North Carolina Newspapers

Page TWO THE PILOT—Southern Pines. North Carolina THURSDAY, DECEMBER 31, 1964 ♦ Southern Pines ILOI 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. Step In The Right Direction Two weeks ago, we praised the county commissioners for deciding that a survey by an “outside” professional agency should be made to help the commissioners and the county’s three boards of educa tion reach a sensible conclusion on what should be done about high school consoli dation in the lower end of the county. Now that the commissioners have authorized such a survey, to begin im mediately and to last about six weeks, we reaffirm that praise and commend them for moving ahead with such assim- ance. We are not so carried away with joy, however, as to forget that there is no special magic about a survey—nor, ap parently, are the commissioners, one of whom pointed out that the board may or may not accept its recommendations. Yet we are convinced, that no more healthy, promising step than the survey could be taken at this time. Moore County needs an “outside” viewpoint, another perspective, on this school con solidation matter that has too often ap peared to have been viewed in rigidly set preconceptions, rather than in flexi ble, rational terms. That E. Connecticut Ave. Curve The E. Connecticut Avenue Extension curve, where seven young men were in jured in two one-car automobile wrecks within a recent week, evidently will re main a hazard until some basic engineer ing changes are made. Truth to tell, the hazard is far more in the drivers than in the curve itself. But highway engineers have long since learned that roads must be built to pro tect not the careful but the reckless driv er. The curve in question and its approaches are fully, even blatantly, marked with speed limit and caution signs and a series of post reflectors, all clearly visible, day or night. Yet the accidents keep on happening. A nearby resident tells how the sound of squealing tires, night and day, as cars round the curve at high speed, jang les the nerves of those within hearing. Add to this the all-too-frequent crashes when cars leave the road and plough into ditches or trees, scattering the injured on the highway or leaving them crumpled in wrecked vehicles. While we hope that some way can be found to straighten the curve, as the only reliable solution to the problem, we think that some “saturation” attention given to this stretch of road, by both town police and highway patrol, would do much good. A “whammy” speed check set up on the curve or at either approach to it, manned at times when reckless traffic can be expected, could result, we feel sure, in a number of arrests whose effect would be salutary. Most of the offending drivers on this road are military per sonnel and we have a hunch the word would get around at Fort Bragg that E. Connecticut Ave. extension, in and near Southern Pines, was a place where slow ing down could keep you out of trouble and out of court. Obviously, police and troopers can’t watch the curve around the clock, but if the area gets the reputation of being watched—nobody quite knows when— much the same results can be obtained. Good Citizen Lost To The Town The Pilot extends its best wishes to the Rev. Carl Wallace and his family as he leaves his pulpit at the United Church of Christ here to become pastor of The First United Church of Christ at New port News, Va. The Rev. Mr. Wallace’s tenure in Southern Pines has been highly success ful in conventional terms—church mem bership raised by a third, its budget greatly increased and so forth. That is good, yet we feel also that his seven years here have had an impressive com munity-wide effect. His interest in mental health brought him the presidency of the Moore County Mental Health Association at a time when the association was achieving its goal of establishing a mental health clinic —a facility that has since grown to serve more than Moore County alone. He was active and eager in several aspects of the association’s work. In racial relations, the pastor who left Southern Pines this week was influential, over-several years—through the bi-racial Ministerial Association and through his personal attitude—in establishing the lines of communication and the tone of friendly understanding that laid the groundwork for the successful operation of the Good Neighbor Council in the 1963- 64 period when a large measure of public racial integration was achieved here, with dignity and a minimum of discord. Southern Pines has lost a good citizen and we wish him well. A Resolution For Everybody North Carolina is ending 1964 with a road death toll of nearly 200 more per sons than that of 1963—a record that contrasts with the state’s notable and pride-evoking achievements in other fields. Here in Moore Coimty, highway acci dents took two lives during the holiday season, including the death of a 16-year- old girl in a one-car accident that gave every appearance (this is written before we have heard the official report of its cause) of being easily avoidable. While fortunate families across the state can look back on 1964 as one of the most prosperous, pleasant years within memory, the families of the state’s more than 1,550 traffic fatalities this year will remember 1964 as a time of grief, suffer ing, waste and irreparable loss. It is expected that, as the year wanes in its final hours tonight, other lives will be lost. Can there be, for any of us, a more pressing and pertinent New Year’s reso lution than to do everything in our power to stop this slaughter? Must not each driver resolve, at least, to obey the law himself and exercise all possible caution on the roads? And must not each of us, in whatever ways we can, exert what in fluence we may have—through personal example, through support of legislation, through words of warning and advice— to make the highways safer in the com ing year? ‘Tar Heel Gift Packages’ The Commerce and Industry Division of the State Department of Oanservation and Development is circulating in its “Industrial Newsletter” a suggestion by Henry Belk, Goldsboro editor, to boost the use of North Carolina products. The idea is to develop “Tar Heel gift packages” for mailing out of the state, containing typical North Carolina pro cessed foods—country ham, sourwood honey, sea foods and so forth. There might be, it is suggested, a separate box for each of the three areas of the state — coastal. Piedmont, and moimtain. We don’t see that such a development would have any extensive effect on the food processing business, but it would be mighty good advertising for the state. We are thinking, for instance, of what a hit packages of native Sandhills Christ mas greens and decorations—^mistletoe, holly, big pine cones, magnolia leaves— always m^e with folks to whom such items are sent, in the North. It used to be that a bushel of Sandhills peaches, sent to a destination in the North, made the finest sort of gift. In recent years, rising express rates and better food dis tribution everywhere have lessened the appeal of this particular form of “adver tising” N. C. products. There’s no need to wait for an official state program, with standardized pack ages, to use Editor Belk’s suggestion on food items or to send any of the other many interesting N. C. products. Any body, any time, can make up attractive Tar Heel gift parcels that will stimulate interest in North Carolina and be a good will advertising message for the state. Helping Find Homes We hope that, in the fliury of Christ mas activity. Pilot readers did not miss an impressive story in last week’s paper about the Children’s Home Society of North Carolina, the Greensboro adoption agency that found good homes for more than 225 babies and children across the state during 1964. This agency, known far and wide for the impeccable standards it maintains, depends for a large portion of its opera ting funds on an appeal made each Christmas, welcoming gifts large or small. Contributions may be mailed to the Society’s headquarters, 740 Chestnut St., Greensboro. ’'//M UNITED NATIONS REPORT The UN—Christmas and Beyond Though not all members of the United Nations are of the Chris tian faith, Christmas has become a universal holiday which is pre pared for just as Congress works, trying to wind up its activities. Extra meetings are held the last few days in a- fever of activity. 1964 was no exception, with most delegates considering De cember 23 the deadline. Unfor tunately, three items frustrated their efforts; the illness of the Secretary-General which took him away from his duties; the Arrears question; and the Congo problem in the Security Council. Thus with great reluctance dele gates found themselves faced with meetings on the day before Christmas and the prospect of meetings planned for this week. Still progress is definitely in the wind. It is just untoriunate that there was not enough time to make this progress before Christmas. In the Arrears ques tion, President Quaison- Sackey of the 19th General Assembly of fered what amounted to an ap peal to all members to make a voluntary contribution toward a Rescue Fund as a way of solving the financial crisis brought on principally by the Soviet Union’s refusal to pay for the Peacekeep ing operations of the Congo and the Middle East. Reliable sources indicate that the Soviet Union has accepted the appeal provided that voting begins im mediately and that the General Assembly reconvene Januarv 11, 1965. Compromise Possible The United States conditions its acceptance on the reaction of the Secretary-General and some mention of the continued appli cability of Article 19 which says that any member nation that is in financial arrears will lose its vote in the General Assembly. Largely ‘due to the position taken by the majority of dele gates, to say nothing of the im movable position of the Soviet Union, the United States has had to abandon its original unequivo cal support of Article 19 or face the grim likelihood of starting a process which could eventually destroy the United Nations. Some might say, then, that the Soviet Union has won a major victory. Actually if the appeal is adopted along the lines indicated, the re sults will be a compromise with the Soviet Union giving a little and the United States giving a little. And when all is said and done, this is perhaps the major forte of the United Nations in its continued struggle to exist in a world divided by nationality, race and culture. The Congo debate in the Se curity Council has dragged on longer than expected, principally because more and more Africans wanted to have the opportunity of airing their views rather than getting on with the more con structive task of finding a solu tion. It may be impalatable to Americans to hear Africans at tack the United States as a colon izer, an imperialist, an aggressor, and anti-black. Yet it is some thing that is beginning to happen all over the world, even in the BY JAMES BOYD United Nations Correspondent United States itself. Unfortunately no nation but a nation of power could have car ried out the paratroop drop to save white hostages in the Con go. Ghana suggested that the the United States would have been unhappy if Ghana had sent in paratroops to save Negroes in the South, implying that this is what the United States did in the rescue mission, joining with ex colonizers such as Belgium and the United Kingdom in supplying the aircraft to transport the troops. A Better Way A better way, had there been time, would have been to call for a Security Council meeting first in order to possibly get the Uni ted Nations back in the Congo, which in reality saw its only peace under the United Nations flag. Had the United States done this, it is safe to say that we would be a friend of Africa today. It seems likely that the rebels would have adhered to the wishes of the United Nations because, basically, Africans respect and support the World Organization and might have brought the nec essary pressure to bear. The situation now is that an appeal or declaration or resolu tion is in the works to be submit ted to the Security Council by the Ivory Coast, one of the two African members. It will suggest that the Organization of African Unity be the principal organ en trusted with solving the prob lem, with possible United Na tions support along the lines of using the good offices of the Sec retary-General. Whether this ac tion of the Security Council will have the desired results, i.e.. peace in the Congo and stoppage of all foreign intervention and military assistance, only time can tell. The difficulty is that this will be putting a tremendous amount of responsibility on the Organization of African Unity which is largely made up of newly independent states unfa miliar with this kind of duty. As 1964 comes to a close, those who favor the continuation of the United Nations and: its'Char ter dedicated “to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind” can rest assured that the United Nations has become an integral part of our interna tional life. UN Indispensable It has weathered many storms such as the Suez crisis, Cuba, and the Arrears question. Those who work there know that it is not perfect and never will be. On the other hand, it is an indispensable buffer zone for the Great Powers and' a place where all can let off steam and speak their minds rather than take up arms. Some Americans question the United Nations way, but it is good to remember that the en tire Congo United Nations oper ation cost only about $400 mil lion dollars with many nations contributing, while the United States spends $1.5 million a day in its own private war in South Vietnam. One lesson to be learned from this is that it is cheaper and safer to let the United Nations control the trouble spots of the world than have the United States act as a kind of self-appointed inter national policeman. Holiday Greetings Simplified Editor's Note: Pilot read ers who have just gone through the great annual Christmas gift and card scramble—and who are now going through the post-Yule unpleasantness of counting up persons from whom gifts or cards were received but to whom none were sent—may be interested in the follow ing proposed solution to their problems, as voiced in a let ter to the Manchester (Eng land) Guardian Weekly. Sir: Recent complaints about the disruption of postal services at Christmas do not go deep enough. The root of this over loading lies in the practice of sending Christmas cards. We send these squares of cardboard to relatives and friends either because they send them to us and it would be churlish not to re spond or because we wish to re mind people, to whom we should write a letter, of our continued existence. The two main purposes of this quaint relic of the past could be met much more efficiently now adays by the Notional Christmas Card Scheme. Each person sends a list of people whom he wishes to greet, with their addresses, to a central clearing house, where an electronic computer collates them all and sends back a list of the people who have responded. In this way, one sends and re ceives only one letter. The cost and the labour is reduced by a factor of N2 where N is the ave rage number of cards per person. This reduction factor probably lies between one hundred and one thousand. There is, of course, no reason why the scheme should not be extended to include notional Christmas gifts. After each name one would print the notional gift: it would be splendid fun, on Christmas morning, drawing up a balance sheet between notional expenditure and receipts, instead of the present dilemma about whether to offend your nearest and dearest or actually to wear those terrible socks. The money saved by actually not buying presents would be most useful at the January sales. This extension to the scheme would, of course, be a great boon to shopkeepers, who could carry on their normal business in De cember, instead of having to suf fer the hordes of Christmas shop pers. Green Turtle Navigators Why don’t we stop risking lives and pending billions trying to get to 'the moon and, instead, try to find out how the green turtles set a course 1,000 miles straight as an arrow across the At lantic Ocean to Ascension Island —and get there. Ascension Island is a tiny pin point, only five miles wide. Here is where the turtles first see the light of day. When they are grown they swim the 1,000 miles back to the coast of Brazil. They spend the next two or three years in pleasant dalliance; then, at the appropriate time, swim the 1,000 miles back again to the is land—and lay their eggs, of course. The article doesn’t say whether they swim back again to Brazil and back again to the island or how long they kept this up. Exhausting? Yes, but utterly intriguing. How do they accom plish this amazing pilgrimage, and WHY? Perhaps it may not be as ghast ly difficult as getting to the moon but it seems to make about as much sense. Or as little. The article about the green turtle navigators is long and tre mendously interesting. And lots of people are interested: the Navy, for one. It is carrying on a large and expensive project to try to find out how and why they do it. The subject has endless possi bilities. Since reading the article we find ourselves counting green turtles at night instead of sheep. Think of WHAT? ’The firm of Borg and Warner may be great engineers, but they’re goofy ad-writers. How's this prize, from a recent full page ad, extolling their success in the textile field: "NEXT TIME YOUR WIFE SLIPS INTO SOMETHING SLINKY THINK OF BORG AND WARNER." Of all non sequiturs this is the nonest. What husband is so piti ful that he thinks of engineering in such a situation? 'l^at wife is so woe-begone as to possess such a husband? Right Back at You! Marya Mannes is at her wit tiest in the section she contrib utes to Harper’s “Defense Man ual For Tourists” article, publish ed this month. Here’s a bit of it, with the foreigner asking the questions and the USAer defend ing his nation: Foreigner: “Your crime rate is appalling. 'Why are your law en forcement officers incapable of controlling it?” Answer: “Because we believe in private initiative and indivi dual liberties.” (Or, depending on the political sympathies of the questioner, blame it on the Mafia, the I.R.A., the Zionists, the Liberals, the Radical Rightists, or J. Edgar Hoover.) Foreigner: “Why are you all so afraid of the handful of Com munists in your country?” Answer: “Because we don’t think our democratic .system is strong enough to withstand their alien ideology.” (Say this with a straight face.) Foreigner; “Why do you main tain your discriminatory immi gration policies, while you pride yourselves on being a melting pot?” Answer: “We give millions in foreign aid to make people stay where they are.” (Alternate; “Be cause the pot has melted.”) Foreigner: “What are <he Americans doing in 'Viet Nam?” Answer; (Excuse yourself quickly to make a long-distance telephone call.) Foreigner: “Do you really think there will ever be a stable government in 'Viet Nam, and', if not, how do you expect to con trol the Vietnamese?” (You’re still on the telephone.) THE PILOT Published Every Thursday by THE PILOT, Incorporated Southern Pines. North Carolina 1941—JAMES BOYD—1944 Katharine Boyd Editor C. Benedict Associate Editor John C. Ray Business, Adv. C. G. Council Advertising Bessie C. Smith Advertising Mary Scott Newton Business Gloria Fisher Business Mary Evelyn de Nissoff Society Composing Room Dixie B. Ray, Michael Valen, Thomas Mattocks, J. E. Pate, Sr.. Charles Weatherspoon, Robert Coffin. Subscription Rates Moore County One Year $400 Outside Moore County One Year $9.00 Second-class Postage paid at Southern Pines, N. C. Member National Editorial Asnii and N. C. Press Assn.