davidaulloa/AmericanStories huggingface dataset:
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
AIRCRAFT IN NAME ONLY

From the New York Globe.
 The American Defense society again calls attention to condition of affairs in our army and navy that demands imme- diate correction. According to a protest sent in the form of letter to MT. Till man, chairman of the Senate committee on naval affairs, the aeroplanes and hy- droplanes of the navy are in even worse condition. if that were possible, than the army machines which proved such fiascos when an attempt was made to use them in connection with General Pershing's ex- petition into Mexico.
 Not one of the naval planes now in use is fit for service, and, in addition ma chimes recently ordered are of an obso- lete type. The defense society suggests that they were purchased because of their cheapness in comparison with the up-to-date models. Within the last two months two lieutenants have been killed in practice work because of defective ma chimes, and every officer who makes a flight in one of the naval aircraft takes risks that he should not be called upon to assume.
 In a country that gave to the world the heavier-than-air machine it is pitiful to contemplate how far we have been out stripped by other nations in it's use and development. Instead of having nation al aviation corps second to none, at least as far as equipment is concerned thou | sands of dollars are spent by the au- I thorities on a choice collection of junk which is useless for all practical purposes We have men of daring and skill to man our machines. We should give them something other than aircraft in name only
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24

 STEAMSHIPS
From Life.

LlIe.
 Steamships are used to carry gamblers, actresses, immigrants, society queens and other undesirable citizens from one coun- try to another. They come in various lengths to fit oceans, bays and rivers. When man wants to build steamship he orders some steel plates and rivets and has ten-story building put up; then. by closing up and sharpening both ends it becomes steamship. It is then put on rollers, and young girl steps up and wastes a bottle of perfectly good cham pagne upon it, after which it slides off on the water and is all ready for the gov ernment to subsidize.
 Steamships are made and owned by every country except the proud and happy liberty loving land in which we are all trying so hard and vainly to make both ends meet. The reason why we don't own steamships is because we have been so busy subsidizing everybody else that we haven't got around to it yet The best we have been able to do so far is to encourage steamships to bring over as many foreigners as possible, in order that our coal barons may not be worried to death all the time over their help; also to keep up our slums to the standard of efficiency required by public opinion.
 Every respectable steamship now has a tennis court, swimming pool and a golf links. The spectacle of seasick golf CTS putting out on the last green in a northeast gale while the band plays God Save the King has become a necessity of modern travel
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24

land speaker. On the less doctrinal sd ject of Sabbath observance he said;
 Behind Sunday is one immense sal ton, not the sanction of books or cod but of the needs of humanity. World have the right, the very sanction God, to get something of recreation a relaxation besides worshipping on Sl day. Y It is wrong to say that must keep Sunday in the same wi. When we let men keep the Sabbath their own way we are divorcing ourseIJ from sham"
 We don't believe there is, nevada, much sham" about Sabbath observan The spirit of the tina IS pretty fiber Men do not all keep Sunday in the sal way, and so far as we. can observe one is trying seriously, certainly not fectlvely, to make them do it. Those W prefer a Puritan Sabbath for the selves have it, though they cannot ( force it upon the rest of us; for the who prefer relaxation and recreatit man or woman or family draws { formula for the combination of plea sl and mental or spiritual Improvement
 We do not attempt to prescribe for t pulpit. but we are certain that ma doctors of divinity err i'll diagnosis a prescribe erroneonsly for their congree tions.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24

A writer in a London newspaper says the German people are still confident that they can never be defeated. How ever, even the Teut overlords will dis cover that they can't fool all the people all the time.
 Tears are being shed over the passing of the floating theatre but according to advertisements appearing regularly in the Billboard, several such playhouses are still doing business.
 
 Senator Lee of Maryland points out that danger of war with Mexico is not over yet still, large numbers of militia men seemed woefully disappointed about something or other.
 Mr. Ford was unwilling to accept the prohibition nomination for the presidency yet he probably doesn't feel any farther away from the White House now than he did before.
 With comparative clam prevailing along the Mexican border and the Teut conspir- ators quiescent, Uncle Sam can hardly keep awake during these sultry days.
 The observer who says women's ankles are getting thicker probably jumped to that conclusion after seeing a burlesque show famous for it's fiat ones.''
 Having put out a ticket, the prohibi- tionists can now return to their private affairs and wait to hear the news of Woodrow Wilson's reelection.
 A female tennis champion smokes cig- arettes when she is not swatting the ball. thus giving the reformers some- thing else to ponder over.
 Another sumarine merchantmen is ex- pected at Baltimore. but there would be no surprise if it were reported overdue. The waters are subsiding in Alabama and the excited correspondent has re- lapsed into innocuous desuetude.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
MILLIONAIRE AND CoACHMAN

F rom the f1LtSDurS DlSpdCCn.
 The late James Hobart Moore. one of the millionaire Moore brothers of Island fame, was known to the general newspaper reader chiefly as trust or ganizer and as lover of fine horses. His financial ups and downs were spectacu- lar. He blossomed into a millionaire all most over night, even more swiftly was plunged into bankruptcy, and in few years had acquired another fortune. But there was evidently finer side to the man than the financial and legal finesse he shared with his brother, Judging by the story told by his coachman after the funeral.
 This man, William Beattie, had been with him five years when his match trust operations made him a pauper between days T was in an awful fix" Moore used to say, worth less than nothing when Beattie came to me. He had been to the bank and drawn out every penny he had saved-$2O00 Take it, he said, I got it from you and you are welcome to keep 1t as long as you want it. Moore used the money to tide him over He acquired new millions. but never for got the service of Beattie. He rAid back the 5000 many times over. and Lideo the coachrnan to investments that have netted him more than $1oo,ooo. And Be- attic worked with him to the last. Any one who worked for MT. Moore would have done what I did" he said beside the grave.
 There was bigger tribute to the dead millionaire than all his millions, the friendship and trust of a man who sin cerely liked him. There must have been something in him that the coachman saw more than the mere money machine the public deemed him. No man may be 2
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
THE woRLD-wIDE cRINoLrNE

From the Providence Journal
 One of Secretary Redfeld's staff of bright young men, looking up commer- cial opportunities in Russia, observers that 'the new fashion in wide skirts" for women, approaching the crinoline styles of about 50 years ago, are result ing in the use of about two and one-half times as much cotton material in skirts and underskirts as heretofore" Here is fresh testimony from an official source, to the universality of Dame Fashion s sway The same phenomenon has been remarked in the United States, in other European countries, in Japan and South America.
 It is calculated to make our cotton man ufacturers look pleasant, especially as the mills in the war countries must supply the governments needs for piece goods before they can attend to the growing de- mands of the shopkeepers. The Russian market looks inviting for American man. ufacturers
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
THE NATIONAL AIR

the Scotch get along without Scots WI Hae,' and why hadn't it any competitd once it mysteriously became their Il tional air? Many persons could wr| more eloquent words than those of "Gl Save the King" but it would be uselel because nobody would ever sing thel What makes the song of nation something in the air, in both senses; is common consent, how obtained nobo knows. God Save the Czar" was ma the national hymn of Russian by impd ia1 order, but that sort of thing caI be done here. Hunting for the one al pie, adequate, satisfying national d and trying to write 1t or find it Is ii searching the horizon for the gre American novel or looking for the pot gold at the foot of the rainbow.
 It is true that "The Star Spangl Banner" was an 'occasional' pied written about the bombardment of Ed McHenry. It hurts solemn and logid minds that an occasional piece shou be taken as national air; 1t seems
 unrea sonable. The very name of ''Tl Marseillaise" shows it to have been occasional piece; it was written to i spire the "Six Hundred Marseillais who know how to die" as they march on Paris to overthrow the King. IF Wacht am Rhein" is no more nation If you insist upon being strictly logics it's name would show what a limit ground it undertook to cover, even if words did not. It is too bad that
 many things in this world are unreaso able and illogical; in fact, most thin that are connected with the affection A national air is national air becau the people of the nation love it, and y can condemn it all you like, and pr pose reforms and substitutions till y are weary with well-doing, and ha your labor for your pains.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
From the New York Times.

From the New York Times.
 TT HIS discovery that The Star Span
 gled Banner wouldn't do comes
 every other summer, and many pa- triots biennially offer suggestions for a national anthem. Still, even if it is ''un- singable' we go on singing it and stand ing up, and even if nobody knows the words" we go on tra-la-ing to 1t. The great reform has not yet begun to march. One gentleman writes the Times to "call to your attention my Song of Liberty " and another sends the Sun a little thing of his own called The Homeland. Prin- cipal James J. McCabe of this city has set America to music of his own, and modestly hopes we will sing 1t to that instead of to the Sassenach tune to which we have been singing it. Admirers of him write to the Times and other papers to that effect. MT. McCabe's air is a mediative, jogging sort of melody, sug- gesting that his muse is named Dobbn. Comfortable people, who do not like to be excited, will like it very much. The tune ambles along for three notes at a time and then gives a sudden jolt for about bered something. There Is nothing an- moving or vexatious about MT. McCabe' s national air. and we hope it will be sung at many church sociables.
 Some of the reformers want "a worthy and dignified air." and some want some- thing like Dixie which is too tumul- tuous and joyful to be called ''dignified.' ? One who wants Dixie adopted com plains that nobody knows the words of Keys poem. We call upon him, here and now, without looking at the book, to re- cite all the words of Dixie" Men and brethren, how are you going to get your new anthem, whatever it may be, made national? An act of Congress won't do it. What hakes national air? How did
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
BIRMINGHANI's EPIDEMIC

From the Montgomery Advertiser.
 One thing that helps to account for Birmingham's typhoid epidemic. accord
 ing to Commissioner Hornady, is that the legislature passed a law requiring the city to live within it's income and that expenses had to be cut $400,000 an-
 nually. Naturally the health depart ment had to bear it's share of the loss, meaning that the number of sanitary in-
 spectors, for one thing, was cut down from 13 to five. In his talk Commission CT Hornady said:
 We now have in the supreme court a
 measure which Is being tested and we hope to get favorable action on it at the fall term. This will enable us to
 make sanitary connections where they
 are needed, even though the property pay for the connection. It gives us a permanent lien on the property which can be satisfied in the future. This will eliminate many of the dry closets. Dur ing the past six months we have re-
 moved at least 1000 of these death traps With the cooperation of the people we will make Birmingham a sanitary and healthy city, but we must receive their hearty cooperation.
 At times we have had strong delega- tons of business men appear before the commission protesting against the en- forcement of the sanitary measures which are advocated so forcefully in the report of Dr. Lumsden.
 Dr. Lumsden, United States govern ment typhoid expert after making an | investigation, found that the epidemic is traceable to an ice cream plant and to the number of dry closets in Bir- mingham. He said the ice cream plant was not to be blamed, since infected milk was sold to it.
 The authorities seem to have gone to the bottom of the trouble in Birmng ham. Only in this way can they hope to eradicate the disease. We venture that this lesson will cause Birmingham to take due precautions in the future and that there will not be return to the epidemic next year.
 Birminghams experience should prove lasting warning to other cities.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
BIRMINGHAM'S HEALTH

From the Mobile Register.
 City Commissioner J. R. Hornady of Birmingham, writes the Register that the epidemic of typhoid fever in that city is not due to the garbage, as city commissioner of Mobile in an interview in the Register last week alleged. In his letter MT. Hornady says: "The city of Birmingham does collect garbage. Therefore, we do not lack this public service, nor is the epidemic of typhoid due thereto. This epidemic. so far as we have been able to ascertain, was due more largely to the use of infected food products than to any other cause. This condition has been relieved to a very large extent and the fever seems to be decreasing rapidly"
 MT. Hornady calls attention to the condition that existed and how it took almost a public calamity to arouse the people to a sense of their duty in public health matters. He says:
 Birmingham has had an unenviabla typhoid record for number of years, but it was not until the present outbreak that the public became aroused to the gravity of this situation. However, the awakening has come, and out of this awakening will develop much cleaner community, and one in which typhoid fever will become rarity
 Publicity of the real condition in Bir- mingham has not only aroused the peo- pie to sense of their danger, but has stirred the guardians of the public health in Birmingham to remove the danger and clean up the source of infection. Mir Hornady is the commissioner of health and education in his city; he was for many years a prominent newspaper man there He often criticised public off. cials for dereliction in duty. His ever tempered letter shows that he does not vince under such criticisms now
 It is good to learn that Birmingham Ii ridding herself of typhoid and that the awakening has come to that city.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
THE GULF STREAM sCAPEGOAT

From the New York World
 Ten years ago, tarpon, belonging, as
 everybody knows, to the semi-tropical
 waters of Florida, were found swim
 ming off Canadian shores. At the same time, Sunday newspaper artists were drawing pictures of New York as a city of palm trees and jungles. Why? The gulf stream had changed its course Today sharks infest the bays and beach waters of. New York and New Jersey, and while bathers are bewaring and sea. side landlords are berating, wise skip pers sail into port to tell us why. The gulf stream is shifting it's course. It has been ever thus. The gulf stream has been the scapegoat of the Atlantic coast perhaps ever since it was discov' cred. Certainly ever since the living gen. erations began to have memories. In vain official Washington tells us that the warm water streak to the deep water east | flows now where it has flown for ages 1 Captain Pillsbury, sturdy navigator cl | the battleship Maine, carried to needless
 ears within recent years the assurance
 that the stream is "as fixed as the Hud' | SOIL l ne SklpperS anu oOiAA0 VI siiS So' of us know better.
 1 Is the December grass fresh and greer | in Central park? Does a New York spring | push January off the calendar? Does Au
 gust finger in the golden lap of October
 Does the peach crop fail in Delaware? Il Great Britain shiveringi perhaps snow | Hurried, in June?
 There is single answer The gull
 stream has changed it's course. This an swer covers everything. It is alwayi | ready. as reliable tomorrow as today
 And it will work both ways Indeed. a gallant captain of 1906 declared that the
 stream itself had turned around and wal
 flowing backward. Which was as true
 as most of the things said about it.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
From Age-Herald Files

Sunday, July 24, 1S9S.-John B. weakley, Sr., is thrown from his wagon near Flor ence and instantly killed.
 More than 100 applications have been received by the board of education, through Dr. J. H. Phillips, superintendent of public schools, for the position of principal of the Paul Hayne school, made vacant by the resignation of Prof A. c. Moore.
 Officer Shirley, assisted by Special Off cer Burke of the Louisville and Nash vile railroad, makes clever catch of 8 burglar wanted at Calera.
 Post B. Travellers Protective associa- tion, holds smoker in the private par lors of the Morris hotel. President Louis Hart presided.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
hero to his valet, according to the say l ing, but here was a multi-millionaire wh was a real man to his coachman.
ON WORK

By William Ellery Charming.
 Manual labor is a school in which md are placed to get energy of purpose an| character-a vastly more important e1 dowment than all the learning of al other schools. They are placed, indeed under hard masters, physical suffering and wants, the power of fearful element and the vicissitudes of all human thing] but these stern teachers do work whic| no compassionate, indulgent friend coul do for us, and true wisdom will bled providence for their sharp ministry.
 have great faith in hard work. I'll material world does much for the minl by it's beauty and order, but 1t does mon for our minds by the pains it inflicts; b it's obstinate resistance. which nothinI but patient toll can overcome: by it's vad forces, which nothing but unremittin] skill and effort can turn to our use; b it's perils, which demand continual via ilance, and by it's tendencies to decay believe that difficulties are more impoI tant to the human mind than what VI call assistances. Work we must if wi mean to bring out and perfect our nd |ture.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
WHY IS A COCKTA AL?

, Smile being a vicious example, whit belle the name. There are barbaria who ask for syrup--not sugar-and lo4
 with pleasure upon the cherry when is pink There are but two genuine cool tails, in the opinion of experts, and the| are the Dry Martini and the Dry Nal haitian, and the battle between them is that between the Prunes and the RiI Hawthorn e11s 11ss51ss 11s1 11siobi rETAOINNNUJ] which Tartarin found raging so fierce4 Hawthorne speaks of gin cocktails, pe| haps an earlier form of Martini, an Thackeray of brandy cocktails. But d though the name may savor somewhat antiquity, the cocktail as we know it
 essentially modern drink, and, as thoI who have patronized American bars foreign cities will testify, an America
 drink as we'll What was it ElizabeI
 Flanagan served to the weary warrio|
 at the Four Corners? That point shouI
 be settled before the assertion that s1 invented the cocktail can be accepted a historic fact. But why the name? That is a questid which Investigation should now seek
 answer. There is no darkness but th| of ignorance, and in it we are profound involved. There is possible key to tH
 mystery in the fact that a horse of mixd
 blood is called a cocktail. He may two-thirds thoroughbred and the rest
 a baser strain. Is there some connectid
 here with the traditional proportions vermouth and the stronger spirit? Or hi the word some remote kinship to ''cocky -denoting the cheerful, not to say al gressive, mood which the cocktail is sui posed to promote? The Complete Ba keeper'' throws no light on the subjec Who can?
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
From the Philadelphia Public Ledger.

From the Philadelphia Public Ledger.
 N UESTIONS of profound socolog- O ieal import press for an answer,
 no matter how the thermometer may rage or it's victims imagine vain thing. Thus correspondent of the New York Sun opens up wide field of in quiry by asking if the cocktail was in- vented by Elizabeth Flanagan. There is little authentic information on the sub ject. fact which again deepens regret at the mysterious delay in the publica- tion of MT. Herkimer Johnson's colossal work. His own researches at the Por- phyry club have doubtless been many and profound. The ascription of this great honor to Mrs. Flanagan rests on a statement in a volume published at Chicago in 1889, in which it is stated that cocktail was first compounded at the hotel that she, the widow of an Irish sol- dier, established between Tarrytown and White Plains in 1779. Here the French and American officers gathered to taste the new drink. Even if we accept this account of it's origin, it's name is still a thing of mystery The suggestion has been offered that it was originally stirred with a cocks feather. But this is a fanciful explanation. Can no profound student of the history of mixed drinks, an expressing subject worthy of deep thinkers, give us better one?
 The dictionaries give us no help. Even their descriptions of the nature of the connection are vague and misleading. What skillful and intelligent bartender would not smile to read in the Century that it is made of spirits, bitters and a little sugar, with various aromatic and stimulating additions?" Phoebus, what a recipe! There are cocktails, the Royal
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
Best Men for office

"Gadsden is one city in Alabama which selects it's city officials without regard to politics. said Col R. A. Mitchell of that city, who was at the Tutwiler yes terday. We are to hold city election there in a few days at which time a mayor, president of the council and mem- bers of the board will be selected. One of the candidates for president of the board is a republican, yet it can be safely stated that neither the democrats nor re- publicans will take that into consideration when they cast their ballots. We usually have the best men in the city to offer for the various offices and we think we have a fine city government
The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-07-24
Tie Down Lake

For the past few weeks we have all most been forced to tie down the lake we recently constructed at the amusement park at Riverview in Tuscaloosa said c. R. Carter, general manager of the Tuscaloosa Railway and Utilities com pany, who was in Birmingham yesterday "Our company, which operates the car line and the other utilities of Tuscaloosa, built a splendid amusement park on our car line at Riverview, which is on the banks of the Warrior river. For the greater part of the time since the park was complete, it has been under several feet of water and we could not find the lake we built However, if the rain will ever stop, everything will be in good shape in few days"
 MT. Carter announced that his company had only recently completed the installa- tion of gas service in Tuscaloosa and he said the rates charged, ranging from 70 to 90 cents for the smallest consumers, were the lowest for artificial gas of any city of similar size in the country.