Newspapers / The Chapel Hill Weekly … / July 3, 1956, edition 1 / Page 2
Part of The Chapel Hill Weekly (Chapel Hill, N.C.) / About this page
This page has errors
The date, title, or page description is wrong
This page has harmful content
This page contains sensitive or offensive material
Page Two The Chapel Hill Weekly Chapel Hill, North Carolina 1M K. R—wry Tetephoa* M 271 or M«1 Pablnfccd Every Tuesday and Friday By The Cltapel Hill Pabltobinic C— ipaay. lac Loon Gravis Contributing Editor Joe Jokis Managing Editor Billy Arthur _ — Auociate Editor Orville Camfrill General Manager O. T. Watiums Advertising Director Charlton Camrrzll Mechanical Supt. Intercd a* aecood -clow matter February J>- It**. the poctatfloe at Chapel HUi North Carolina, under the aet of March 3, ttn SUBSCRIPTION RATES 1b Orange County, Year fci.oo (6 months 92.25; 8 months, $1.60) Outside of Orange County by the Year: State of N. C., Va., and S. C. Other States and Dint. of Columbia 6.00 Canada, Mexico, South America 7.00 Europe „ . 7.60 A Tale of Two Cities Brooks Atkinson is drama critic of the New York Times. Bill McDermott is drama critic of the Cleveland Plain dealer. Here is a passage in Mr. Atkin son's book, “Once around the Sun,” about how they exchange visits: "Bill McDermott and his wife Eva come to dinner . . . Our association with the McDermotts reveals one of the in equalities of New York life. When we visit Cleveland on business we stay in the McDermott’s house, which is a large one, take breakfast, luncheon, and din ner with them, and go to the theater with them. After two or three days like that we cover a wide variety of topics and arrive at a number *>f conclusions. Apart from the glow of friendship, we accomplish a great deal. But when the McDermotts come to New York on busi ness, only the most careful sort of plan ning makes it possible for us to spend one evening together. Since we live in an apartment and not a house we can not put them up in comfort. And since they have a number of plays and peo ple to see, they are pressed for time, and my working schedule is apt to be inelastic. A visit to New York is gen erally under pressure, a visit to almost any other city in America is a release from “pressure.” Tennyson in Victorian Fog! From Harold Nicholson’s biography of Tennyson: “Tennyson’s occasional verses are of considerable interest not only because of their intrinsic quality but also because they are generally ex empt from the intention of striking some particular attitude or conveying some particular moral . . . They show him, moreover, in a pleasant light as a quite human, quite urbane, alnjost gen ial man of culture. They are an inval uable antidote to the Victorian fog which obscured so many of his poems. Stick to Subject at Hand (Bladen Journal) Governor Luther Hodges has called’ a special session of the General Assem bly to convene on July 23 to iron out some of the problems facing the State in regard to segregation in the public schools. Despite the fact that we consider the session a “lame duck” gathering, due to the fact that so many who attend will not be in the regular session which convenes in January, it is hoped that those who do attend will stick to the subject at hand and not jump into other areas of legislation that can best be at tended to by the regular scheduled meeting of the Legislature. The problem facing the Legislature —and the State —is not one that can be resolved overnight. Calm delibera tion and prayerful thought is needed. Haggling and ill-tempered words at the special session or any session will be more harmful than any legislative ac tion that could be devised. Governor Hodges has “hoped” it will not take the Legislature but one week to dispose of the problem. We hope his estimate is correct for the longer the legislators stay in Raleigh during the hot summer days the more likely it is that divergent tangents will develop. TV’s Southern Dialect (Chatham Record) Television is a wonderful form of entertainment, and we are one of those who put up with most of its shortcom ings. We can even stand to see some of the repeat shows and some of them have been repeated so often that the films must be completely worn out. ■ We are patient when the commer- cials blare out twice as loud as the regu lar portion of the program. With but a little irritation we can sit through a dull hour play, which usu ally has an unsatisfactory ending. We are long suffering and take the bad with the good, but there is one practice in television which makes us boil in righteous indignation, and that is the custom of casting Yankees in the role of Southerners in serious plays. And the way these Yankees murder the melodious Southern dialect is some thing out of this world. What started out to be a drama is quickly turned into a comedy-tragedy. We favor retaliation in kind, For just once, we should like to go into the deep, deep South, say Mississippi, and select a talented group of college drama students. We would take them to New York and talk NBC or CBS into casting them in the roles of East Side New- Yorkers. You can imagine how com pletely ludicrous the result would be. We would suggest to the television network that should they need some Southerners in a forthcoming produc tion members of the Carolina Playmak ers at the University of North Carolina would be delighted at a chance for the trip and some extra money. Mozart and Truman (New York Herald Tribune) Few of the celebrations of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart can match the charm ing informality of a little event in Salz burg. Mozart’s birthplace. In this at tractive little Austrian city Mr. Harry S. Truman, former President of the United States, sat down at a small piano once used by the composer and de livered himself of the work known to musical historians as Mozart’s Sonata No. 11 in A Major. K. V. No. 231. This is the same sonata of which he played a few measures for a national audience when he conducted a television tour of the White House some years ago. Mr. Truman's performance at Salz burg will not go down in musical annals as an official contribution to the Mozart Bicentenary. He was in Salzburg as a tourist; as all tourists should, he stop ped at Mozart's birthplace: there was a piano there; he is a pianist—the se quence of circumstances led to an in evitable conclusion. But however casual his appearance and unpremeditated his performance, it is pleasant to find a former President <>f the United States paying an impromptu and sincere trib ute to one of the world’s greatest com posers. Greenbacks and New Smells (Bertit* Ledger-Advance) Over at Woodland the town fathers are struggling with a problem that is an example of the changing times in this area. The citizens are suffering the penalty of progress from the agricul tural to the industrial age. There are unpleasant odors emanat ing from one of that growing town’s industrial enterprises. The citizens are complaining and would like to have something done about it. The particular plant is a hog slaughtering and sausage processing plant, an excellent home grown small industry of the kind that the Roanoke-Chowan section needs to encourage and could well do with many more. We have no advice to give on the solution of this particular problem at Woodland, but we venture tb remind that one cannot have one’s cake and eat it too. Industry creates smells and smoke and problems, along with pay rolls and prosperity. One further reminder, the sight of greenbacks soon makes people become accustomed to new smells. Consider the folks in Franklin, Va., and their big pulp mill and all its foul smells —but think of that nice spending money. Congressional Farce (The Franklin Frew?) In Washington North Carolina’s At torney General Rodman testified before a Congressional committee in opposition to {lending so-called civil rights legisla tion. But neither committee members nor the several co-sponsors of the legis lation bothered to hear what Mr. Rod man had to say; when he finished, the only legislator, present was the chair man. The point is not whether Mr. Rod man was right or wrong, or even whe ther the legislation is good or bad. The point is Congressmen make a farce of committee hearings when they declipe to listen to any testimony not in accord with their preconceived conclusions. THE CHAPEL HILL WEEKLY |pgj| The Weekly Congratulates. . . The Weekly congratulates the Chapel Hill Ro tary Club for its high calibre of leadership over the years. Last week Rotarians installed Dr. Robert B. Lindsay as its 1956-57 president. He succeeded H. S. McGinty, who had acted as president during the illness of the elected Dr. John Brauer. It would be superfluous to mention their long list of predecessors. It is sufficient to note that over the years the club has steadily grown, consistently contributed to community betterment projects, and more than met its motto “Sendee Above Self.” With all confidence, we predict that under the direction of Dr. Lindsay the wheel of Rotary will continue to turn forward in Chapel Hill. s . . .and The Weekly Asks One of the stories that W. D. Carmichael Jr. likes to tell always brings laughs. It concerns the time when Confederate veterans were employed as guides around the battlegrounds of Petersburg and Richmond, Va. On one occasion a guide was taking a bus load of sightseers around and was describing the events that had taken place in the 1860 s. “Over on that hill,” he pointed, “a gallant platoon of Confederate soldiers held off a company of Yankee troops and saved Richmond. And over to my left on that knoll a company of brave Southern men fought off a battalion of Yankees and saved Richmond. On the fields before us a company of stalwart Confederates routed a division of and over there a . . .” “Say,” one of the visitors interrupted, “didn’t the Yankees win a single skirmish around here?” "No,” the Confederate veteran stormed, “and they ain't going to as long as I’m driving this sightseeing bus.” \ Some Mud in the River of Knowledge By Billy Arthur Deliver me from people who know it all, who can —and will at the drop of a phrase—-give you the solu tion to every single one of the day’s problems, and who are the only ones mentally equipped to state the objections and obstacles to what six or 12 other men think are fine works. Some of these people you can keep at arm’s length or have nothing at all to do with. The rest you just have to make the best of. Therefore, there must be some advantages in being cantankerous, contentious, and even belligerent. But 1 can’t find them, and 1 may be eyually as foolish as Ljjjey to worry about them in the first place. On the other hand, take a man of good sense and temper. Nobody considers him, tries to keep him straight, smooths him, pets him. Everybody takes for granted he will do and act right without any manage ment at all. But, everybody listens to a cantankerous man. He’s important. He’s the loose screw and the weak link in the chain that is more important than the tigh* and strong ones. People watch him. They’re afraid he might explode or break any minute. They go to all lengths to straighten and strengthen and tighten him. He’s kept in good humor. He’s privileged. No matter how wrong he is, he’s suffered. No one ever offends him by trying to cor rect him. Instead, he’s generously lubricated with soft soap. No one disagrees with him. They tell him it was a great day when he was elected or named to that body of men. They say, “My good fellow, what you say has a great deal of merit, and we all have the greatest desire to do what you say, and you are probably ab solutely correct, but —.” See, he’s now puffed up, deferred to, made much of, humored, and considered by people trying to per suade him to act as any sensible man would act with out any persuasion at all. And everybody ends up quite pleased and happy that he’s been put on the right track. And. he’s happy, too because they can’t get rid of him, he keeps them on their toes, he’s a healthy in fluence. So he keeps right on being cantankerous, con tentious, belligerent, telling you everything he knows, and enjoying himself. I don’t mind being instructed and enlightened, but not by people who are enjoying themselves just because they're talking. When they get on their feet to speak, some folks go back 2,000 years to a time everyone, specially I, feel uncertain aboute and authorities differ on. They pick out a Roman *%ii>eror or a characteristic of one and let you have it to support something presently. For my money, it doesn't require that much burrowing or foraging. Tfien they skip to an Egyptian tomb and get a souvenir, pick up a date from the One Hundred Years War and finally w’hen all is weighted dowm with many other gleanings, it is handed out with the expectation that the idea and the listener will sink together. And they usually do. Anyone can prove anything to me when he goes off to the Dark Ages to do it. So I’m not going to fol low them. They ramble back through the years and finally without any warning say “therefore” and then proceed to give you a 1956 conclusion. Their “therefores” just about drive me nuts. They may be logical, but it’s long distance logic. If an army on the march w r ent back at night to where it started in the morning, there probably would be no wars. And that’s just about what’s going to kill off euch speakers eventually. The sooner the better. I’m for folks stating their points, sitting on them, holding to them, and anchoring them instead of go ing way back through the years to get stuck in the mud at the source of the river of knowledge. Chapel Hill Chaff (Continued from par* 1) Dr. Howard Patterson, and the brother of Mrs. Paul Schenck.) When he retired at 73 four years ago Dr. Alexander said: “I'm going to fish all I want to.” But he found that fish ing and other pastimes didn’t give him the thrill they had given him in his youth. In fact, they soon became deadly tiresome. Bert Vincent, the writer of the article I saw, quotes him as sayipg that he got so miserable he almost prayed to die. “He had practiced as a phy sician and surgeon in Knox ville for 44 years,” writes Mr. Vincent, “and he wanted to get back in harness. He found just what suited him—-helping people who are ill. Dr. Bed ford Peterson put him to work at the Eastern State Hospital and he says he’s happier than he’s ever been in his life. He's a consultant and also a sur geon. His greatest happiness is serving the elderly women pa tients. When I went around the hospital with him he got one, 87 years old, to play the piano for us. "Mrs. Mason, the matron, told me: ‘He’s here in the morning before his working hours are supposed to begin, and he's often here Saturday afternoon when he’s supposed to be off. I fuss at him but it doesn’t do any good.’ “Dr. Alexander had a heart attack after he went to Eastern State. ‘Acted the fool,’ he said. ‘Parked my car. It started roll ing. It knocked me down twice. Finally I got the key into the door lock and stopped the car just in time to prevent an aw lul accident’.” Eben is remembered by all of his boyhood friends for his love of outdoors and wild life and for his boundless energy. Os course his energy expressed itself in the 1890’s in ways far different from those of the 1950’5. I have told in this paper before of his training a crow to talk and of how the crow walked up and down the rock wall between the Alexander place and the Episcopal church, when the windows were wide open and it could be by all the congregation, Und re peated the highly critical things that it had been taught to say about tiie sermons. How the passage of time does change a man’s standards! For many years now Eben has been an elder of the Presbyterian church. Sometimes in moments of solitude he may cherish that crow’s performance as one of the happy memories of his boyhood, hut if a crow acted in any such manner alongside the Presbyterian church in Knoxville today the congrega tion would surely see in Dr. Alexander a profoundly dis approving elderly elder. Land of Ponds (Chatham Record) Chatham County might well be called the land of farm ponds. Right now there are more than one thousand of these ponds dotting the land scape in every section of the county. This county may be topped by just one or two other coun ties in the number of farm ponds, but it stands near the top of the list. In recent years this section has been bothered by one drought after the other, and farm ponds have played a great role many times in helping to relieve the situation. The greatest use of the or dinary farm pond is for water ing 'livestock and poultry. In Eastern Chatham, however, farmers are growing more and more dependent upon the farm pond as a source of irrigation for his tobacco, and in many cases this has meant the dif ference between a good crop and a bad crop. One may ride down any rur al road in Chatham late in the afternoon about this time of the year and see folks fishing along the banks of farm ponds all along the way. In the matter of recreation, the pond on many farms is used primarily as a fish pond. Time was when rivers and creeks were the only places to fish, but all this is changed now. Many Chatham residents still travel to the coast for a day or two of fishing, but others who used to go are now re maining at home and fishing in their own or their neigh bor’s pond. Little Robbie Sanders 111 up in Clayton, three and a half years old, can truly be classed as mother’s little helper. The other morning his mother went to the kitchen to heat the form ula for his brother, Randy, who is five weeks old. When she returned to the bedroom little Robbie had carried Ra .1/ from his bassinet to the bed and was changing his diaper. —By Henry Diggs in the Smith field Herald. Ijjjjjl f Like Chapel HIU JUII Bob Bartholomew noted that the opening speech for North Carolina School Week was titled “I Was a Hobo Kid.” He added: “Seems a strange title to speak on at a meeting of school teachers.” * * * * This is a dull season for Hap Perry and Carring ton Smith. “WYiat’ll we do today?” Carrington asked. "Well,” replied Hap, “we can go down to Albert Coates’ new building and watch ’em push that dirt from one side of the yard to the other.” ♦ * * * % Ed Lanier was having a laugh on himself this week when telling about putting up campaign signs in Person County. “Till I was all through,” said he. “I didn’t realize I had crossed the Orange County line, and it was so late I didn’t go back to take ’em down.” r * * * * A witness on the stand in Orange County Superior Court at Hillsboro last week was being questioned about hfw he got from Chapel Hill to Carrboro. He maintained that he went from East Franklin to West Franklin Street and thence into Carrboro. "Is that the only way you can get from Chapel Hill to Carrboro?” the attorney pressed. * “No, sir,” the witness replied, “you can turn left on Columbia Street, go to Pittsboro and come back up to Carrboro, but West Franklin Street is a short cut.” * * * * Two more bits about our New York trip and I’ll be through with it. After I had had a pastrami sandwich in a delica tessen, I sought a toothpick, explaining, “My teeth just weren’t built for pastrami.” “Are anybody’s?” asked the cashier. * 9 * * The day we were to return home via plane, I was taking my time dressing for breakfast. “Come on,” the Missus called. “Hurry, we want to eat breakfast early so we’ll be hungry when they serve lunch on the plane.” 0 Until the other day, no one has ever known Sena tor Sam J. Ervin, of North Carolina, to be at a loss for words. He has a word for every occasion; in fact thous ands ot words, but for once he was rendered speech less. The Dixie oratocrat was bemoaning the plight of the Southern textile industry, and becoming more lugubrious by the word. He was a prophet of doom. His soothsaying was so dolorous that a correspondent essayed to cheer him up. "What would you say,” asked the newspaperman, "if I gave you the latest textile importation figures from the Department of Commerce?” “Plenty probably,” replied the vocal solon. “What are the figures?” “I will read you just one item,” said the reporter. "We are importing 140,000 Confederate flagsmonth from Japan.” A good 15-second silence ensued. Then Senator Ervin muttered: “1 wish 1 could think of something to say—” and strode away shaking his head. * * 9 * An influence peddler in Washington is to be re- called by the investigating committee. It has probably ■ dug up something he has not yet pleaded the Fifth Amendment to. 9** * * Married people would be happier if women were as kind to their husbands as they were to their lovers, and if men were as thoughtful of their wives as they were to their sweethearts. 9 9 9 4 It's not what you take with you, it’s What you leave behind that counts. *** * j Next thing you’ll be buying on the iuajtallment plan is coffee. For a pound, small down payment and easy terms. 4 4 9 4 There are thousands of useless words in :he Eng lish language, and all of them were used in commence ment addresses. *** * I The reason June is the month for bride * i s that it takes dad that long to recover from April I [5. * * * 9 Now every beach is advertising itself $M the bath tub arid sand box of the U. S. 9 9 4 4 Married people would be happier if the] r remem bered both married for worse as well as bett er 4 * * * Most men owe their success to the tion they * * * * p; I ' Adversity links men while prosper*! scatters them! * * * * How to make both ends meet: Watch I the small boy just before he reaches the walking ®tage, and you’ll see how it’s done. * * * * If civilization is a matter- of putting J>n clothes, where are we headed this summer? T k *** * I Happiness consists of seeing someone I more mis erable than ourselves. I 9 9 9 9 Freedom of speech means, persons beini at liberty to say what you think. 9 9 9 9 I The trouble with inferiority complemes is that not enough people have them. 1 * * * * I Freckles are not so bad. No girl objeems to seeing them on another girl. J * * * * One cannot serve golf and mammoim. * • * * ft The man with his nose to the grindstone doesn’t have if in someone else’s business. I Tuesday, July 3, 1956
The Chapel Hill Weekly (Chapel Hill, N.C.)
Standardized title groups preceding, succeeding, and alternate titles together.
July 3, 1956, edition 1
2
Click "Submit" to request a review of this page. NCDHC staff will check .
0 / 75