The potters herald. [volume] (East Liverpool, Ohio) 1899-1982, 1942-04-23
The Cherry Tree
Where We Hutched Out
The Truth
Q CIVILIAN DEFENSE
. BLACKOUTS
REHEARSALS NECESSARY
. BE PREPARED

Let's carry a torch for civilian de-
try, but especially in coastal towns,
blackouts are becoming familiar
thing
The lights go out. Generally there
are laws or ordinances to give officials
the power to shut off lights where
action is not voluntary.
But still there are those who will
not take the practice blackout serious
ly-who will not prepare room and
who think that merely turning out
the lights is enough.
Also there are those who turn out
the lights when the warden comes
around and turn them on again when
ne has departed.
That's all wrOng-all very wrong.
x X X
The practice blackout is way of
training to be ready for the real thing.
The real thing will come and it can
come to your town.
These rehearSals are for your bene-
fit The whole idea is that, in emer-
2encies, people automatically do what
they have been trained to do.
That's why soldiers don't run back
wards in battle Their training makes
them go in the proper direction and
do the right thing.
Baseball would be sorry spectacle
without practice.
For your own protection you should
do the right thing automatically.
There still are those who think it's
sissy, or something like that, to go
through with blackout rehearsals. 1t
is no more silly than training troops.
1t is a deadly serious business and
everyone must take it that way.
The ones who hold back are unfair
to their fellow citizens!
X X X
Union members know what training
means, both in knowing how to do a
job in the shop properly and how to
run union properly.
Without discipline and training we
have mobs. We don't want mobs, run
ming wildly around, when bombs fall,
whether they be high explosives or
incendia reS.
Nobody can do much, under present
circumstances, to provide complete
protection against the high explosives.
But the danger can be greatly reduced
by proper training for proper action.
The time to train to act properly
is before they come.
All up and down the Atlantic coast
the nights now are dark. Lights are
screened, cars must drive with parking
lights only. 1t is teaching people that
war is serious for every civilian.
1t is the lesson that every city must
learn.
In hundreds of cities little hospitals
- emergency casualty stations - have
been equipped. 1t takes many persons
to staff these stations. Civilians are
| giving their time to do this. They have
| TO be trained, many long hours.
Surely, while thousands upon thou
sands of volunteers are training to
care for you, it should be possible for
| you to do the little that is required to
| learn how to protect yourself and your
| family.
Many are looking at it that way.
But enough of Il minority to he d great
cause for worry is not looking at it
| that way.
| The whole question might we'll be
made Il matter of serious concern by
unions. There is much they can do
much that many of them have done
to make civilian defense by civilians
| themselves more effective, against that
| day when the enemy tries to score
and confuse us by bombs from the air.
Let's not be caught unprepared in
any direction, including this one.