White Bluffs spokesman. [volume] (White Bluffs, Wash.) 1907-1938, 1933-02-23

IuS luOuSduuS III Cu6 great CLUES Will
in few hours ride.
Today Vermont is cheerful, sunny,
independent little state, in which life
admittedly presents more difficulties
than in the lands wherein one may
live on breadfruit. But it is more
worth while. 1t is distinctly not given
to hero worship, and it has pawky
humor that might trace to it's Gale
DOMAIN pioneers.
A calm, clear-visiened common
wealth it is, too, with distaste for
rebellion against constituted authority,
but with a fine capacity for it on
occasion; willing that each shall wor-
ship God in his own way; intent upon
getting the dollars worth, but not
falsely valuing the dollar; hospitable
as are few states in these days of the
easy road.
Every Town Has Its Peak.
Not single town in Vermont is
without it's eminence. There are APP
proximately 900 peaks whose SUBMITS
are 1000 feet or more above sea level.
The northeast corner, an area perhaps
SO miles by so, is in effect wilder
ness. Bears roam there and deer, and
landlocked salmon are to be caught
in lakes rarely seen by man.
Elsewhere the mountains seem more
hospitable. The tallest, Mount Mans
field, 1893 feet high, can be reached
by automobile over good though steep
roads and all are accessible to mixers.
This is a state of lakes, too; for
there are approximately 4O0-from
Lake Champlain, 118 miles long. be-
tween the Green mountains and the
Adirondacks, to mere potholes gleam-
ing in hill Businesses; and of little
rapid rivers, which slow down here
and there into placid reaches where
the hungry trout leap at dawn.
AS one rides through the state. the
remains of old water mills are to be
seen - moss grown, picturesque,
warped wheel Gathering in a ruined
race. Now they are an invitation to
the artist. With them are weathered
gray houses clustered about by for
gotten orchards and dim roads that
seem to lead nowhere through tangled
woods.
One of these days, one fears, there
will be humming turbines where the
little old mills are now falling into
decay. Factories will replace the sag
cling rooftrees of the old houses.
Whether we like it or not, this is an
age of progress, and these hillside
rills and springfield mountain lakes
will ultimately be harnessed.
For thirteen years Vermont was an
independent republic, making it's own
laws, maintaining its own army, coin
ing it's own money 1t was con-
tumacious and stiff-necked community,
for during this period it was not only
in rebellion against England, but was
carrying on lively private fight Of
it's own with the state of New York
and the Continental congress.
A historian records that Vermont
was never anything but free. Never
a crown colony, never yielding allie
glance to any province, state, or king
DOM" When she was admitted as the
fourteenth state to the American
Union, after the Revolution had been
won by her loyal aid, it was upon her
own terms.
champIain's Voyage.
Her written history begins on July
d. some say July IA. 1909, on which
debatable date Samuel de Champlain
discovered the lake which hears his
name and which is our largest body Of
fresh water outside the Great Lakes.
On that voyage the Seur de Cham
plain fought with his Algonquin hosts
against the Iroquois, and so assured
the friendship of the latter powerful
tribe to the British. who were to come
later. 1t has been argued that this
may have decided the future over
lordng of this continent. Who knows?
The first French settlements on Isle
La Motto we're not permanent. Whlte
men did not come to stay until liza,
when settlers who had seeped In from
the Massachusetts Bay colony built
blockhouse at Fort Drummer, near the
|
bore. Here Timothy Dwight was born
in 1928. Three of his descendants
through his marriage with Mary.
daughter of Rev. Jonathan Edwai DIS,
we're to become presidents of Yale.
This is worth noting, because Vermont
talks more Of her men than of her
marble or slate or granite.
"Afore than once" is the cautious
statement, "vermont has furnished q
greater number Of men to Who's Who,
relative to population. than any other
state"
IF one begins to name the distin.
puIshed sons of the state. one fears to
he overwhelmed yet 1t must be re.
membered that for decades they were
almost the only exportable product,
and have left their traces everywhere
! through American history