Page 20 - SUSQUEHANNA TIMES Letters Dear Editor: Lancaster County is one of the most beautiful areas in the State of Pennsylvan- ia. I'd just like to let a few people know how 1 feel: about littering our beautiful land. Some of the nicest places are now ruined, by broken bottles, beer cans, paper, wood, garbage, junk cars and even the kitchen sink. A friend and 1 were driving down along the river near Cargill, to a Dear Editor: During a recent Recogni- tions program by the Don- egal Neighborhood of Girl Scouts, everyone was given praise and awards but one person. Nancy Kopf is the Neighborhood Coordinator for this Neighborhood. She has done a tremendous job during her first year in this position. Nancy spends hours working to see that all the troops run smoothly, besides being leader of Troop #32. She listens and helps us solve any prob- lems we as leaders may have. Nancy has taken on a hard job and got things Dear Editor: I would like to take this opportunity to thank each and every one of the people who helped ‘‘man’ the ““MYO’’ stand at the Memorial Day celebration in Maytown as well as during the boy’s tourna- ments. The money earned from this food stand enabl- es us to keep our team on the field. I also want to thank the persons for the cash and food donations. It cost approximately $32.00 for each child to play ball. This includes insurance, uniforms, um- pire fees and the endless need for baseballs, bats and other equipment. In addition to this, there are league and tournament fees to pay. Our coaches? time is favorite fishing spot, when we ran into a whole truck load of garbage and wood dumped right in the middle of the road. Earlier this Spring I've spent hours of my time cleaning up the same spot and know that it now looks worse than before. There are a lot of people who love this land and a few who just don’t give a darn!!! Lets try beautiful!!! Donald L. McKain, Jr. to keep it back in shape after we had no leadership in this posi- tion for some time. This last year we found out what ‘‘Being a Sister to Every other Scout’’ meant. We learned to know each other and worked together as we hadn’t done in a long time. We even had our own Troop Camp Course in which Nancy took charge of getting the whole program set up and instructors to teach several phases of camping. I would like to close by saying a very heartfelt thank you to Nancy on behalf of everyone in the Donegal Neighborhood. Sharon Marley donated—approximately 1500 man-hours per sea- son. Try to remember to thank your child’s coach for his or her efforts. Baseball might be a game, but the effort of the people behind the scenes is a full-time job. I would like to single out Jim Shirk, our Boy’s Commissioner, for the many hours he has donated getting the fields in shape for all the games. There are five fields to get ready and Jim hasn’t failed us yet. Yes, we all have jobs, we all are too busy or disinter- ested at times, but remem- ber, they are our children, lets do all we can to keep them playing ball instead of running the streets. Sincerely, Jay L. Hoover, Treasurer MYO Maytown, Pa. Maytown Ambulance meeting The monthly meeting of the Maytown—E. Donegal Area Ambulance Assoc., Inc. was held on Monday, June 13, at 7:00 p.m., at the Maytown Fire Hall. Crew chief Dennis Hall reported that the Assoc. Ambulance responded on 12 Emergency calls during the month of May. The members of the Maytown Ambulance Assoc. would like to thank the students of the Beahm Jr. High School Student Council for their recent donation to the Maytown Ambulance Assoc. Our thanks to a fine group of young people. Next monthly meeting of the Ambulance Assoc. will be Monday, July 11, at 7:00 p.m., at the Maytown Fire Hall. All present members, or anyone wishing to join the Assoc. are urged to attend. June 22, 1977 “My father was a Vigilante and we were all sitting in the kitchen when there was a knock on the door. It was a man with a hood over his head. ... my father picked up his .45 and they left...” A boyhood in the wild west; the Ben Tracy story (Ben Tracy, the author of this memoir, was born around the turn of the century in York. He was an employee of the Mount Joy Bulletin until his retirement a number of years ago. Mr. Tracy now lives in Lancas- ter.) I REMEMBER WHEN... by Ben Tracy The names in this article are my Mother Bertha, Father Thrasher, Brother George, Sister Thelma and Grandmother Emma. The reason my Grandma is included is that she always met us somewhere in our travels. She was married six times and buried all of her husbands. She married her sixth husband when she was 85 years old, lived with him 8 years\V til he died, and then lived alone til she died at the ripe old age of 103. George and 1 were born in York, Pa. and Thelma was born in Larned, Kan- sas. My early recollections seem to start in Larned. We used to play in the ruins of the old Fort. From Larned we went by wagon to Hastings, Ne- braska, about 125 miles. It may seem like a very short distance now, but it took us almost a week. While there we saw Halley’s Comet, in 1906. The townfolks were all out watching to see if the Comet would pass over or fall to earth. The Church bells were ringing, the Fire Co. whistles were blowing, people were praying and singing Hymns and alto- gether they made quite a lot of noise. i Contrary to what may be said about the Indians, they were very friendly and we spent many days and nights with them. They shared what food they had and my father would hunt with them. He was a very good shot and if he did miss with his first shot he never took a second shot. He said that if he missed, the game was free to go and I am sure this im- pressed the Indians. 1 was only 7 when I experienced my first sight at what was then, ‘The Law’. We were living in Los Animos, Colorado. My father was a Vigliante and we were all sitting in the kitchen when there was a knock at the door. My mother answered. It was a man with a hood over his head. He called to my father who picked up his 45 from the table and they left. My mother took us children and we went to a hill in back of the railroad station to watch Vigliantes, one of whom was my father, deal with a murder- er. They put him on a horse, tied his hands in back of him, put a noose around his neck and put the other end over a rafter of the R.R. station. They hit the murderers horse, and while -the man was swinging they all shot him several times. Soon after the lynching we heard that Grandma was married to a horse rancher in Eads, Colorado. We loaded up the wagon and left for Eads, about S0 miles away. Grandma was surprised to see us and could not believe we were living 30 near her. She and our new grandpa Gray insisted that we move in with them. I walked to 3rd grade in a school nearly 4 miles away. Every other Friday, after school, George and 1 saddled up and rode 20 miles to town for the mail. We stayed in town overnight and came home Saturday morning. Grandma and Mrs. McCor- mack, from the next ranch, liked to ride part way with us on Friday. They would have quite a time shooting at jack rabbits and prairie chickens. Eventually we moved into a large house in Denver near the top of White City Park hill. Here I saw my first street car. It was not one like the ones you see now. It was horse drawn, and it had a stall at each end. The horse would pull the car up the hill and then get into the back stall and ride down the hill. We could hardly wait to go anc ride up and down the hill. My father had electricity put in our new house. It was the first house in that part of Denver to have this and the people came from miles around to see this new lighting. Thelma and I would unscrew a bulb and stick our finger in the socket to feel the electri- city. Fortunately there was not much current in the line or we would have gotten more than just a little tingle. Once we took our horses and wagon and tried to reach the tops of Mt. Evans and Mt. Estes, just a few miles above Denver. There were no roads out there then and we had to find our own way. In fact, in all of our travels we had to make our own way. There were dirt roads in and near the towns, but when you left town, it was up to you to find the trails. We got to the top of Mt. Evans but only part way up Mt. Estes. Our new grandpa said he would show us how to live off the land, so we hitched up our wagon, and, with Grandpa in the lead, we headed south. We went to Pikes Peak and rode donkeys to the top. Then we went to the Garden of the Gods near Colorado Springs. We crawled into the hole in a mountain and came to a small stream full of fish with no eyes. They never saw any daylight and so evolution worked its wonder. (This cave is now The Cave of the Winds). From there we went through Trout Creek Pass, Monarch Pass, Wolf Creek Pass, saw the Aztec Ruins, went through Ship Rock and Marsh Pass and came to the south rim of the Grand Canyon. Here we rode donkeys down to the bottom of the canyon. We went to the Sunset Crator Volcano (above Flagstaff), to the Petrified Forest, in the Gila Cliff dwellings, and Rosewell. On this journey there was plenty of game and we learned to eat everything that flew, crawled or walk- ed. Grandpa showed us how to get water from cacti ‘“‘apples” on the desert. When ripe, these purple apples were very sweet tasting and juicy. Cactus patches always had apples. One way to tell north and south was that all the apples never died off at the same time, they died from South to North. In other words, as the one died, the next patch north had ap- ples and so on till you reached fertile land. By the time the northern-most ap- ples were all dead, the southern apples were ripe. We settled down in Trini- dad, Colorado. One day my mother, an experienced wilderness cook, said that if the boys from my 4th grade class would bring her birds, she would make us all pot-pie. She did not say what kind of birds, so the boys brought pigeons, doves, sparrows, crows and even a few hawks. There was a pile of birds almost waist high. The boys pick- ed the feathers off and my mother cleaned them and made the pot-pie in a large iron pot in the back yard. When the boys told thier parents what they had eaten, several parents came to complain. Mother explained to them about our living off the land, they tasted the pot-pie, and all was forgiven. We found Trinidad more civilized than Las Animas in its treatment of murder- ers. One condemned man had such a large neck and small head that when they sprung the trap, the rope justslipped up over his head. When school was over, my family took the train to Phoenix, Arizona, to see my father’s sister. My aunt had a lion farm, enclosed in a 12 ft. wire fence, where she raised the lions for circuses and side shows. My father was a tailor and he decided to settle down in San Luis Obispo, California, for a while, to open a shop before starting back to the east coast.Dur- ing school vacation my parents bought horses and a wagon and took us to Billings, Montana, Yellow- stone and Grand Teton parks, we traveled down through Idaho Falls, and Salt Lake City, Utah. We visited Yosemite Park, and Devils Postpile, Kings Canyon park, the Sequoia Forest, and the Redwood forest. The streams were full of trout. Bear and deer were plentiful. Finally my father opened his shop and we became ‘‘city folks’. School was not a one room building, as the other schools were, but each [continued on page 6]
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers