Newspapers / The Franklin Press and … / April 25, 1957, edition 1 / Page 2
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?h* Slmnkim tyvzM nttii ?he iHirjblnniis ^ntimian Second class mail privileges authorized at Franklin, N. C Published every Thursday by The Franklin Press Telephone 24 WEIMAR JONES . . BOB 8. SLOAN ..... J. P. BRADY ...... ROLFE NEILL ICRS. ALLEN SILER AIRS MARION BRYSON CARL P CABE FRANK A. STARRETTE . . . CHARLES E. WHITTINOTON O. E. CRAWFORD .... DAVID H. SUTTON Editor Advertising Manager News Editor-Photographer ' Reporter Society Editor Office Managei Proofreader Operator-Machinist Compositor Pressman Stereotyper Commeiclal Printer SUBSCRIPTION RATES Outside Macon County Insidc Macon County One Year ... $3.00 One Year $2.50 81* Months ..... 1.75 SI* Months ..... 1.75 Three Months .... 1.06 Three Months . ... 1.00 Two years . . . 5.25 Two Years , 4.25 Three Years .... 7.50 Three Years ..... 6.00 Are We Children? To anybody who looks honestly at what has hap pened in the Macon County school situation, there is no escape from these conclusions : I Whether the change in county superintendents will prove wise remains to be seen. All the public can do is hope. Because, just as the county board of education never gave any really valid reason for dismissing the retiring superintendent, it has not bothered to tell the public why it thinks the new man will be any better. II Presumably, the new superintendent, Mr. H. Bueck, is responsible neither for the fact a change was made nor for the way it was made. He, there fore, vought to be blamed for neither. So all good citizens .should join in wishing him a successful administration. That is demanded in fairness to him. More importantly, the welfare of the schools and of the children, who usually are the real vic tims in such a situation, demands it. III Nobody can take pride in the way the retiring superintendent, Mr. Holland McSwain, was treated. 'Great Christian charity is being ascribed to the board because it withheld announcement of Mr. Bueck's election until Mr. McSwain could get the vacated Murphy job. Well, the charity was a trifle late. Because as recently as three weeks before he was replaced, Mr. McSwain had been given no ink ling that he would not be re-hired. He should have been told? and all the evidence is, he could have been told ? months ago, in time to have some choice of jobs. IV However noble the motive that prompted it, the board did act in secret session. Nobody knew when or where the board was going to meet, and the action it took was kept secret for six days ? how could any meeting be more .secret ? V From the beginning', the board has consistently violated a law mpch older, more basic, more sacred than any statute law. The right of the people to be heard has been tra ditional since Magna Carta. But when it took the important step of electing a superintendent of schools, the board was careful to deprive the peo ple of that right ? by meeting unannounced and in secret. This entire matter, in fact, has been handled as though the people of Macon County were children. They were not consulted. They were not informed. They were not told why. Now the change has been made ? and they still are not told. I s ' ? It is the people's tax money that supports the schools. It is the people's children affected. But the people are expected to take what they are given, without question ? without a chance even to ask questions. After May, Water Any long-time solution of Franklin's water sup ply problem has been unofficially postponed until after the town election next month. But when those chosen in the May election take office, they will find themselves facing the same old question.: How and where to get an abundance of good water for a growing community? / When the next board sits down to study the problem, and when it debates the advisability of wells vs. creek water vs. a publicly owned and con trolled watershed, we hope the town officials will take into consideration a recent announcement: The city of (ireenville, S. C., an industrial town well out of the mountains, puts such a high prem ium on the purity, the softness, and the good taste of water from a mountain watershed that it is pass ing up sources close at hand and coming many miles to the mountains to buy a big watershed, as a supplement to its present one. The new project will cost $9,000,000. Letters Let's Welcome Mr. Bueck i Dear Mr. Jones: Now that the tumult and the shouting over the selection of a county superintendent has died and the choice has been made, It is time for a brief afterthought. Personal opinions as to the wisdom of the move, or as to the fairness of It, should not affect our cooperation with our new superintendent, or with the school board. I hope that every citizen of Macon Cotnty will welcome Mr. Bueck and his family with real Maconian courtesy and will give him full and enthusiastic cooperation. Certainly personal differences must not be permitted to have an adverse affect on our schools. We have good schools in Macon County and only the citizens of the county can keep them so. Let us keep an attitude of good will and cooperation toward all who are connected with the administration of our schools. REV. S. B. MOSS Franklin. Others' Opinions (Opinion* expressed in this space are not necessarily those of The Press. Editorials selected for reprinting here. In fact, are chosen with a view to presenting a variety of viewpoints. They are, that Is, Just what the caption says ? OTHEB ST Opinions.) What Is Spring? Spring is lavish in her splendor ... in her brief span she is the song of skylarks rising to greet the sun . . . she is the heady scent of apple blossoms and of lilacs . . . She is the symphony of birds chattering over the business of nesting . . . she Is a potpourri of color ? the azure sky, a rainbow, a tulip bed jeweled by April rain . . . she is the folklore of all seasons told in the over-tones of swaying branches . . . she is hope and life . . . she is the essence of creation and the gentle hand that nurtures little creatures everywhere. Through A Boneyard (Phillips Russell in Chapel Hill News Leader) People still living can remember when southern small towns, however sleepy and non-progressive, were so well shaded that one could traverse their main street as If under an arbor. Then came municipal Improvers who razed everything in favor of paving and poles, and now a man driving a car hurries through them as if through a boneyard. Pleasure Of Grandfathers (Goldsboro News-Argus) If there Is any joy in this world that somehow does not hold its small Irritations, its occasional sadness, we know It not. Grandchildren are just about as great a joy as this world can bring. The other day a friend who lives a couple of blocks from us said: "I wish you and your General Manager would come to see us. We have our three small grandchildren visiting us." Then he paused and added soberly: "After a half hour with them you will be able to appreciate your solitude." Home Of The Brave (Ellavllle, Ga., Sun) One reason America is the home of the brave could be that almost no one is afraid of d?bt. RACIAL RELATIONS: THE SOUTH IS STILL TRYING TO FIND SOLUTION Southern Pines Pilot A native-born Southerner re turning from a trip North tells us that while up there he found himself, somewhat to his own amazement, arguing on be half of racial tolerance and understanding with a Yankee who, also to the Southerner's amazement, was vltuperatlvely and blindly bitter when discus sing racial relations. Racial prejudice, he discover ed. was indeed not confined to areas south of the Mason-Dixon Una. Beyond that, he discovered this element about his own thinking and what distinguish ed his thinking from the Yan kee's; the Northerner said that he ignored the Negro, contemp tuously and completely. To him, the problem was thereby solved. What the Southerner then real ized, he said, was that the South simply cannot Ignore the Negro. We are all living here, white and Negro together, with our economic and political lives ? If not our social lives ? inex tricably entwined. Because we all MUST live to gether, therefore, we MUST find a solution ? whatever the solu tion may be, that will enable us to live In mutual tolerance, even if not yet attaining the goal that morality and Chris tianity forbid us eventually to evade: Mutual respect. What the Southerner discov ered was that he had not quit trying or hoping. However faul ty or misguided may be some of our efforts in the South, he realized, we have not closed the book. This Is true. And we all, white and Negro, know It in ou hearts. Somehow, some way agreement must be reached or the terms of our Ille here In th( South together. Of course, there are people It the South who have closed thei: minds, who have quit trying Just like the Southerner's Yan kee acquaintance. But most o the people in the South havi not, because they know ai plainly as the sun will rise tha they cannot. Therein, no matter how pain fully and slowly It may develop lies the South's salvation. *1 Didn't Quite Catch Th' Name? Mr. Rip Van? What?" * STRICTLY - Personal It could have happened in few places. Maybe nowhere but here. in town one evening last week, I found myself (as usual) with no money in my pocket. And I needed a little. Stepping into Clyde Galley's Grill, I bought a pack of ciga rettes and asked him if he'd cash a small check for me. "Sure. How much do you want?" And he handed me the cigarettes. "O, a couple of dollars will do". He handed me two one-dollar bills, and turned to some other duty. "But what about the check?" I asked. "O, I haven't got a blank check handy. You can give it to me, sometime". Which reminds me: I'd bet ter go give him that check right now, before both of us forget it! . . . o, yes, and add enough to cover the cigarettes. ? ? ? Aren't people funny? No mat ter how naturally a man acts, they seem to think what he does is strange. I am reminded of that almost every time I am on Main Street. Having finished my errands' up VIEWS t ? By BOB SLOAN A number of others have had their say About the superin tendent of education situation here, and I would like to add a brief word. I had a part in bringing Hol land McSwaln here as superin tendent. I am proud of the rec ord he has made here in the past six years. I hate to see him leave. As to the new superintendent, H. Bueck, I know something of his capabilities. He is a good school man, capable and well qualified for the Job. I hope he continues to encourage the progress that has been made in our schools, particularly in the field of encouraging teachers to improve their qualifications and offering them every opportun ity possible to do so. Let's all help him In this and other ways. As to the Board of Education; r the calibre of the man they , selected discredits many of the i dire motives attributed to them. : However, I cannot pass on with out suggesting that, had the k board taken the public into its . confidence, most of these ru mors would not have arisen. I believe the Board of Edu t cation members can help lm ? prove the schools In our coun i ty if, in the future, they take t the public and the county su perintendent into their confl . dence. They did not do this, this past year, with either the t ?Continued on Pace 3 town, I am ready to drive back to The Press office. So I start walking up one side of the street, looking; then I go down the other side, looking. Friends seem puzzled; so I explain : "I've lost my automobile." Now what, I ask you, could be more natural than that? But they don't seem to under stand. "Do you mean", they ask in alann, "that it's been stolen? . . . or just what do you mean?" "Just what I said; I've lost my automobile." They don't literally shake their heads; they're too polite for that. But I can see from their faces they're doing a job of mental head-shaking. Then I'm the one who is puz zled . . . and a little irritated. "I can't remember where I parked the darned thing!" Surely that ought to clear the matter up; surely they ought to say, "oh, I see"; surely their tone ought to suggest that nothing could be more natural, that everybody does that every day. But you should see their smiles! So I continue to look. "Let's see, did I park it here in front of the post office. No; it isn't here. Maybe in front of Angel's Drug store". So I walk from the post of fice to Angel's. Still no auto mobile. By WEIMAR JONES ".Maybe on the other side of the street; no, that was yester day . . . But it must be on the other side, because it's not on this one. So I walk from the S & L five and ten to Bun-ell's, looking. Still no automobile. "Maybe the Main Street park ing places were all full, and I left it down by the jail." And sometimes I find it there; sometimes I don't. It's an awful nuisance, of course, this business of never remejnbering where you've parked. But it's not a new nuisance. I've done it all my life. Twenty five years ago, in Asheville, I often walked the three quarters of a mile from the office home, was surprised to find the car wasn't there ? and then remem bered I'd left it parked within a block of the office. Then there was the time I sold our car; planned to walk for a while and save money. But the very next day I saw a car that looked just like the one I had sold, and got home with it before I remembered I didn't own a car. As I say, that sort of thing is an awful nuisance. But, if, as I suspect, everybody does it, why are folks so all-fired amus ed when I do it. As I said before: Aren't people funny? No mat ter how naturally a man acts, they seem to think what he does is strange. DO YOU REMEMBER? Looking Backward Through the Files of The Press 65 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK (1892) If a certain "wldder" don't quit flirting with a gentleman who wears striped trousers and red leather shoes, she'll get her name in the paper. ? Aquone item. Mr. and .Mrs. David Norton, of Highlands, have been spend ing a week -among their many friends here. They will re-open their boarding house May 1. A chicken with four legs on the lower part of the body, two of them set right and the other two reversed suitable for walking backward, was hatched out at Mr. Zeb Balrd's last Wednesday. 25 YEARS AGO (1932) Public school committees for 1932-33 were announced this week by the county board of education. For Mlllshoal were Wayne McCracken, Frank Cabe, Add Klnsland, Wylle San ders, J. W. Shuler, Frank Bailey, George Buchanan, N. B. L. Downs, A W. Reld, A. L. Dills, J. M. Corbln, and A. A. Adams. Home-coming Day will be celebrated at the First Baptist Church Sunday with the dedication of the church, from which all debt has been . removed. The Rev. A. J. Smith, a former pastor, will preach. The Rev. E. R. Eller is pastor now. Miss Vernon Parrlsh, of Iotla, and Mr. Buren Pruett, of Bonny Crest, were married at Clayton, Ga.( Friday. 10 YEARS AGO The $100,000 street-water-sewer Improvement program Is under way In Franklin and is expected to be completed by mid-summer. The County Board of Education Wednesday re-elected Guy L. Houk as Macon County superintendent of schools by a 4-1 vote. To demonstrate the value of Its payroll to the community, the Zlckgraff Hardwood Company will pay off all its regular employes in silver dollars.
The Franklin Press and the Highlands Maconian (Franklin, N.C.)
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April 25, 1957, edition 1
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