25 Cents
a Year
15 Cents
in Clubs
of Five
or More.
When you
get hold of
something
good, pass
it around.
Send in a
big club.
no
THIS PAPER, IN SPITE OP ITS NAME, DOES NOT BELIEVE IN KILLING PEOPLE.
SJOT.TTTHTl! 7
BOOMER, NORTH CAROLINA, AUGUST 1916.
NUMBER 3
l JAt J; ec:
s'
1
Made to Order.
Wish I had a poem
Or a little fool song
That I could stretch out
About three inches long.
This corner of the paper
Looks odd and undone
Without a few verses
, All gracefully spun.
But my poetry mill
Is run down at the heel,
And the papers print nothing
That is fit to steal.
What on earth shall I do?
It's awful! Oh, drot it!
I need a poem SO bad
And now I've got it.
BLEEDING.
The old time doctors were great
believers in " bleeding' ' as a cure
for every disease known to the
human race. If you had anything
from the seven-year-itch to
chronic laziness and called on a
doctor about it, he would look at
the. bottom of your foot, feel of
your pocket-book, and bleed you.
You generally got well, and you
believed the bleeding cured you.
And maybe it did. But sometimes
you died, and then you are sure
you would have died anyhow, and
it wasn't the fault of the treat
ment. The bleeding habit has been
mostly out of date for a good
while, but now it seems to be com
ing back on a world-wide scale.
All the nations of the earth have
got something bad the matter
with their political guts, and they
are falling back on the old custom
of "bleeding" to cure what ails
'em.
But I notice that the great poli
tical "doctors" who prescribe
"bleeding" as the remedy for
the world's bellyache are always
yery careful not to let it be tried
on their own -precious, royal
veins. They love their country,
and they want to see it cured, but
they-are perfectly willing for it
to make out with the common
cheap blood from the veins of the
workers.
But looky -here, nowi If the
blue blood of the master class is
bo much more rich and precious,
why wouldn't the spilling of it
buy a better grade of "liberty"
than the blood of us poor scrubs?
Why wouldn't it "consecrate
the ground" better and make
"freedom's soil " produce a
richer harvest of durned fools? --
move that we give it a trial, any
h0W. , J j .
THE FLOOD!
Well, we got ours this time.
We had read about floods in
other parts of the country, but
we had somehow made up our
minds that they would never
reash us here in the mountains
of Western North Carolina.
But we were mistaken. North
Carolina has been visited by the
most destructive Flood that ever
hit this neck of the woods.
The rain began falling on the
evening of Friday, July 14, and
continued all that night, all the
next day, and all the next night
nearly 36 hours of the hardest
rain that ever fell in these moun
tains.
The creeks and rivers came up
like magic, covering the valleys
and climbing the hill-sides. So
sudden, so rapid, and so un
expected was the rise in many
places that the people living in
the valleys had to run for their
lives, leaving everything to be
swept away by the Flood. Some
people did not even save them
selves, numerous cases of people
drowned or missing having been
reported. .1
As soon as the flood waters
went down so that the wreck
and ruin could be seen, it was an
appalling and disheartening
sight. All growing crops were
enner swept out oy tne roots or
buried in mud. Bridges, rail
roads, homes, factories every
thing in reaeh of the flood-
either washed entirely away or
drifted into a mass of mud-
covered ruins.
The property loss in my own
home county (Wilkes) is esti
mated at two to three million
dollars. Our railroad was so bad
ly damaged that for two weeks
we wereTcompletely cut off from
the outside world. All wires were
down, the mail service knocked
out, and we were practically set
back a hundred years into the
past.
I couldn't get my shipment of
paper to print The Fool-Killer
on, and I couldn't have . sent it
out if it had been printed, so
just had to wait.
Being nearly a month behind
already, this , calamity has put
me stiM further behind, and now
there is no chance of getting out
an issue for July. The last issue
was for June, and you will notice
that this one is dated for August.
I do this in order to keep pace
with the hurrying feet of Time
which, by the way, was the
only thing not held up and de
layed by the Flood. Time went
right on. It always does. And
The Fool-Killer is going right on,
too, if another Flood don't come
and get what little this one left.
So let everybody grab a wheel
and roll. In other words, send in
as many big clubs as you can.
During the coming fall and win
ter let's cover the earth with
Fool-Killers as never before.
OH, HELLUP !
We Are Invaded! The Whole
Mexican Army is in the Benited
States.
Most of people know that this
country is in trobule with Mexi
co, but mighty few of them have
any idea how it started or what
it is all about.
Well, it started like this:
There is a little group of multi
millionaires in Mexico who own
two-thirds of all the wealth of the
Benited States. You didn't know
that, did you? Well, it's a fact.
The leaders of this group of Mexi
can capitalists are Rockario D.
Johnnyfeller, J. Pusselgutta Mor-
ganoodle, Andrwai Cornygut,
and a few others. These men own
and control the great copper
mines of Colorado, the coal mines
of West Virginia and elsewhere,
and all the rich oil fields of the
country. And they are connected
up by interlocking directorates
with other great capitalists
until they actually hold the
destiny of this country in their
hands.
Well, there was a strike in the
Colorado copper mines, and the
first thing anybody knew an army
of six thousand Mexican soldiers
were dropped over into Colorado
to keep order and to protect the
Mexican interests there. Other
Mexican troops were sent into
West Virginia and still others
stationed around the great Mexi
can steel works in Pennsylvania.
The Mexican government claim
ed that ks soldiers were sent into
the Benited States merely to keep
order, quell riots and catch strike
leaders. At first we took them at
their word, treated them in
iriendly manner, and thought
they meant no harm.
But when the strikes and riots
were all ended and all the lawless
captured or scattered, we began
to think it was time for them to
go home, and President Wilson
kindly requested Carranza to take
the Mexican army out of the
Benited States. The object that
they came herer7 for was accomp
lished as far as they could ac
complish it, and there seemed to
be no reasonable excuse why they
should longer remain on our side
of the border.
But don't you think Carranza,
the insolent half-breed, stubborn
ly refused to order his troops
home. He sent back an insulting
note to President Wilson saying
hat his army should stay here as
ong as he pleased, and that we
had better just lay low and say
nothing.
Well, that didn't look so good,
but President Wilson is very
patient, and so he sent another
request for the withdrawal of the
Mexican army, pointing out the
trouble that might result if the
American people should become
suspicious of a foreign army on
their soil. They might rise up and
demand war to drive the invader
out. Carranza again refused to
iisten to reason, and his last re
fusal was more insolent than ever.
President Wilson and all our
people began to see that there had
been no sincerity in Carranza 's
statement of his purposes all
along. He had merely used the
Colorado strike and the other
labor disturbances as a pretext
for getting his army into our
country, with the evident purpose
ot waging a war of conquest
against us and annexing this coun
try to Mexico.
Natuarally that didn't set well
on our stomaches, and we began
to get things in readiness to pro-.
tect ourselves the best we could
against the Mexican army of in
vasion, intervention and conquest.
Ihen Carranza called out every
thing that could tote a sun and
started then toward our border.
We were getting in a nrettv uglv
humor by this time and demanded
that they stay on their own side
of the line, or there would be
trouble.
They came on.
There was trouble.
There is going to be more.
Well I'll be ding-busted! If I
ain't gone ahead here and writ
this whole story right plum tail-end-foremost
and . top-side-bct-tom'ards
from start to, finish!
That's the good of toeing always
in such a hurry.
But the type is already set, and
I'll be civilly sarn-taked if I'm
going to change it.
If women would dress sensibly
and quit going wild after every
new "fashion" that comes along,
they would be plum purty things
to look at. But of course they'll
sorter do as it is.