The Telegraph-courier. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1888-1946, 1923-04-26
Unsung Heroes Give Their Lives in the
Cause Of Progress and Advancement

n maglcally into the heavens
An outlining it's steel frame,
naked and unclothed, against the
light, day by day or hour by hour one
can see its great bulk spring mush-
room-like from the dust. Amid the
whirr of the hoists, the cries OF the
laboTers, the prolonged tattoo Of the
pneumatic hammers, the modern
towers Of Babel take their form and
shape.
SWells With Pride.
The good citizen looks upon these
Improvements and is pleased. He is
glad to be an inhabitant Of city
which shows so much spirit of prog
ress and advancement He talks or
the height, the number Of rooms, the
cost Of the latest office Leviathan;
he remarks how such and sucn
section was merely great field only
the year before. In a word, he is
impressed by the externals, the
grandness, the hugeness, the color
and picture of it all.
Never does he think Of the men
whose toll and sweat and blood made
these great structures possible.
Those who gave up what might have
been hours of blissful ease, those
who left something Of their strength
and life blood in the building, or yet,
those who consecrated the toll of
their fellows by the benson Of their
blood.
Tucked Away in a Corner.
Sometimes, of course, if one is dill
igent in reading the newspapers and
diligent in his attention to the bits
hid away in the obscure corners, he
may read something like this:
"Two men were killed yesterday
afternoon when they fell from the
eighth to the fifth floor of the sky
scraper being erected at the corner
Of A and B streets. So and so was
killed instantaneously Such and
such a one died on the way to the
hospital. The men"
Only an obscure item. One that
the city editor of almost any metro
politan newspaper would feel justi-
fed in suppressing If the pressure of
more important news warranted 1t.
It would seem that true sense of
values is little existent. The soldier
who goes forth to war and dies upon
the field Of battle is extolled sas a
hero, even though the work of his
hands has been one of havoc and
destruction. Honor to him to whom
honor is due" y
Deaths Not Acclaimed.
On the other hand, the man who
dies at his labors-while in the pur-
suit OF a living for his family, goes
to his grave without a word of hon
or and acclaim. Indeed the whole
matter is a kind of sordid affair, one
that 1t were best to get over with as
little fuss as possible.
How many of us have ever passed
a skyscraper in the building without
stopping a few minutes to gaze en-
tranced upon the boisterous and an
mated scene. Far up above our
heads, walking like fly along the
naked beams, one catches sight of
the steel workers about their la
bors. Above all the giant derrick
stretches forth its ponderous and
mighty arms of steel. From time to
time great girder balanced by a man
or two will swing perilously upward
into the air, adding its length to the
rapidly growing pile.
What the Men Think.
The attitude of the men engaged.
as a matter of routine, in the danger
Gus work of building great buildings
is an interesting one. Naturally they
do not think a great deal about the
dangers. If they did they wouldn't
be good workmen.
"Danger-well; I should say there
is" said an engineer at work on one
of the giant structures "I've been at
this kind Of work ever since | was a
kid-20 years now. I've worked ev-
erywhete and for all kinds of com
panies. I've done everything that's
possible to be done-from riveting
to riding the Orders into place. Now
I'm running this thing here. He in
Dictated the derrick engine. In that
time I've seen a lot of accidents.
Men brushed off the Orders by acct
dent; dumbells pull the guy ropes
and tumble themselves with a girder
or two to the ground. On this job
we haven't had any accidents to
speak of, but the building isn't built
yet. You never can tell.
"See that building over there? Well,
/ worked on her about ten years ago
when they were putting her up. We
killed two and injured five others