"SECOND THOUGHTS
By javie aiche
‘tained a British soldier, but we got a
man was here and what’sabout it.
tion his ship) was killing time until
Fleet could be gotten into condition
What impressed your correspond
no particular strictures of censorship
officials and newspapers have been
overly reticent. It didn’t scare this
~ narrator to hear Wilder on what
~ has happened to England.
What has happened, he said, is
that there no longer is any port
in England where a war vessel
can be repaired. President Roose-
~ velt performed not only a timely
act but a service of salvation when
‘he opened up the American ship-
~ yards to the Dbattle-wagons of
England and permitted them to
heave to and have their wounds
dressed. If Cecil Wilder knows
his England, and it appeared that
“he did, the mere attempt to dock
and get a second breath is to in-
vite hell and damnation from the
~ skies. The German air fleet is still
that strong.
; But, isn’t there anything to talk
~ about, to write about, excepting
the suicide of civilization? A
while ago Joe MacVeigh suggested
to this scribbler that he might call
~ one day and ask that we appear
‘before his favorite service club to
talk about “The Advantages of
Living in Dallas.” The immediate
response was that it would be pre-
sumptuous in a slum dweller to
dare to canvass the joys of the
Back Mountain country, its allure
of leisure, its compensations in free
air and clear atmosphere.
~~ Now we know better. We have
lived almost a whole week with
your co-Editor Kiefer. And we
have found out that what we be-
lieved all along isn’t true. Fred
does have ' going-out clothes. It
had always seemed to your corres-
pondent that he habitually dressed
in dungarees, corduroys, woolen
sweat shirt, golf shoes, a disreput-
able hat, a pipe and the admirable
nonchalance of a chap who wasn’t
going anywhere and didn’t give a
dam if he never got there.
It was the same about Dallas.
Three lunches in the Tally-Ho, one
night in a bar-room, a Sunday re-
hearsal, one afternoon and two
nights of “Let Us Take Council’
summed up this scrivener’s achieve-
ment of the community that has
everything decent in the world, ex-
cept a swap of a country house for
a domicile in Kingston. We'll give
odds any time, honest to Gawd.
Yep, we actually got to rhyming
about it. Here goes:
BALLADE OF BEAUTY
Again they bloom, the apple trees,
And soon will follow plum and
berry,
And Pan is piping down the breeze;
Across the mesa light and airy
The birds in conduct exemplary
Full-throated are in rhapsodies.
It’s second-nature to be merry
Amid such ‘scenes, designed to
please.
The blossoms lure the honey bees
Though whimsy, quite imaginary,
~~ Would make of their small entities
The folk of dreams, each one a
fairy.
Of bees and fairies, pray be wary,
They're made to see and not to
Well, your correspondent is one up on Edith Blez. ‘We, too, enter-
time football star of Saint Thomas College, Cecil Wilder of (let's not men-
of the awful truth about what happens to a democracy when a conqueror
gets astride the hobby of world power.
a
lead on Miss Blez on why the young
Taken in tow by Paul Murray, one-
his particular unit of His Majesty's
to put back to sea. :
ent about Cecil Wilder is that he felt
or patriotism to give notice to some
Maybe, the United States, its
THE LOW DOWN FROM
HICKORY GROVE
If you were to ask the
next person you meet how
much do we average in
the U. S. A. per day for
fires, you would get some
wild answers.
I been reading where we
burn down—or up—
around 30 million dollars
a month. Brother, that is
hefty money. One million
per day is mot chicken
feed.
And also I was reading
where we could cut down
on fires by a half, easy as
shootin’ fish, by being
more careful. That is 500
thousand saved per day.
Flipping a hot cigarette
butt—without a look—is
the champion way to start
a fire.
Somebody is liable to
say, “What of it, I got no
forest or factory to burn.”
But if you have nothing
to insure your own self,
look at your gas man and
your barber, etc. They all
have insurance. The more
they dig up for insurance,
the more everybody has
to shell out for gasoline
and haircuts. I was tell-
ing Henry about it, and he
says, “Jo, if you figured
all that out on your own
hook, I been underrating
you.” If anybody ever
reads your stuff, he says,
they can believe you—this
time.
Yours with the low down.
JO SERRA.
Ee a
Of humankind they're more than
chary
And fragile as the floral frieze.
The Susquehanna flows at ease
Offside my desk (Prothonotary)
This far away its verdigries
Are scintillant, though quite con-
trary
On close approach. An eagle's aerie
Would hold right now allure to
tease .
A mood as pure as any dairy
And white as cream and cottage
cheese.
I’Envoi
Ah, Prince whose chest is brown
and hairy,
Whose lungs are free of whine
. and wheeze,
What matters that the world is
scary
The blooms are on the apple
seize,
trees.
OUR DEMOC
RACY by Mat
A TERT
Wd
ONE PER THOUSAND.
THE US. HAS THE OMLY SYS
Back oF ice CREAM IS THE STORY OF REFRIGERATION,
. 797% OF OUR FAMILIES EQUIPPED. OF MECHANICAL
REFRIGERATORS ALONE,ONE HERE FOR EVERY 7
PERSONS. IN CENTRAL EUROPE IT'S ABOUT
RAILROAD CARS, TRUCKS; AND COMMERCIAL VENDING
CE I
300 MILLION
GALLONS EATEN
A YEAR HERE.
IN EUROPE IT
HAS ALWAYS
IN WHICH THE U.S. LEADS THE WORLD —MORE THAN
gl
Er
5
1 RL ey
TEM OF REFRIGERATED
UNITS. FAST-GROWING, TOO, IS THE NUMBER OF
REFRIGERATING LOCKERS, “FOOD BANKS” FOR
FARMERS’ OWN VEGETABLES AND MEATS.
GIMME A MATCH
By
"FRED M. KIEFER
Harry Meiss called me on the
telephone one day not so long ago,
“Abe Lewis and I will pick you up
about one-thirty for crows,” he said.
“All right,” said I, and there they
were.
The day was cloudy and on our
third stop it began to rain. This
condition, although it soon had us
wet, mattered very little for the
crows were caw-ing. I had never
shot one of these blue-black wvil-
lains and now I have—one. Our
bag was nine, Harry blowing down
five and Abe three. This, the two
old crowers told me, was a very
bad shoot: Harry has killed as
many as fifty in a single day, while
Abes’ record is thirty-two. So, we
blamed it on the weather and let
it go at that.
We would leave the car alongside
the road and find some cover well
in the woods surrounding a small,
cleared space. After the first crow
was brought down it was hooked in
the crotch of a small tree or bush
where it was visible from above.
Each of us would at least partially
conceal himself under spreading
spruce boughs and Harry would be-
on the orchestration. Placing the
crow call to his lips he would huff,
he would puff and he would blow
and you'd think he had a crow in his
throat. The crows thought so, any-
how. :
Surprisingly we waited no time
at all until answering caws came
back and shortly the birds would
appear—very high. Upon seeing
the decoy they would come down
and in quickly and we would put
the guns to the use Mr. Remington
intended. :
Of course when they told me to
hide I thought they meant hide and
I did. I hid myself so completely
that I also hid any sight of the
crow I might have had. I didn’t
know they were there until Abe
and Harry had killed them. The
lattice-work of leaves and branches
above my head made getting a clear
view a job of some difficulty. Our
visitors would come in from
any angle and the finding of a hole
through which to shoot took just
enough time to allow the targets
to get away from it. I must have
looked like a rug-cutter, jitter-bug-
ging around under my tree but the
exercise was splendid.
My 16 mm movie camera accom-
panied me on the chance of getting
some action shots. After ‘hiding”
about twice I concluded this was
not to be. It seems to be a custom
with amateur photographers that
upon loading the camera—when
leaving home it must not be brought
back without exposing the film, This
regardless of whether any appro-
priate opportunities for good pic-
tures turn up or not. Therefore, we
faked about thirty feet.
In one very exciting scene, that
had us all on edge, a dead crow
THE SAFETY VALVE - By Post Readers
was draped in a low bush. Harry
and Abe, at the word “go,” moved
forward in the accepted Daniel
Boone crouch while I started the
machine. Apparently the great
woodsmen sighted the quarry sim-
ultaneously. Simultaneously they
shot and I hope the puff of black
feathers, which resulted, shows up
well in the picture. :
After this dangerous experiment,
Harry threw another dead bird into
the air; I followed it—I think—
in the finder; Abe shot. Of course,
the crow sailing up into the air feet
first looked exceedingly natural
while coming down its life-like ap-
pearance was phenomenal. It re-
sembled, as closely as I could vision,
a black hot-water bottle flumping
through space. It sounded like one,
too, when it hit the macadam high-
way. There was the usual explo-
sion of feathers after the shot. Oh,
well, I suspect Frank Buck did
things like this, too.
Harry took the much-shattered
birds along at the request of Hank
Pool who intends to give his friends
a grouse dinner at the Westmore-
land Club in the near future.
Here is a tip for Burgess Smith.
He might do the same and the next
time the Dallas Scotch Club is in-
vited to his home for a grouse din-
ner each of us would be served with
more than the square inch we got
last fall. MacVeigh and Ohlman
wouldn't know the difference any-
way, Bert.
He Respects Nobility
Editor, The Post:
My good and captious friend, J.
V. H., who taught me much of what
I know, and therefore must share
the responsibility for what I say
and do, has fault to find with my
viewpoint and invites me to write
again, more thoughtfully this time.
What would democracy be without
such friendly tiffs as the one I pro-
pose to engage in with J. V. H.
when I get home?
~ John has me suffused by the
emanations of Royalty, bedaz-
zled by the beauty of the Union
Jack floating from the bastions of
New Providence.” I'm sorry I must
deny a charge so prettily put. I do
respect nobility, John, whether it
appears in the royal family, 2 penni-
less poet or an honorable ditch-
digger. I do find beauty refreshing,
whether it be the Union Jack flut-
tering over Government Hill or the
sun setting over Huntsville dam,
and when the beauty has symbolic
meaning, I am doubly grateful for
the privilege.
J. V. H. errs in trying to inter-
pret me. Quite likely, his skep-
ticism is merely the suspicion of
the newspaperman for the wun-
frocked journalist who has sold his
soul to the publicity trade. John
thinks I want my country to go to
war which, unless he has a sad
opinion of me, means that he thinks
I want to fight. As a matter of
fact, I am as confused as he is. I
only know that I can admire Joe
Louis’ left jab without wanting to
get in the ring and get pasted by
his opponent. .
J. V. H. is correct when he speaks
of the Bahamas’ poverty. You are
off base, though, John, when you
say that tourists are asked not to
a community institution”
THE DALLAS POST
ESTABLISHED 1889
“More than a newspaper,
A non-partisan liberal
progressive newspaper pub-
lished every Friday morning
at its plant on Lehman Ave-
nue, Dallas, Penna., by the
Dallas Post, Inc.
Entered as second-class matter
at the post office at Dallas, Pa.,
under the Act of March 3, 1879.
Subscriptions, $2 a year, payable
in advance.
Single copies, at a rate of Sc
each, can be obtained every Fri-
day morning at the following
newsstands: Dallas; Hislop’s Rest-
aurant, Tally-Ho Grille; Shaver-
town, Evans’ Drug Store; Hunts-
ville, Frantz Fairlawn Store.
Editor and Publisher
HOWARD W. RISLEY
Associate Editor
MYRA ZEISER RISLEY
Contributing Editors
FRED M. KIEFER
JOHN V. HEFFERNAN
Mechanical Superintendent
HAROLD J. PRICE
visit the sections where such pov-
erty is apparent. They do, and if
you will accept my repeated invita-
tion to come down to visit me I
promise to conduct you there my-
self, to hear you admit that the
colored family which lives in a 40-
cent-a-week cabin is happier than
either you or I. What do you pre-
fer, John, happiness or a Social
Security number? A ‘couple of
spots I seem to remember in Wyo-
ming Valley have fallen short of
Utopia, too.
All this talk about “aid to Eng-
land” seems to me to overlook the
basic fact that Hitler doesn’t love
us, either. If we go to war, Heaven
forbid, we shall be fighting in our
own defense, quite as much as we
are in Britain’s. And we shall not,
as John fears, be fighting for the
continuation of the class distinc-
tions which J. V. H, as a good
American, abhores, any more than
we shall be fighting for the preser-
vation of Luzerne Countys’ gang
politics, the Solid South’s medieval
share-crop system, the Ku Klux
Klan or the inverted class struggle
of the C. I. O.
There’s a revolution in the world,
John, and it's threatening even
your right and mine to argue like
this and write letters to the editor.
Fortunately, there’s a counter rev-
olution under weigh. Despite grave
obstacles, that counter revolution
has been gaining strength steadily.
We don’t even have to help Eng-
land if we're willing to pay the
price of isolation. We are still
masters of our own fate. All we
have to do is decide what sort of
a fate we want, and how much
we're willing to pay for it. We'd
better decide soon. It’s fun to
squabble, but too many nations
have already been bankrupted by
the high price of indecision.
That’s all, John.
Respectfully,
Howell E. Rees.
Nassau, Bahamas,
. |To please the desert and the slug-
THE SENTIMENTAL SIDE|
By EDITH BLEZ
the entrance hall?
warmth about a house I have never
FOOTNOTES
By EMMONS BLAKE
When I was much younger, a lit-
tle shaver in fact, I thought that
the greatest day in my life would
be the day I started to shave in
earnest. I had visions of a different
type of beard for every day of the
week and in no way doubted my
ability to produce them,
Now when I have reached that
stage and should shave every day I
find it a most boring task. There are
few things to alleviate the mon-
otonous ritual. I have tried timing
my shaves, in an effort to set a
record. But almost always these
record runs end in a spurt of blood
where I cut a corner too sharply.
Once or twice I have tried to draw
designs or letters, but the: limited
space hampers my aesthetic at-
tempts. Shaving while standing on
one foot, or with only one eye open
to destroy perspective have their
thrills but constant practice soon
brings perfection and thereby min-
imize the effect.
If I live out my normal life ex-
pectancy I shall have to endure
(barring a beard or camping trips)
21,900 shaves. At a conservative
three minutes per shave that means
forty-five days of ceaseless scrap-
ing.
Like every other boy I have tried
to grow a mustache. In fact I
have tried twice. The first time
was about two years ago. Three
times in a row I did not shave my
upper lip. As I hoped, my father
did not seem to notice, and hence
did not tell me to remove it. Two
months later I woke to the realiza-
tion that no one had noticed it,
and therefore in fairness to myself
I removed it. The second attempt
was very recent. On the whole
it was much more successful than
the first. It lasted two days, but
was most effectively squelched by
a remark of my father’s that went
somewhat as follows: ‘Hey, your
face is dirty.”
The thought of a full beard ap-
peals to me strongly. Not only
from an economical standpoint in
time and money, but also in the
aura of authority that glows around
one who can stroke his beard while
making an important decision, Also,
after the hair has grown out of the
bristle stage there is the point of
warmth in Wint—Gosh! I just hap-
pened to think,—if I live that long
what shall I ever do with the seven-
ty-five hundred used blades?
POETRY
THE RHODORA
J
=
a=
In May, when sea-winds pierced our
solitudes, :
I found the fresh rhodora in the
woods,
Spreading its leafless blooms in a
damp nook,
gish brook.
The purple petals fallen in the pool
Made the black water with the
beauty gay;
Here might the red bird come his
plumes to cool,
And court the flower that cheapens
his array.
Rhodora! if the sages ask thee why,
This charm is wasted on the earth
and sky,
Tell them, dear, that if eyes were
made for seeing,
Then beauty is its own excuse for
being;
Why thou wert there, O rival of
the rose!
I never thought to ask; I never
knew;
But in my simple ignorance suppose
The selfsame power that brought
me there brought you. |
—Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Have you ever walked into a strange house, a house you have never
entered before and discovered a strange something to which you could
give no name—something which seemed to greet you as you walked into
It has happened to me very recently and I would
certainly like to know why it is that I should feel such a comfortable
been in before.
The house certainly was not a familiar one and I hadn’t known the
present occupants very long but everywhere in the house I happened
to go something kept reminding me that here was a place that had been
lived in, here was a place where
people had lived, and died, and been
born, here was a house which had
really been a home; the walls, the
doors, the floors, everything about
the place radiated a familiar air of
comfortable warmth.
It wasn’t an elaborately furnished
place but the furniture seemed to
fit right in with the lay out of the
house. It was furnished exactly as
it should have been furnished if
you know what I mean. I felt that
it was furnished as the original
owners might have furnished it.
The dining room seemed to in-
vite intelligent conversation and
gracious eating and plenty of good
food attractively served. There
seemed to be plenty of time in that
house, it seemed to have always
been tenanted by people who lived
graciously, people who took their
time about living, people who
seemed to have left much of them-
selves behind them; they had left
something invisible but very evi-
dent.
The kitchen seemed filled with
the spirit of women who enjoyed
preparing meals, women who made
their kitchens their kingdoms. The
kitchen was large and airy and
filled with something a modern
kitchen knows nothing about. There
was room to move about, room to
sit down and chat, plenty of room
for a comfortable chair or two
which ‘I suspect were there years
ago when the women of the house
had time to visit a little while
they were doing their kitchen
chores.
I particularly like the long halls
and the high ceilings and the bath-
room which looked out over a
shady area in the garden. Every-
thing about the place was big and
wide and open; there was room to
live, room to raise a family, and
room for plenty of privacy.
Yes, Sir, that house had been
lived in and I suspect the original
owners have been dead some time
but they left something of them-
selves which the house will never
quite lose, and I sincerely hope that
the people who again take the house
for their own will cherish all it’s
good points and not destroy the
heart of it with too much modern
fixing. I suppose it would do the
floors good to be done over, and
perhaps a new bathroom would
help, but the house seems to cry
out against too much change. It
wants to retain as much as pos-
sible the dignity and graciousness
it has acquired with years of good
living.
Oliver's Garage
Hudson Distributor
DALLAS, PENNA.
“SMILING SERVICE ALWAYS”
MEN,
$1 A WEEK
Will Get You That
NEW SPRING
SUIT
We have over Twelve Hundred
Pleased Charge Accounts
OPEN AN ACCOUNT HERE.
18 years of square dealing.
Complete lines of Hi-Grade
Men’s, Boys’ and Students’
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LUZERNE
“JESUS LOVES M
Jesus loves mel this [ know, “2
For the Bible tells me so:
Little ones to Him belong,
They are weak, but He is stron
Yes, Jesus loves me,
Yes, Jesus loves me,
Yes. Jesus loves me,
The Bible tells me so
WV Little Stories
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GREAT HYMNS
Anna B arner who wrote’ m
May 13, 1941.
isi. uk
ANG
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‘For more than half a century children all over the world, even to
the interior mountains of China, have loved this hymn, and today
missionaries teach it to converts wherever they go. It was written by
remenbered for this if she had written nothing else.
9 &
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any bible stories, but would be
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HOWARD H.WOOLBERT
- FUNERAL DIRECTOR
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