a glimpse of the
tree as it gleamed in the dark.
We took one good look and ran
back to bed again. We had
gotten what we wanted and
now the bed was warm and we
crawled under the covers sat-
isfied to sleep until the rest of
the household decided to wake
up. he
THE LOW DOWN FROM
HICKORY GROVE
Doing something for
the farmer is mow the
popular slogan. A better
name for it would be “Do-
ing the farmer.”
Uplifts go in waves, but
the finish is always the
same — somebody gets
elected to something.
I know a farmer ower
there back of Harvey's
Lake and brother, he has
ideas on the Govt. doing
something for the farmer.
He is a regular guy. Jo,
he says, do you know what
I'm going to do? And I
says, mo. Well, he says,
maybe they will put me
in jail, but I don’t give a
hoot; I'm fed up on super-
vision, I'm going ahead
and just farm. You gotta
have a slide rule and a cal-
culus, and even then you
can’t tell what they want
you to do or vice versa.
Everything is uplift and
supervision. Showing a
boy how to roll a hoop,
that is the play ground
Supervising Commission-
er’'s job. Boy, we are a
hot bunch.
Yours, with the low down,
JO SERRA.
The Mail Bag
I was slightly amused and
more than slightly annoyed the
other evening when driving on
a back street in Dallas to find
the street almost blocked by
the car of a councilman who
lived directly opposite the
town’s Burgess. I suppose
parking his car on the wrong
side of the street is the privi-
lege of a town father but as a
taxpayer I'd like some privi-
leges for my money.
These men put down laws
for us to go by. It would seem
to me that in this town, park-
ing on two sides of the street
could be eliminated to one side.
If the law says two sides, two
sides it must be but when a
councilman has two neighbors
who park their car correctly it
would be to his credit and to
the advancement of the town
if he, also, would park his car
behind or in front of theirs
and free the road for the mo-
torist coming up the hill, at
least face it the correct way.
I hope that in the near fu-
ture, when I again travel the
road that I've paid for, I find
it slightly more accessible.
—~CriTIC.
ToMORROW
He was going to be all that
he wanted to be—
Tomorrow.
No one should be kinder or
braver than he—
Tomorrow.
A friend who was troubled
and weary, ‘he knew—who’d
be glad of a lift—and who
needed it, too—on him, he
would call and see what he
could do—
Tomorrow.
Each morning he stacked up
the letters he’d write—
Tomorrow.
And thoughts of the folks he
would fill with delight—
Tomorrow.
It was too bad, indeed, he
was busy today, and hadn’t the
minute to stop on his way.
“More time I will have to give
others,” he'd say—
Tomorrow.
The greatest of workers, this
man would have been— !
Tomorrow.
The world would have
known him had he ever seen—
Tomorrow.
But, in fact, he passed on,
and he faded from view, and
all that he left here when liv-
ing was through, was a moun-
tain of things he intended to
do—
Tomorrow.
‘Fred M. Kiefer
There is a new indus y
growing up these days. It |
reaching robust proportions,
plaything.
I am speaking of model rail-
roading, and please don’t con-
fuse the toy train idea wi
scale modeling. For not only
are the modelers grown men
in many cases, but when going
in for this hobby thoroughly,
they either are when they sta
or they sooner or later become
master mechanics. hl
Building miniatures to scale
involves draughtsmenship,
electrical and mechanical en-
gineering, carpentry and land-
scape architecture. Over 100,-
000 American men and boys
are enthusiastically reprodu-
cing exact scale models in the
standard O, OO, and HO
gauges of the giant locomo-
tives on the high rails of to-
day. They build their own gen-
uine steel rail tracks and
switches, towers, signals, cross
gates and semaphores and op-
erate them by remote electric
control. They construct their
own rolling stock, miniature
factories, breakers, cities, vil-
fields and their tiny trees an
shrubs with every item to th
perfection of the scale they are
working in. Ely
* 0% *
| With it all they have adopt-
red the vernacular of the rail-
road, which is, strictly speak-
ing, a foreign tongue to most
of us.
deavored to present an example
of a highly improbable con-
versation (but using the natur-
al terms) between a railroad
find errors—most of you will
probably agree that it doesn’t
even make sense. 2
* * * EN
“Good morning,
says the Main Pin, “you're
looking better. Feel like tell-
run?”
tell you up to the time of the
meet. We weeded the garden
the main iron, so we beat er
on the back down the alley and
carried the mail. I ain’t the
sure was crackin’ the black dia-
monds when of a sudden the
hoghead lets out a yell and
wings ‘er. The calliope shud-
ders as the pig wipes the clock
an’ I hear tell even the monk-
teeth an’ one of ’em -hit the
grit. Maybe the switch hog
brownied or the snake bent the
wrong rail. I don’t know for
when we made the big hole he
was blowin’ smoke to a dead-
head and all of a sudden the
Zulus in the varnish began
bouncing around. Anyhow the
scissors bill on the red ball says
as how the bakehead told him
their hogger was wipin’ jerk
soup outa his eyes and don’t
see no red eye, if there is one,
and besides he didn’t get no
washout. Then the tea kettle
blew and me, when I come to,
I'm covered with lump oil and
that’s all, Mr. Goodtie, I know
about the damn cornfield.”
FREEDOM
The columnists and con-
tributors on this page are
allowed great latitude in
expressing their own opin-
ions, even when their
opinions are at variance
with those of The Post.
2
and it had its beginning as a
lages, mountains, rivers, wheat
official and the fireman of a
wrecked train. Railroaders may
best ash-cat on the line but I
GIMMER
5
Following, I have en-
Casey,”
ing what happened on the 4:
“Well, Mr. Goodtie, I can
on time. The Big O got a flim-
sy and we got the high ball for
¥
eys in the crumb box lost some
sure an’ the baby lifter says