davidaulloa/AmericanStories huggingface dataset:
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03

/ ms hght from nearby tree when
ms beacon was DESTROYED.
me ilrst duty of a keeper is to tend
ms hght, to keep it burning even
though the mechanism is smashed
and the windows blown in, with the
lower sWaylng in a hundred-and-
twenty mile gale. He finds time to
conduct extensive life-saving opera
tlons on the side, however The rec
ords show that life and property were
saved by keepers and assistants on
l43 occasions in the past year. The
rescued included everything from
exhausted swimmers to disabled air
ships.
Motorboat rescues are perhaps the
commonest. These craft get caught
I'm the currents which drive them to-
ward the rocks, and i'm case of any en-
gine trouble, they are practically
helpless Then the keeper, who has
been observing their progress with a
glass from the tower, rows out and
lows them to safety, after which his
report generally states that he re-
paired the motor for them and sent
them on their way. Light tenders
(the service vessels which supply
lighthouses and lightships with fuel
ana food very often give assistance
to the distressed at sea. During the
past year they have saved several
n,
according to the ships captains, would
otherwise have been lost
The tenders rescued men in open
/, boats who had left sinking ship and
iloated about for days without food
or water when the lghtship found
them. Tenders pulled vessels off bars
where they had grounded, and light
Keepers on one occasion performed
the same service with their power
boat. The officers and crew of a light
tender off the Maine coast landed to
help in lighting a forest fire. Perhaps
the most sensational rescue was made
IN New York harbor, when a light
Keeper rowed out to pick up two
aviators whose machine suddenly
dropped into the bay. Both men and
aeroplanes were rescued.
So the lighthouse service makes n
sort of federal coast emergency relief
system, as well as an unbroken series
OF guiding beacons that stretches from
the northern tip of Maine around to
the northern tip of Washington, and
lights the coasts of Alaska and our
| island possessions too. Under the
general head of "Aids to Navigation +"
the service maintains about $1,000
lighthouses, lightships lighted buoys,
bellbuoys, whistling buoys, fog sig
nails and submarine signals. Every
reef on our long coast line has it's
warder
Lightships are used on exposed
| shoals where it is impracticable or
too expensive to build a lighthouse
The service maintains So of these yes
sells, some of which are very old. One
of them has been doing duty for 66
years. The more modern ships are
equipped with standard engines, by
which they can leave post when re-
lieved under their own power. and
also work their way back to station
should one of the winter gales tear
them away.
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
ARRANT HYPOCRISY
[New York Tribune ]

on Christmas Eve an Austrian sub
marine torpedoed the French pas
senger steamer Vile de la Ciotat with
out warning. The boat sank, carrying
with it several scores of men, women
and children. At about the same time
an Austrian submarine similarly tor
pedoed and sank e japanese passenger
ship.
These things were done after the
text of the last Austrian note on the
Ancona had been written in Vienna.
Mr.. Wilson now asks the American
people to believe that the Austrian
note represents an American victory
for humanity and a vindication of in
ternational law.
That which precedes was written
before the news came of the latest
massacre. To the statement of fact
there is added nothing but the detail
that two American citiZens-one of
them an American consul-were
among the victims of the newest
slaughter. Is it necessary to add any
word now TO the exposure that the
latest crime supplies of the lie and the
sham of all that American policy has
meant in recent months?
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
NEW ADMINISTRATIONS

NEW administrations in both city
" and county take over the reins
of government to-day. The op-
portunities for service in both are
many The new county commission
ers start off well, with promises of
good housekeeping and changes in the
methods of the office designed to in
crease efficiency and economy in that
branch of the countys affairs. The
poor directors have plans under con-
sideration that if carried out will
greatly increase the effectiveness of
that office and improve generally the
condition of the INDECENT poor in
both city and county. The other
offices pass into control of men whose
past records forecast success for them
in their new lines of work. The indi-
cations are that the next four years
will be marked by able and construc-
tive work in the county government,
with harmony prevailing among all of
the various elements that go to make
up the whole.
In the city there is equal oppor-
tunity, but the outcome is not so ap-
parent. Three of the councilmen re-
turn, two of them to continue success
full administrations of the active, con-
structive branches of the city govern
ment, and the third to resume his
duties in charge of the finances. The
public cares little for the petty politi-
cal differences of the various members,
but it does care very much about the
manner in which its business is trans
acted and its interests conserved. All
of the city commissioners are on rec
ord as to their attitude in this respect.
1t remains to be seen how they pro-
pose to carry their pledges into effect
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
LIGHTS AND STORMS
BY Frederic ]. Haskin

.NTITH the coming of the winter
wv gale season, now at its height,
W the real work of the year be-
gins for the lighthouse service. For
the men who tend the towers and the
lightships do. a great deal besides
regulating their lamps. They form a
sort of supplementary life-saVing SER
vice, and one with an exceptional
record of risks taken and lives
saved.
The storm season always begins in
the early Fall with a series of hurri-
canes that come swirling up from the
Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean
Sea, nearly always destroying ves-
sells: often devastating islands such
banana crop this year, and occasion
ally striking the southern cities of the
United States. This Fall was the
worst in many a year. There were
three hurricanes in six weeks and
two of them struck both Galveston
and New Orleans. The great damage
done was duly set forth, but how
much the lighthouse keepers pre-
vented by sticking to their posts has
not even been estimated.
Bolivar Light stands off Galveston
Harbor. On the night of the Gal
weston storm all families in the i'm
mediate vicinity took refuge in the
tower, where they waited and Won
dered if the whole structure would
be blown into the sea, for it swayed
like a treetrunk in the terrific wind.
The keepers were too busy to specu-
late on the chances of being drowned,
for in q storm such as this the light
is immensely more necessary to ship
ping than in q, calm. Bolivar is a
rotating light, and the swaying of
the tower threw tn mechanism so
sary to turn it by hand. After a time
even this became impossible, so Boli-
var Light burned as a fixed beacon
all through the night of the storm.
The direct force of the wind blew in
the iron door of the lighthouse, which
the keepers were forced to close at
great risk, to protect the towers from
the wash of the waves, which had al
ready swept away everything on
Bolivar Point except the light itself.
Hardly a light in the storm district
came through the night of this hurri-
cane unscathed. Half a dozen of
them were maintained by hand after
the mechanism which, gives them
their characteristic flashes of light
and darkness, by which seamen
recognize them, had been put out of
order. The high waves ripped off
storm shutters yards above ordinary
high water mark, bent and tore away
iron hoofs. smashed wharves, and
even bent iron foundations, but the
keepers stuck to their posts and kept
the lights shining.
In the later hurricane which struck
New Orleans, the storm panes about
some of the lanterns were blown in.
and had to be replaced in a wind that
blew ninety to a hundred miles an
hour. One keeper kept glow in his
tower by hanging a lantern behind
the lens when the light was put out
of commission. Another man, in
charge of an off-shore beacon, hung
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
THE TEUTONIC REPLY

TINE real reply of the Teutonic
allies to the Ancona note and
all of the protests of the United
States that have gone before, is the
sinking of the British liner, Persia,
with the death of an American consul
and the narrow escape of another
American who was aboard. Not all
of the specious claims of victorious
conclusion of the Ancona incident" ."
emanating from Washington, will wipe
out the fact that Germany and Aus
tria have absolutely no respect for
the claims of the United States and
that they hold the American govern
ment as at present constituted, in con-
tempt. They tell us one day that they
have abolished their piratical, blood
thirsty course on the high seas, and
the next they sink a ship without
warning, drown American passengers
and prepare another meaningless
note for the placating Of the Wash
ington administration.
The whole situation is a tumble of
contradictions and falsehoods the
only outstanding, self-apparent feat
ure of which is the utter failure of
the national administration to uphold
the dignity of the country and to pro-
tect its interests abroad. 1t has not
involved us in the European war, and
that is about all that can be said in
its defense. We have no other course
than to accept what it chooses to give
us in the way of amateur diplomacy,
but we do have the remedy, and that
is a change of control at Washington
next November. The whole attitude
of the President and his advisers has
been weak and inconsistent. The
situation is fast approaching the i'm
possible. But unless Congress takes
a hand. which is not likely, all the
country can do is to grin and bear 1t.
until the opportunity comes to cure
the evil by the major operation of
amputation.
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
FACTS ON CROPS

TT is greatly to the credit of the
State Department of Agriculture
that it is making an effort to tell
the people just what Pennsylvania Is
raising in the way Of crops in these
DAYS when, because of European de-
mands, the prices of provisions and
grain are liable at any time to give
limitations of fancy war stocks.
If there is anything that American
people will not stand for it is. a juggle
of figures on the food supply. 1t is
apt to make any man mad to be told
that there is an abundance of pota-
toes or a huge wheat crop and then to
wake up and find that it is short and
that he must pay more. Hence it is
the part of wisdom for State and Ma
tional governments to give plain, un
vanished facts about crops.
This State has had crop report
system for a long time, but it was not
until a bureau of agricultural statistics
was created in 1913 that the public
began to get the benefit of the data
which the State Government was gath
ering. Prior to that time the infor-
nation was collected and embalmed in
bulletins which came out long after
the potatoes of which they dealt had
been made into "hashed brown" The
new bureau started a system of
monthly bulletins on the crops and,
enlisting the services of a number OF
men thoroughly interested in agricul-
ture. began to get figures which soon
attracted the attention of the Ma
tionaI Government and commercial or
ganizations, to say nothing OF the
everlastingly vigilant freight depart
ments of The railroads.
In the last few months this bureau
has done more to tell people of Penn
sylvania the magnitude and value of
the crops raised between the Ohio and
the Delaware than was done in the
preceding decade and whoever is of
the opinion that the Keystone State
is not a factor in the food supply of
the United States is due to learn a
few things this year. Pennsylvania
does a great agricultural business and
by publishing the facts about it is
advertising in the best possible way.
And it pays to advertise, especially
when there Is a S46, 900 900 hay crop
to be talked about.
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
GERMANY'S GIRL WIVES

[MaXimilian Harden, in Die Zukunft ]
It is imperative and in the most
vital interests of the German people
that solid barrier be placed against
the hurried and reckless matrimonial
alliances which, thanks to the cupid
ity of the tribes of marriage brokers,
are being made in every part of the
country.
Every girl is possessed by the obses-
sion of getting married. How fire.
quently we hear men talking in that
fashion. Yet their mental Incidence
prevents them from seeing whose
fault it is that young girls find no
way but that of marriage to realize
their aspiration for sympathy and
psychological communion.
1t is due to the brutal heartless-
ness, the sordid race after money of
a great mass of our men, forefully
aided as they are by the vile marriage
brokers' that young girls lightly sacri-
flee love, youth and happiness for a
marriage that is in most cases moth
ing but a brutish enslavement.
And why not, ask the men? The
costs are paid by others. Who are
those others? The poor victims them
selves. What do we see as the result
of this inhuman> system which is
gnawing like a canker at the very
heart of the German nation and de-
Stroying its hopes or future regenera-
tion ofithe race at a time when those
of us who are real men are shedding
their hearts blood on the battlefields? Z?
The result is this: That to-day in
Berlin alone there are $4,000 divorced
girl wives.
This is nothing short of a national
shame. which cries out aloud to the
authorities for instant and drastic ac-
ton. To remove this shame from
our midst is every whit as imperative
as the engineering of the food ques-
tion. because where one involves the
material the other concerns the moral
starvation of the race.
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
.'DAY REN1NG,

quivered whenever the voice of the
orator of Plainfield was to be heard
in the White House corridors. Two
months ago, yes, one month ago, Will
son and his New Jersey friends had
no intention to let MARITIME go to re-
nomination unopposed. Since they
control the party organization over
there, there can be no doubt of their
ability to defeat MARITIME IL they
choose-and Senator Smiths recent
failure in business has made 1t sure
that there would be nothing to fear
from that source.
Yet MARITIME is to pass through the
primaries unscathed. Why?
There can be but one adequate an
swer-that he stands no chance to be
reelected, if nominated, and that it
may. serve some useful purpose to put
him up to be knocked down.
Right here, however, arises an
other question: If MARITIME cannot
carry New Jersey, how can Wilson
expect to do so? A Democratic poll
tician would answer this by saying
that Wilson is stronger than his party.
The real answer is that neither Will
son nor MARITIME can carry New Jer-
sey again. AS matter of fact, Bryan
was a stronger presidential candidate
than Wilson in Wilson'S own State
and there are indications that the
Democratic managers have abandoned
New Jersey as factor in the election
of 1916 and are trying to make up
the loss of its fourteen electoral votes
by playing up California. which has
a strength of thirteen in the electoral
college. This serves to explain why
Secretary Daniels is so suddenly
solicitous for the Mare Island navy
yard and it also serves to explain the
uneXampled prominence which is be-
ing given to California's new Demo-
cratic Senator, Mr.. Phelan, who, in
addition to being a Democrat and
from California, is rich and has a
reputation for being a good spender.
Building up the Mare Island navy
yard, plus a generous contribution
from Senator Phelan, and a little help
from Governor Hiram Johnson might
give California to Wilson.
But even this would not re-elect
the President. Swapping New Jersey
for California would be a net loss of
one electoral vote, in any way it is
figured-and the Democrats cannot
lose any electoral votes next time if
they are to win. No sincere political
obServer beIipVes that the Democ
can carry either New York, Ohio,
or Indiana. No man ever be-
came President who did not have the
support of New York. In 1888 Benja-
min Harrison lost New Jersey-but
he carried New York and was elected.
In 1892 he lost New York and was
defeated.
If President Wilson's second cam
paign is beginning with the abandon
ment of his own State, how will it
end?
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
KING WITHOUT CoNTRY
New York Sun

King Peter of Serbia, old, inflrm and
ill, fleeing before invaders and seeking
an asylum in Italy, is one of the pa
thetic figures of the war. He man
aged to please his people principally
by being merely royal parsonage and
never mixing in their politics. His
daughter. a good, sensible girl. whose
advice he often sought, married and
went to Russia; his oldest son, in
whom he centered his hopes. was COM
PEELED to leave Serbia, and the old man
afterward led a lonesome life at the
royal palace in the shadow of the
crime that made him king. Even
should Serbia survive as a kingdom it
is scarcely likely that he will return as
its king; he will be more willing than
ever to turn the honor over to Alexan-
der, his second son.
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
OLD AND NEW

From the New York SUM-
We bury the dead year solemnly, a year
that was born in flame.
Never to be forgotten so long as the
race shall be,
A year that goes in sorrow as in tears
and woe it came,
The Year of Death they'll call ii
through all eternity.
Never to earth since man was man came
twelvemonth such as this,
Its food was manhood slaughtered
and it loved the taste of blood.
1t crucified the Christ again, but not by
word or kiss
But by the lowering of the curse IL
came upon in bud.
We bury the dead year joyfully. for il
did mankind a wrong
That peaceful years in centuries will
never quite undo.
1t placed the weak and helpless be-
meath the cruel strong
God grant the Old Year dead may be
a warning to the New
EDWARD. s VAN ZTIE.
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
EDITORIAL COMMENT

German is soon to float another war
loan. this one for $2.50O, 900. .000. Her
chemists must have learned how to
make synthetic money as well as
synthetic food. - New York Evening
Sun.
There are more than 100000 corpor-
ations in this country, according to
figures compiled by the Federal Trade
Commission. OF which more than 100.-
coo have no income whatever. Those
must be the good corporations.-New
York Tribune.
The ease with which European ma
tions dispose of Cabinet Ministers must
excite the envy of every American. =
New, York Tribune
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
RESOURCEFULNESS

January Outing.l
II was at Fishkill Plains during the
cavalry maneuvers last summer. One
force was driving the other back and
the retreating force was destroying
roads and bridges to hamper the pur-
sniff 10 be sure the destruction was
not actual. but constructive. A bearer
of despatches was hurrying down the
road when he came to bridge so
destroyed. Nothing daunted, he
startod 10 ride across when a sentry
posted there halted him.
"Hey there" said the sentry, don't
Won see that that bridge is construc-
tiveIy destroyed? You'll have TO use
the ford
structiyely swimming the stream"
cane tbe quick answer, and the des-
patch bearer held on his way.
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
WELL KNOWN PEOPLE

Judge Cameron, of Tioga, who re-
tires to-day. is one of the oldest judges
in point of years in the state.
Samuel Rea gave the usual NeT
Years reception at the Pennsylvania
Railroad offices in spite OF his health
Richard Harding Davis. the novel
list, is doing war correspondents duty
in Salonilli.
The Rev. j. Alvin Orr, of Pittsp
burgh. was presented with an auto
mobile by his congregation on Christi
mas Day.
Professor Camden NJ. Coburn, of
Meadville has been making n study of
Egypt and says that the Pharaohs had
their favorite cartoonists.
Colonel Francis r. Skunk, United
State engineer officer at Pittsburgh.
is TO be transferred to a new place of
duty. having served four years.
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
TARIFF COMMISSION
Philadelphia Public Ledger. ]

If the President and his party are so
stepped in doctrinaire theories as to
the sacred action of their tariff sched-
ule that they will do anything to stop
dumping of foreign goods after the
war except change any clause of the
Underwood tariff law. why, let us take
our medicine and at least be thankful
that they are inclined to a tariff COM
mission. For a commission properly
organized should be able to clear up
the situation in no time. The ample
facts already collected by the various
smelling and junketing committees, by
the various government bureaus, by
our consular officials. are there for a
commissions use and elucidation,
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
THE NEW YEAR

TIME New Year is before us, botl
as a people and individually. I
is ours, to do with as we will
What will the answer be? Only tim'
will tell What John Peter AltgelC
gave as advice to young men apple
equally to us and the New Year. Thi
Is what he wrote:
Two voices are calling you-one
coming from the swamps of self
ishnesS and force, where success
means death, and the other from
the hilltops of justice and pro-
gress, where even failure brings
glory. Two lights are seen in your
horizon-one of the fast-fading
marsh light of power and the other
the slowly rising sun of human
brotherhood. Two ways lie open
before you-one leading TO an ever
lower and lower plain, where are
heard the cries of despair and the
curses Of the poor, where manhood
shrivels and possession rots down
the possessor; and the other lead
ing Off TO the highlands of the
morning, where are heard the glad
shouts of humanity and where hon
est effort is rewarded with immor.
tality.
One of these ways we must choose
Which shall it beH What say you?
Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-03
INTOXICATED AUTOISTS
IPhiladelphia Record. l

Judge Baldridge, of Blair county,
who gave warning some time ago
that he would give Jail sentence to
any person found guilty of running an
automobile while intoxicated, has
made good by sending a well-to- do
resident of that county, who plead
guilty to driving car while under
the influence of liquor, to 80 days in
the county Jail, adding a fine of 500.
A few doses of this SOLDERING charac-
ter will do much good in Blair county
and all of the Judges of the State
ought to follow the example of Judge
BaIdridge.