SECTION B—PAGE 2
THE DALLAS POST Established 1889
“More Than A Newspaper, A Community Institution
Now In Its (1st Year”
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Allow two weeks for changes of address or new subscription
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Single ‘copies at a rate of 10c each, can be obtained every
Thursday morning at following newsstands:
Dallas—Berts Drug
Store, Dixon’s Restaurant, Helen's Restaurant, Gosart’s Market;
Shavertown—Evans Drug Store, Hall’s Drug Store; Trucksville—
Gregory's Store, Trucksville Drugs; Idetown—Cave’s Store; Har-
Sweet Valley—Adams
veys Lake—Marie’s Store;
Grocery;
Lehman—Moore’s Store; Noxen—Scouten’s Store: Shawanese—
Puterbaugh’s Store; Fernbrook—Bogdon’s Store, Bunney’ s Store,
Orchard Farm Restaurant.
Editor and Publisher— HOWARD W. RISLEY
Associate Publisher—ROBERT F., BACHMAN
Associate Editors—MYRA ZEISER
RISLEY, MRS. T. M. B. HICKS
Sports—JAMES LOHMAN
Advertising—LOUISE C. MARKS
Photographs—JAMES KOZEMCHAK
Circulation—DORIS MALLIN
100 Years Ago This Week...in
THE CIVIL WAR
(Events esgelly 100 years ago this week that led to the Civil War—
sold in the language and style of today.)
Naval Force Racks Up
: Big Win at
Gen. Butler
~ Leads 7 Ships
To Raider Base
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Aug.
! 25 A Union Naval force scored
‘a sharp vietory early today at
Hatteras Inlet, N.C., President
Lincoln was told tonight.
_ Bearer of the news was the
leader of the expedition, Maj.
~ Gen. Benjamin Butler, com-
- mander of Northern forces at For-
tress Monroe, Va.
Butler came directly to the capi-
%ol after the victory and reported
to Navy Secretary Gideon Welles
end Gustavus V. Fox, assistant
secretary.
The naval chiefs took the bub-
bling Butler to the White House
after Mr. Lincoln had retired.
They ordered guards to awaken
, the chief executive, who, it was
reported, met the enthusiastic trio
his nightshirt.
: Mr. Lincoln was said to
have been overjoyed at the
news.
As Butler related the operation,
an expedition of seven ‘warships
and two steamers earrying some
850 men—mostly troops of the 9th
and 20th New York Infantry—had
sailed two days ago from Fortress
Monroe, with Flag Officer. Silas
Stringham commanding the ships
“and Butler the men.
fin * *
HATTERAS had been chosen
because it was an operating base
for successful Southern raiders.
Protected by Forts Clark and Hat-
~ teras and strategically situated
~ on the cape that bears its name,
it was the home port of the famed
sidewheeler Winslow, which has
been playing havoc with northern
- shipping in the area,
stringham’s ships, armed
~ with 1l-inch rifles, battered
the smoothbore cannon instal-
lations of the Confederates for
three hours before the defend-
ers surrendered.
In the first big amphibious oper-
ation of the war, Union troops
went ashore to capture 715 pris-
oners, 1,000 muskets, and 30
pieces of artillery.
Five OCOonfederates were
J killed and there was one
Union fatality.
Butler’s successful raid fol-
lowed by only a few days Welles’
orders for intensification of the
bloekade of Southern ports.
> * *
A CONTROVERSIAL figure
sine his appointment as com-
mander of Massachusetts militia,
Butler was in civilian life a highly
suecessful trial lawyer with a per-
sonal fortune built through in-
; vestments.
Hatteras
GEN. BUTLER
Gladdens White House
He is widely reported to have
impressed President Lincoln with
a warning that so many Repub-
licans—and so few Democrats—
were being made Union officers,
that the Republican party’s
chances in the 1862 congressional
elections were endangered.
White House sources said that
Butler convinced Mr. Lincoln that
there would be hardly any Repub-
licans left to run against the stay
at-home Democrats.
The president then authorized
Butler to recruit 6,000 men—pre-
sumably, including a goodly num-
ber of Democrats—within 60 days
in New England. Butler promptly
filled the order.
Gen. U. S. Grant
Takes Command
At Cairo, 111
ST. LOUIS, Mo.—Aug. 28—Brig.
Gen. Ulysses S. Grant of Galena,
I1l., has been named to command
of the Union forces at Cairo, Ill.
The appointment was announced
by aides of Maj. Gen. John
Charles Fremont, commander of
Union forces in the west.
Grant will relieve Col. Richard
J. Oglesby at the vital encamp-
ment, perched on the bluffs over-
looking the Mississippi. The force
now numbers some 4,300 men—
3,800 of whom were ordered to
Cairo by Fremont five days after
his arrival in St. Louis July 25.
At that time Fremont advised
Washington that the Cairo detach-
ment was ‘‘very sick, with fever
and dysentary prevailing,” and
generally malcontented fo the
brink of desertion. In one of his
first acts, Fremont ordered sev-
eral river steamers into the port
for use as hospitals.
Copyright, 1961, Hegewisch News Syne
dicate, Chicago 33, Ill
Photo: Library of Congress.
2 Party For Han Symons
"Alan Symons, Harrls $01 3 oad
who ‘recently celebrated his sixty-
eighth birthday enniversary, was
honored et a family dinner at the
home of his eon end daughter-
in-law, Mr, and Mrs, Alan Symons,
Jr. and family in Bloomsburg.
| Attending were: Mr. and Mrs.
Howard Symons, Elizabeth and Ann
ySymons, Mr. and
Sarda Wyman. Vo. 4 Vin
Mrs. Earl Symons,
Earl, Jr. and Henry Symons, Mr.
and Mrs. Norman Symons, Elwood |
Michele Ren’e Wallace
Mr. and Mrs. Robert D. Wallace,
Sweet Valley, announce the birth of
an eight pound daughter in Nesbitt
Hospital, August 18, The new ar-
rival has been named Michelle Ren’e.
Mrs. Wallace is the former Beatrice
of Dealers Transit Co, Allentown.
Robert Ellsworth, Bertha and Elmer
Ellsworth, Mr. and Mrs. Alex Sear-
foss, Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Evans,
Kenneth and Helen Evans, the host
and bostess, and the guest of honor,
Morris, Mr. Wallace ig an employee |-
Yesterday
Ten, Twenty and Thirty Years
Ago In The Dallas Post
ir HAPPENED 3) YEARS Aco:
A legislative act amending the State
School Code required that all com-
missioned superintendents be col-
lege graduates and complete cer-
tain approved courses in admin-
istration and supervision.
In ‘Stella Presbyterian Church,
Forty-Fort, Miss Grace Miller, Wyo-
ming married Dr. J. C. Fleming,
Dallas.
Kingston Township School Board
named Mack and Sahm Architects
to draw up plans for the new high
school.
Charles A. Jones, 46, former resi-
dent of Dallas, died in Pittston Hosp-
ital.
Mrs. Ambrose Rutz, Dallas, re-
ceived a compound fractured leg
when she fell at Sandy Beach.
Edward Ellsworth was named
campaign manager for William H.
Evans, candidate for recorder of
deeds.
Eugene Eyerman, 3, suffered a
fracture to the left leg when hit
by an automobile at Kunkle.
Montross-Kitchen Reunion was
held at Walter Kitchen Grove, Ide-
town.
Descendents of John and Mary
Hilbert who came to America in
1836 from Bavaria, Germany held
a reunion in Fernbrook Park.
rr HAPPENED 2() YEARS AGO:
Rev. Charles H. Frick, pastor of
Huntsville Christian Church and
chaplain with the 109th Field Ar-
tillery at Indiantown Gap, was prom-
oted from Major to Lieutenant
Colonel. z
Celia Price, William Landarcher,
Harvey's Lake and Louis Carney,
New York, were rescued from stormy
waters off Harvey's Lake when their
sail boat capsized.
Sixty-three employees of Jim Oliv-
er’s Main Street automobile dealer
and garage company held their an-
nual outing at Harris Park.
Mrs. George Sawyer, Church
Street, walked off with most of
the honors at the Noxen W.S.CS.
flower show. She won firsts with
dahlias. gladiolii, Chinese forget-me-
nots and an arrangement.
Mrs. Allie Morris, Franklin Street,
the oldest living person born and
raised in Dallas Borough, celebrated
her 77 birthday.
Noxen tannery employees pre-
pared for Union election. The Threat-
ened! strike staved off.
wernor Fine signed. a bill
allowing youngsters below the legal
age of five years, seven months, to
enter first grade if proven ment-
tally and physically capable for first
grade. 3
Charles 'W. Steinhauer began
promoting local [Little League for
the Back Mountain.
Friends and relatives of Frank
E. Harvey entertained him on his
sixty-fourth birthday.
|
Phyllis J: Borkowski, {South Bend, |
Indiana, married Hanford Louis |
Eckman.
Mr. and Mrs. Edward Baer celeb-
rated their fifty-third wedding an- |
niversary.
Laura M. Pollock married Harold
Rose in the Shavertown Methodist
Church.
Mills Brothers three ring circus |
set up the big top om Route 415
northwest of Dallas.
Frederick U. Zimmerman, 66, died |
at Lehman.
Second annual reunion of the
Roushey family was held at the
Trucksville Fire House.
Robert Henderson was appointed
band leader and George Lewis named
mathematics teacher for Dallas
Township: .
Arden C. Steele, Sweet Valley,
wrote after three months as an
army enlistee, that life in camp
was enjoyable and constructive.
An ad ran: Send your soldier
boy the home towr: newspaper. One
dollar a year military rate; cheaper
than you can wrap and mail the
family’ copy.
Mrs. Rachael Wycoff was reported
“spry as ever’ on her 93 birthday.
Mrs. Sarah Ransom, 55, passed
away at her home.
Mrs. Flora Ide, Idetown, born in
1874, died after a lingering illness.
Clifford R. Fink was sent to Camp
Lee, Petersburg, Virgina for train-
ing.
John Trescott, 85, was guest of
honor at a family birthday dinner
in his honor.
rr nappENeD 1() YEARs Aco:
Dickie Clark won first place for
best boy handler in the Back Moun-~
tain Kennel Club Dog Show. Ginger,
the Clark’s boxer, was killed by a
hit and run driver several days later
at Wyalusing Rocks.
A letter from a native Korean boy
to Mrs. Elizabeth Wallo praised
her son Joseph's fine job as driver
for General, Soule,Admiral Jay and
General VanFleet in Korea.
Three clagsrooms at Lehman-Jack-
son School, located in the old gym-
nasium were nearing completion. It
was reported that classrooms would
be crowded until completion of the
shop wing and a Home Economics
room.
Flames from a oil ‘stove caused
several hundred dollars damage to
the home of Mr. and Mrs. Walter
Mead, Lehman-Idetown road.
The Wandell reunion was held at
lop’s Grove.
ar “Allie Morris celebrated her
gmaven oidden |
__THE DALLAS POST, THURSDAY, AUGUST 2, 1061
SHUR IRI
Half of the First Forty, who rode
on horseback into Wyoming Val-
ley in January and February 1769,
assembled in Lebanon, Conn., ac-
cording to the account given by
Mr. ‘William Brewster in his “His-
tory of the Certified Township of
Kingston”. This included three from
Lebanon, four from nearby Wind-
ham, about eight from eastern Con-
necticut and nearby Rhode Island,
and five from the southeastern part
of the state.
In those days, Lebanon, Settled
just before 1700, was an important
town in which resided a number
of important families. Jonathan
Trumbull, soon thereafter elected
governor of Connecticut, lived in
Lebanon and Mr. Brewster says his
home was visited by Washington,
Franklin, Jefferson, Samuel and
John Adams, Lafayette, 'Rocham-
beau, Sullivan, Knox, Putnam, Jay,
and others in those stirring times.
Trumbull was the only one of the
current governors who supported
the Revolution with all the resour-
ces he could get. Some of the others
were notorious Tories, especially the
son of Benjamin
governor of New Jersey.
Trumbull was awake to condit-
ions long before actual fighting
broke out. There is posted in Leb-
anon today a facsimile of a proc-
lamation he issued “At Hartford
the 9th day of March, in the 14th
year of our Lord King George the
Third, A. D. 1774” calling upon all
residents of the colony to observe
Wedesday the 13th of April next as
a Day of Fasting and Prayer for a
long list of things for which Divine
guidance was needed. He was care-
ful to include the health and welfare
Franklin, then.
; CCE C20 C3 SR
Rambling Around
By The Oldtimer—D. A. Waters
E0030 C0 ES ESE CEE
eH eT
Col. John Trumbull, son of the
governor, was active at the time
and later is said to have designed
the First Congregational (Church
which stands near the Trumbull
home. William Williams, a signer
of the Declaration of Independence,
lived in Lebanon and was a son-in-
law of Governor Trumbull. The
Trumbull home is now maintained
by the D.AR. as a museum.
The First Congregational Church
was built in 1804 and destroyed
in the hurricane of 1938. It was
restored and is now a good example
of the New England church built in
brick. Near the church formerly
stood Moore's Indian School, estab-
lished by Eleazer Wheelock, re-
moved in 1769 to Hanover, New
Hampshire, where it became Dart-
mouth College.
Today Lebanom is a little town
of about five hundred, surrounded
by farms. On some of these we ob-
served Brown Swiss cattle, not a
common breed elsewhere. On the
old village green, said to be about
the same as in colonial times, there
stands a wooden high school, not
impressive in style, about forty feet
high.
A number of local residents are
known to be descended from those
who assembled in Lebanon, Conn.
with the First Forty. The oldest that
comes to mind is Mrs. Amy DeWolfe
{ of Rice or Mill St. She is a descen-
dant of Peter Harris from East
Greenwich, R. I. who may have
lived in Plaingfield, Conn. He was the
father of Elijah Harris who settled
‘Harris Hill” in the Carverton
‘area.
Frank Jackson brought a boxful
of bird nests to the Dallas Post a
few days ago and lifted them gent-
ly out, ranging them on the counter.
“See this one?” he said, “Chances
are you've never seen a two story
nest.” a
He inserted a finger into a rip in
one side of the yellow warbler's
nest in ‘the crotch of the laurel
branch.
“When that nest was taken
down,” he said, “a man up in Nich-
olson wondered why it bulged at
the bottom, and he cut a flap in it
with a pair of shears.”
Frank demonstrated.
“That yellow warbler wasn't go-
ing to be sold down the river by any
cowbird. When she found a cow-
bird’s egg in her nest, she just wove
the nest shut at that point, burying
the cowbird’s egg along with an
egg of her own, and hastily wove
another nest right on top of the
first, finishing it just before she
deposited an egg in it. She laid
three more eggs, and three baby
warblers hatched. That's about the
only way there is of licking 8 cow-
bird.
* Frank opened a little pill-bottle.
“There's the egg the warbler left
for me. It’s less than half the size
of the cowbird egg.”
“And here's a nest that's made
to order. You hear people say that
an oriole won't build except in an
Birds Are A Lot Smarier Than You'd
Think They Are, Says Frank Jackson
Looking at
T-V
With GEORGE A. and
EDITH ANN BURKE
DOBIE GILLIS * Come this Fall, the
nation’s viewers will be seeing a
somewhat more mature Dobie Gil-
lis. He'll be out of the Army, a
student at a junior college and no
longer a teenager. As the series
goes into its third year, the hero
of this CBS-TV show will emerge
as a young man with 20 years of
life behind him. :
In reality Dwayne Hickman, who
portrays Dobie is 27-years--old.
An‘ intelligent, quick-witted and
articulate young man, different in
many ways from Dobie Gillis; bach-
elor Dwayne is working toward a
long career as a light comedian.
Despite the misgivings some per-
formers may have about playing
the same character on a weekly
show, ‘he does not believe that
being typed ‘as ‘Dobie Gills will
hurt him.
“If you prove you have ability,
you don't have to worry about
being typed,” he went on “Look
at Cary Grant. Wouldn't you say
that he’s a type? Or Jack Lemmon.
Isn’t he a type? And how about
Dick Powell, who started as a mus-
ical type and then went into the
heavy, private-eye stuff ?
‘lI wouldn’t mind at all if I'm
typed as a light comedian. Young
light comedians have been few in
Hollywood. Perhaps the movie per-
former in that category today is
Jack Lemmon.”
Dwayne already has piled up an
impressive list of acting credits in
his native Hollywood. The younger
brother of Darryl Hickman, co-star
of “The Americans,” he has been an
actor since he was 10 years old.
Before moving into the Dobie Gil-
lis series, he was featured for five
years onthe Bob Cummings show,
for which "he appeared in 175
episodes:
Before he joined the Bob Cum-
mings Show he was a full-time col-
lege student, majoring in Economics.
When he finally left college for a
regular television job, he was only
six units short of a degree.
JACK PAAR’S staffers are report-
edly job hunting for next year. They
evidently believe that Jack will ask
for his release from NBC in Janu-
ary.
MARTIN MILNER, co-star of ‘Route
66" can honestly say that he grew
up in show business. His father
was a film distributor and his
mother a dancer on the Paramount
Theater circuit.
As a child he got his first taste
of the theater as a 10-year-old
in children’s plays in Seattle. And;
from the moment his parents set-
tled in Hollywood, it was pretty
well decided that their only child
would become an actor.
Photo by Kozemchak
Rare Picture Of A Shy Little Thrush On Its Nest
elm tree, but that isn’t true. This
oriole built in a basswood tree, and
it used a lot of strings I cut up from
lack carpet warp. See where the
bird wove the strings in among the
white strands?”
Frank, a bird-lover from away
back, was bubbling with enthusiasm
about a recent trip he had taken
to a bird sanctuary near Cortland,
N. Y., where University of New
York ornithology students can ram-
ble over 6,000 acres of protected
land, studying the habits of wild
birds.
At the northern end the Btate
of New York raises wild birds in
incubators. Bird-counts in that area
show 250 species. Thousands of
geese annually stop over on their
long flights, with a count of 25,000
geese no rarity in a single season.
Out in the islands of Leke Cayuga,
banding of baby birds goes on in
season.
Pondsand dammed up streams pro-
vide good nesting grounds and
refuge.
- Frank’s daughter, Ruth Richards,
who is taking a summer course in
Ornithology at New York Univer-
sity for credits toward a degree,
accompanied Mr. Jackson on his
tour of the wild-life preserve in the
Finger Lakes district, and came
home with him to do intensive
study on material for her term
paper. !
Sudan were old * keep exact
His first big break came when he
"landed a part in the film “Life With
Father,” but just as the movie was
being completed, he suffered a polio
attack. Although his recovery was
complete, the recuperation slowed
his career. 5
He enrolled in the theater arts
department at the University of
Southern California. He continued
there for a year, before being in-
ducted in the Army in 1952. After
his discharge, it was more strug-
gling, and then finally landing roles
on television.
1957 was an important year for
Martin Milner.: He married TV act-
ress and singer Judy Jones, won an
important. role in Sweet Smell of
Success” and also landed a major
part in “Marjorie Morningstar.” His
latest movie, his first as a star is
“The Private Lives. of Adam and
Eve.”
He plays a carefree, footloose,
thrill-seeking young man on TV
but in real life, he is a serious, de-
voted family man whose hobby is
collecting early American furniture.
He and his wife and two-year-old
daughter live in Sherman Oaks,
Cal.
WILL (SUGARFOQT)
has been cut out of the “Cheyenne”
cast for next season. Clint Walker
and Ty Hardin will ride that range
alone.
BILL LEYDON - The emcee of “It
Could Be You” was seriously in-
jured in a hunting accident some
months ago - so badly, in faet, that
doctors still fear he may lose his
sight in that eye.
records of a nesting project, and
where better a spot than on the
rocky hillside at Harveys Lake,
where the Jackson yard climbs
steeply up the mountainside, and
saplings abound to provide neces-
sary privacy for a wood thrush?
The nesting thrush, wide-eyed
and vigilant, endured the flash of
Jimmie Kozemchak's camera, cover-
ing her fledglings closely as the
shutter clicked.
Ruth and her father are working
out a schedule of baby-sitting, and
by keeping close tabs on the nest,
have found out something new and
different.
At those times when father and
mother thrush are : panting from
their efforts to keep the hungry
mouths filled, a tiny wren watched
her chance, perches on the edge
of the nest, and delivers a dainty
mouthful to the babies.
Possibly a spinster aunt, opines
Frank, thwarted in her desires to
bring up a family of her own, and
willing to settle for being a good
foster mother to some other bird's
babies. ;
“Birds,” he concluded, “are a lot
body knows all the answers.”
HUTCHINS |
2 That he has made progress is, however, indisputable.
smarter than youd think, and no-
DALLAS, PENNSYLVANIA | ©
From
Pillar To Post...
‘by Hix
It is a far cry from the hideous red brick high school of my
youth to the beautiful modern building which will be opened to the
public for inspection Friday and Saturday of this week.
And a far, far cry from the little red schoolhouse, beloved of the
oldsters who, forget how the pot-bellied stove scorched their faces,
while drafts sifted through the rattling windows under the onslaught
of the first snowstorm of the season,
There is no return. Things were simpler then. Most of us are
prone to view childhood through a rosy mist, because it was our
own, and all things become more precious with the passage of time.
While it is perfectly true that a child who genuinely desires an
education can get it, in a logging camp, on a trip by sailing vessel
around Cape Horn, in a one-room schoolhouse or in front of his
own fireplace, studying by the light of a blazing pine knot, there
is no reason in these modern times why a child should not have
all the advantages that modern science can conjure up for him.
Most children accept education as part of a normal span of
growing up. Few of them would go out of their way or suffer in-
convenience in order to get it, if left to their own devices.
In what we refer to as “The good old days’ most youngsters
finished elementary subjects, and going to high school was much
more rare than going to college is in this generation. {
There was no pressure applied unless the child came from a
family which considered an education the open sesame to success,
and the boy was destined for the professional field. VEL
The seventy-year old man of today, who deplores the “frills”
of modern education, would shudder at the thought of cranking up
the Model T or enjoying the bracing benefits of outdoor plumbing
in a blizzard.
-
There were no “frills” in education when I was a youngster.
It was strictly business, first in a one-room school far out in
the country, later in a red brick grammar school in Baltimore, its
sunbaked brick play yard enclosed by a high plank fence, and
later still, in a high school which would be considered so far sub-
standard in these days that even the most lax of school boards
would have thrown up its hands in despair.
It was so substandard, in fact, that my parents took me out
and sent me away to boarding school after the first year.
_ People are still taking their children out of schools that do not
prepare sufficiently for the terrific ‘competition of the Atomic Age.
Editorially Speaking:..
|
OUT OF THE SHADOWS
Paul Valery, a poet writing many years before the
disaster of June 1940, saw that France was dying:
The storm has ended, yet we are still restless
and full of care . .. We have only vague hopes, but
clear fears . . . We are aware that the charm of life
and its abundance are behind us . . . There is mo
thinking man who can hope to*master this concern,
or avoid the darkness, or even estimate the probable
period of deep-going disturbance . . . All the found-
ations of the world have been shaken . .. Something }
more essential has worn out than the replaceable
parts of a machine . . .
What came upon the once great nation during the
Second World War was merely the finalization of a decay
that had begun in the preceding century. Still, those who
loved France could not help but feel that one day she
would move from the shadows. Such a man was Antoine
de Saint Exupery, who said:
. There was a time when my civilization
proved its worth—when it enflamed its apostles,
cast down the cruel, freed peoples enslaved—though
today it can neither exalt nor convert. If what I seek
is to dig down to the root of the many causes of my
defeat, if my civilization is to be born anew, I must
begin by recovering the animating power of my
cwilization, which has become lost
Today we are witnessing the search of one man for
that animating spirit. To him “France is not truly her-.
self save when she stands in the front row.’
That this man happens to be the President of the
Fifth Republic, Charles de Gaulle, lends hope to all those
who love France that the hour of rebirth is indeed at
hand, For the sickness which ate away at the nation’s
insides for so long was compounded by weak, inefficient,
corrupt, and shortsighted political leadership.
What General de Gaulle, above all else, has blokglt
to his country is the echo of greatness gone and “the
poet’ s vision blended in equal parts with logic and _pas-
sion,
“All my life,” he wrote in the first paragraph of his
memoirs, “I have made for myself a certain idea of
France. Emotion has inspired it as much as reason. All ~
‘that there is in me of passion conceives France as the
princess of the fairy stories or the madonna in the fres-
coes, dedicated to a high and exceptional destiny.”
De Gaulle, like many other great and powerful men,
is an egotist. He is also an old fashioned nationalist.
There can be little doubt that he looks back with longing
and pride to the days of the Sun King Louis XIV when
France was indisputably the strongest country in the
world, or the period when all Europe trembled before Na-
poleon’ s armies.
Yet, this ardent nationalist has gracefully presided
over the liquidation of the far-flung French Empire. |
Under de Gaulle more than a dozen African states, cover-
ing 3,014,317 square miles and containing seventeen mil-
lion people, have been granted independence. And their
names, such as Dahomey, Chad, Mauretania, and the
French Congo, contribute to France a glory at least equal
to Austerlitz, Verdun, and the Marne. |
Whether de Gaulle can succeed in bringing France
back to life is a question which can not yet be answered. |
It hinges upon too many imponderables: the European
settlers in Algeria, the Army, the extremists in France
herself, an assassin’s bullet, and old age, for de Gaulle is
seventy with failing eyesight.
-,
A New York Times dispatch at the time of the Army up-
rising in April reported approximately ninety per cent of
the country willing to go to the barricades to defend the
Fifth Republic. A similar dispatch in 1958, a few months
before de Gaulle came to power, found fully half the na-
tion agreeable to an armed overthrow of the Fourth Re-
public.
No optimist, de Gaulle recognizes that his great
undertaking may well end in failure. For his is the
dilemma of the strong man who finds himself struggling
against what appears to be the tide of history. In that
extra-ordinary first paragraph of his autobiography he
sees victory and defeat intermingled in the French soul: >
“I have a feeling, a belief that Providence has created her
(France) for perfect successes or for exemplary failures.”
; “What must then be done, President de Gaulle feels,
ig to strive for mighty ends, to wrestle with and overcome
inevitability. “Only great enterprises are capable of 3
balancing the ferment of anarchy our people carry within {
themselves; our country, such as it is, among the others,
such as they are, must, on pain of death, aim high and
hold fast to the straight path.”
Thus, we may well witness in France during the next
few months and years the most glorious triumph or the
sublimest tragedy which that storied nation has experi-
enced since the time of Joan of Arc, who mandged to
: weighing b both elements in her legend. ?