Evening star., 1925-02-27

Yen Flu CHEN of Foochow Is puz-
zled about Americans.
He has never been to America, but
he has decided that Americans must
be astonishingly changeable.
Yen Flu Chen left a job ornament
ing fans to paint polished bone and
bamboo chips for mah-jong sets. He
couldn't paint them fast enough for
the Americans. Then, all of a sud
den, America did not want so many
NAH -jong sets. Yen Flu Chlen lost
his job.
He could not know that the fad
of cross word puzzles had cut into
tn efad of mah-tong in America. And
he did not worry much. The change
able Americans developed a taste
for Chinese parasols. These also
needed ornamentation and, since Yen
Flu Chen was a decorator, he ate
again.
Hair Net Trade Mcnnced.
Yen Fu's sister was not so fortu-
nate. Just about the time her
tresses were long enough to market
the bottom dropped out of the hair
net trade, because bobbed hair was
"all the go" 5000 miles from Foo
chow She had to accept a low price.
Her hair is now being used to tie
the lacquer paper covering to the
bamboo ribs of the parasols her
brother decorates.
"All the worlds a stage for the
'Fads of 1925, or any year" says a
| bulletin of the National Geogra phic
! Society from it's headquarters al
Washington. Their first acts are
usually laid in strange out-of-the-
way places; Arctic Islands. trepic
jungles. deserts; the second on Broad
ha
| ment in the third act may occur in a
high-ceiling room where grave dip
| lomats draft a treaty-or may be
| same as act L.
''The opening curtain OF Platinum,
| a twentieth century comedy based
| on Charles Lambs famous roast pig
story, rises on a street scene in
Quibdo, Colombia. AS a prologue II
| is necessary to point out that the
mothers of most of US were as proud
as peacocks of their engagement dia-
| mond in It's gold setting. The 1925
'fapper' would probably stay single
all her life before she would weaI
anything but platinum filigree.
Premium on Platinum.
The demand for platinum jeweiry
has helped to shoot that metal Il
well over 500 an ounce and, with
| the Russian field cut off, Colombia /.
! the principal producer. Washing fol
gold is an ancient industry fol
Quibdo natives. but they long re-
garded as nuisance the heavy lump;
| they had to separate from the gold
The Jumps were platinum. Wher
they realized that platinum wa.
worth four times as much as golC
they began frantically to pan tn,
creeks, which are the towns streets
hn o-Io
government laid claim TO the streets
so they panned their gardens ant
| dooryards. Finally one patrio
| burned his house down. Panning tn,
ruins. he obtained enough platinum Il
| build new house and still hav
! $4,000 in the bank, thus coming OF
much better than Lambs Chinamar
| with all the enthusiasm OF Kan
| sas farmers in a good wheat yeai
natives of Cape Colony, South Africa
are hailing an obscure American new
item. 1t is an announcement from De
ltroit, Mich, that a great percentage o
automobiles now sold are closed cart
| What connection can there be be
tween the rocky, drought-ridden ii
of Africa and sedans? To find tn
root of the rejoicing the first &C
must be seen again
Ostrich Feathers and Autos.
"In the last part of the nineteent
| and the first part of our centur
| royalty in Europe took to ostric
feathers. BY 1910 the willow plum,
I was one of the dearest possession
of American womanhood. Sout
| Africa had discovered that ostriche
were it's special vocation and nearl
million birds stalked its pens A
| attempt was made even to star
ostrich farms in California Wit
the war the bottom dropped out an