Page 2—MIRROR-HERALX)—Tuesday, September 27, 1977
€DI10RlhL
opinion
\
Helping other people
to stand on two feet
The Kings Mountain United Fund one-day campaign is coming up Fri., Sept. 30
and the goal for the 1978 drive is $45,000.
The campaign kick-off luncheon was held Monday and division chairpeople
report the campaign is well underway throughout the community.
Of late there has been some rather negative dialogue about the effectiveness of
the United Fund program. In our opinion negative dialogue is all it happens to be.
The truth is the United Fund program is a great help within a community. Better
than 90 percent of the monies collected are used right here in Kings Mountain.
There is financial help, under the UF, for the boy scouts, girl scouts, rescue
squads in Kings Mountain and Grover, the American Red Cross, the senior high
band and chorus, the Salvation Army, the county drug abuse prevention
organization and the ministerial association. These organizations, with the
exception of band and chorus, help a great many individuals in need in this
community. And the band and chorus are made up of young talented people from
this community who also deserve consideration.
It’s great to be able to say you stand on your own, two feet. But, it’s even
greater to be able to say you didn’t hesitate when someone else asked you to help
them stand on their own two feet.
The citizens’
is where it’s
problem
at today
Last Tuesday’s local government meeting in district four was more like it.
Twenty-two men and women gathered in the fellowship hall of Second Baptist
Church to hear a few words from the mayor and the district four commissioner
and special guest Ken Mauney, chief division engineer for N. C. Department of
Transportation, then to voice their own opinions and complaints about the City.
Listening.to citizens complain about su.ch things as low water pressure, backed
upsewcyr and surface drainage may seem like small potatoes when you consider
there are italllions of Federal dollars out there just waiting for the right grant-
sman to come along.
However, the individual citizens’ problems and not the awarding of a grant is
where it’s at today. What good is the “big picture’’ if a resident can’t get his
curbside trash hauled away?
The mayor and the commissioners want to be more responsive to the citizens.
In fact, they must be more responsive. Besides this series of “one-on-one”
meetings in each district, the commissioners are compiling a list of the day to
day problems citizens are having with city services and are setting about to
remedy those problems. There are quick answers to some woes, other answers
will take longer and tar some there may be no answer at all as far as the city is
concerned. But these are the things that will never be known unless the citizen
with that problem makes it known.
I Small potatoes? You can’t fight city hall?
, In the first place, no citizen is insignificant and none of his problems related to
what he pays for in taxes is small potatoes. And the person who said you can’t
fight city hall was probably a politician throwing up barriers to keep citizens
from bugging him.
■ The third one-on-one meeting is tonight at 7:30 at Mt. Zion Baptist Church
(district five). Be there.
People like to lie...
After careful scientific consideration
and geometric logic I have arrived at a
conclusion that lying has become more
acceptable to everyone than telling the
truth.
Examples:
A mother asks her small son, “why
did you pick Mr. Jones’ prize winning
roses?”
“For you, mommy, because you’re
sweet and pretty, too.”
Junior gets a hug and kiss for that. If
he had told the truth, he picked them
because he wanted to get back at Jones
for chasing him out of the roses in the
first place, junior would have gotten the
seat of his pants dusted.
A wife asks her husband, “why are
you so late getting home?”
“I’ve been working late at the office to
make extra money to buy you a nice
present.”
He gets a hug and a kiss. The truth
might be that he was out whopping it up
with the boys and forgot the time. Tell
the little woman that and it’s curtains.
A feller everyone knows around KM
recently had some passport pictures
made by IThe Mirror-Herald’s Gary
Stewart. The feller was asked if he
planned to go on a extended vacation out
of the country. “1 might,” feller an
swered.
We found out the truth a few weeks
later when another newspaper an
nounced the feller was going to a foreign
country to work for his firm.
Another local well-known citizen
recently had the audacity to tell the
county commissioners that the citizens
of KM had no newspaper to give the
citizen’s organization news coverage.
That was a lie. The truth is the KM
newspaper has published everything
about that citizen’s organization we
could find. Another truth is after
repeated calls to the citizen’s group
asking for a representative to meet and
give the lowdown, no representative
showed up.
Don’t people realize that all
newspaper people are sensitive artists
and such things just crush us beyond
, imagination?
Shoot, dang and goshamighty!
I know a man who suffered ridicule
and abuse from his wife because he
didn’t have as much clout as a certain
politician was supposed to have.
Seems the wife had got a speeding ticket
and she asked her husband to ask their
friend the politician to call his friend the
judge and get the tickets fixed. Husband
dutifully called politician who called
judge who laughed in politician’s face.
Husband ended up having to get a
garage mechanic to make out a sworn
statement that wife’s speedometer wss
on blink, taking statement to district
attorney, who agreed, if judge didn’t
object, to go light on charge. Prayer for
judgment continued was the verdict,
which means the charge is filed away
until next time wife speeds and is
caught.
Wife didn’t go to court. Husband had
to grin and bear it when wife said, “Isn’t
politician a wonderful person?”
“Yes. He certainly saved your
bacon, didn’t he?”
“Yes. Why can’t you have pull like
politician?”
As far as I know husband is still
keeping the secret.
I wonder how things got so turned
around like this in the first place.
TOM
MclUTYRG
RGhD€R DIIMOGUe
Problem needs to be solved soon
To the editor.
The controversy over the Kings
Mountain Rescue Squad greatly sad
dens me. This fine public service
organization is being damaged by un
necessary argument.
Many people have a lot of time in
vested in the Kings Mountain Rescue
Squad. In the five years I was a mem
ber, a year and a half of which I was an
officer I spent over 6,000 hours in
training, stand-by time and in transport.
Many other members have invested
much more time than I. Needless to say,
they feel very strongly about charging
fees for transports and tempers have
run short.
Like Mr. (BOb) Hope, I was sick when
I heard a member ask a caller if he
could pay for ambulance service. I
eventually resigned because I could not
charge someone for something I did as a
volunteer.
The argument presented by the
county and certain local officers for
charging fees for ambulance service is
that health insurance, VA, medicare
and Social Services will pay 95 percent
of the cases. This is not true. I recently
had to transport my mother from Kings
Mountain Hospital to Gaston Memorial
Hospital and back after she bad been in
an accident. Had the fee schedule been
in effect at the time I would have bad to
bill my own mother $50 for transport. I
pay over $70 a month for Blue Cross
insurance and it, does not cover am-^
bulance charges. A member of the
Shelby Rescue unit did have to charge
his mother for ambulance transport
recently. Also anyone who has ever
dealt with medicare knows it does not
always pay ambulance charges. And if
I’m not mistaken, the law gives the
county the power to attach wages to
recover unpaid emergency transport
fees. I was in rescue work to help
people, not add to their troubles.
It has been suggested that the rescue
squad drop the fees for ambulance
services. Because of the agreement
with the county this may not be possible,
although it would solve the problem. I
suggested the same thing, but the new
leadership rejected it and began
pressuring me to resign as equipment
officer. Unfortunately, several of the
rescue squad officers have axes to
€D
SMITH
unimportant quote....
grind. I’ve talked with men on both sides
of this issue and they all agree that if
charges are dropped the problem would
be solved.
There is more involved in this debate
that the question of another vol
unteer rescue squad in Kings
Mountain. The very survivai of all five
volunteer units in Cleveland County
could depend on the outcome. If, by my
count, at least three more EMTs leave
the Kings Mountain Rescue Squad for
Kings Mountain Emergency Services,
Inc., then the former is going to suffer.
Trained, experienced EMTs cannot be
replaced overnight.
Whatever the answer is, the problem
needs to be solved and the sooner the
better. Kings Mountain does not need
nor can it support two independent
rescue squads. What the citizens of
Kings Mountain need and no less
deserve is a single trained, dedicated,
and well-equipped rescue squad.
MARK HUGHES
Rt. 2, Kings Mountain
Concern for squad
Dear Editor,
I am writing this letter out of concern
for the Kings Mountain Rescue Squad.
I have had several experiences with
the Squad and each and every time they
have given me excellent care.,^,,
The Rescue Squad has been serving
Kings Mountain for 20 years and they
have always given excellent care. They
have taken courses to increase their
knowledge of their work. So, I would not
hesitate in paying them for their ser
vices.
I feel thatif Bob Hope really wanted to
help the citizens of Kings Mountain he
would have given his time and effort in
helping the Rescue Squad that now
exists. The citizens of Kings MounUin
have been upset about the Rescue Squad
charging people for their services. Some
people don’t understand that most In
surance policies pay for ambulance
services. The Rescue Squad is not
heartless, for the people who need the
services but are too poor to pay and
have no insurance I feel the Squad
would not charge.
Thank you for reading my letter and I
would like to challenge the citizens of
Kings Mountain to write and express
their thoughts about the Kings Mountain
Rescue Squad, whether they are against
or agree with me.
DEBBIE SMITH
Kings Mountain
i Most Tar Heels are familiar with that
^ question “What did the Governor of
South Carolina say to the Governor of
forth Carolina?” It Is, Intact, one of the
most famous, though unimportant,
^laodes in the state’s history.
I Far fewer know the answer to the
^stlon, however, and almost nobody
foday knows the circumstances under
Which the event took place. (In most
oases, even the roles cf the two par-
gclpants get reversed, with the chief
«ecutlve of our state supposedly doing
1|ie commenting.)
! It was during the early fall of im
((exact date unknown) that the famous
Sicldent took place. In those gloomy
days at Reconstruction with both
(>irollnas under the Iron hand of
tedaral military control. It was
iquently necessary for Governor
ithan Worth of North Carolina and
iremor James L. Orr of South
ollna to confer with General Daniel
Stckles, the one-legged military
imor of their dlatrlct. Both dreaded
be meetings, for Sickles, though tactful
fid often sympathetic, was a stickler
1^ details, and the sessions dragged
interminably.
On (me occasion, as Sickles recounted
it in his memoirs, ttie gregarious.
convivial Orr turned to Jonathan Worth
and groaned “The Governor of South
Carolina feels constrained to say to the
Governor of North Carolina that at these
military cabinet counsels there Is a
damned long time between drinks!”
-oOo-
Judge William Gaston was one of the
most gifted and outstanding citizens of
this state during the first half of the 19th
CJentury.
He was bom in New Bern, September
19, 1778. Though Gaston was repeatedly
elected to the state’s General Assembiy
and ultimately rose to the position of
Justice of the state Supreme Court, he
was never sent to Congress or the
Governor’s Mansion (or one single
reason: he was a Catholic, and the
state’s Constitution than prohibited the
election to high office of anyone not of
the Protestsmt faith!
As a delegate to the convention called
In 1885 to rewrite the state’s con
stitution, Gaston fought long and hard to
insert a provision guaranteeing
religious freedom In North Carolina,
making some of the most brilliant and
impassioned speeches in the history of
this state’s political history. Ironically,
however, his success in this matter was
overshadowed by his authorship of the
state’s official song, “The Old North
K
0
state,” and It Is for this that he is
principally remembered.
Both Gaston County and the city of
Gastonia were named In his honor.
-oOo-
lieutenant Klffln Rockwell, of
Asheville, was the first American to
shoot down an enemy aircraft in
combat, and the first to die as a result of
such action. He was shot down in
France, on Sept. 28, 1916, during World
War One.
Rockwell and his brother Paul were
members of the famous Lafayette
Bscadrllle, a squadron of volunteer
American pilots fighting with the
French.
Another member of the group from
North Carolina wan James R. Mc
Connell, of Carthage. Thare were 88
American pilots In the Lafayette
Escadrllle, and in all, some 180 who
served In the French service.
A “bom filer,” Rockwell was one of
the first air aces in history, being
credited with the destruction of four
German aircraft. (His contemporaries
mslntained he destroyed many otheri
for which he received no official credit.)
As the first American to die In aerial
combat, his death brought him much
attention here and In Europe.
miM&id
PUiLISHIDIACH
TUISDAV ANOTHURSOAV
TOM MCINTYRI
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