The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-10-25

2
: Wood, toastmaster at the banquet
: in introducing Mr.. Underwood.
|:
President ]. e. Shelby of the Board OF
Trade and Sterling A. Wood, toastmaster
at last nights banquet TO Mr.. Underwood.
sounded sentiments which were reflected
by al those present and by thousands of
his fellow-citizens who We're unable 70 at
tend.
Toastmaster Wood spoke as follows:
THE dreamer who rmerly dreamed
dreams of Birmingham fashioned them
solely in regard TO our material progress
Ids reward was to be told that he was
building castles in the air. We have lived
to see these castles reared. even to the
highest battlcments all OF these dreams
came true
while this dreamer dreamed of ma
terial progress only, ne failed to COM
prehend that material progress has some
thing behind it, ami that no castle, how
ever small, is builded save by man; that
the country that produces great thirgs,
| must produce gr at men. Necessarily, if
| this district produces the best in material
| ruatters, to do so it shoulG also produce
the best Of the human kind, and We are
here to honor one of its best products, a
! man.
"Our Board OF Trade our Chamber of
Commerce, has celebrated the purity of
our dolomite, the high calories in the
coal the great strength of our coke, The
ducfility Of our iron. the toughness of
ooI steel, and the :esourccfulness of our
fields, but fought we celebrate the fact
tnat all of these excellencies have been
transmitted to and repose in our honored
guest, and now form part of one of ma
tures greatest handiworks, Oscar Under
| wood
Follow Work From Day to Day
"All of this and perhaps more was what
we thought of him while he was in Wash
| ington, when we read the Associated
| Press account of his work from day 10
day, and we believed il as such as Uncle
Remus says, when he was in the king
ing business;" yet today and tonight We
are staggered to find that this man wnorn
at a distance we had supposed so great,
when We meet HIM and clasp hands,
| ceases to be great; he is only just plain
| Oscar Underwood, the man whom We
sent to Congress also as boy, who
/ seems to have grown in appearance
scarcely older by his long stay there, and
| who is just s pleasant, Just as cheerful.
| just as amiable, just as unassumng as
| him whom we used to meet and greet
| from day to day, with Good morning,
| Oscar AS the darkey said to the catfish
| after his less fortunate brother angler
had surreptitiously exchanged fishes with
| him, You must be my catfish, but, golly,
| you sholy has shrunk'
"A street gossper said the other day
that Underwood did not know much; ;
| that all he knew was the tariff. He re-
minds you of the man who speaking
| of a preacher. said that he didn't know
much about religion, that all he knew
was the Bible. One of the most dis
tinguished members of the House of
Representatives said of our guest that
he was the only man that America had
ever produced who could go into his
room alone with per and paper and
bring forth proper tariff bill They
say that what made Shakespeare so
great was that he played on all the
10000 chords that touch the human
heart. The tariff has more than 10000
chords and each is somewhere at
tached to some endeavor of mankind
and he who knows the tariff simply
knows it all. The tariff follows you
from the cradle to the grave, and as
some congressman said he only wished
1t stopped there, but it continued its
taxation far beyond, only stopping short
of the Pearly Gates, But I find blue
pencil has been marked over what
had to say about the tariff, including
a large danger signal. Perhaps some
one will refer to 1t tonight Certainly
the speaker shall not do so in this
presence.
Some Twenty Years Ago
Some 20 years ago we placed a COM
mission in the hands of our guest and
he accepted the same and went /. 10
Washington to represent us.
"At that time you recall, the House
was republican, but this did not keep
him down; soon the greatest of repub-
J licans, Speaker Thomas Reed called
him to the committee on rules and oft
entimes when democrats would sigh for
recognition by the speaker like a love
sick swain for his departed lady love.
our Oscar would get up in the House
and be recognized by the SPEAKER to
the surprise of all. including the re-
publicans. Reed found out his talents
and ,used them, even to discipline his
own party occasionally in a quiet way
Let not suppose that what has
been attained has come by chance. by
good luck, or otherwise than by that
great other accessory, good. hard, sub
stantial work. Close attention to duty,
morning, noon and night at his post in
the House; after adjournment in his
office, with just trips home during va
cation to keep in touch with his people
and today we find him still at work,
learning as to the needs and necessi-
ties of mankind.
u zone of the greatest qualities of our