^Peterson’s Paper”
Issued Twice a Month
Subscription Price $1.00 a Year
VOLUME in.
DUNN, N. C., MAY 1, 1935
NUMBER 7-8
PERSONAL PARAGRAPHS AND COMMENTS.
Confined to his home by illness, the editor
wondered’ how he could give this number of The
State's Voice the personal interest that has
formerly come from personal contacts in travel
er about the state. But before me is a batch of
lettt.rs and personal notes and clippings from the
news columns of the papers, which seem to afford
n]f, a chance to chat about a number of people
readers of The Voice should know.
A Veteran Teacher—Doesn’t He Deserve
a Pension?
Thirty years ago H. L. Edens, then, seemingly
to the writer, approaching old age, was a good
friend of mine down in Robeson. I received a
letter from him since my illness was announced,
and 1 am going to let Mr. Edens give you an
Elding of a long and ill-paid service to the state.
While our legislators and others are worrying
over the low salaries of present-day teachers, let
ir,e commend to their attention such men as'H.
L. Kdens and two of my old Chatham friends of
similar records.—Why should a judge who is
paid ten salaries of the average teacher receive, a
pension after only a few years service while
such men as H. L. Edens have to depend upon
their children, themselves reared in comparative
puvcrtv, for support in their old age: I am
quite sure that the average wage of H, L. Edens
;is teacher for over a half-century did not average
$300.01) a year. ■ - •
Here is Mr. Edens’ review of his career:
Lumberton, April 8.
Dear Friend: The Stated Voice has just been
received and read, and, like its predecessors, is
' * ’lull of interest1
“At the Cross-Roads of Decrepits” is a warn
ing full of pathos tel''all who have reached or
passed the three-score-and-ten mile post. The
interpretation is self-evident—Active life-,is over
and one is forced to travel the short western
road of twilight till nightfall. I’m in my 79th
year, practically all of the years spent in school,
in an effort to prepare for life and m the school
room as a teacher.
J began teaching in 1876 and. quit in 1931,
after my hearing and sight Were too badly im
paired to allow me to continue in the profession.
I have been principal of all the schools I have
taught in except the first one. When I gave up
my last school I had conducted it 9ix years. We
had an enrollment of four- to five-huridred pupils
and eleven teachers.
As I remember for fitty-nve consecutive
I taught boys and girls not only the various text
hooks but also religious and moral truths, and
I never left any big, bad boy or girl in doubt that
punishment was certain for given offenses. My
motto was: ‘“The, fear of the Lord is the begin
ning of wisdom,” Soft, sentimental tommy-rot
applied to he^less, self-willed youths is giving
them license to scrap all things of good r®P°Jt
and hasten to lodgings in penal institutions of t e
state. Whip ?—Yes.; it has'no competitor as a
remedy for an otherwise unryly* pypib
When .I began teaching I determined to do my
duty as I understood it each day. Many have
threatened to do me bodily harm but up to now
1 have a clean conscience and a body that has
never received a' blow of violence from pupil or
parent.
My children are all married those still hv^1£b
1 am living with a married son and fami y.
public has vised up my life and left me a e P.e
charge upon others. J0ut I am not complaining.
Your friend of “Argus” days,
H. L. EDENS.
I am just wondering where Mr. Edens f°u®
a school in 1776 with more than one teacher m
!t- "Argus” days refers to my publication o
bumberton Argus from 1901 to 1906. If
government is ever going to give Mr. Helens
Pension, it is high time that it is getting about n.
but notice that he didn’t even thmk about the
likelihood of his ever getting something excep
by hard work of his own or of his children.
The Budget Commission’s Estimate Sound*
• Just arrived the morning I begin these
chats is a cheering note from the Doverno .
True, you know him as well as I do, but 1 av
been wondering how much trouble the General
Assembly could have saved itself and how much
cost to the State if it had followed the Governor’s
budget commission’s estimates. As plainly seen
the budget commission had estimated what
seems, after three months of review by the fi
nance committees and a month of discussion in
the two chambers of the General Assembly of
the available sources from which revenue can be
secured without the possibility of doing more
harm than good, just about the true limit.
I criticised the Governor during his campaign
for what might fairly be considered a pledge,
more than a year before conditions prevailing
during the .1933 legislature could be revealed, to
oppose the imposition of a sales tax. I have not
LOOK AT YOUR LABEL,
Look at the date on your label. The State's
Voice labels, unlike those of papers of greater
frequency of publication, are typewritten, not
printed. Therefore, the dates will be given
only occasionally.
criticised him for turning to the sales tax when
he became convinced that such a tax was neces
sary.
Now, while I highly approve the, budget com
mission’s estimates of the ability of the State to
pay and its moderate increases in proposed ap
propriations, I am sorry that he and his commis
sion went in £aVOr of a sales tax as to pro
pose a ii
get recommendation and found funds to substi-'
tute for those proposed from the taxation of
bread and meat, it could have been adjourned
w.eeks ago, and with a fair measure of justice
meted to both taxpayers, and recipients. There
are two ways to make revenues and appropria
tions meet—and the safer, always, is to reduce
appropriations to the level of reasonable or just
levels of tax levies. Governor Ehringhaus’s
commission had fallen upon a fairly happy, if
not golden, mean. Within three months the gen
eral assembly has not'agreed upon the means of
justly levying more than that commission’s esti
mate of available funds.
Chief Chaplain Yates Sends Cheering
Word—Augina Pectoris Curable—Cols.
Yates and Dockery as Wake Foresters.
Maybe you don’t know that the chief chaplain
of Uncle Sam’s armies is a Wake County boy,
Rev. J. E. Yates, ranking as colonel, I believe.
Well, he is, and my old friend took not only
enough interest in the announcement of ray re
cent attack of angina pectoris and the limitation
of my activities to writing, to renew his subscrip
tion hut to* clio from Dr. Copeland’s health dis
cussions in the papers the symptoms of the dis
ease and the cheering statement of the Senator
Doctor’s that one should “not be misled by the
belief that angina pectoris is a fatal affliction.
“In many cases,” says Dr. Copeland, “complete
freedom from attacks is obtained by change in oc
cupation, habits and mode of living. With
proper care the number and severity of the at
tacks can be lessened.” .
Cheering are those words, but there is one thing
about it, if the severity and frequency of at
tacks could not be lessened, the victim _ would
care mighty little if the disease should be fatal.
I note such a frequency of deaths from'angina
pectoris—several about the time of my attack,
that I am quoting here Doctor Copeland s cited
symptoms so that readers of TheVo*e mfy.{jaVe
an idea of what has them if it should grab them.
Says Dr. Copeland:
“I venture to say that usually the fatal effect
of heart disease can be traced to negligence. 1
am sure that, if more persons were taught to
recognize early symptoms of heart disturbance
ond carefully followed instructions given by
their doctors, the prevalence of this disease
would be greatly decreased, .
“Angina pectoris is due to a change in the
. “coronary arteries” of the heart. These blood
vessels furnish the muscle of the heart with the
necessary nutrition. They may become brittle or
obstructed by a small blood clot. When this oc
curs the sufferer complains of severe, agonizing
pain in the region of the heart. '
“The attacks come on suddenly and usually
follow some physical or mental exertion. But> '>,?
one may become seized with an attack while at ‘;
rest, or even during sleep. Worry, mental dis
tress, anger, anxiety, excitement and physical
fatigue are factors that lead to attacks of ‘an
gina.’
“The skin of the sufferer becomes grayich.
- pale, and a cold sweat appears Upon the fore
head. As a rule the victim does not complain
greatly. .
“The attack may last for a few minutes or.
may persist for hours. At times the pain travels,
down to the left arm, or it may pass to the right
shoulder and down the 1 ight arm. Occasionally
the attacks are preceded by nausea and vomiting.
“The pain is not always as typical as I have
described it. I. have seen cases of angina pec-.
toris with pain in the pit of, the stomach and
where the condition was confused with indiges
tion.
“Relief is obtained by the application of heat
and the administration of nitroglycerin, mor
phine or other strong opiate.”
The pain in the chest, in the arms, and the
cold sweat should be just about enough to iden
tify the monster that has you, but in my case
these were only a few of the variety of pains that
attended the attacks. A., grappling of the wind
pipe about the adam’s apple is one of the most .
unique of pains. It is simply indescribable. And
iRput^om^r r ^-.i
itrng'preceding an attack, eating .preceded in toy
case and vomiting brought relief. The little ni
troglycerine tablets brought relief more quickly
than did morphine.
But back to Colonel Yates himself. It was
about 1889 he and his brother enrolled as stu
dents at Wake Forest. He was reared over in
the fine old Olive Chapel community, on the very
verge of Chatham county. I hadn’t seen him in
over forty years till last year at the Centennial
banquet at Wak© Forest. The most of those
forty years had been spent in( that fine spiritual
service to the boys in uniform that finally,
brought him to the chief chaplaincy. •
He and Col. Oliver H. Dqckery, Jr., are the
only Wake Forest men I know who have spent
their lives so largely in the army service. I have
seen Dockery only once or twice in the same pe
riod of more than forty years. Colonel O. H.
Dockery is the baby brother of the aged Victor
Dockery who passed away in Raleigh only re
cently. The Colonel is one of the survivors of
my own class of 1892.
Every time I,think of that first fall at Wake
Forest in 1888, when Col. O, H. Dockery, Sr.,
was a candidate for governor on the Republican
ticket, and how young Oliver was almost ostro
sized by the students of the college that owed its
existence so largely to his grandfather, Col. Al
fred Dockery, and of how the backwoods Samp
son county lad, who by good fortune had learned
that Republicans were not poisonous, almost be
came a chum of the scion of the aristocratic ,
Dockery family till the campaign was, over and
the students lost their political bitterness, I am
glad that North Carolina has passed the days of
such partisan folly, even if the majority party is
hot yet honest enough to redistrict the state so
as to give the Republicans their deserved quota
of representatives in Congress and still so de
termined to win by any means that the abomi
nable absentee ballot law still menaces the rights
of the voters of many counties.—But wouldn’t
it be fine if, when this goes to print more than two
weeks from it^ writing, Senator Weathers’ bill
calling for the repeal of the abomination had be
come law! '
She; Used to Be Little Edith Taylor.
From an appreciated note from Mrs. Edith
Taylor Crittenden, librarian at Wake Forest Col
lege, I quote this word of cheer: “I trust that ^
you will soon be up and about again, for indeed
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