Lincoln County leader. [volume] (Toledo, Lincoln County, Or.) 1893-1987, 1903-03-13
A TOLEDO BOY IN HONOLULU.
Zenas Copeland PrOsperiDg in the
"ParadiSe of the Pacific"

"Paradise of the Pacific"
The LEADER is in receipt of letter
from Zenas Copeland, dated "Honolulu,
Fl. T., Feb. 25, 19O3," from which we ap
pend a few extracts:
"Since left Toledo, nearly two
years ago, have wandered around con-
siderable, and finally settled down here
in Honolulu, the so-called Paradise of
the Pacific
II am working for the Honolulu
Rapid Transit and Land company, and
am doing we'll. Since have got used
to the climate / have beer onjoying ex-
cellent health, which is nothing new to
me.
with this mail send YOU two num-
bers of our principal papers. One is
the cable edition" :" the other contains
an article on how we used to get news
before we got the cable"
As most of our readers are aware,
Honolulu was connected with the Uni
ted States by cable at the begin.
hing of the present year. A portion
of the article mentioned by Mr. Cope
land is here produced:
THE Washington Star says: Il guess,
maybe, the cable won't be appreciated
by the Honolulu folks!' said au Amer
can newspaper man who recently re-
turned to this country after being en-
ployed for many years on the staff of a
Honolulu newspaper. have knocked
about the world good bit, and | don't
know of any place that has been more
in want of cable Communication for
years past than Hpnolulu. The white
population is composed exclusively of
hustling men and thoroughly up-to-
date women from all parts of the Uni
ted States and Europe, and their feeling
of isolation, even while living in so mod
ern n city as Honolulu, has long been
acute, with no other news brought from
the outside world than reaching them in
heape3 up form in the American news
papers that we get to the islands by
steamers at from four to ten days inter-
vals between them. They are alert
people, who before settling in Honolulu
were in the habit of closely fol-
lowing the news of the world from day
to day, and the business of waiting for
days at a stretch for information as to
the worlds doings, especially at periods
when they knew something big was
going on, has been extremely irksome
to them.
"'To illustrate: Our first news of the
eruption of Mount Pelee was brought
down to us on the steamer Australia.
The Australia brought the San Fran
cisco papers, containing The bare al
nouncement Of the great catastrophe,
published the day after the great erup-
ton, before any OF the details OF the
horror were known. There were Just
four or five double-leaded lines on the
first pages of the newspapers, telling
of The thing, and that was all. The
steamer Australia had left San Fran
cisco for Honolulu just seven days be-
fore, and there was no other steamer
from the states due for something more
than week.
"'Now, if there's any one thing that
the people living in the Hawawiian
Islands are particularly interested in,
| it's volcanoes. So, when the Australia
brought the San Francisco papers, con-
tanning only those few lines. about the
Mount Pelee affair, the people longed
for cable as they had never longed be-
fore. The brief announcement stated
that perhaps $4,000 lives of residents
of ST. Pierre had been sacrificed, and
the Honolulu folks weren't very cheer
full just about then.
"'The Warrimoo, bound for Samoa
and Australia, was late, and didn't get
down until ten days after the arrival of
the Australia, and we had to wait all
that time to get the details Of the
Pelee affair. Then we each got our
big bundle OF newspapers, ten days of
them. aud we had to sit down and
spend a night wadiug through the ter
rible history of the dreadful Martini
que calamity. Honolulu was the
gloomiest city imaginable for several
days after the arrival of the Warrimoo.
Whereas il the town had been in con-
slant daily communication with the
United States by cable the news of the
great catastrophe would have come ont
gradually and naturally, and the shock
of swallowing it all at gulp would
not have rendered the city dismal and