The people's journal. (Pickens, S.C.) 1891-1903, 1897-09-16
WAKE UP, JONAH"
Rv JOAQUIN MILLER.

Jonah was and is even now to be seer
hero snugly housed i'll ono end or MS
buoo old whalcboat by ono OF our YAK
land wharfs, an old Yankee sailor
to,, lean, lank, once rs full OF ola sea
.tor;o, no on old pincushion is full OF
oia noodles Nearly all of these stories
oro made ND of dreadful shipwrecks, IN
oyorv ono of which ho bore consplcu-
s,o MORT md was each timc tho worst
oI;n,vrocked sailor of tho whole crow,
ond think this is why tho Callfor-
u;ans long, long ago, when 1T was tho
hoh;t 70 call men by queer names, called
iii, man Jonah. Anyhow the namc
,vos firmly fastened on him when few
,,oors 400 he was set to watch Il certain
lilac, nv tho shore and give alarm in
case of fire.
Well. in a few days the place took
fire, and everything, including old DO
nah, as it was thought, was burned to
ashes, But as these Cal:fornians always
rchnild very quickly the workmcn,
while clearing away for now founda-
zion heard voice away down below,
and. opening the mouth of the we'll
that had been covered by falling tim
hers, there they found poor old Jonah,
up to his neck i'll the water, where he
had fallen while running i'll great haste
TO give the alarm of fire.
This and other less important INCL
dents in the Same line gave the honest
old sailor such II reputation for bad
luck that few fishermen Orplrasurc par
ties were willing to embark with ionah
il other boats were 10 he had nj hand.
Rut on the 2Sth of November 1856,
the day Oh which the California ArNor
day was established, the old man htd
his big boat filled with rs hrlEht al"
lovely littlc crowd Of country boys
and girls as could have been found fer
miles around. and this WAS because "v-
ery other boat had been engaged t" -
to Yuba Bucna island. III the middle OF
the great and most glorious hay ot San
Francisco where the ceremonies were
to take place
This great. bic .nd USl1 island i'll
this broad and most ttAUutU! bay OH
the globe, if we except the bay of Ma
pies perhaps, is n BARREN and rocky
place. 1t belongs ~ the government and
has pretty lighthouse On II. There are
four other islands in this great bay Of
San Francisco, but they are not SO bar
rcn and ugly. One of them Is huge
fort, with more than 500 cannon and
many soldiers on it, Another one is a
great place for building ships.
And so, as this barren island lies al
most in the middle ot this magnificent
bay and is nearly between Oakland and
San Francisco, where boats pass by CON
tinuously, it was agreed that il would
be good thing to begin our California
Arbor day by planting this ugly and
barren island with forest trees.
General Howard, the one armed old
hero Of Gettysburg and many another
bloody field Of battle, was ! command
Of our armies and armW ut on this
coast at the time, and II headed tn,
work by giving all the Sh IS and all th
sailors and all the soldiers to carry tn
people to the island and hrlp plan
trees, and so ON.
Mr.. Sutro, the great engineer WI
made the Sutro tunnel into the Silv,
mountains Of Nevada, gave Us 5000
trees to plant on tb" island. and ~ 1
was to plant the first tree. and as ti,l
eral Howard was also TO plant tree
and as the governors and senators Q
California and Nevada were also t
plant trees, and rs the famous orator
John j. Irish, was to make "A Speech
why, you See nearly everybody wanted