Page TWO
THURSDAY, J\
ILOT
Southern Pines
North Carolina
“In taking over The Pilot no changes are contemplated. We will try to keep this a good
paper. We will try to make a little money for all concerned. Wherever there seems to be
an occasion to use our influence for the public good we will try to do it. And we will
treat everybody alike.”—James Boyd, May 23, 1941.
Faith In This Area Remains
Writing the obituary of the Mozur Lace
plant project has not been a pleasant task for
this newspaper—just as it has not been pleas
ant reading for a eommunity which had cen
tered on this project its hopes for a welcome
industrial operation.
The project failed because of the inability
of the Mozur firm to reach a satisfactory
agreement with a contractor. This was a mat
ter that was out of the hands of the local in
dustrial development committee—and certain
ly out of the hands of the residents of the
Sandhills who had pledged some $180,000 to
help finance the cost of the proposed plant.
The feeling of this community was well ex
pressed by Robert S. Ewing, president of the
local development corporation, when he said
last week:
“We have seen a wonderful spirit de
veloped among our citizens. People in
A Successful Half Century
The Pilot joins the many other newspapers,
organizations and individuals who are con
gratulating Carolina Power and Light Com
pany this month on the 50th anniversary of
its founding.
Elsewhere in today’s Pilot is an article trac
ing the history of this company ■ that now
serves about half of North Carolina’s 100
counties as well as a large area of South Car
olina. This article is interesting: we commend
it to readers as something most Americans
love—a success story.
It is a story that has involved each one of
us in the company’s territory. It is a story
that shares in the sweep and drama of Amer
ican industry. Seen in perspective, after half
a century, the accomplishments of the Caro
lina Power and Light Company, like those of
other American businesses which have ad
vanced technologically while constantly
‘To Make A Better Community’
The announced purpose of “The Voice,” a
new mimeographed information sheet to be
published monthly by the Civic Club of West
Southern Pines is “to stir up the minds” of its
readers “so that they will become more alert
to their opportunities to become better citi
zens, to make a better community.”
This is an aim to which all of us, on which
ever side of town we live, can subscribe.
We are pleased to see this renewed evidence
of enthusiasm and activity by the Civic Club
of West Southern Pines, an organization that
has played a part in community affairs for
the past 20 years, “to increase the public in
terest in all matters relating to good citizen
ship.”
We have frequently heard Negro spokesmen
in town council meetings, appearing on behalf
of some need or project, who have presented
themselves as speaking for the Civic Club of
West Southern Pines, thereby giving their
requests or ideas considerably more author
ity than if they spoke for themselves alone.
While we would not deny the need or the
effectiveness of racially militant organiza
tions which are focussed primarily on the pro
tection and extension of Negro rights, we see
an equally important place in any Negro com
munity for organizations such as the Civic
Club of West Southern Pines which apparent
ly directs its attention to the ways and means
of good citizenship as such, emphasizing the
responsibilities that are incumbent on all good
citizens, Negro or white. This ties in with our
conviction that there will be progressively less
hostility to Negro rights drives, such as the
schobl integration effort, as Negroes demon
strate increasingly the responsibility that or
dinary citizenship implies.
T Was Bom July 4,1776. •. ’
One of.the most original and interesting
July 4 items to appear in the nation’s press
this year was the following, called “A Nation’s
Credo,” which was published in the Chicago
Sun-Times:
“■‘I was bom July 4, 1776, and the Declara
tion of Independence is my birth certificate.
The bloodlines of the world run through my
veins because I offered freedom to the op
pressed. I am many things and many people.
I am the nation. I am 165,000,000 living souls
—and the ghost of millions who have lived
and died for me.
“I am Nathan Hale and Paul Revere. I
stood at Lexington and fired the shot heard
’round the world, I am Washington, Jefferson
and Patrick Henry. I am John Paul Jones
and the Green Mountain Boys and Davy
Crockett. I am Lee and Grant and Lincoln.
I remember the Alamo, the Maine and Pearl
Harbor. When freedom called, I answered the
call and stayed until it was over, over there.
I left my heroic dead in Flanders Field, on the
rocks of CorregidOr and the bleak slopes of
Korea.
“I am big. I sprawl from the Atlantic to
the Pacific, 3,000 miles (before Alaska) throb
bing with industry. I am more than 5,000,000
farms. I am forest, field, mountain and desert.
I am,, quiet villages and cities that never
sleep. . . You can look at me and see Ben
jamin Franklin walking down the streets of
Philadelphia. I am Babe Ruth and the World
Series. I am 169,000 schools and colleges and
250,000 churches, where my people worship
God as they think best.
“I am a ballot dropped in a box, the roar
of a crowd in a stadium and the voice pf a
choir in a cathedral. I am an editorial in a
newspaper. A letter to a congressman. I am
Eli Whitney and Stephen Foster. I am Tom
Edison, Albert Einstein and Billy Graham.
I am Horace Greeley, Will Rogers and the
Wright Brothers. I am George Washington
Carver and Daniel Webster and Jonas Salk.
I am Longfellow, Harriet Beecher Stowe,
Walt Whitman, Tom Paine.
“Yes, I am the nation. I was conceived in
freedom, and, God willing, in freedom 1 will
spend the rest pf my days. May I possess al
ways the integrity, the courage and the
strength to keep myself unshackled, to re
main a citadel of freedom and a beacon of
hope to the world. This is my -^irish, my goal,
my prayer on July 4, 1958—one hundred and
eighty two years after I was bom.”
Comforts And Pioneers
That news story out of New York about the
trend to “sissy” Boy Scout camps is a sign of
the times.
National Boy Scout leaders, the story says,
are worried because about half the Scout
camps over the nation are “babying” boys
with such comforts as dish washing machines,
potato peelers, hot showers, deep freezes, air
mattresses, heated cabins and even vacuum
cleaners.
We hate to say it, but we’re inclined to be
lieve that the advocates of the “pioneer spirit
of self-reliance” are waging a losing battle.
Many years of gadgetry have made us a na
tion that will take our comforts with us,
wherever we go, whether as infants. Scouts
or adults.
The fact is, the pioneers lived roughly be
cause they had to. If they’d bqen able to have
hot showers, vacuum cleaners or a potato
peeler, don’t think they wouldn’t have used
them.
As the American frontier advanced, a com
munity had no sooner been settled than along
came scads of ingenious fellows who turned
out, in the 18th and 19th centuries, an amaz
ing series of inventions to make work easier
and existence more comfortable. Many of
these things seem crude today, but were
heaven on earth to the hard-pressed people
they were invented for.
We don’t say all this emphasis on comfort
is good for the nation’s moral and physical
welfare. It probably isn’t, but people, even
Boy Scouts, won’t give up their comforts, ex
cept under dire necessity.
OMl(^6to(cbool;i^H\TITWAS WAS HUMAN NATURE
this area want industry to help round out
the economy and I don’t believe we’ll
stop now. . . This is a blow to us all, but
it isn’t the end of the world and I assure
you that every member of the committee
stands ready to work even harder when
we get another opportunity to have some
thing good locate here. . . ”
To this we would only add—knowini that
we speak for the people of Southern Pines—
our appreciation for the time and effort de
voted to this project by members of the local
committee and others who worked with them
on the lace plant project.
This community should stand behind them,
as well as the larger Moore County Industrial
Development Committee, in subsequent in
dustrial projects which may be undertaken.
Our faith in the diversified economic future
of Southern Pipes, the Sandhills and Moore
County remains unshaken.
'ncc Upon a time
there was a BIG
BIG1X)P starring
Uncle Sam and
headlining such BIG
important things
05 a COLD WAR,
DlSARVyVA\EKT,
ASPACEIIACE^
and I don’t
i^owr what all...
THEM CAME AUTTLE BITTY SIDE SHOW—
^ADAHS’eOlDFIHEAPPlE
growing, seem almost incredible. It is a story
that has its human side—whether it be the
constant courtesy of company employees or
the feats of linemen and others at time of
emergency, illustrating a type of selfless serv
ice that has become a legend in and out of
the industry.
Speaking locally and for ourselves alone,
we at The Pilot have had the most cordial
relations with CP&L people at local and di
vision offices of the company. They have been
frank and cooperative in all the varied con
tacts that a newspaper has with a public util
ity, taking time always to supply us with re
quested information, sometimes on occasions
when we know it must have seemed to them
that they had more important things to do.
Again our congratulations to CP&L and
our appreciation for its high quality of serv
ice to the public.
AND DISAPPEARING ACTS, ^
FATHER OF BOY IN FATAL WRECK SAYS, 'NO'
Should IS-Year-Olds Drive Cars?
Worthy of attention by all
parents of teen-agers and by
young people themselves are
the following excerpts from
an article written by the fath
er of a 16-year-old boy who
was the driver of a car that
went out of control at high
speed, killing one high school
student and injuring five oth
ers, including the driver. City
Councilman W. B. Myers of
Tampa, Fla., father of the boy,
was asked by the Tampa
Times to write his reactions to
the tragedy.
It was a wholesale tragedy. We
realize that Tommy must face the
fact that the boy lost his life in
the car Tommy was driving.
There is nothing in the world
to compensate for the loss of a
life. If I could I would give my
own life for that boy’s. I surely
would. I feel that with aU my
heart.
Whatever charge they place
against Tommy he is going to have
to take it. I’ll stand by him as a
father, but not as a public official.
If every parent of a teenager
who drives could stand by help-
Broomstraw Used
For Eggbeater
You know Old Timers who
will tell you sincerely that wood-
fired cook stoves bake the best
biscuits.
And in some homes deep in the
woods and along the creeks of
Eastern North Carolina there
stiU dwell housewives who cook
their men biscuits three timies a
day and on wood stoves.
That line of thought develop
ed upon reading about a New
York Times interview with Al
fred Lunt, 64, on French cooking.
The actor holds a diploma from
Cordon Bleu Cooking School of
Paris. He was bragging on his
newly-acquired souffle secret: •
“Egg whites are beaten by hand
with a wire whisk or not at all,”
he said.
Some of you good cooks prize
your wire whisk for beating egg
whites. Most of you long ago
succumbed to thfe electric beater.
And before that there was the ro
tary beater. You turned a crank
that was geared to beaters which
whirled like some miniature heli
copter.
When I was a boy, however,
broom straw made the best egg
beater. Aunt Connie was the cook
of our house who went in for
such rarefies. She would select
three or four strong straws from
the handle of the broom. It seems
she tied them together near one
end with thread, and then one of
us children was assigned to do
the beating. At the start it was a
real adventure. But often before
the eggs had been beaten to suit
Aunt Connie’s taste our arms
were tired no end and we wish
ed we hadn’t been around when
the idea started.
—Goldsboro News-Axgus
lessly in a hospital and see their
children lying on an operating
table, wondering if they will live
or die, I’m sure they would wish
that the automobile had never
been invented.
Yet you realize that you can’t
lock your children in the house
and tell them they can’t be a part
of society. And you can’t be with
them every minute. So what is
the answer?
I know that much of the prob
lem is centered around speed.
Ever since we have had a tele
vision set in our house, all I can
remember seeing on automobile
ads is power, speed, pick up . . .
How can you explain to a child,
or even an adult, that he has to go
under 40 (the limit where this ac
cident occurred) when he is con
stantly shown examples of cars
which go more than 100?
My son had been told not to
HERE'S A VOTE FOR THE ROSE
What For A National Flower?
By Rena B. Lassiter In
The. Sinithfield Herald
Newspaper coltimns that are
usually cluttered with political
wranglings, crime disturbances,
weather disasters and the like
have recently had stories of a
different sort of bickering. Not
sordid or unpleasant was the
controversy that had to do with
recommending a national flower
for these United States. It was a
group of women who did the dis
puting and no less a group than
the General Federation of Wom
en’s Clubs in its 67th annual con
vention in Detroit.
One faction upheld with ardor
and spirit the rose. An opposing
faction championed the com tas
sel. Rose supporters pointed out
that the rose could be grown in
small gardens as well as in large
ones, and that a poll has shown
the rose to be the favorite flower
of a majority of the people. Min
nesota delegates were quite as
■outspoken for the corn tassel.
TROUBLES OF
INTELLECTUALS
In several of the intellectual
enclaves along the. Eastern Sea
board, places like Nyack, N. Y.,
Bucks County, Pa., and others,
the drive for STA’TUS does not
miss a single beat. The big thing
there is NOT to have a television,
and the folks are having a pretty
rough time of it, hiding the set
in the broom closet every time
the door-bell rings. The reception
is very bad, too, because they
wouldn’t think of installing an
out-side aerial. Now if some
smart yokel or hillbilly invented
a sort of invisible aerial or one
that could be hidden down the
chimney, he’d be doing the intel
lectuals of the North a very great
service.
—^Harry Golden in The Carolina
Israelite
Grains of
drive fast, not to exceed the speed
limit, to be careful and look out
for the other feUow.
One of the problems confront
ing me now is whether to let him
drive again. Frankly, I don’t
know if I’ll ever let Tommy drive
until he’s 18. But it wiU be a
long time before I have to make
that decision, due to the extent of
his injuries.
I think that except in extreme
cases a boy probably should not
be permitted to drive until he is
18. The two-year difference be
tween 16 and 18 will give him
much more maturity and common
sense. The law gives a child 16
years old the right to drive. But
I feel that each parent should ex
amine his own child as an indi
vidual and determine whether the
child is fit from the standpoint of
maturity and common sense to
operate a lethal weapon such as
the modem car. I
Thai: Nightmare Again
Well, the home safety press re
leases from the National Safety
Council have com^ in again—and
they’ve just about spoiled our
quiet summer. Makes us think
we’d be better off trying to sail
a 3()-foot boat across the Atlantic,
join an expedition to study the
head-hunters of Brazil or maybe
even volunteer to be the first per
son shot at the moon.
One thing about the good old
Safety Council is that it doesn’t
pull its punches. Opening its nice
white mimeographed folder, we
read: “Mrs. Housewife—there’s a
killer in your home!” We close
our eyes and shudddr. Then: “The
killer? Poisons. 'They lurk every
where . . . They take a steady toll
throughout the year—about 120
lives a month. . . ”
'Then comes one designed to
cheer the old folks. The Council
eases into, this horror story in a
tone that reminds us of the sepul
chral, booming voice that used to
announce the March of Time
newsreels:
“The pattern is pretty much the
same:
“The time—July or December.
The place—the home. Or more
specifically, the bedroom. The
victim—someone 65 years of age
or older.
“Yes, that usually is the story
of home deaths from falls, which
take about 14,000 lives annually.”
Then we turn a few pages and
one of the Council’s new slogans—
we know it’s a slogan because
they put it in quotation msirks—
leaps at us from the chaste white
page, as though ■written in letters
of flame:
“Let’s not kill off the man in
the home.”
“Women can keep their men
alive,” goes on the Council pon
derously. “Encourage your hus
band or boy friend to play it seife
when working around the house.”
Play it safe? You bet we’re go
ing to! And our first step to safe
ty is going to be to quit reading
press releases from the National
Safety Council. No matter what
else happens to us then, our nerves
will not be shattered by the Coun
cil’s good advice.
Yoo Hoo! Look Whal I Got!
Readers across the nation
should be grateful to Helen G.
Myers, the Long Beach, Calif.,
elementary education supervisor
who collected first graders’ des
criptions of everyday things over
a period of two years.
For example:
“Arms are to hold your hetnds
on.”
something ^
which may be found in all parts
of the country. It took a standing
vote to decide the recommenda
tion of the Federation, and the
rose won.
In Congress
This does not mean, however,
that the rose will be chosen as the
national flower. It will have to
be fought out on the floors of
both houses of Congress. Resolu
tions have been offered in Con
gress favoring both the rose and
the com tassel. Whether Senator
Margaret Chase Smith, who fav
ors the rose, will have more in
fluence than Representative Wal
ter H. Judd, who is for the corn
tassel, remains to be seen.
Hal Boyle, New York column
ist, advances the cause of the
lowly dandelion. He calls it the
“gqlden democrat of lawn and
pasture, a true all-American
flower, a rugged individualist
that stands above class or creed,
or local partisanship.” He points
out that Congress may cause
statesmenlike heads to roll like
petals of the first frost, as Con
gressmen undertake to name an
official U. S. flower. “Garden
lovers are a passionate folk,” he
says. “Knock their favorite flow
er and it’s worse than kicking
their dog around.”
None Lovelier
As far as I am personally con
cerned I’d sooner name the nut-
grass flower than the dandelion.
It is just as persistent a grower if
not more persistent, and it will
certainly grow anywhere. But
without. any facetiousness, I am
wholeheartedly for the rose. If
there is any flower lovelier than
a perfect rose I have never seen
it. Our North Carolina flower, the
dogwood, has its points. I am
glad it was chosen for our State.
All of the flowers chosen by the
other States have something to
recommend them. Three states—
New York, Arkansas and Georgia
—saw fit to select the rose as
their state flower. I am for the
rose as our national flower.
“Eyebrows are
women shave off.”
“Little stones are big rocks
chopped up.”
“Cats are for dogs to chase.”
“Dogs are made to like people.”
“A door is to answer.”
“A dream is something you
think when you’re asleep.”
“Ears are something that big
people put hearing things on. . .
Ears are to wriggle.”
“A face is a thing that holds
your head and hair in place.”
“Ground is to grow grass.”
“A hat is a thing to tip and
say, ‘How do you do!’. . . A hat
is for magicians to take rabbits
out of.”
“Mashed potatoes are things tp
have steak and gravy with.”
“Mountfdns are a place that’s
hard to go up and easy to come
down.”
“A mustache is something old
men get. . . A mustache is some
thing else to wash.”
“A package is sorfiething to
say, Yoo hoo! Look what I got!’ ”
“The world is where you jump
up in the air and always come
down again. . . The world is
something to come down to after
you’ve been tip in space.”
Commenting on this list. Pub
lishers Auxiliary, a trade news
paper that is read by most of the
nation’s editors, draws the con
clusion that editorial writers
could learn something from the
“sparkle, enthusiasm and clarity”
Of the youngsters’ definitions.
The PILOT
Published Every Thursday by
THE PILOT, Incorporated
Southern Pines. North Ceurolina
1941—JAMES BOYD—1944
Katharine Boyd Editor
C. Benedict .‘.Associate Editor
Vance Derby News Editor
Dan S. Ray Gen. Mgr.
C. G. Council Advertising
Mary Scott Newton Business
Bessie Cameron Smith Society
Composing Room
Lochamy McLean, Dixie B. Ray,
Michael Valen, Jasper Swearingen
Thomas Mattocks.
Subscription Rates:
One Year $4. 6 mos. $2; 3 moe. $1
Entered at the Postoffice at South
ern Pines, N. C., as second class
mail matter
Member National Editorial Assn,
and N. C. Press Assn.