Saturday, January 28, 2006
RULES FOR BENDING
Current news headlines remind me, so often, of two short stories we have in our national treasury of such material which is not longer being read. One story deals with that type of person who insists that you follow rules exactly and the other is made up of people who have deeply ingrained feelings concerning their right to “something-for-nothing” and “pie-in-the sky” treatment. Both stories were written to be funny. Their merit is found in the fact that they are still comical when read today. They still have meaning today because they deal. The depict human traits which do not change with the pages of our calendar. Sometime about 1906 a man by the name of Ellis Parker Butler had fun writing a story he called “Pigs Is Pigs. And, Mark Twain had written one a little earlier called called “The Man Who Corrupted Hadleyburg.” The very titles themselves were enough to send the grammarian perfectionists into a frenzy of explanations concerning the proper use of pigs – singular and plural - “that” “is-are”, “who-whom”... with suggested means to keep our language pure. Neither of them will ever be called “classics” I suppose. They're too fun-filled. The Butler story speaks of someone, finding a rule who feels he is bound to follow that exact guideline, He is a person with “no bend”; no “give and take, “live and let live” ideas at all. Only at times when he finds such a plan is not working to his advantage will he be ready to shade a few of the stricter lines a bit, fail to dot a few “I's” or cross some ”t's” and learn “how to look the other way.” In “Pigs Is Pigs” the author has us meet Mr. Morehouse as he calls on Mr. Flannery at the Interurban Express office where expects to pick up a small crate containing two guinea pigs. He expects pay to make payment for their having traveled on Mr. F's rail system. When they check the manual they find no specific price quoted of ”guinea pigs” . The Express Company clerk enters the rated charged for: “Barn Yard Pigs”. The customer enters a loud complaint and refuses to pay the bill. They agree he will consult the home office of the express company. In the meantime, the clerk will have full possession the giunea pigs. Guinea pigs multiply at an astonishing rate, and those were a dozen; a score and more and more until the Express Company was making daily shipments of giunea pigs o all points south, north, east and west - awaiting word from the home office for rates on such shipments. In the end, several persons had to understand the need for occasionally bending rules. The Mark Twain story packs a strong moral lesson for us today, as well. A strange old man visits the town of Hadleburg one night - a town proud of its reputation of honest and purity. He leaves “a sack of Gold” behind to be given to that unknown person who, many year before had befriend him and made him a loan. One by one residents started remembering the man and the deed of long ago. A great many rules had to be modified for Hadleyburg to regain even a small portion of its old reputation. Rules must be tempered with a bit of common sense because people are no always what they appear to be. None of us. No one. A.L.M. January 29, 2006 [c000wds]
Friday, January 27, 2006
DEALS ON WHEELS It certainly ought not to come to us as some that was not expected to happen - that American car manufacturers find it necessary to cut back severely. When Ford Motor Company announced it plans to pink-slip from twenty-five to thirty thousand workers in is manufacturing, assembly and distribution systems some people expressed a limited measure of concern for the very first time. Such a cut goes far deeper than most citizens realize. It does not affect just the thirty thousand well-paid individuals will, no longer be getting their weekly check or benefits to which they are, as mere employees of a large firm, eligible. Financial and other advances through to have been associated with retirement can be quickly, and permanently nailed unemployment wall. There may well be others as we along but they will I'm sure prove to b e anti-climactic and “also ran”entries in the race toward ruin. The action of the “big boys” get the main attention and we often fail to realize how vital the smaller losses can be. For very job that is lost, many others in related fields go with it. Any actions by the “big boys”is impressive but the smaller ones are important as well. They don't attract the same attention. And, we often forget that when any job is lost many jobs go with it. There is ample evidence that we, as a nation, continue to buy new cars. We buy foreign-made cars and many reasons are cited for our doing so...among those reasons: quality. The nation's best selling units this past year have been HONDA cars and trucks. Owners will tell you why they changed. Their comments are not flattering the average local dealer, or distributor of American made vehicles. Many will say the present method of selling new American cars by inducements are on the very edge of nightmare and insanity. Rebates no longer make good sense. Giving a buyer back as much as half has never made sense. The American automobile makers need to realize value and quality must be maintained and their sales forces must be able to tell truth and sell cars. A.L.M. January 27, 2006 [c376wds]
Thursday, January 26, 2006
BIG NOSE I just learned recently that the career of the infamous Apache chief know to us as “Geronimo.” came to an end when he surrendered rather peacefully to a former Harrisonburg, Va, school teacher whom he knew only as “Big Nose.” The Spanish dubbed the Indian chief with the Spanish translation of our name Jerome. His native name by which we was a called during the days of the Apache War, and as he was known at home in Chiricahua, was “Goyathlay” which means “none who yawns”. He seem anything but one who appeared to be sleepy to both Mexican and U.S. Troops tracking him for many months. The American army Lt. Charles Bear Gatewood was called “Big Nose” by Geronimo himself because of what he saw first when the young officer came into his camp to talk him into surrendering. And, because he did just that, to Lt. Gatewood gets credit for bringing the expensive Apache War to an end. When Charles (the Bear) Gatewood went into the Sierra Madre Mountain range in Old Mexico in 1886 to ferret out the wily Geronimo and his warriors he had a force of five thousand soldiers and in that time he had just about one quarter of our nation's entire armed forces. Mexico also sent groups of various military units into the fray against the Indian chief, and they never quite accepted the treaty Gatewood made with Geronimo. In fact, on the very day he physical surrender was being enacted several hundred Mexican watched transfer tensely and when one Mexican officer accidentally or unthinkingly shifted the position of his weapon in his belt, the Indians drew their weapons and were on the alert. American troops stepped between them, it was reported, and the surrender ceremonies continued. Geronimo and his associates were sent to reservations in Florida, Alabama and Oklahoma. Atwood was cited for “meritorious acts while leading Indian scouts in 1886” according to West Point records. The citation accorded him was “for bravery and boldness and alone riding into Geronimo's war camp among hostile Indians and demanding their surrender.” He had previously been honored for another such act of bravery. In 1892 he was sent garrison duty at Fort McKinney, Wy. There, during a barracks fire, he was injured by a dynamite explosion and died at the age of forty-three at Fortress Monroe, Virginia while awaiting reassignment. Lt. Gatewood was born in Woodstock, Va. which he called “home”. For a brief time he lived in Harrisonburg awaiting news of his appointment to West Point and the start of his military career. A.L.M. January 26, 2006 [c446wds]
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
CHIEFS VERSUS INDIANS Our American educational system has, over many years, existed while displaying obvious shortcomings. They are becoming more noticeable as we progress toward a worthy rearrangements, but much remains to be done. Simply contrasts of the attainment by students under other, more efficient systems tell the story graphically. The average one of us dislikes the reading of any negative qualities in even the most colorful presentations. Simply put on such criticism is that we are constantly trying to create far too many Chiefs and not enough Injuns. We have justly been accused of attempting to turn out graduating classes which will consist mainly of executives with left over who will serve as workers. Now that outsourcing has become the way industry, commerce and business are to be run we have no need for training for non-existing. We are required to go along with the real world – like it or not. We must now fit individuals for daily life in being consumers, users, managers, delineations, or co-ordinaters. I ran a check on things I wear last night and I find only two items marked “Made in U.S.A.” One was a belt so marked that I don't know if it means the leather-like belt itself or just the metal buckle. Another item which I was led to believe was shipped from weaver's shamrock-scented hands - my genuine, authentic and sassy, narrow brimmed, little tight woven of the best of wool - my prized “Irish Walking Hat”.It is the only clothing I possess made U.S.A. The plague of mail order diploma mills now sweeping the nation shows the extreme extent to which illegal college degrees of all levels, high school and trade school certificate are being printed and sold. They are being sold – many from overseas source, and they are being accepted and used in the job markets. Meanwhile college enrollment costs are rising steadily even as standards for acceptance are being lowered. How is all of this going to end? And – how soon? It has ceased to be a mere matter of chiefs and Indians. It concerns survival of the entire tribe. A.L.M. January 25, 2006 [c368 wds]
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
DULLEST DAY? Earlier this week, I heard someone on TV testifying that it had been decided that the date – January 24th is known as “the dullest day of the year. I've never heard that it was so designated, have you? Certainly the individual who came up with that idea must have got up on the wrong side of his or her padded cell some morning recently. You cant just go around branding specific days as being complete duds. So much depends on your own special interests and what you consider to be worthwhile. If you're strong on music, for instance; if you don't mind stretching the category a bit that Justin Tubbs died of an aortic aneurysm January 24,1998. He was a son of the late Country Music Hall of Fame member Ernest Tubbs and that made a lot of good people sad. In 1994 David Cole, a superstar producer, died of spinal meningitis, a college music professor sued the “New Kids on the Block” for 21-million back pay charges and he accused them of lip-synching eighty percent of their concert lyrics. Good things for the date: birthday cakes for Mary Lou Retton, John Belusi, Edith Wharton, Tatyana Ali, one of the “Sesame Street” children you've watched growing up. 1986 In 1986 the “Voyager 2” space probe came within 51,00 miles of Uranus, giving earthlings their look at the distant planet. Then,there were a few in-between things which could have been bad or good depending on how you look at them: a Russian nuclear powered satellite plunged to the earth's surface,disintegrated and scattered radio active dust over much of Canada's Northwest Territory. In Lebanon gunmen were holding four American educators hostage. They were later released. The prosecution made its opening statement in 1995 at the O.J. Simpson murder trial in California. “Olestra” - a no fat, no-calories cooking oil was FDA approved – January 24, 1995. A U.S.Supreme Court upheld a Missouri law that limited the contributions an individual could donate to a political candidate in one election. And, of course, here are some oldies you just may not like to be reminded of because some of them sound just like yesterday. In 1908, in England, Robert Baden-Powell organized the first Boy Scout Troop. In 1962 Jackie Robinson became the first black member of the Baseball Hall of Fame. In 1984 Apple-Macintosh unveiled heir first model to change computer thinking forever. It was also on January 24, 1848 – a day when, supposedly very little of consequence takes place, that gold was discovered in California. The President of the United State - President James K. Polk – made the discovery official that same year -eleven months later in December 1848. It's shame he couldn't have waited a few more weeks and made the announcement on Jan. 24, 1849 because the Gold Rush came to be called “the 49's” after all. A.L.M. January 24, 2006 [c496wds]
Monday, January 23, 2006
P.O.W. PASTOR How many ordained ministers do you know who have been prisoners of war? Not very many, I would guess. The sixth minister of Old Stone Presbyterian Church of which I am a member was in just such a situation for seventeen months. He wrote a book about it which he impishly titled “U. S. Bonds” It had originally been intended as a personal journal but family interest caused him to edit and rewrite much of the story of his Civil War imprisonment. He completed that work on January 1, 1874 in ”Ashley Manse” a log house down the hill a bit to the east of the church. You get a feeling for the intimate things one sets down in a daily diary, but he appended speeches, poetry. He passed his writings along to his wife when she visited “in numbers” as he put it. He often buried his manuscript awaiting her next visit. His prison was at Fort Delaware, just south of Wilmington, in mid-river and within sight of New Castle the place our first minister John Craig had landed in 1734. Records show his name to have been Issac W. K. Handy. He was pastor of the Presbyterian Church in Portsmouth,Va. The first entry in the journal was dated June 17, 1863. He had planned a family trip to visit his wife's family in Maryland He felt that the curbed life they lived occupied Portsmouth has been hard on them. During the eighteen months he had been there he had preached one hundred extra sermons and funeral services in addition to his normal pastoral duties and he visited he sick and dying, too. In strict accord with military regulations, he applied to the proper Federal officials for permission to visit his wife's ill mother whom she had not seen for five years. Reverend Handy knew he had friends in the Federal army who appreciated and respected his work, but he knew he had one enemy in certain General Dix who had sworn publicly that hat he would never do any favor for Preacher Issac W.K. Handy! And while you are waiting, help out a bit. We have yet to discover what the “W.K.” initials stand for in his signature. He always signed it with those two loose letters and with absolutely no hint of what they might mean . A.L.M. January 23, 2006 [c411wds]
Sunday, January 22, 2006
SO FEW It is not at all uncommon for most of us to have, at least, a basic understanding of what we sometime “secret language” known as the Morse Code. Most kids are thrilled to learn that the English letters “S.O.S” mean that danger threatens. Most of us are aware of the code because of some early association with boy scouting, military, or ham radio. Until recently a basic knowledge of code was part of the learning process of ham radio, but it has now been eliminated to stay in-line with our general educational tendency to lower standards to gain membership in an elite group called the educated. Many of us accept the idea that we can transmit intelligent exchanges of information by sounds, visual manifestations ranging from Semaphore flags to huge antennae arrays. We even have units seeking a connection of some sort of with extra-terrestrial civilizations. We think of code as being useful in rescuing sailors lost on tropical islands in our films, TV shows and imagination. Code can be a handy to have in time of need. Why don't we use it more often? The mine accidents in West Virginia which killed eighteen people this past week, illustrate the potential benefits. At one point they spoke of a pipe leading to the disaster zone. If that report any convict in any prison can tell you a tap becomes a “dit” and scrape become a “dah”. “Tap-scrape” on the transmitting pipe becomes “dit-dah” and will be read as “A”. All right, it's slow! I know that but if reliable information can be exchanged we are way ahead. One would think there would be a conscious effort on the part of safety program leaders of life saving groups that some members of that crew must have a working knowledge of Morris Code. We have many ways of bringing sub-surface sounds to the surface and some of those can certainly be adapted to work the proper, prompt and pertinent trapped with a minimum equipment they might carry with them as safety standbys. There is yet another aspect of all of such concern for safety. The Braille alphabet and numbers used by blind people are a simple system which uses two columns of three dots each arranged in a domino fashion and raised on the surface of a heavy paper. A working knowledge of “signing” would also enhance the chance of saving lives in times of disasters - natural or man made. A.L.M. January 22, 2006 [c426wds]
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