Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1918-11-01
Glrat

Just as the long distance telephone
is commencing to gather in much of
the business which the ~congested'
telegraph lines cannot handle in
and about Harrisburg, motor truck
lines are entering into a field of
transportation which was barely dis
cerned before the world wal began.
Harrisburg has become familiar
with the trains of Army trucks which
pass through the city, coming from
the Lincoln highway at Chambers
burg or coming down the William
Penn and jolting along over the
highways in the boroughs betweeYs
this city and Allentown, but 1t is not
generally known that there are half
a dozen lines of trucks running out
of OIL through Harrisburg on regular
freight service and they are doing a
fine line of business, handling what
the railroads cannot possibly han
die. Some of these trucks make reg
ular trips to Philadelphia and New
York and in addition to those which
% from this city there are trucks
which come through u town on
regular schedules, Sunbury and
Lewistown concerns, for instance,
having trucks which pass along
Harrisburg streets with products
every week and oftener. OF course,
these lines, like the use of the long
distance, to get through what the
dots and dashes men can not care
for, came into being, more or less,
since the government took over the
railroads and telegraph lines and the
critics of government ownership
have thrived much thereby. The
telegraph offices in Harrisburg are
TANNED with government stuff, war,
banking, a dozen lines, and there is
naturally a great lot of commercial
business and in influenza times much
newspaper matter. The railroads
are burdened and men who used to
seek. business for railroads, express,
telegraph and other companies are
about as arbitrary as they used to be
obliging. The war has curious eff
fects and if any one would have fore
told that the automobile truck would
have been handling railroad bust
ness and the long distance telephone
relieving the Western Union, for in
stance, he would have been able to
make some arrangements which are
hard to achieve now.
Speaking about the telephone end
of the government, it is an interest
ing fact hat il will be this means
of communication which is going to
handle the bulk of the election news
next Tuesday. And the spry gentle
men connected with the Bell system
are proceeding to get ready for it.
The telephone has always been n
more satisfactory way of getting such
news, but the telegraph companies
always shrieked hard and held on
to the business. Now they are un-
able to do very much and the tele-
phone is coming into apther big
field in which it will serve many
thousands of people and in speedy
fashion, too.
The Philadelphia Public Ledger of
yesterday published this about some
people we'll known to many Harris
burgers: In a recent letter from
London to w. Haywood Myers, of
Philadelphia, Yice-president of the
Pennsylvania Railroad Company,
Colonel NJ. c. Kennedy, of the staff
of Brigadier General w. w. After
bury, calls attention to the existence
in the English metropolis of what is
probably the only monument ever
erected concentrating a charge of
British soldiers under the leadership
of an American officer. The monu-
ment, which stands near Bucking-
ham Palace, was erected by the
Royal Marines in memory of their
comrades who fell during the Boxer
Rebellion in China, 1S99-19O0. A
bas-relief on the side facing the pal
ace depicts an assault by English
troops under the leadership of Capt.
(now Brigadier General) John
T'wiggs Myers, who is at present in
command of the United States ma
rine barracks at Paris Island. S. c..
General Myers, who is a brother of
w. Hayward Myers, after serving his
country through the Spanish War,
went to China in the Brooklyn and
was sent TO Pekin. During the de-
tense of the Pekin legation he took
command of a detachment consisting
of twenty-five British marines. fif-
teen American marines and fifteen
Russians, and with this handful of
men dashingly stormed and captur-
ed a barricade erected by the be-
siegers which was endangering the
defense. 1t is this event which is
represented on the monument"
Mrs. w. Hayward Myers was one
of the Sargent family of this city.
Members of the Harrisburg units
of the Reserve Militia and the Har-
risburg Reserves will resume their
drills next week in all probability.
Arrangements are being made to get
in some outdoor work before winter
sets in. A number of the Reserves
have gone into the Militia.