North Carolina Newspapers

yolume XLV Lino NewJ EsUbKld llJS ,ConwlidLl April l. 1919 LENOIR, N. C, THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 1919 Price, Fit Cent the Copy No. 22 BLINQ PREACHER TRIES TO KILL RIVAL AND SELF HU Sweetheart Turned Him Down After a Long Engagement and He Wanted to Shoot Rival and End His Own Life News has just reached here from Hudson that Rev. Mr. Setzer, a blind preacher, ran amuck with a .38-cal-lber pistol several days ago, threat-1 ening the life of another man who i had wo nthe affections of his sweet- heart. Setzer planned to shoot his . rival and then commit suicide. Ir is said that Setzer and the girl i were engaged and that he had rented a house and had partly furnished it. A few days ago the girl turned him ; down. He then secured a pistol and j vent to the girl's home looking for ; his rival, whom he expected to find there. According to reports he plan ned to kill his rival and then turn the pistol on himself and end it all. Failing to find the rival, he created much excitement. Friends disarmed him until he had quieted down. NATIONAL THRIFT STAMP WEEK TO BEGIN MARCH 1 State superintendents of schools in every State in the Fifth Federal Re serv edistrict have been notified that National Thrift -Stamp Week will be observed beginning Monday,' March 1, and ending Saturday, March 6. The war organization for this ter ritory is sending out instructions, literature and pledge cards to super intendents, and will co-operate in ev ery way to awaken new interest on the part of parents and pupils in practicing everyday thrift. The ef fort is intended to emphasize the value of saving regularly in small amounts. Through the press, school i'ournals, notices on school bulletin oards, programs and in various ways the message of the 25-cent United States Thrift Stamp will be carried. It is likely that the celebration of Thrift Stamp week in the schools will culminate Friday, March 5, with an entertainment featuring the number of Thrift Stamps each child has bought during the week and the pres entation of a program based on those prepared by the treasury department for this purpose, t RAILROAD BILL READY TO BE SIGNED BY PRESIDENT , The compromise EschjCummins railroad bill was approved late Satur day by the House, which adopted the conference report after four hours' debate. The report was adopted by a vote of 249 to 150 a clean margin of 99 votes. The conference report on the rail road bill was adopted late Monday by the Senate. The vote on the of the report, taken after several hours of debate, was 47 to 17. Thirty-two Republicans joined with 15 Democrats in voting for adoption of the conference report, while three Republicans and 14 Democrats com prised the 17 voting against it. The bill went immediately to Pres ident Wilson, and the general opinion around the capitol was that he would sien it. Max S. Hayes, national chairman of the labor party of the United States, Monday sent a telegram to President Wilson, voicing a protest against the proposed Cummins-Each bill for returning the railroads to private ownership. Mr. Hayes de nounced the measure as legislation for the benefit of special interests and demanded that the President veto it. MORGENTHAU URGES PEOPLE TO FIGHT PLAN FOR TURKEY Henry Morgenthau, former United States ambassador to Turkey, in an address at a mass meeting in Phila delphia tinder the auspices of the near east relief, declared that the Turk should be driven from Europe and urged the American people, to make a strong protest against the outrages which he said have taken plac eand continue in the near east. "The British and French politi cians for ielfish purposes, are arrang ing to leti the Turk remain in Con stantinople," Mr. Borgenthau de clared. "I believe the time has come that the American people must pro test It is a farce for the countries that professed to be fighting for jus tice and the self-determination of all small peoples do not wait until the blood is dry on the hand of the Turk, but take that hand while it is still streaming- with the blood of murder ed Armenians." ARE GOING TO HAVE ANOTHER MEAT PACKER INQUIRY Opening another congressional in quiry int othe packing industry, and tne activities of the.,"big five" Chi cago packers, the House agriculture committee Tuesday 'heard- Federal Trade Commissioner W. B. Colvert , and Representative Anderson, Re publican of Minnesota, author of a bill carrying out recommendations of the trade "commission, for regulation of the lindustry. Some members of the committee demurred at the pror posal to , hold the hearings, Repre sentative Rainey, Democrat, of XIII , nois, . pointing out that five succes sive congressional inquiries had been " held since 1916, while other members suggested that exceedingly extensive records of previous inquiries which cost the government $2,000 a volu ume, should be considered sufficient basis for action. The vote, however, was 10 to S in favor of holding hear ings. .. , CAPT. EDMUND JONES STRICKEN YESTERDAY Capt. Edmund Jones suffered a stroke of apoplexy yesterday morning about 11 o'clock, and was not ex pected to live through the night. Up until the time of going to press last night he had not regained conscious ness lor a single moment since he was stricken. Physi cians called in immediately following the stroke have given up any hope for his recovery and say that the end is a matter of a few hours only. Capt. Jones had not come down the street nor to his office yesterday morning, but was preparing to do some work about the house when he was stricken. ARE GOING AHEAD WITH TRIAL OF GERMANS Preliminarv proceedings in a num ber of cases of Germans accused of violations of the laws of war have alreadv begun and progress is being made in the collection of documen tary material, Dr. SchifTer, minister of justice, announces, according to a dispatch from Berlin. The minister said that accused persons would be tried at Leipzig by a court consist ing of the customary seven judges. German witnesses will be herd in ac cordance with the prescriptions of criminal trial regulations and wit nesses will be examined abroad if they not care to go to Germany. It was indicated that a German exam ining magistrate would go to other countries to be present at the taking of evidence. Accused persons who do not respond to the summons to appear before the imperial court will have to ibe arrested, and German au thorities will in any case do every thing to expedite proceedings a5 far as poscible. On the principle that each accused would necessarily have to be tried individually, Dr. SchifTer energetically emphasized the fact that the government regarded it an "affair of honor to punish those real ly guilty." ' The government, how ever, was not obeying tne ententes will in carry insr out this trial, he as serted,, but. was fulfilling the require- ments-of any "ordered state and its own feehntr of what was just. Examination of the official text of the last allied note sent to the Ger man eovernment relative to the trial of men accused of war crimes shows that a significant passage was' omit ted from the. Baris version published in Berlin. This passage refers to a stipulation by the entente that pre vious verdicts at trials of German war offenders must be annulled and that they be remanded for new trials. This provision means the reopening of the Fryatt case, in which a Ger man commission decided the execu tion of Fryatt, captain of a British merchantman, was not a violation of international' lawv The conservative. pan-Germanic press unites in reject ing the allied note as wholly unac ceptable and the -Tageblatt expresses the belief it "is a halting place on the road leading, to revision of the Versailles treaty," FIRST WOMAN ARRIVES WITH BODY OF HER SON Mrs. A. Devera of Chicago, the first American mother to bring back from France the body of her son, who died in service, arrived in New York last Friday on the steamship Brittania, Her son had been buried at Marseilles. , $ha casket, draped with an American flag, was escorted with military honors from the pier to the Pennsylvania station, to be taken to .Chicago tor burial. The Knights o Columbus provided a motor truck for the journey across the city after an undertaker had de manded $45 for a hearse. A dispatch from Washington says that the. bodies of American soldiers buried in England and in the rear of the army zones in France are expect ed to begin to arrive in this country soon. The war department an nounced that 17 bodies had been dis interred in English cemeteries and were ready, for shipment. This will be the first homeward movement of American soldier dead, with the ex ception of 111 bodies returned last November from Archangel MRS. CHARLES ALLEN DIED THURSDAY MORNING Mrs. Charles Allen died early last Thursday morning following several weeks' illness. Interment was made Friday afternoon at Belleview cem etery, the funeral services being con ducted by Rev. I. W. Thomas. Mrs. Allen, who was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. L. M. Wall, was only 27 years old. She. Was gentle and kind and a very lovable woman who was possessed of, many friends. Her death is greatly regretted. Besides her . husband, mother and father she s survived by three broth ers,, Messrs. Albert, Ned and Howard Wall, and two' sisters. Misses Coline ; and Beatrice Wail. WORST IS YET TO COME; BAY RUM MUST GO TOO ' - , Bay rum, hatf tonic, toilet water and similar preparations, sold and used under prohibition provisions, must be modified by. the addition of chemical agents to make "themiunflt , for beverage purposes," according to instructions J. S. Persinger, collects j or Of internal revenue at Roanoke, Va., received from John F. Kramer, national prohibition commissioner. WILL RECLAIM UNUSED LANDS THROUGH BOND ISSUES Reclamation of unused lands in the West and South through a series of bond issues, operating similar to the Federal farm loan system, would be authorized by a bill introduced last week by Senator Fletcher, Democrat, of Florida. A similar measure was offered in the House by Representa tive Smith, Republican, of Idaho. Under the plan $20,000,000 worth of bonds would be sold the first year, $30,000,000 the second, $40,000,000 the third and $50,000,000 the fourth year, with a total of not more, than $350,000,000. In presenting the bill Senator Fletcher asserted money required for construction would be furnished by the investing public withou tany bur den being placed upon tne taxpayers. Working out the plan, he said, would benefit the small homesteader. The measure represents the con cert of action of the. South and West for a great national, rather than a sectional, plan. The Southern in terest, including the governors of States and officials of the Southern Commercial Congress, met in Wash ington last month and evolved a bill which the representatives of the West, under, the chairmanship of Gov. Davis of Idaho, later approved. The Southern Commercial : Con- --------- - e, 5VJ""l-,f,r" adopted would make feasible the rec lamation ff 5,000,000 to 7,000,000 acres of laTid by the end of the tenth year. "REBELLION" AGAINST DRY LAWS IN MICHIGAN A "rebellion against prohibition" has broken out in Iron county, Mich igan, and the county, led by its pros ecuting attorney, is in "open revolt" against Federal authority, Maj. A. V. Dalrymple, Federal prohibition director for the central states, noti fied Washington Saturday, says a dis patch from Chicago. A prohibition agent and a party of Michigan State constables were held up Feb. 19 by Iron county officials and wine they had confiscated was taken from them, according to infor mation received in Chicago. Maj. Dalrymple appealed to At torney General Palmer to order war rants issued for the arrest of the prosecutor, two deputy sheriffs, two police officers and three other resi dents of Iron River, a mining village. While awaiting word from Federal authorities Dalrymple issued orders orders for a company of picked pro hmibition agents to gather in Chi cago preparatory to starting on an armed expedition which he declared would "clean up" Iron county. WOMAN TO BE SPEAKER FOR WEAVER IN THE NINTH , L. L. Jenkins, Republican con gressional standard bearer for the tenth district, an aadant supporter of woman suffrage, will have to face a woman speaker on the stump in the district this fall, if he accepts the challenge to be made to him by Mrs. Roberts Piatt, president of the Ashe ville Woman's Club, and ene of the prime movers in the equal suffrage cause in this State. Mrs. Piatt told friends in Asheville that she planned to take the stump throughout the tenth, district, at her own expense, for Congressman Weaver, who stands high in the good graces of the women of Asheville for his enthusiastic' sup-' por tof all equal suffrage measures which have come up before the House during his two terms there. CRAZY MAN ROBBED STOREj TAKEN BACK TO MORGANTON Sheriff Triplett went . to Hudson Monday and placed Joe Hice in cus tody and took him back to the State Hospital at Morganton. Hice had escaped from Morganton some time about Christmas and had come home. His mind seemed to be in better fix and he was not taken back to the asylum. Last Saturday night he broke into, the store and shop of Mr. Frank Smith, and later caused more or less excitement in the town and community; - Sheriff Triplett was called, and Monday he went to Hud son to take Hice back to the asylum. ROBTl E. PEARY, DISCOVERER OF NORTH POLE, IS DEAD Rear Admiral Robert Edwin Peary, retired, arctic explorer and discover er of the North Pole, died at 'his home in Washington last Friday from penicious anemia, from which he had suffered' for several years. Admiral Peary submitted to a blood transfu lull VVU UHJO UC1VIB.IIIS UVUblll , TT i W V... was the thirty-fifth to which he had submitted within two years, accord- ing to his physician. . . ' . - sion ten days before his death. which COMMISSION ADVERTISES Fllll BIBS 1 IBM WORK Yadkin Valley Road from Turnpike ot Beachford is First to Get Im provements; Wilkes Delays Work on Highways Yadvin Valley road from the turn pike to Beach ford is the first road in the county to come in line for im provement. Bids for its construction are now beinz advertised for bv the Caldwell county road commission. leh section of road on which bids are being asked for now is about six miles long. Work on the link of the State highway system leading from Lenoir to mlkesboro is being delayed now by the county commissioners of Wilkes county, according to authori tative reports reaching here from Wilkescboro. The section of this road in Caldwell has been surveyed and accepted by the State highway commission. The road accepted is along the ridge route by King's Creek. The delay in Wilkes county has been caused by the selection of this route. It seems that in Wilkes county preference was given the riv er road route, and 'since the State highway commission assured aid only on the ridge route the commissioners of that county are backfiring and re fuse to put up the necessary 25 per cent for the road's construction. Af ter the State highway commission as sured the Wilkes county road com missioners that the rigde ro'ad was the only road on which State and Federal aid could be given they de cided to accept this location. The trouble now is with the county com missioners, who are not in sympathy with the adoption of this route and are withholding the necessary 25 per cent of the cost for construc tion. REDUCED PRODUCTION OF FOOD IS FORECAST Warning that serious risk of re duced food production impends be cause of high wages demanded by farm laborers, high cost of farm equipment and supplies, and pro nounced movements of people from tne farms to the cities, was given Tuesday . by the department of agri- Laii turn on tfi oasm 01 renorts ana Fitters from all sections of Ue 'coun- try. "The most definite of these reports come from New York state, the de partment's announcement said, "where records of the population of 3,775 representative farms on teb. 1 this year and February a year ago were made by Federal and Mate workers. It was disclosed that dur ing the past year the number of peo ple on these farms decreased nearly 3 per cent, and the number oi mred men decreased more than 17 per cent. If the same ratio holds for all farms in the. state about 35,000 men and boys left farming to go into in dustries, while only about li.uuu have -changed from other industries to fatminer. This is a more rapid movement from the farms to other industries than took place in the early part of the war. "The same conditions in varying degrees exist in all sections, accord ing to the Federal bureau of crop estimates, although they are not so acute farther from industrial cen ters. MR. WATTS BUYS COTTON MILL IN IREDELL COUNTY Mr. J. W. Watts of Patterson, Caldwell county, has bought the Stimpson & Steele interests at Tur neisburg, Iredell county, consisting of the cotton mill, grain mill and store, says the Statesville Landmark. Mr. Watts has also bought from Mr. Clarence R. Stimpson the Stimpson home place at Turnersburg, consist ing of the house and about 150 acres of land. The Landmark understands the total consideration was around $100,000. Mr. Watts takes posses sion at once. The cotton mill at Turnersburg is the oldest cotton mill in the county and one of the pioneer mills of the tSate; The-mill has served success fully three genertaions of the Wil fred Turner family, and now for the first time its existence, is in the hands of strangers to the Turner blood. The mill, now possessing 1,600 spin dles, will ibe operated by Mr. Watts, a native of Alexander county, and a successful business man. Mr. G. V. Henkel had an option on the property and made the deed. CATAWBA BAKERS FIND THEY . , WERE FOOLED More than 150 descendants of Jo seph and Andrew Baker, who mpnths ago were reported to have left an estate-' in California worth many mil lions of dollars, gathered in Hickory last week to receive a report on the status of this wealth and) learned that It existed, so far as they were concerned, only in the imagination of northern and western geniuses. A letter ; from the auditor-general of Pennsylvania, to which state i $464, 00,000 was said to have reverted in escheat, was read declaring ithat no such sum was known in Harrisburg, and that if it ever existed it was no longer tangible. , in ROBBING GRAVES IN VIENNA ; Systmatic vandalism and robbery incenieteries has led to demands for police protection in. Vienna. 'News- tumors eai? ffrnvnti anA vanlfa thara u.f.wt mJ fe-1 v.mv.v have been despoiled, articles of the slightest , value stolen ; and ' coffins smashed for firewood. ' NORTH CAROLINA LEADS IN STILLS DESTROYED Figures for the first month of pro hibition enforcement under the con stitutional, amendment show that North Carolina led the states in the southern district in the number of skills seized and destroyed. Further more, the southern district led all other sections of the country in seiz ures. These statistics did not partic ularly surprise revenue office officials, as moonshing records for a long time past have shown that agents had most work to do in the southern sec tions, where the mountain maker of liquor has been hard to suppress. Figfures announced for North Carolina seizures during the first month, covering implements seized and estroyed, were: Distilleries, 175; still worms, 60; fermenters, 1,751; gallons of spirits, 280; gallons of mo lasses reported for seizure, 1,584; pounds of sugar reported, 500. In the entire southern district, which comprises the states of Vir ginia, North Carolina, South Caro lina, Tennessee and Kentucky, some of the to:al items of seizure and de struction were: Illicit stills, 445; gal lons of spirits, 1,104; fermenters, 2, 954; gallons of molasses reported for seizure, 2,670; number of persons ar rested first month, 438. There were no convictions record ed in the southern district because of congested dockets and delay in court processes, but tnals will come along during the spring and summer. Ex pense of prohibition enforcement in the southern district was given as $36,754, while the revenue bureau appraises the value of the property seized and the penalties and fines will be about $136,000. THE VOTE ON THE SUFFRAGE AMENDMENT IS CLOSE Thirty-two States have ratified the woman suffrage constitutional amend ment, but there is a charge of defect in one Ohio so that but thirty-one can be counted as sure. Five mere States are necessary. . Of the States yet two act, two Florida and Ten nessee cannot act until next year, constitutional reasons preventing the legislatures meeting befor ethat time. North Carolina and Louisiana are not expected to ratify the amendment. The suffragists have a chance at six other States to get the five ratifica tions Oklahoma, Washington, Dela ware, Connecticut, Vermont and West Virginia and they have a com fortable hope of all except Delaware. If their estimate is correct that Will be just enough to put the amendment over. If one of the five should fail the amendment will not be defeated, but ratification will be delayed, so that the women would not be able to vote in this year's elections, ex cept of course in the States where they already have the ballot. Ratifi cation being so nearly accomplished, however, it is possible that some of the States that are in doubt or listed as opposed to the amendment, may decide to get on the band wagon and go along with the procession, says the btatesville Landmark. GOVERNMENT SAYS THAT MEAT PRICES MUST BE LOWER Retail meat dealers throughout the country must reduce their prices as the wholesale price of meat declines or else submit their books to the Federal agents for investigation of their profits. This definition of the' government's attitude was announced Sunday night by Attorney General Palmer, according to a dispatch from Chicago. Instructions to serve . the notice on all retail meat dealers have been sent to every United States dis trict, he said. "For three months the price of meat has been falling," said Mr. Palmer. "The retail dealers have claimed that their supplies were old stock purchased at the higher prices. The old stocks should be exhausted by this time, and unless the price to the consumer comes down we will have to look into the question of the dealers' profits." Mr.- Palmer's pronouncement on the meat price situation followed the publication by the Institute of Amer ican Meat Packers of a bulletin an nouncing the practical cessation of foreign trade as a result of the ad verse exchange situation. Wholesale meat prices at the Chicago yards dropped to. pre-war levels for some grades following the publication of the bulletin. SAYS LABOR PARTY WILL RUIN LABOR MOVEMENT Formation of a political labor party would be "detrimental to the interests of labor and exactly in line with that which is most ardently de sired by those who seek to oppress labor," Samuel Gompers declared in a letter to William Mitch of Terre Haute, Ind., a leader in the Indiana State labor' party; made public in Washington. Mr. Gompers wrote in reply to a telegram from Mitch and his assistants slinnnrf in the nctinn j of the Indiana State labor party in opposing the political declaration of the American Federation of Labor in calling on organized working men to elect their friends and defeat their enemies. Mitch's telegram declared !h a.,AM A ta.Ir!M AA anlAl. I HI JLHTU1 VI limiting IllKllb OVICIJT il 1. 1 1 . inrougn a lauor party. . KILLS MAN WHO SAID "TO HELL , WITH U. S." ACQUITTED It took a Hammond, Ind.,' jury two minutes last-Friday to acquit Frank Pedroni, an Italian, who admitted he killed Frank Petrich. , Pedroni, a naturalized citizen of 17 years, had an argument over Austro-Italian claims with Petrich, who is said to have been an unnaturalized "red." During the argument Petrich said: "To hell with the United States;" and Pedroni shot him dead. . CHANGES THE PAST WEEK Messrs. George K. Moose and Jama T. Pritchett Buy Interest in Le noir Drug Co. The Hoover Bros. Buy Brickyard Two important business changes marked the business life of Lenoir during the past week. George K, Moose, prescription man for the Le noir Drug Company, and James T. Pritchett, a young attorney, bought a third interest each in the Lenoir Drug Company. The other business change was thatof Garland and Ray Hoover buying the brickyard ma chinery of Powell Bros. In the drug store transaction Dr. Coffey, who owned a half interest, has sold his entire holdings, and Mr. J. R. McNairy, who held the other half interest, has sold a portion of his holdings, making it a partnership of three equal shares. The purchase of the Powell Bros, brickyard machinery was sonsum mated several days ago. The new owners have bough ta boundary of brick clay just at the foot of the Spainhour hill, just west of town, and are now moving the machinery to this new location. They plan to begin operations by the middle of the coming month. ONE RESERVATION READOPTED BY THE SENATE The Senate last Saturday re-adopt ed the first of the reservations at tached to the peace treaty in No vember. The reservation relates to withdrawal from membership in the league, providing that this nation shall be the sole judge whether its obligations have been fulfilled in case it desires to withdraw, and that no tice of withdrawal may be given by a concurrent resolution of Congress. The vote on its adoption was 45 to 20, ten Democrats joining the solid Republican line-up supporting it. Four of these of these Senators had stood on all previous roll calls stead fastly against any qualification of the treaty. It was by a bare majority, 33 to 32, that the Senate rejected the change in the reservation framed by Republican leaders and submitted by Senator Lodge as part of his . com promise plan. Under th4 amend ment either the President or a ma jority of Congress could have given notice of the nation's withdrawal, a modification which Senator Hitchcock of Nebraska, the administration lead er, denounced as making th ereserva tion more objectionable than it had been before. LABOR UNIONS ARE CALLED TO MEET MARCH 22 Central labor unions over the country were requested Tuesday by the American Federation of Labor's political campaign committee to meet March 22 to select local committees of ffve to conduct in their communi ties' labor campaigns "to elect its friends and defeat its enemies." "Labor must make, this campaign memorable," sai dthe request. "It must strain every fiber to achieve success. Your organization has a place in the ranks; it has a respon sibility to meet which must be met. In order that there might be nation wire action at the earliest possible moment labor's national non-partisan campaign committee requests that every central body call a meeting to be held on March 22, 1920, at which a committee of five of your able and devoted members should be appoint ed. Your committee will manage the local non-partisan political campaign in your districts in accord with the national committee." WOULD HAVE STATES MAKE OWN BEER AND WINE LAWS Amendment of the Volstead prohi bition enforcement act so as to per mit the States, by referendum, to au thorize sale of 2.75 per centsbeer and 10 per cent wine was proposed in a bill inrotduced a few days ago by Representative Mlnahan, Democrat, of New Jersey. "My bill," said Mr. Minahan, "merely provides for" a sane, reason able and logical method of enforcing the prohibition constitutional amend ment. It is utterly repugnant to the American spirit to impose arbitrary and rigid restrictions as to their per sonal habits upon the American peo ple in a particular community which are manifestly contrary to the-wishes of the people of that community." DANIELS AND M'LEAN' ARE NOT AFTER THE GOVERNORSHIP A. W. McLean and Secretary Jo sephus Daniels have denied reports ta the effect that they would be candi dates for governor of North Carolina in 1924. Both said th-y knew no basis for the report, which was print ed in an eastern North Carolina pa per. Secretary Daniels said he ex pects to return to Raleigh and re sume charge of the News and Obser ver when his term of office as secre tary of the navy expires. - BOYS STOLE MILLIONS ' Joe and Irving Gluck, brothers and Wall street messenger .boys, have confessed that they turned over to Nicholas Arnstein, alleged head of the .$5,00,000 Wall street bond rob bery plot, at least $2,300,000 in stol en securities, jt was announced in New York gt the district attorney's office. , Th eboys made the confes sion, it was said, because they claim ed Arnstein "held out" on them.