Newspapers / The Hyde County Herald … / April 5, 1945, edition 1 / Page 2
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Pape THE HYDE COUNTY HERALD. SWAN QUARTER. N. C. APRIL 5, 1945 3 If. . - ;.fj i" I .!> M ••.•1 1 ip' Hyde County Herald i oUR DEMOCRACY- by Mat PUBLISHED EVERY THURSDAY A. =v\,AN ol'JARfER. NORTH CAROLINA. BY TIMES PRINTING CO., Inc. THOS. E. SPENCER Editor Entered as Second Class Matter at the Postoffice at Swan Quarter. N. C. Subscription Kates: One Year $2.; Six Months $1; Three Months 60c. TOO MUCH WAR BALONEY We are getiting fed uip on so much of this baloney written by neurotic old maids, and mediocre psychiatrists which shouts .at us from every newspaper and magazine about how we should treat the returning soldier. Don’t talk too mudh about the war some of them warn. Others caution us against treating him as a human being. Still others tell us we must take into account the probability that he is a new person altogether, and his wife and family must remake themselves in order to keep him home. Foolish fictioneers are writing stoiji^p^^, and magazines print them to convince us that every soldier returning home is a prob lem child; something to tax the mind and heart of every rela tion, and particularly to bring a mo^t severe strain on any young wife, w'ho is not indowed with super-duper imagina tion. Well, for our partfwe think if we don’t stop such foolish ness, we are going to find a lot of believing we have all gone crazy. We have made it a special point to observe a number of these boys, wiho have returned from combat duty in the various branches of the military forces. Most all of them we knew fairly well before the war. Generally speaking, we see nontable difference in them now. For one tbing all of them are a little older, and naturally exhibit some of the sobriety and maturity that comes with age. All of them have had a tough break, so to speak, for they have made great sacrifices, say what you may. Mdst all of them have lost money, their careers have been interrupited, their pilans upset, because of their oall to the colors. They have been forced into a rather grim and ghastly duty; they have faced death, and they have gone through bitter moments, and hours of torture. But those who were strong men have come out the strong er; many w*ho were weak have collapsed, but other weak ones have been strengthened. The village drunkard returns to drink again as usual; the loafer is still a loafer. The work er, after a few days rest is looking for something to do. The man who loves his home and family is glad to be back and is sticking close by them. In short those who are not living true to.form, are the ex ceptions, and there are always exceptions. We have seen a dozen boys go norlth and be employed a season pn a dredge boat and of the lot some would come home broke; some would work when they got home, and others who didn’t work before, didnU work afterward. Now and then one not espec ially promising beforehand turns out well, and becomes a substantial citizen. lit is our belief that the war is going to bring out what is in a man, although a little flatter perhaps. We think we are go ing to get some fine leaders out of the veterans; we certainly need them as never before. We don’t know if it is quite fair for them to have to come home from the battlefield, and take up so many burdens of citizenship, but we certainly need them; it has never been so, and for our part, we are in favor of turning the county over to the best Of our veterans. They will have earned that right, and they will be so busy they won’t have time to brood over the past injustices which will be fading into the past by the time they have streightened out the mess. More likely they will look upon us all as the odd, the pecu liar, and the crazy ones. We think they will have just cause to do so, as they relturn home. About Your Neighbors panied by Miss Geneseise Shine M. R. Daniels. They were aocom- of ECTC, Greenville and Miss Eunice Winborn of Fremont. Mr. and Mrs. Harold Howard have returned to their home in Chesapeake City, Md., after spending a week with Mrs. How ards’ mother, Mrs. Dora Davis. Mr. and Mrs. Thorpe and Mr. and Mrs. Hughes Tillett of Nor folk were the week end guests of Mr. and Mrs. Dewey Tillett. Miss Arsilla Midgett of Nor folk spent the Easter holidays here with her mother, Mrs. Arsil la Midgett. Mr. and Mrs. Ernest Wahler and baby of Norfolk^ were the week end guests of relatives here. Mrs. Calvin Sawyer of Nor folk spent the weekend here with her parents, Mr. and Mrs. Craw ford Daniels. Chlvin Davis has returned to Norfolk after a visit with his fa ther, B. H. Davis. Erb Tillett continues very ill. John Etheridge of Norfolk, Va., spent the week end here with his mother, Mrs. Connie Etheridge. Ward Daniels is in the Marine Hospital, Norfolk, for medical treatment. Mr. and Mrs. Julian Brothers, Jr., and daughter, Gail, of Nor folk were the week end guests of relatives here. Mrs. Joe Meekins has return ed to Elizabeth City after spend ing a week here with relatives. Mrs, Connie Etheridge contin ues very ill. SPRING FEVER PLOWS NO FURROW. THE 'OLD farmer's almanac", first ISSUEDt- " FOR THE YEAR. OF OUR LORD, I793, BEING THE FIRST AFTER LEAP YEAR AND THE SEVENTEENTH OF THE INDEPENDENCE OF AMERICA." - NOW - ISSUED FOR THE ISS*® CONSECUTIVE YEAR . // (jPW HTKM /homer, C UKPrr ©WN.USE 1.U SERVICE V; W CHAPTER XXI Mh 'C N 4-/ illiiiS Part of America's daily life for generations, THE farmer's almanacs HAVE BEEN A SOURCE OF HOMELY TRUTHS AS WELL AS USEFUL INFORMATION TO FAMILIES ALL OVER THE COUNTRY. 'Spring fever plows no furrow — only by SETTING OUR HANDS TO THE PLOW OF WORK, HOLDING STEADY TO THE HABIT OF SAVING, PUTTING OUR MONEY INTO SUCH THINGS AS WAR BONDS, LIFE INSURANCE AND SAVINGS BANK ACCOUNTS DO WE ACHIEVE FINANCIAL WELL-BEING — n/^A^r//£srM/s//rFi/^j^avofOi//?oM///S£cmry. It broke my heart to go back to the farm. A succession of renters had about stripped it; the cave where we had hidden from the cy clones was falling in; the fences were down, the hog pens my fa ther had taken so much pride in were ankle deep with filth; the corn rows were green with cockleburs. In a way, I was glad my father could not see it. I was tempted to sell it. But I could not quite do that, for the feel for a farm is deep and abiding; especially if it is wrapped with ten der youthful memories. No, I could not sell it. Nothing could make me do that. A black shadow appeared. A mem ber of my family got into trouble and wanted to put a mortgage on the farm of $8,500. I thought of what my father had said as I had sat on the camel-backed trunk, but the situ ation was so serious that the mort gage had to go on. It was as if a hand had squeezed my heart. I came back to 10 Standish Road, depressed. I looked at The Little House with the Big Mortgage and my heart went down again. As so often happens, this was the time my stock was up, when everybody I built that barn by mail and in my imagination. They told me the day the first load of lumber would be hauled and I was on that load of lumber; they told me the day the slushers would arrive and I saw them taken out to the bam lot. They told me when the head carpenter would arrive, and I saw him put on his apron and drop his hammer in the loop on his leg. And the barn progressed, they sent me snapshots of it, and I watched it grow. I was like a father a thousand miles from the hospital But at last it was borr When I went down to the dep®* get on the train, I felt exactly —my white-and-blue-trim child. SoVne way or other I raised the mon ey to go out and see It, and Spide was down to meet me, as Pa used to be, and we climbed into his car. We came in from the east side of the farm and, when we topped the hiU, there was the barn shimmering in the sunlight. At least, it seemed shimmering. Of course it was a bit I different from what I had expected— "time I felt I isn’t a child always?-but there It j was a fine white, stanch, center- ' drive, hip-roofed barn with two lightning-rod points. And on the front of it there was painted: The Homer Croy Farm, J. Theodore Lo gan, Manager. I think you would like that barn; I think anybody would. aia was cnougnt anything I But I didn’t know what to d®- . been through two bitter expe^* ^^^,5 with mortgages; a third was ute. , I hated the farm. It was everything and giving nothing- yet thpre was still a linger*®® for it, as one might have for ® son who has broken his heart. For the first time in its ex*^ ® our town saw people lining up 9 „ our banks demanding their t®'’ j* Two of the banks closed and went on relief. A word my had never heard. The Salva ^ Army played on the streets ^ (,{ had never played before. j qd farmers, In patched clothes, corners. Food was doled out ®L.jjo basement of the church where / Sunday had shaken his fist st devlL did when I had left Pa in bed the farm w®' luld I told myself I did not care, weaned away from it; it was 0®““' I was doihg I nothing but demanding money- was a city man. A man could be tied all his life to a pie®* land just because he chanced t® j bom on it. Sell it for whatever Service, has returned to duly af ter spending a leave of several weeks with his sister, Mrs. Shel don O’Neal. iMrs. Cohbett Willis of Norfolk spent Easter week end with her daughters, Mrs. Rebeoea Willis and Mrs. Lawrence Gray. Mrs. W. B. Midgett, Mrs. A. D. Pringle and daughter, Patsy, have returned from Norfolk, where they spent several days. sladesville news SALVO NEWS NOTES 1 Mrs. R. D. Gray has returned to Manteo where she spent the past week with her sister, Mrs. Minnie Midgett. Mrs. L. H. Hooper spent Tues day in Manteo. Graves Midgett, Jr., spent East er with his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Graves Midgett. Linville Farrow has returned to duty after spending his leave with his wife and daughter. He also visited with his parents, Mr. and Mrs. P. G. Farrevv. L. C. Gray, who has been ill for the past Jew days, is some what improved. Henry Midgett spent the week end in Manteo with his aunt, Mrs. Minnie Midgett. Mrs. L. Y. Gray spent Thurs day at Rodanthe on business. Mrs. Calvin Midgett and daugh ter, Shirley Roe, spent Thursday night with her mother, Mrs. L. Y. Gray. G. A. Hooper spent Tuesday in Manteo on business. A large crowd of our young people went to Rodanthe Wed- r-esday night to a party^ for the binefit of the school. Mrs. L. Y. Gray, Mrs. W. E. 'Whidbee and children, Velma Kendall, Earl, Irene and Jean. Eat Tuesday night at Waves \ th Mrs. Gray’s daughter, Mrs. Calvin Midgett. Mrs. K. R. Pugh, who has been E->ending several weeks at Waves , v\ ith Mrs. Calvin Midgett, has returned home. Mrs. Louise Rountree of Nor folk, who operates a store here, sperrt several days in rtorfolk re- -cently. She returned Tuesday. WANCHESE NEWS Carolyn Daniels and Melvin Daniels, Jr., of Rocky Mount, N. C., spent the Easter holidays here 'With their parents, Mr. and Mrs. J. M. Culiifer of Norfolk is visiting his son and daughter-in- law, Mr. and Mrs. S. D. Culiifer. Mr. and Mrs. Leon Harris and Leon, Jr., of Henderson, are vis iting Mrs. Harris’ moUier, Mrs. Amanda Sears. R. W. Green and L. A. Sawyer were in Belhaven and Washing ton on business Saturday. Mr. and Mrs. Carl Gearhardt of Norfolk spent the weekend with Mrs. Gearhardt’s mother, Mrs. Amanda Sears. Fenner Allen of Greenville were here on business Friday. Mr. and Mrs. Rufus Pittman and son, Robbie Williams, and Mrs. Dallas Williams left for Nor folk Saturday. Mr. Pittman and Mrs. Williams are returning to duty after spending a short leave with rela tives here. Mrs. Martha Sears is spending a few days with her brother, J. A. Lupton. D. S. Daniels and Gratz Credle are jurors in Washington at the Federal term of court. Mr. and Mrs. Kelly Equils vis ited the Edmond Sadler family Saturday. J. W. and S. D. Culiifer were in Washington on business Fri day. ENSIGN PRICE OF AVON IS ON NEW DESTROYER Ensign Hubert Caston Price, UlSNR, 21, of Avon, N. C., has been assigned to duty as supp-ly officer on board a new fast des troyer transport, the USS Wil liam M. Hobby, which was chris tened and commissioned in cere monies at the Charleston Navy Yard Wednesday (Aprirt.) A son of Mr. and Mrs.. N. E. Price of Avon, Ensign Price was a student at the University of North Carolina at the time he en tered naval service on December 15, 1942. He has two brothers serving in the Coast Guatd, Alvah T. Price, a chief radioman, and Her man M. Price, a signalman third- class. thought I was prosperous. My name I Owen Davis was turning my story was in the papers, I had sold the >"‘0 • Will Rogers. I first talking picture for WiU Rogers remembered what my friend had at what everybody assumed to be a ®e*fi about Hollywood needing some- whacking price; and I let them think with the homey touch. In so, uncomfortable as I sometimes . ®P*te of the almost desperate situa- tion, Hollywood was managing to get along without me, for the tele phone didn’t ring, except from the bank and a few scattered bill col lectors. The bank wanted to know, since I had sold a motion picture for Will Rogers, why I didn’t pay up. I told them I had got only a crumb or two from Mr. Fox’s table; they said they knew how to handle people like me. The picture was released and made an outstanding success. I went could get, pay the insurance pany and, if there was anything *® at least I’d be that much ahead- But even while I was telling self this, I knew I could not S through with it. Any more than ®® can desert a member of the f^*®' who has become a burden. There is, indeed, truth in . adage that the blackest hour is ^ before dawn. I have seen it wo out too many time^ to doubt it- con>- ALTON EVANS SETTLING IN CLEVELAND, OHIO Alton C. Evans, after many years travelling on the road through the middle we^ is plan-1 ninig to make his permianent home j in Cleveland, Ohio. He has mov-| ed his wife and balby girl from' his wife’s home in New Orleans' where they spent the winter, and where the baby was born Novem ber 5, last. Mr. Evans is the son of the late R. C. Evans of Man- teo, and has many relatives here. The Easter bunny is up to date on his vitamins. The carrot is aj good source of vitamin A and the cabbage furnished vitamin C. SPRING PLOWING MANTEO PERSONALS Miss Wilma Jones of Norfolk spent Easter week end here with relatives. Miss Mollie Fearing and Wood- son Fearing, students at Louis- burg College, spent the Easter holidays with their parents, Mr. and Mrs. M. K. Fearing. Edison Midgett, U. S. Maritime Meantime there was that $210 a month; and some months I was not making that. How often they came around! The Irving Trust Company had the mortgage on both the lot and the house. I can still see those print ed forms that came snowstorming in with the blank spaces filled in with ink. If by a certain day, the money had not been paid, an impersonal voice would call up and say that we had undoubtedly overlooked it. I was trying to write humor. In all the writing business there is noth ing so hard to sell. You’d think every magazine would want humor; and every magazine says it does. But they don’t buy it. Chiefly be cause no two p^sons ever agree as to what is humorous and what is pretty terrible. In a magazine of fice, among the manuscript readers, there is always a divided opinion; so, usually, the editor plays safe by taking something everybody agrees on. Finally the lane turned, but not before it was almost at the preci pice. I got a new tenant for the farm, Mr. and Mrs. Spide Logan. Thank God it was just in time! I had known Spide when I was a boy, but not very well. Kis first name was a nickname, but it had become so universal that it took an old-timer to know that he had another. He had long legs, in his growing days, and the boys had started to call him "Spider," finally it had shortened to Spide and Spide it still is. Never had I realized what a blessed differ ence a good tenant could make. We drew up a contract which said, in effect, we were partners and we would go share-and-share alike—fif ty-fifty—with certain provisions. I was to furnish the land and the fences and the seed; he was to fur nish the "power," which meant horses, then; and the help to operate the farm. The contract got down to a finer point than that; for instance, I was to pay half the fuel oil, if we ever made enough money to buy a tractor. Then a little twist in the contract: I was to get one-third of the eggs. I did take it for a while—and thankfully, too—but final ly told Nellie Logan the egg money was hers. The barn, which Pa had built aft er the cyclone had whisked the first away, was now a noble ruin. When you went In IL you ran a chance of having it come down on you. One tenant had fancied a door, so the door had departed with him. W« had to build a new barn. How we were going to build it, I didn’t know. But that bam meant something to me emotionally. I had played in the old bam, I had slept in it during the haying season when an exciting hired man told exciting stories. One night a storm had come up. I wasn’t quite brave enough to stay. But the hired man did. You bad to respect a man like that. It Is truly astqnishing what you can do when you have to. But It also makes a person feel that half the time he Is a pretty weak vessel. The barn was to cost a thousand dollars. The sum was staggering. I went to J.oseph Jackson, president of the bank, and told him my trou bles and be drew up some papers and after a while there was a thou sand dollars in the farm account. I suppose ours was the first barn in the world that didn’t cost more than the amount originally planned. Whan, finally, the bam was up, we didn’t have enough money to paint ! it. But, Nellie Logan turned the hens sii®' th® I hated the farm. down to my club. The Players, and let them look at me. I was con gratulated right and left. Lots of drinks . . . money that should have been going to Mr. Boerner, the gro cer. But that is human nature. It was sweet, indeed, to nibble the fruit of success—the first I had had since West of the Water Tower. But there' was no fruit in the bank. I had a sickly little account in the bank in Forest Hills. Now and then I would creep in and draw out a few dollars. The manager hardly looked up any more. And all the time I would read In the papers about the successful books and plays my con temporaries were writing. During these days of readjust ment, I did not get to see the farm as often as I wished. But it was there, it was still mine! I could al ways have that to fall back on if anything . . . But my wife and Carol Were of the city. Carol’s idea of a farm was an acre and a quarter in Connecticut where she had spent a week end with a school friend. When she spoke glowingly of its one calf, I controlled my.self. When I told her about that first piece I had writ ten, she said it must be cute to teach a caU to drink. When I was able to get back to tile farm again, I found many changes. A mortgage was on my back, too, just as it was on the backs of most of those present. But, some way or other, I could see its effect mere vividly among them than I could on myself. And now the eastern Insurance company was after me, too. I was This special dawi. began very ply by a telephone caU from McCann-Erickson advertising cy, in New York. Would I com® ' and see them? Would I! I would have crawl®*^' But you don’t teU an advertising agency that. You pretend you ®*'® a very busy and successful wr*!®'' and say you think you can manaS® it and work out a date convenient to all. It is quite an art. The best hope I had was that the) might want me to submit something for a radio program. But also knew that advertising agencies ®*' pect the poor author to take aU th® risk. Well, I would growl a Ui^® about doing It on speculation, but I’d do it. Maybe something would come through . . . that is the hop® an author Uves on. And the ®nly way, so far as I know, to make a success of writing is to keep putting in an oar here and there. After * while you may get your boat moti' ing. I found a most Impressive gentie- man who, after some cigarette taUt. wanted to know if I had been t® Hollywood lately. I told him 1 hadn’t. While I keP* wondering to myself what tbi» strange conversation meant. Cer* tainly he had nothing to do with pi®' tures. Scenario writers were ®®* hired on Madison Avenue. "I’ve received a telegram from Chicago about you,’’ he said and picked up a yellow sheet and slowly read it through to himself. Hours if seemed to me it took. Who in Chicago would wire to him about me? I kept asking myself. B®t also I knew the ways of advertis ing companies were inscrutable. He laid the telegram down. “Have you any scenarios you have writ ten?" "Scenarios?” I said, for things are not done that way. "Yes." "I might have a copy of one. I don’t know. I’d have to look through my things.” "Will you do that? I wish you’d bring it in and write down a 1*®^ of everything you’ve done for the movies." He picked up the telegram and again silently read to himself. ’Then put it down. "Can you do that today?” I said it so happened I could. Then we shook hands and I went out I looked through my things and found a scenario and two or three “treatments” and some odds and ends, and raced back. He picked up one of the manu scripts. “Is that what a scenario looks like? I never saw one before." Then looked through it in his slow methodical way. I thought, “If he doesn’t know anything about scenarios, why did he send for me?’’ But maybe this was the way advertising agencies work. "I’ll let you hear from me as aooD as I can," he said finally. I went out again, unable to make head or tail of the mysterious affair. Maybe I should have asked what it was all about. Or should I? 1 sim ply didn’t know. Three or four days passed, then loose on the job. By that I mean she had to take her egg money and f was sold it might not more than turn it into paint. But at last, Nellie meet the mortcage. And there wa.s i and the hens and 1 painted the barnl Phaoe- oaiient i^oena. w-a behind in my payments; if the land j come a telephone call Could I come in to see him? XPlease turn to Page 4)
The Hyde County Herald (Swan Quarter, N.C.)
Standardized title groups preceding, succeeding, and alternate titles together.
April 5, 1945, edition 1
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