The herald and news. [volume] (Newberry S.C.) 1903-1937, 1921-07-01
Larry Cantt's Weekly Letter


demonstrated times without number.
1t is rarely case where brains or
eminent public service are inherent in
a family, for the sons and descend
ants of great men appear content to
live upon ancestral fame. Like unto
the potato, the best part is under
ground.
On the other hand, the intellect,
eminence and leadership every coun-
try must go out among the plain peo-
pie in the more obscure walks of life,
and in the Old World, often its peas
antry. Trace all of the great leaders
in Europe, for both good or evil,
from Martin Luther to Lenine and
Trotsky, and you will find them be-
longing to what is known as the
Clover Glass;" but in our Republic
as the plain people"
William the Conqueror was the
illegitimate son of washerwoman; !;
Catherine, who, after Peter the Great,
crested the Russian Empire, was the
lewd daughter of an ignorant Tartar
peasant, and Napoleon Bonaparte, a
Corsican adventurer whose boast was,
81 am my own ancestor!'
Then consider our own country
Daniel Webster was the son of a
poor New England farmer, who did
not even boast a descent from the
Pilgrim Fathers; Henry Clay was
known as the "Mill Boy of the
Slashes;;" Patrick Henry, born on a
small Virginia farm and when an OBJ
scure young lawyer, reaped fame and
honors in day by his Give nae liber-
ty or give me deathw John c.. Cal
houn descended from family of poor
Irish emigrants; the father of Jeffer-
son Davis was small bankrupt farm
er CT Wilkes county, Georgia, who
moved his family in a wagon to Ken
tucky a couple of weeks before the
President of the Southern Confeder-
acy was born; Alexander H. Steph-
ems belonged to a poor but highly re-
spected family, his father and moth
er's family (Grier) being small farm
ers; Nancy Hanks, the mother of Alb
raham Lincoln, was born and raised
near the Chimney Rock section of
Rutherford county, North Carolina,
and Nancy was a house servant for
a family named Enslow, and on ae-
count of the jealousy of her employ
er's wife she was sent to some kins-
people in Kentucky where she met
and married Lincoln.
Joel Chandler Harris ("Uncle Re-
mus"), journalist and author, whose
book has been translated into many
languages and whose name is revered
by botheold and young throughout the
reading worid-a plain Southern
Democrat whom Republican Presi-
dent invited as his honored and es-
pecial guest to the White House-was
a poor Georgia boy, born on small,
rocky farm in Jasper county. | do
not suppose any boy ever started life
under more trying or discouraging
circumstances. He had only the rudi-
mental smattering of an education
obtained at a small and antiquated
country school, and so he had to edu-
cate himself while earning living.
An old man who made hats out of
rabbit skins printed small paper or
his farm called the "Countryman."
He hired Joe Harris as a printers
devil, and he also learned the boxes
and how to stick type. In due time
the "Countryman" suspended and Joe
Harris found work on other weeklies
in that section, and started to set up
while at the case paragraphs for the
paper; and they were so pointed and
bright that he was encouraged by the
editor to continue the work. Harris
squibs began to attract attention from
the daily papers and were extensively
copied. They became the leading
features in every paper with which
Harris was connected.
1t was during the Franco-Prussian
war. was a young fellow working on
the Savannah Morning News, taking
my initial training in daily journal
ism. The editor of the News was
Col. w, T. Thompson, author of a
humorous book of that day named
Major Jones' Courtship." J. H. Es-
till was proprietor.
One night about II o'clock Mr.. Es-
till came into the Office plotting one
of the most unprepossessing speci-
mems of humanity my eyes ever rest
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