The Key West citizen. [volume] (Key West, Fla.) 1879-current, 1926-08-03
WITH WHAT uNHoLY cLEEl

West lndlan hurricane iaSneS Nassau anu
the Lower East Coast and whirls up along the
Scuih Atlantic to blow itself out in Tennessee 1t
leaves swath of wreckage in its wake, with dead
men and living heroes on land and on the anger
shaken sea.
House boats strew Lake Worth and Biscayne
Bay with debris as the breaking waves dash high.
While the hurricane is being followed northward
by the news press Of the world photographs of the
circumstances at Miami are shot out over the coun-
try by airmail and by train to help the anti
crowd bolster up its contention that "no good can
come out of Israel"
Here is four-column picture of the "Giant
waves, whipped by gale, breaking over The new
Venetian Causeway between Miami and Miami
Beach" 1t is captoned with this sheathed verbal
sword: Land of Sunshine Hit by Hurricane
Here is a three-column haftone showing
wreckage in Biscayne Bay: three Households,
speedboat and punt piled up near The first Miami
Beach causeway. And headed, "Houseboat wreck
age in Florida in wake of tropical hurricane"
There are more but these are enough The
Geographic dispatches run from few flaring
words under big black type in the Tabloid papers,
to two and three columns in the fu-sized dailies.
morning and evening.
The Associate ed Press said: radio stations at
full efforts to establish direct communication with
Nassau when orders from the Navy Department at
Washing on sent the auxiliary fuel ship Bay Spring,
commanded by Captain Thomas James, from the
Key West base to the Bahaman capital this morn
ing"
All this is news; important news; and we no
not decry 1T. But we do decry the unholy glee
with which northern editors mess their readers
minds with seduIous care, handling words in head
lines and captions like chdren's building blocks to
make them exaggerate and distort and twist.
Facts are facts. These things have happened.
History records them everywhere. 1t is all in
days news.
Let's see: million dollars damage done
by young tornado in The heart of Boston's beau
tiful Fenway Park system about two weeks ago.
Lightning and rain of tremendous proportions
the heaviest in years in many places-occupied
front page space from the North within ten days.
The hottest July day in the history Of the
weather bureaus existence caused many ueatiiS,
tremendous expense in delayed work, and untold
suffering among all classes nj the northern tier Of
states between the goth and the 2srd of July.
That was all legimate news; it was all at
tributable to the curious whims Of Nature Key
West had its first hailstorm in ut least SO years
the fifteenth Of July. While eggs we're being fried
on tn roofs in Lowell Mass, and Boston and
Philadelphia; while dogs were going mad in Chi
cage because of the terrific heat Key West was
living in temperature of Ss degrees, with re-
freshing breezes all the time.
The North doesn't get this news. ct would
have been news in the North that Key West had
hailstorm. The papers might have jumped at the
chance to rail at Florida little more.) And it
would be wonderful news in the north that when
thermometers there were striving to do 104 in the
shade the Florida thermometers were sticking close
60 SIS and &c.
But there's nothing to base anti-Florida prop
uganda on under these ideal climatic conditions.
1t is not for US to scott. We do not take our ed
itorial pen and dip deeply in carmne ink when mil
Ions are lost in earthquake or tornado or death
dealing thunderstorms elsewhere. Why then still
pick on Florida. yellow editors though ye of the
North states be?
Why that unholy glee?
s