The Weiser signal. [volume] (Weiser, Idaho) 1890-1904, 1903-04-18
Bill Jenkins Letter.
Edi tor Signal:

a would never put library on Sag
Creek. The people like to read vel
enough but they are opposed to And,
f on general principles. If he want
to get rid of his money, why don't h,
give it back to the people he took i
from, in such form that they car
use 1T as they please. If he didn
want the money, what did he fitch L
tor? 1T he had given his employees
all they earned, and sold to consum.
ers at only reasonable profit he would
nave been one among happy, pros
porous, and Industrious community.
who could have founded their own
libraries, made public improvements
and educated their children to suit
themselves. The people don't ask for
libraries nor charaties In any form.
all they ask is square deal in legis-
lation so that they can get what they
earn and the libraries and other in
situations will follow fast enough.
Think of the hundreds who suffer
ed, went hungry and even starved
while ne was accommodating the money
he is now spending on stone build
ings.
Let US suppose that a farmer
keeps his son at home shaving on the
ranch till he Is twenty one, accumu-
lating wealth for him. The boy
never sees the inside of school house
and knows nothing but hard work.
At last the farmers greed is satisfied
and he has time to view the mental
deformity of his son. He says, MY
son, you are the rudest, most ignorant
pumpkin it has ever been my lot to
see; what you need is knowledge and
refinement. Here are some books. so
cultivate your mind The only diff
ference with Carnegie is that most
of his libraries go outside of the cir
Gle of the Carnegie environment, and
may result in some good, but when
you picked up leather bound volume
wouldn you shudder at the thought
that you might be toying with the
hide of one of Andy's skinned vic
Tins?
AS | understand Andy's plan, he
puts up fine stone building, fur
nishes dozen or 30 full length por-
traits OF Carnegie, plaster paris
oust OF Cicero, and dozen copies of
Jarnegie's Empire of Business. The
citizens are then to put up a few
for other books, But
hlnk OF the strikes and blood it costs.
mo WIDOWS tears--7enough to blur
very word in all the libraries-peo- {
lie struggling for the right to exist
mile Andy schemes for millions for
MARTY, or, rather, vanity-who Z
nows which it is? n
Carnegie has no doubt suffered a
eturn OF conscience. just as other old
eople reach the stage of second =
nlldhood. He has millions that he +
as no use for and he don't know .
ow to return them any other way;
al, after all, there may be an oc- y
'slonal book containing thoughts R
llculated to make the world better. =,
en- and women nobler and purer r.
}, then the laborers have not died "
vain. In the remote future some "
'nerous hearted citizens may raise v
to those who died that we
'ght have books. Then the sculp- W
r may conceive, foundation of "
e bones and skulls of men upon =,
lch rests a pedestal of books, the
atue thereon will be:-A child in w
e throes of death lying upon a pile
straw on the floor, and, kneeling + Z
er 1t a weeping mother in tattered II
rments, on whose face is depicted a,
the agonies of maternal grief and
telltale lines of hunger and priv 3
on. But standing above them
ghtly bending over the mother is q N
autlful angel in robes of white, her Fr
8 parted as If to speak words of
isolation, her left hand LIVING FIR
htly on the mothers shoulder while
th the right she is pointing up- j,