A weekly newspaper devoted to the promotion of the general welfare and published
lor the eniightenment, entertainment and benefit of the citizens of Kings Mountain
and its vicinity, published every Thursday by the Herald Publishing House.
Entered as second cla.ss matter at the post office at Kings Mountain, N. C., 28086
under Act of Congress of March 3, 1873.
EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT
Martin Harmon Editor-Publisher
Miss Elizabeth Stewart Circulation Manager and Society Editor •
MECHANICAL DEPARTMENT
Dave Weathers, Supt. Allen Myers Paul .Jackson
Ray Barrett
Steve Marlin
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TODAY'S BIBLE VERSE
' Happy is the jnnn that findeth tvUxlom and the man that c/ctlrth underxtunding. Provrrbx .l.’M
Garland Everett Still
One Scared. Other Glad
It hardly seems possible that more
Uian 17 years have passed since Garland
Still was elected mayor of Kings Moun
tain in the first run-off in Kings Moun
tain history.
Often little boys square off in a
fighting posture, shout at each other in
loud voice, dare each other to strike ihe
first blow, and never hit a lick.
His election marked a new day and
direction to the city’s political and gov
ernmental history. Mr. Still took his cam
paign to the people and city government
to the people.
The phra.se is familiar: “He’s scared
and the other’s glad of it.’’
North Carolina matured politically
and governmentally in 1901, Kings Moun
tain exactly a half century later. Mayor
Still was the instrument.
That seems to be the pattern during
this election season echelons of Demo
crats take pains to “disagree” with the
Johnson Administration and declare re
luctant support for the party nominee
for president, Vice-President Humphrey.
It was a loud campaign and a loud
two years. Who can forget his circular
OEunpaign? The Herald was credited by
some folk with writing the copy. The
feet is that Mr. Still needed no help. The
qnly political advertising copy the Her
ald ever supplied him was a “thank you”
in a subsequent campaign.
Now here in North Carolina, U. S.
Representative Gerald Ford has adopted
the same thesis in even more blatant and
crass fashion. Don't embarrass your
selves by supporting ex-Vice-Presideiit
Nixon, U. S. House candidates were told.
The bugaboo for both crowds is
George Wallace.
It was some years before the Herald
(Uscovered his method and it was a good
cme. He would jokingly throw out a
pungent barb in the barber shop, at the
soda fountain, or corner service station.
If his audience laughed, he put the joke
into print ctnd let everybody laugh.
ft’s a chicken way to do business.
One wonders if loyalty is dead and
just how these feather legs will perform
should they reach or return to the halls
of Congress.
Who can. forget his “gripe” sessions,
Pen citizens were asked to get off their
iplaints about sins of omission and
cohimission by City Hall?
Would they stand on principle or
chicken out?
Then there was Mayor Still’s dis
covery of a special legislative act which
jM'Ovided that the mayor and two city
commissioners constituted a quorum—la
means whereby Mr. Still sought to nul
lify the 3 to 2 commission split usually
logged against the mayor on key votes.
It isn’t whether you win or lose, the
immortal Grantland Rice penned, but
the way you play the game.
Unmined Asset
Perhaps less remembered are the
long-term contributions of the Still Ad
ministration. Major among them was
fee launching of the movement to add
natural gas distribution to the city’s
utility family, a project brought to fruit
ion by Glee Bridges Administration I,
now benefiting city coffers by $140,000
per year, yet rates to customers are
among the lowest in the area.
Monday, October 7, will mark the
188th anniversary of the Battle of Kings
Mountain, its result an axe blow to the
head of the British, ministered final de
feat at Yorktown via Cowpens and
Guilford Courthouse.
'The four unfair power rate schedules
were compacted into two, both of which
gave rate cuts to all customers.
From “gripes” of citizens living on
unpaved streets, Mr. Still adopted the
ideh of spraying these streets with used
motor oil, relieving these citizens from
stifling dust.
Seven miles to the South lies the
ridge on which Col. Patrick Ferguson
was killed and his force routed. It is a
national shrine, attracting a half-mil
lion visitors annually. Yet Kings Moun
tain, the city which bears the same
name, only occasionally mines this na
tural asset of history.
He foresaw the water problem and
fried to effect a partnership arrange
ment to tap Buffalo Creek with Foote
Mineral Company. Here government
moved too slowly and Foote had to pro
ceed with its own project.
Major celebrations were the sesqui-
centennial of 1930, and those of 1965 and
1966. In the fifties, public-spirited citizens
donned grease paint and costumes of the
Revolutionary period to present histori
cal pageants.
But this event deserves annual,
more than passing, note annually.
But, most important, he taught the
lesson that those who would maintain
political control had to take steps to
provide municipal services to all citizens.
All administrations since wisely
have continued on the same path.
Perhaps the mammoth events of
two and three years ago are too much to
sustain each year, though it is hard to
understand why not. Wilmington annual
ly presents the Azalea festival, little Wal
lace the Strawberi-y festival.
Garland Still was kind, free-hearted
and free handed.
His mark on Kings Mountain is in
delible.
The mining companies are extract
ing lithium ore, limestone, and mica.
Here is opportunity for the whole
community to mine an asset which can
not be depleted.
Point Of View
Wes Gallagher, an As.sociated Pres.®
newsman, wrote Sunday about the
varying points of view of a minister, sci
entist and cowboy as they viewed the
Grand Canyon.
bad news, newsmen are often asked. The
answer, newsier news being the more bi
zarre, or shocking, is that the evil and
tragic are sometimes events, while the
good is rather commonplace.
Sajd fee minister: “What a wonder
ful work of God.’
Said the scientist: “What a wonder
ful geological masterpiece.”
Said the cowboy: “What a helluva
place to lose a cow-.”
Gallagher’s point was that newt
dia get criticized by their readers wno
have varying points of view on politics,
the Vietnam war, sending planes to the
Israeli, or the messages of Dick Tracy
and Little Oi'phan Annie.
Yet, he points out, the same critics
owe their infonnation on what they
fJK£ to the sanie news media.
Why do news media print as much
There is a coroilary in the point
made by the Tampa TriDune, reporiuig a
research study of student riots at col
leges earlier in the year. The determina
tion was that the rioters and demonstrat
ors represented only 2.6 percent of the
aggregate enrollments.
Maybe the news hounds should re
examine their presentations. Certainly
and on scene reporter shouldn’t have to
await a re.search report to write a lead
paragraph like this: “A hundred Blank
College youths (of a 4{X)0 enrollment)
paraded in front of the president’s hoyse
protesting elimination of unexcused class
cuts.”
By MAR’HN HARMON
Space expired last issue before
I completed some correlations be-
tvvi-en the Hebron Colony and
Uncle Samuel’s navy.
m-m
Principal omission was Cap
tain’s inspection, a Saturday
morning event. Each man is re
sponsible for keeping his own
quarters in order. While there
are no penalties, like liberty be
ing canceled or being put "on re
port", grown men (present baby
of the contingent is 39 ye.irs of
age) don't enjoy being told the
lavatory needs some Ajax or
Dutch Cleanser treatment or that
the inspection officer, minus
white gloves, gets Ms finger dir
ty when checking whether the
woodwork has been dusted.
Nor did I developt' the vacation
theme I suggested,
m-m
Various people have various
definitions, one m^n’s eup of tea
being another's poison, but I sus
pect the dictionary developers de
fine a vacation as a surcea.se
from regular day-to-day pursuits,
m-m
While life hero is quite definite
surcease from my normal pur
suits, this vacation atop a moun
tain is also ()uite different from
any’ mountain trek I ever made
before and they began when I
was a babe at Mount Mitchell (I
am told).
KINGS MOUNTAIN
Hospital Log
VISITING HOURS
3 to 4 p.m. and 7 to 8 p.m.
Dally 10:30 To 11:30 oJn.
I PATIENTS IN KINGS MOUNTAIN
HOSPITAL AS OF NOON WED-
NESDAY:
\WAKE UP
AND
TURH ON a
THE WOER/
m-m
Hound Ears club, golf course
and ski run nestles in the valley
below and we Hebronites chase
those little white halls. However,
those balls we chase have not
becen hit by us but those duffers
■who hook and slice into the wood
ed banks which surround this
fine coui'se. I have made only one
of these excursions. My Snow
Hill friend asked, “Do you want
to hunt golf balls?’’ Sure, I re
plied. He handed me the butt end
of a cue stick and said, "L«t’s
go." We walked up the mountain
road several hundred yards and
Horace informed, “Here's where
we go down.” “Here:" I ejaculat
ed. “as I looked down a perpen
dicular incline of about 60 feet
with no visible path or footholes.
In we went, and down, using sap
lings for handholds.
m-m
A foursome was coming “in”
and the third guy to tee off hit
into the hill.
M
Viewpoints of Other Editors
Ml’S. Etta C. Abslier
Mrs. Nettie J. Benfield M
Mrs. Ethel U. Cloninger
Mrs. Essie A. Floyd
.Mrs. Ida VV. HambrighI
Mrs. Martin L. Harmon, Sr.
Mrs. Sidney D. Huffstetler
Mr. Joseph D. Jenkins
Mrs. Annie C. Ledford
Mr. Earl L. Rhyne
Mrs, Ida L. Smith
Mrs. Bessie S. Wilson
Mrs. k'loyd W. Wright
Mrs. Espy Cooke
Mrs. Hobie P. Gann
.Mrs. David Hannah
Mrs. Willie E. Harris
Mr. William Houser
.Mrs. Mary K. Jordon
Miss Katherine Lunsford
Mrs. Florence A. Lynn
Mrs. Betty D. Parker
Mrs. Alma T. Pruitt
Mr. George W. Sellers
Mrs. Samuel P. Stewart
Mrs. Cleo Van Dyke
Mrs. Clara B. Wright
ADMITTED THURSDAY
Mrs. Lillie W. Boone, Bessemer
Stewart E. Moore, Kings Mtn.
.Mrs. Bobby Short, Kings Mtn.
ADMITTED FRIDAY
Mrs. Pauline -S. Barrett, Grover
Harold M. GrindstaJf, Bessemer
City
Mrs. Eula H. Starnes, Gastonia
ADMITTED SATURDAY
Mrs. Alda 1. Phifer, Bessemer
City-
Miss Sylvia Greene, Cit.v
Mr. Edgar L. Kelly, Bessemer
JUST, NOT VENGEFUL
PRAISE
City
Mrs. John Milchem, City
Mr. T. L. Radford, City-
Miss Mary -S. Wilson, Shelby
m-m
The poor fellow looked and,
looked, getting more embarrass
ed all the while his fellows were
ready to proceed. Finally, he
threw out another Sail. Ail the
while I felt like Jes.sie James,|
ready to pounce on the oncoming;
train. But it took some work, a;
shoe bath (both feetl in the
creek and some bramble scratch-1
"s before I retrieved the new
Titlist iSl.25 plus N. C. salesi
tax'. And I found another, marr-!
cd only bv a couple of grass'
st-.ains, which bore the Arnold,
Palmer biand name. I
“Gleb was only a ninth-grader |
on the December morning when
he looked into a display window
where a newspaper was posted
and read that Kirov had been
killed. And suddenly, like a blind
ing light, it became clear to him'
that Stalin and no one else had
killed Kirov. Because he was the
only one who would profit by his
death!”
Thus the hero of Aleksandr I.
Solzhenitsyn’s novel "The First
Circle" described that sham-pierc
ing light, that natural instinct in
dividuals have for perceiving the
truth which not even an oppres
sive regime can snuff out. The.
book, considered as political com-|
mAntarv af o-vnctcoc tha'
10
YEARS AGO
THIS WEEK
Items of news about Kings
Mountain area people and
events taken from the 1957
files of the Kings Mountain
Herald.
m-m i
Climbing Kings Mountain,|
which I haven't since I was sweet.
16, is much easier than thecoursci
we followed. I am now leavingj
the golf hall hunts to others. One
guy found 125 during his stay,
m-m
The modus operand! here can I
be compared to working one’s!
way through college or to Europe,
On a tramp steamer. There is no
c-ash tuition lee, no board and
’•oom bill, nor paying oneself (an-
ent the Yankee draftees in the
Civil War) out of work details. ]
m-m
I have learned (again) that it
does not pay to brag, as I have
at the Herald, that old Harmon
was the best cleaning man on
hand. I am getting a refresher
■?ourse, at which I spend 32’i
houi.^ per week. I have learned
^hat nand lotion is helpful for
’dish pan hands", and that bleach
'ike Chlorox can produce red,
'Tacked digits. I have been re
minded that no matter the claims
of the manufacturers, window
-leaning, floor cleaning, bath-
.'Oom cleaning, etc., still requires
a good'dose of that commodity
long known as elba-w grease,
m-m
When I graduate from this
course I should be qualified to!
become an innkeeper. I know howj
*o clean, to make beds, to operate |
a washing machine and dryer,
bow to make coffee in quantity,
c'art of my duties includes check-
ng in new guests, as.signing them
•ooms, otherw’ise making them
omfortable, and briefly summat-
ng house rules: no smoking ex-
■ept in the lobby, the guest dou-
lies as maid and bellhop, linens
ire changed weekly (barring ac
'identt', television is forbidden,
■nd checkout time is eight weeks
lenee. Via permission of the man-
y-cment, stay mav be extended.
Mcoholic beverages are taboo
nd may NOT be brought on the
iremises, either internally or ex-
ernally. Transportation, other
han hy foot power, will be fur-
lished by Hebron limousine (a
beautiful roliin’s egg blue pick-up
ruck which gains limousine sta
tus each Saturday when a metal
"Oof is appended over the bed),
"'ellow guests are the chauffeurs.
The way they drive on these
mountain curves produces a fish
tail effect. This they design for
the excitement of the passengers
most of whom ride roller-coaster
at county fairs.
mentary, at once exposes the!
smothering effect of the Soviet,
totalitarian state, at its crudest!
with Stalin, and yet registers the'
hope that the human spirit is inj
the end indomitable. i
This said, and grateful as we
are for publication of Solzhenit
syn’s book in the West — a free-,
dom still denied the author in’
Russia — we are nonetheless
concerned that the impulse, al
ready widel.v seen in reviews in t
America and elsewhere, to use
“The First Circle” -as a bludgeon
in the East-West cold war might
not work against whate\-er free
dom Soviet writers are able to
pry open for themselves. W^ are
already seeing in Czechoslovakia
the repression the East’s rulers
are driven to out of fear when
criticism enflames them.
Perhaps it were better to praise
the book for the great literature
that it is and to let the Soviets
bask in the glorj' Solzhenitsyn
has brought upon them than to
cast coals of ven.gefui praise up
on their heads. j
The 33th annual Clefeland
County Fair opened Tuesday to
a whir of turnstiles, as fairgoers
broke all previous opening day
attendance records.
Jane Byars Gilbert, Kings
Mountain freshman at Brevard
college, has been elected the col-
fege Homecoming Queen.
SOCIAL AND PilRSONAL
Mrs. James B. Simpson enter
tained members of tne Friday
Afternoon Bridge club last Fri
day afternoon.
The Mountaineers will seek to
avenge one of last year’s three
defeats in the non ■ conference
scrap with the West Mecklenburg
Indians at City Stadium lierc
Tuesday nlzht at 7:30.
THERE'S NO WORD FOR IT
There’s a deficiency in the En
glish language.
The son of parents A marries
the daughter of parents B. The
newlyiweds instantly acquire rela
tives known as in-laws. The par
ents of the newlyweds acquire,
respectively, a daughter-in-law
and a son-in-law. The language
takes care of this.
Christian Science Monitm-
UMPIRES
When a baseball umpire makes
a decision in favor of the home
teaun, he merely recognizes the
obvious. When the ifecision goes
the other way he is either blind
or in cahoots with the opposition.
That, at any rate, seems to be
the view of a large share of the
sporting public, and it may have
helped two American League um
pires, Bill Valentine and A1 Sa
lerno, to conclude that their
thankless task deserves some
what higher recompense.
Unquestipnably they were in
fluenced by the fact that some of
their brother umpires in the Na-,
tional League already were bet-j
ter paid. So the two umpires
were trying to organize all ma-|
}or-league arbiters into a sort of.
mutual protective society. j
About that time Joe Cronin,
the president of the American
League, suddenly decided that
Messrs. Valentine and Salerno
had never been very good um
pires and tossed them out of the
game. Mr. Cronin said the move
had nothing at all to do with the
nair’s organizing activities, which
may have made people wonder
whv he had waited so long: one
of the umpires had been in the
league for seven years and the
other for eight.
In any case Senators Jacob
Javits and Charles Goodell and
Rpp. Alexander Pimie, .all of New-
York, have wired Mr. Cronin de
manding “a full explanation.”
Not to be outdone. New York
Senatorial candidate Pau] O’Dwy
er chimed in to denounce the fir
ing of organizers as “the oldest
and one of the dirtiest trick* in
the book.”
•It has Jteen a strange political
year, all right. But we sure nev-
But what is the relationship of
parents A to parents B? Obvious
ly they are now a little closer
than friends or, in some unfortu
nate cases, enemies- But for what
it is there is no name. Father A
gets around it by speaking of
"My son’s mother-in-iaw," a ref
erence which the listener has to
think twice to comprehend.
It can get worse than this, too.
When the daughter of Richard
Nixon marries the grandson of
Dwight Eisenhower, what does
that make the Nixon parents to
the Eisenhower parents, besides
Republicans? There’s no word for
this relationship either.
Cousins in varying degrees can
be labeled. Some knew the differ
ence between a second cousin
and a first cousin once removed,
although in the latter case
there’s a question how he got re
moved and by whom.
But what’s the name for the
relationship of grandfather to
the cousins of his grandchildren
on the other side? There’s no
word for it.
’This lack in the language, for
tunately, concerns only those old
enough to be parents-in-law or
maybe great uncles and great
aunts.
Such older folks, presumably,
have time to sit and figure out
who are their relatives, and how
much. For example, if a grand
son of European descent comes
home from Tokyo with a Japan
ese bride, does that make his
grandfather a relative of all
Asia?
But such thoughts are danger
ous. Pursued far enough, they
might lead to the conclusion that
the brotherhood of man is not an
Idealistic notion, but a mathe
matical fact.
The Boston Globe
LESSON FROM
POTTSTOWN
The Pottstown (Pa.) Mercury
is a newspaper that tries to be
different; it has to, being sur
rounded by larger papers in Phil-
adelphiah, Reading and Allen
town. Though small (ABC circu
lation 23,000), it doesn’t rely ex
clusively on press association
news but sends its reporters to
talk to UN officials, national po
litical leaders and other public
figures.
Recently it put out an issue
that must have stai tied Potts
town citizens but ought somehow
to have a wider circulation. It
was a “censored" paper.
With due notice to the readers,
the editors eliminated from that
one edition all unfavorable news
regarding the Johnson Adminis
tration, the U. S. Government, lo
cal and township governments.
Snipped out too were all “nega
tive reports from Vietnam, from
our embattled cities or elsewhere
in the nation.
The editorials were (lone as
they might be done in any na
tion that has a pi,.is controlled
by the government. They were
all written to put the Govern
ment and the Administration in a
good light. Only letters to the
editor that approved of what the
Government is doing were pub
lished in full; any critical ones
were censored.
And to dramatize what they
were doing, the “censored” por
tions of the news stories, letters
and articles were left as blank
white space. The result of this
pock-marked makeup is some
wonderfully frustrating reading—
ypu know something is omitted
from that Vietnam dispatch but
you don’t know what. It also
makes a marvelously impressive
point.
That point, for those who some
times grow impatient with the
frailties of all our communica
tions media, is that while a free
press—free even, sometimes, to
be irresponsible—may be an im
perfect way to inform the people,
it is far less worse than any oth-
ADMITTED SUNDAY
James L. Bridges, Gastonia
Mrs. J. B. Short, Kings Creek
Birth
Announcements
Wall Street Journal
er expected to hear politicians
trying to score points with the
publie by defending baaeball um
pires.
Wall Street Journal
Keep Your Radio Dial Set At
1220
WKMT
Kings Monntain, N. C.
Ne’ws & Weather every hour on the
hour. Weather every hour on the
half hour.
Fine entertainment in between
ADMITTED MONDAY
Mrs. Celia Bonds, City
Mrs. Harold Bradley, Gastonia
-Mrs. Fred H. Camp, City
Daniel W. Ellis, Bessemer City
Manuel E. Ellis, Bessemer City
Mrs. Kenneth B. Hyde, Shelby
Mi’s. Ted Langley, Dallas
Mrs. Jerry F. Oliver, City
Mrs. Jay H. Pressley, Bessemer
City
Larry D. Smith, Bessemer City
Mr. Samuel L. Stewart, Gas
tonia
Mr. Andrew Trammell, Cherry-
viile
ADMITTED TUESDAY
Mrs. Ethel M. Hambright, City
Stephen Brakeficld, Clover, .?
C.
John W. TTirner, City
Mr. and Mrs. Bobby VValkeri
route 3, Shelby, announce the
birth of a son. Wednesday, .Sept
ember 25, Kings Mountain hospi
tal.
Mr. and Mrs. James Brooks,
220 Weldon strt'et, Gastonia, an
nounce the birth of a son, Thurs
day; September 26, Kings .Moun
tain hospital.
Mr. and .Mrs. Roy Barnes, 308
Boyce street, Gastonia, announce
the birth of a daughter, Saturday,
September 28, Kings Mountain
hospital.
Mr. and Mrs. Harold 'Bradley,
Jr., 301 Morris street, Gastonia,
announce the birth of a daughter,
Monday, September 30, Kings
Mountain hospital.
Cooperative studies in which
new drugs were administered un
der controlled conditions in Vet
erans Administration hospitals re.
suited in a therapy program that
has allowed VA to do away with
specialized tuberculosis hospitals.
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