The Bemidji daily pioneer. [volume] (Bemidji, Minn.) 1904-1971, 1911-06-01

Sea and de Egyptians come along
and half way over get swallowed
up?"
Without the slightest hesitation
the colored preacher replied:
8Dat was no miracle. Dem He
brews sure nuf crossed de Red Sea as
recorded but dey done crossed on de
ice. De next day de Egyptians come
along but by that time de ice was
rotten and dey all fall In
But the old deacon knew some
thing about geography SO he said:
Don't you know, parson, dat ice
never does form south of de equa-
tor?''
This irritated the minister who
came back with:
Now look a here. You set down.
Deacon Jones, and don't be abuttin'
in to my business any mo- You try
to cornah me and you jes show 20
own ignowaGce. No ice south of de
'quator! You ignoramuses you!
Don't you know dat in dose days dere
never was no equatah?"
And there is no equator or other
dividing line in Minnesota. Sec
tionalism should not be bar to the
prosperity of the commonwealth.
in nf nfxy oh III
be in harmony with st. Louis; Wi
mona should glory in the prosperity
of Koochiching and vice versa. 1t
is all one city-even to the cities
and as Schley said after the Battle of
Santiago,-"There is glory enough
for ALL" We are all proud of Min
nesota as one of the most richly en-
dowed states of that Union which
goes to make the grandest nation
ever devised by man. And So, while
we would not for moment detract
from the splendor of the South, with
her waving fields of golden grain, we
will, feel, be pardoned for remind
ing the public at large of the fact
that we grow a pumpkin or two in
our neck of the woods. Residents
of the South point with pride to their
thriving villages, the richness of their
soil and the brilliance of their men
but you will search the map in vain
to find more prosperous, thriving,
progressive district than the pine
perfumed, ore-laden, prairie-stretch-
ing counties of the North. You
from the South can boast of the
sturdy little Yankee from Watonwan
but we claim al good citizen in the
strenuous little Scott from Beltrami.
You may harp on the bigness of your
population and we warn you to chain
down your settlers for they are COM
ing up north where life is really
worth living and where an 80 year
old man with a wooden leg will run
foot race before breakfast every
morning just for exercise; you dangla
tassels of corn in our face and we
defy you to point out the corn line.
You talk Of favors from Nature and
we tell you truthfully that in natur-
al wealth st. Louis county alone has
the rest of the state tipped up at an
angle Of As degrees.
Winona county has good lands and
so has Aitkin; Fillmore, for SO years,
has been a garden spot, but the tim
Der OF. Hubbard has sung merry
tune through the. saw mills and the
soil that grew the trees is now grow
ing everything that Fillmore can
grow, the representative from Wi
mona county to the contrary notwith-
standing. And so, while the south
has grown and settled and prosper
ed, the north, in a period of new
awakening is sweeping onward with
strides that astonish the ignorant
visitor from the south and causes
him to say fervently that Minnesota
is a great state. And because of
this greatness it should be our de-
sire, and believe it properly one Of
the duties of this great convention
to do what it can In bringing about