Frostburg mining journal. [volume] (Frostburg, Md.) 1871-1913, 1895-04-27
A Poor Defense.

enNlaDle position yum DerlaDu occupies
in the view of the county, as set forth
all too briefly and tenderly in these
columns last week. 1t struggled man
fully, we may say gallantly, but its
vocabulary of invective had been
ransacked for past explosions until
hardly syllable was left to do service
in a cause otherwise utterly defense
less. Like "the spirits called from
the vastly deep" only those appeared
that had died from overwork, and,
hence. we got the following:
The suggestion that taxes collected for local
or county purposes ought to be allotted or
parcelled out equally TO the several districts
is not only novel, but we feel sure that it
could have originated nowhere but in the
pretentious alembic of the great paper. The
JOURNAL would have its readers believe that
they have no interest whatever in the taxes
expended at the county seat for the support
of the courts, the Jail, the almshouse, the
insane asylum, and in the payment of
salaries to public officials elected by all the
people Of the county.
The JOURNAL is read by the scholars
of the county as well as by large
corps of less discriminating but in
telligent people. These do not need
to be told the Alpha of things when
Omega is made clear as MONDAY.
Hence, neither the JOURNAL, nor
,,1boJy o1eo horrnJrro. Cr,, bowl, Il n
single dollar that goes there on county,
seat account. We would not grumble
about even little mo1e than legit-
innate demands going there, but to pile
it on, pile it on, and pile it on year
after year until we see that the county
seats biggest snap is in the direct and
indirect revenue it draws from this
region, eoithout making any return aohat
eoer, we cannot be deferred by the vain
cries of "libel," "indecency," etc.,
from exposing when occasion offers
the bad bargains Cumberland makes
forus.
But some years ago Frostburg want
ed the insane asylum located here, but
Cumberland wouldn't let it come.
Later-after Cumberland permitted
the courthouse to burn down, we
wanted the Lew one built here, where
it would be protected from fire, but
not would then be 'entirely too far
from OldtowE !"
And now the fact that Cumberland
beat us in both instances is made to
do duty as a pretext why we should
be held up and robbed all the time.
Twice we wanted new county, but
Cumberland was too much for us with
its little plaintive cry-''not enough
territory'' And so great is the pull"
with which our wealth endows the city
that it is able to thwart authority to
re survey in order to find the 43 miles
which the aboriginal surveyors over,
looked.
Really it seems like waste of time to
notice this attempt to create the impression
that the expenditure of large sums of money
for the support Of institutions necessarily
located at the center Of population and the
seat of local authority, lntlicts wrong upon
the other districts of the county.
Of course it seems that way to Cum
berland. 1t would be the strangest
thing under the sun if the bene-
ticiaries Of the county's bounty thought
otherwise. Isn't the 100000 or
1920, 900 of more consequence to them
than only $4,000 this gear to the coun-
try roads? Why, it is so important to
Cumberland that all the wants of "the
seat of local authority were fully pro-
vided for by cash, the only items for
which debt was incurred are $4,000 on
a country schoolhouse and $11 900 on
country roads-this, no doubt, to i'm
press the country with the enormous
cost of the country to the city.
Waste of time ?" You bet.
But "the clock strikes one," and the
Neaes, like Young, apparently "takes
no note of time but from its loss'--in
hopeless effort to explain, for in
stance, why for each $500 raised by
taxes only IS is dedicated to roads. If
the Neocs were as economical in the use
of platitudes as it is in time spent in
answering hard questions it would be
the most concise, terse, concrete
daily literary gem in the universe.
Cumberland mere parasite of Frostburg!
AT the risk of wounding the vanity, and
puncturing the self:concet of our dissatisfied
friend, we beg leave to assure him that the
people of Cumberland never think of Frost
burg as possible rival in any relation what
ever. 1t has nothing that we covet, nor is it
possible for it to interfere in the slightest de-
gree with our business or commercial as
pirations.
This is a comment upon the JOUR-
NAILS intimation that the Neaos did not
dare to speak otherwise than well of
"Frostburg and the REGION" But the
Neacs cuts off the big end of the SEN
tence and attempts to belittle both the
JOURNAL and the town. Does this mean
that, though Frostburg has nothing
worth having, Cumberland has some
thing belonging to Frostburg and the
region' that is worth keeping? And