Newspapers / The Franklin Press and … / Nov. 25, 1959, edition 1 / Page 2
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mt fftrnKlitt and <Hhr Higljlanbfl JRarmttatt WEIMAR JOKES Editorial Page Editor THURS.. NOVEMBER 25, 1959 THE COURTHOUSE Under The Rug? After' all the talk, all the meetings, about the courthouse, where are we? Exactly where we were before the talk and the meetings. The problem is still there. And we still are short of specific facts. Nobody knows, for sure, whether it is practical to remodel the present courthouse, or what we'd have when we got through, or what it would cost. And nobody knows, for sure, whether we'd get more for our money by building a new courthouse, or what we'd have when we got through with that, or what that would cost. And nobody knows, for sure, what the majority of the people of the county want done. It is quite true, as the county commissioners pointed out, that the number attending the courthouse meet ings was too small to be representative. Thus, the commissioners are in the dark about what is the majority sentiment. But will they ever know that until a concrete proposal has been submitted to the people in an election? We don't think the courthouse problem ought to be just swept under the rug. We think it ought to be passed on by the people ; it's their courthouse, and it's they who must put up with it if nothing is done, and they who must foot the pay if some thing is done. But the people can't pass on the problem unless there is something specific and concrete for them to say ves or no to. It seems to us the time has come for the county commissioners to spend some money for some exact information ; time to hire a really competent architect, one with imagination and common sense as well as technical training, and learn from him whether it Is worth while to remodel the present structure, and exactly what we'd have when we had remodeled it, and what it would cost. Learn from him, too, wliat sort of new courthouse would be adequate and a credit to the community for the next fifty years, and what that would cost. And by "learn from him", \ve have in mind detailed plans and specifications, with draw ings any voter can understand. ?, With such information, there'll be something to submit to the voters. Without it, there can hardly be anything more than more aimless talk that gets nowhere. V Little Red School? Is the little red schoolhousc on its w/ay back? Our guess is it isn't; our hope, likewise. Nonetheless, there seems to he a growing feeling that muvbe we've gone too far in the other direc tion ; t' it we've put too much emphasis on bigness in public schools. Two, bits of evidence of that came the other day front opposite sides of the continent. What happened in an Idaho community is told in an editorial in The Intermountain, published at Alameda, in that state: ? The courage of a little band of parent out on the Arco desert has brought off a victory for children all over Idaho. A victory over brick and mortar and busses, over efficiency and officiousness. On Monday, District Judge Faber Tway ruled that the grade school in Atomic City shall be reopened. To close it, he said, was ain arbitrary, unreasonable and capricious act. Officials of the Snake River District had ordered aban donment of the school. Parents of the 30-plus elementary pupils Living in the desert town, when the buses came to haul their children to the central school in Moreland, re fused to put them on the bus. After years of surly and shabby treatment they took their plea to court. Atomic City won on two counts ? the community had not been allowed a proper hearing, nor an election, on the lockup of the desert school, and the school board's action was an unreasonable imposition on small children, too many hours, too many miles away from home . . . The tykes do their best work in a cosy environment of a small schooL There they know the children and the teachers around them. Home, they know, is just around the corner. These simple facts, understood by any parent or teacher with normal affection for and empathy with ttds, has been walked all over by administrators intent on efficiency and by trustees Intent on building big, beau tiful schools as memorials to their own importance . . . The ugly little school at Atomic City is therefore a shrine to courage and reason. The kids who sit at those beat-up desks are Idaho's most privileged children. Only a few days later, the Wall Street Journal published a dispatch from Newton, Mass., that said in part: ' ? While many educators talk of the need to consolidate small high schools into large ones, a number of commun ities are moving in the opposite direction ? they're break ing up large high schools into small ones. With the start of classes this school year, this prosper Short-Lived ous suburb of Boston figuratively chopped its giant 3,000 student high school into six units, each with an enroll ment of 500. Elsewhere around the nation, some 58 schools in the last five years have adopted some form of decen tralization, Dr. Stanton Leggett, a New York City educa tional consultant estimates. Sanford's Challenge Terry Sanford, young North Carolina guberna torial hopeful, gives evidence that he knows people. He knows, first of all, that people ? at least, most of the people in North Carolina ? are looking not chiefly for ease and comfort, but for a challenge. And he knows, second, that any state program, to be really successful, cannot be dictated from Ral eigh, but must enlist the active support of the peo ple of the state, from Murphy to Manteo. "The time has come", Mr. Sanford said in a re cent speech, "for us to launch a long-range pro gram to make our public schools second to none in the nation." Well, why shouldn't they be "second to none"? For North Carolina is not a poverty-stricken state. Moreover, better education is not solely a matter of money. So Mr. Sanford proposes a ten-year "crusade" to improve education in this .state. And he pro poses that such a program be outlined and sub mitted to the voters for their ratification; for "we need for all our citizfcns to become committed to it and to feel a part of it". The details of what Mr. Sanford has in mind we do not know. What we do know is that such a program is over due. We believe we know it will have a strong appeal to North Carolinians. And we are convinced, if the details make it a practical, workable plan, the people of this state would ratify such a program overwhelmingly. Confusion (Ottawa, Canada, Journal) A staid gentleman, honorary Judge at a horse show, was up set by the dress of some of the girls. "Just look at that young person with the poodle cut, the cigarette and the blue Jeans," he said to a bystander. "Is It a boy or a girl?" "It's a girl. She's my daughter." "Oh, forgive me, sir," apoliglzed the old fellow: "I never dreamed you were her father." "I'm not," snapped the other. "I'm her mother." DO YOU REMEMBER? Looking Backward Through the Files ol The Press 65 TEARS AGO THIS WEEK (1894) Rev. J. W. Bowman and Tenney Myers swapped places last week, and both are moving this week. Arthur and Laura Slier, of Cartoogechaye, went on a visit to Walhalla, S. C., last week. Mr. Lee Barnard was in town, talking up a telephone exchange, last Saturday. Mr. John and Miss Nannie Trotter went over to Clay Coun ty yesterday, to spend a few days, visiting relatives and friends. 35 YEARS AGO (1924) This morning thermometers in Franklin registered 14 de grees above zero. Fred Blaine, the popular taxi driver, left last week to spend the winter in Florida. Mr. Jim Parrish has moved to the Hall place, near West's Mill. 15 YEARS AGO (1944) Mrs. BUI Bryson, who Is employed in the office of the judge advocate, U. S. government, in Asheville, spent the v.eek end here with her sisters, Mrs. Ray R. Swanson and Mrs. Prelo Dryman. 5 YEARS AGO 1 (1954) The last of Macon's old frame high schools is drifting into the . pages of history after more than 45 years of faithful service. The Hlgdonville school, used as the Higdonville Bap tist Church since it was bought from the county in 1948, Is being razed to make room for a new church structure. / DIFFERENT PEOPLE' ^ i What's Southerner Like? Here's A Yankee's Answer In 1869 WIJVSTON-SALEM JO UIIN'I L What are the special traits which give such colbr and interest to the Southern character? A penetrating study of the Southern temperament, long for gotten but written with warmth bnd understanding, has Just been unearthed from two 1869 Issues of Harper's magazine. The author was J. W. DePorest, a glfteu writer who got to know and respect the Southern char acter as a Union officer during the Civil War. It has Just been re-publlshed in a Harper's maga zine anthology, Oentlemen, Schol ars and Scoundrels, covering 109 years of the magazine. Pointing out that Southerners are certainly "a different people from us Northerners," DePorest wrote: "They are more simple than we, more provincial, more antique, more picturesque; they have fewer of the virtues of modern society, and more of the primitive, the natural virtues; they care less for wealth, art, learning, and the other delicacies of an urban civtli zation; they care more for in dividual character and reputation of honor. "Cowed as we are by the Mrs. Grundy of democracy; molded Into tame similarity by a general education, remarkably uniform in degree and nature, we shall do well to study this peculiar people, which will soon lose its peculiar ities: we shall do better to engraft upon ourselves Its nobler qualities. "Self-respect, as the Southerners understood It. has always demand ed much fighting. A pugnacity which is not merely warpaint, but which Is, so to sp?ak, tatooed into the character,' has resulted from this high sentiment of personal value, and from the circumstances which produced the sentiment. It permeates all society; it has in fected all Individualities. The meekest man by nature, the man who at the North would no more fight than he would jump out of a second-story window, will at the South resent an Insult by a blow, or perhaps a stab or pistol shot ... "The pugnacious customs of Southern society explain in part the extraordinary courage which the Confederate troops displayed during the rebellion. A man might as well be shot doing soldierly service at Bull Run or The Wilder ness as go back to Abbeville and be shot there in the duel or street renoontre which awaited him . . . "It seems to me that the central trait of the 'chivalrous Southern' (as Southerners used to some times Identify themselves) is an intense respect for virility. He will forgive almost any vice in a man who is manly; he will admire vices which are but exaggerations of the masculine. If you will fight, if you are strong and skillful enough to kill your antagonist, If you can govern or Influence the common herd, if you can ride a dangerous horse over a rough country, If you are a good shot or an expert swordsman, If you Stand by your own opinions unflinchingly, if you do your level best on whisky, if you are a devil of a fellow with women, if, in short, you show vigorous masculine attributes, he will grant you his respect." DePorest said Southerners blamed the Civil War on the ag gressive spirit of Northerners and oartlcularly of the New Eng landers. A Greenville (S.C.) planter, speaking of New Englanders. told him: "They always were, you know, the most quarrelsome people that God ever created. They quarreled In England, and cut off the king's head. They have been quarreling here ever since they came over in the Mayflower. They got after the Indians and killed them by the thousands. They drove out the Baptist and whipped the Quakers and hung the witches. Then" they werrf the first to pick a fight with the old country. It's my opinion. Sir, and I think you must agree with me. that God never made such another quarrelsome set. What In H ? 11 he made them for passes my com prehension." Thine* I am thankful for: THANKSGIVING itself. Orafi tude Is a noble sentiment, and I am glad and proud our forebears felt the humility that alone makes gratitude possible: that they hand ed down to us the custom of an annual giving of thanks. Thanksgiving, past, present, and future. The memories of Thanks givings gone are among my pleasantest ? a holiday from school; the family gatherings for Thanksgiving dinner; the football and klck-the-can and a dozen other games played during the long morning of a spend-the-day visit that literally lasted all day; and the mouth-watering spreads when, at last, the dinner was put on the table. By the standards of that day, modern folk virtually starve; and, by the standards of this day, the people of that earlier generation virtually ate them selves into early graves. And the Thanksgivings to come. They mean football games to be looked forward to, young people home from school, and family gatherings ? even If neither the families nor the food are quite as overflowing as they seemed to a small boy. But what has already happened is only a memory, and what Is to come is only an anticipation. This Thanksgiving of 1950 Is here, the reality ? a day to be observed with gratitude, a day to be enjoyed, one to be savored, like the food on the Thanksgiving table. THE BLESSINGS of being an American. (What a shock it was when I first learned that other nations do not have Thanksgiving day!) Sure, there's plenty wrong with America. And of course the Strictly Personal Bj WEIMAR JONES peoples of other countries have their own peculiar blessings and virtues. But what American would trade citizenship with someone from another land! (Even most of those misguided young men who defected to Soviet Russia, a few years ago, soon changed their minds.) THE UNITED NATIONS. Im perfect as it Is, ineffective as it sometimes seems, it stands as tangible evidence of men's faith in the possibility of world peace, and of their determination to find a way to bring it about. And so long as men strive for peace, there is assurance that sometime it will be attained. Men's faith and striv ing, though sometimes it took centuries, always have brought advances. MACON COUNTY. We are not the sole hope of the world, to be sure. But we are a part of the hope. For how can there be a successful state or nation or inter national organization like the UJN. unless there are first successful little communities, which set the pattern of faith and honesty and courage and kindliness that are the only roads to a better world; and which, must produce the In dividuals to give leadership to state and nation and world. This Macon County of ours has some thing to contribute, and the fact we're small has nothing to do with the value of what we may con tribute. Character and ideas and spirit don't come In sizes. THE PACT I live in this age. By oomparlson, life, even a hun tred years ago, was slow and hum drum. And, what with the dangers of atomic radiation and our race toward more said more speed, life, even a hundreds years hence, may be so dangerous and so hasty ltfl won't be worth living. NEIGHBORLJNESS and klndlil ness. We, here In the mountains I have those things in heaping measure, thank goodness. But w J have no monopoly on them. Thejl are everywhere. Imagine life wittl no such thing as a neighbor, in ttul best sense of that word; no suctfl thing as kindliness and thoughtful consideration of others. Thai would be a bleak world Indeed I so bleak, no amount of wealthl of gadgets, of physical comforl and security could make It otheifl wise. ( I LAUGHTER. It is a sense of AJ mor that keeps people sane. It lfl laughter that breaks the strata of everyday living in today's tensfl world. The ability to laugh hal about It something of the divine! for it is one of the things thai distinguish man from the animal! And humor, laughter, like mod of the joys of life, is somethinfl that must be shared. Ever tell I funny story to a group and han nobody laugh? Most of us take pride in oil sense of humor. Most of us wil admit to any fault, to any ladfl except the lack of a sense of hi mor. That's something all of ufl no matter how humorless, clalfl we have. Yet how thankful we should tfl that others have it, too. For mofl of the fun of laughing Is laugl ing together. ? ? ? Of course it's a cock-eyed worlfl Of course we face terrible pro! lems. Of course there's a lot I evil, seemingly powerful evl loose In the world. But boy; am I thankful to fl alive In this exciting age! WHAT'S CASTRO LIKE? The Cuban Puzzle AS SEEN BY A J What are we to make of the situation In Cuba? Most of us find it so confusing, we don't know what to make of it. And, after hearing it disucssed by a qualified observer who knows it first-hand, I found myself not less, but more, confused. The confusion, I suspect, grows out of the human element. For it is rare indeed that a human is all good or all bad. And at the center of the situation in Cuba is a human ? a young man named Fidel Castro. It would simplify matters to write Castro off as a demagogue, a fanatic, just another dictator ? and maybe he is all of those. Yet, in Charlotte the other night, I heard a newspaperman, talking to other newspapermen, say some good things about Castro. The speaker was Francis L. Mc Carthy, head of the Havanna bureau of the United Press Inter national. He was not sympathetic to Castro; in fact, he was bitter about Castro's treatment of the press, especially about his charges against the press. But he said of Castro: "He is obviously sincere. He is obviously determined to improve the lot of the underdog in Cuba. And he obviously has helped the Cuban at the bottom of the eco nomic ladder." True, he's dpne it by high handed methods. He's arbitrarily forced a reduction in rents, for example. And he's trying to break up the big sugar plantations and see to it that each Cuban has a little plot of land on which he can grow, not sugar cane, but the things he needs to eat. He proposes to carry out this land reform by expropiration ? that is, arbitrarily taking the land from its present owners, many of them Americans. Yet. the speaker said, land reform is so badly needed in Cuba that the United States government told Castro, soon after he came to power, that it would work with him; discuss with him the meth ods of expropriation, and try to work out something that would result in a break-up of the big plantations in such a way as to be reasonably fair to the present owners. Castro's reaction: A refusal to discuss it with Washington, and continued, growing abuse of this country. * ? * The speaker cited his efforts to give the peasants a chance; the fact that Castro is a master showman, and that virtually every Cuban family has a TV set and. even if he can't read, can and does see Castro's exhibitions on television: and, finally, the marked facial resemblance of this bearded young man. still in his early thirties, to Jesus. In a country made up chiefly of illiter ates. who are mostly Catholics, that resemblance has a tremend ous, if unconscious, effect. Mr. McCarthy added ? and I had the feeling he might be "whistling in the dark" ? that, while 75 per cent of the people still worship Castro, the other 25 per cent on longer support him. "And, at first, he had 100 per cent support". There are several groups from which opposition can be organized, and is being organized. First of all. there are the politicians who now are out of power; second, there are the wealthy who. quite naturally, don't like to lose their influence and perquisites; finally, the Cuban army today Is "people's army", made up of i lettered peasants ? and t former regular army soldiers, i listed men as well as officers, i on the outside looking in. N they'd like to get back on t inside. ? ? ? How long can Castro last? The speaker pointed to a vai ty of indices that suggest t country's economy is near c lapse. But, he said, if Castro < ride out the next few months, may be In power for several yea It probably depends on h Strong and effective the organi: resistance becomes. ? * ? What can and will the Uni States government do? Americans have a billion < lars invested in Cuba; that co try has been the United Sta showcase for good relations tween Washington and its nei bors; and Cuba lies only a I miles from United States territ< at Key West. Despite the fact t Cuba is an independent coun the American government will sit idly by forever, the UPI n believes. He said Washington already warned the Castro governm that, if abuse of the Uni States continues, our State Dep ment, as a first step, will (i American tourists to avoid CI In no case, the speaker phasized, will Washington per Cuba to be taken over by Communists. ? * * But is Fidel Castro a C munist? Mr. McCarthy ? and he viously is no friend of Castro feels sure he is not. "And I I that more on his Catholic b; ground than on his actions.". In fact, everything he does in with Communist policy, there is little doubt that man; his chief lieutenants are s pathetic to Communism, if actually card-carrying member the Communist party. * ? ? Are the lives Of American Cuba in danger? Yes, was the answer. Not f the government itself; but i man whom 75 per cent of people worship continues to out against the alleged wic ness of America and Americ it is only a question of time i some of his more fanatical portors ? perhaps without tro's knowledge or wish ? at> any American whom they hap to see. ? W. J SOME JOTTINGS FROM A NOTEROO Elbow grease is a better 1 ness lubricant than soft soap. You may get in deep water, you should not stay in it. Thi what a fish does. You have a well trained men if it will enable you to fo the unpleasant things. The chap whose sleeves rolled up the highest does no ways do tltfe most work. Don't expect too much t others. Remember, they are much better than you are. Some people are not sati; with going to the extreme. 1 want to start there? And*: <S. C.i Independent.
The Franklin Press and the Highlands Maconian (Franklin, N.C.)
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Nov. 25, 1959, edition 1
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