Newspaper Page Text
Hlnrhson Traqrrss-^rqus
J. D. JONES - PUBLISHER
(1908-1955)
DOYLE JONES JR. Editor and
Publisher
Published every Thursday at 129 South Mulberry Street,
Jackson, Georgia 30233. Second Class Postage paid at Jack
son, Georgia 30233.
Address notice of undeliverable copies arid other corre
spondence to The Jackson Progress-Argus, P. 0. Box 249,
Jackson, Georgia 30233.
TELEPHONE 775-3107
tk MA ~WLt) A/JM/ official organ
NeWpAper BUTTS ™ r
Association - Founded 188! ___
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Six Months $2.75
Single Copy 10c
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j irs THIS WAY
BY DOYLE JONES JR.
Jest of the Week: “No license lady?” growled the traffic cop.
“Don’t you know you can’t drive without one?”
“That explains everything,” she exclaimed. “I thought it was
because I was nervous and nearsighted that I hit two cars and ran
into a fire hydrant.”
• W 9
MANY NEED OUR ASSISTANCE AT CHRISTMAS
We have often written that one of the tragedies of Christmas
is an all encompassing poverty that robs many of happiness at this
the most happy of all seasons. It is unfortunately all too true.
Christmas is a season for love and sharing and of compassion
for one’s fellow man. For the Christian it is a time of great re
joicing as we commemorate the birth of our Saviour and Lord, Jesus
Christ. It is an occasion when if ever man can forget himself and
put others first, he can at this merry Yule season.
But for those poverty-stricken families, despondent and perhaps
encumbered by financial obligations that cannot possibly be met—
Christmas is a mockery, a time of stress and strain because they
cannot purchase the necessities of life, let alone gifts for children
and adult loved ones with whom they would like to share. It is a hol
low symbol of perhaps better times.
What can we do? While it is true that perhaps we can do little
to allay the ghastly sight of children with bloated bellies starving
to death in Hiafra, or do nothing to circumvent the suffering and
death ol famine stricken hordes in India or China, we can do much
to combat the problem of poverty in our own county. We do not
have to travel abroad or journey to a city’s teeming slums to find
families deserving of our assistance at the Christmas season. There
are ample opportunities here in Jackson and Butts County.
( ertainly one way in which we may alleviate suffering here
and display the true spirit of Christmas is to join hands with the
Empty Stocking Fund, the most worthwhile project of the Butts
County Jayeees. Names of needy families can probably be obtained
from local agencies such as the Department of Family and Children
Services, or from rural postmen who daily witness the struggle of
some families to merely subsist, or from church groups to whom
such families are usually known. If the families of the county who
can and will share their bounty with the needy, there is no reason
for any family in the county, white or black, to go unremembered
at Christmas. Quite obviously the Jayeees, the churches and other
charities cannot do it all. There are certain to be some families
missed and certain to be duplications on other families, but if all
will cooperate and respond in sharing names and information, there
is no reason for any children or adults in the county not to receive
a semblance of Christmas on December 25th.
1 he spirit of Christmas is giving. Long ago the gentle Galilean
whose birthday we honor taught us that it is more blessed to give
than to receive. If Christmas can transform Dickens’ Scrooge into a
generous, lovable person, then certainly most of us, being less miser
ly than Scrooge, can open our hearts and purses to the call of those
who are unable to help themselves at this most blessed of all seasons.
There is much to be done and time is the thief. The heart of
a child who expects a visit from Saint Nick on Christmas Eve can be
broken if Santa fails to arrive. It matters little whether the parents
are penniless or can show a net worth of SIOO,OOO. Christmas is for
us all, but especially for the children. God grant that not a single
child in Butts County will be forgotten on Christmas. If so, then
all of us who can do something about it are guilty of an unpardon
able transgression.
"Inasmuch as we do it to the least of these, we do it unto
Thee." We can make Christmas a joyous day for the unloved and the
unlikely It we keep Christ in Christmas we will remember the less
fortunate.
UNBROKEN HALVES
How do you shell pecans as
unbroken halves? Home econ
omists with the Cooperative Ex
tension Service say to place the
pecans in lukewarm water—one
and one-half hours for thin
shelled nuts and three hours for
thick-shelled nuts. Drain them
and allow to set overnight.
Crack by applying pressure end
to end.
THE JACKSON PROGRESS-ARGUS, JACKSON, GEORGIA
(uest Editorial
THE ATLANTA CONSTITUTION
THE MY LAI MASSACRE
The reports of a bloody massacre of women and
small children by American soldiers in the South
Vietnamese village of My Lai may well be, as Geor
gia Sen. Dick Russell suggested, the most shocking
incident for most Americans of the entire war in Viet
nam.
It is a terrible war. And, with no attempt at pro
found observation, it reveals again what we knew al
ready, simply that all wars are terrible. Civilians die
—including women and babies—when bombs fall.
Or when artillery shells are fired into a village from
some distance away. Or, sometimes, with the acci
dental rifle shot.
But having said this, it must also be said that the
current reports of what happened in a South Viet
namese village in March of last year chill the heart.
The Army investigation con
tinues, as it should. At least one
officer faces a courtmartial on
charges of murdering civilians.
There may be other charges. The
tragic question of individual re
sponsibility must be decided. But
the main facts of the incident,
based on actual photographs and
reports from individual soldiers
on the scene, are not really in
dispute.
American soldiers, apparently,
rounded up South Vietnamese
civilians in the village and shot
them down in cold blood.
It happened, let it be noted,
during one of the bloodiest peri
ods of the Vietnamese war, just
after the enemy Tet offensive
early in 1968. The village where
the massacre took place was in
an area generally under Viet
Cong control. The American sol
diers involved had suffered recent
casualties. Their company had
lost men to booby traps and
sniper fire near the village.
War is hell. That’s not anew
discovery. Yet, we pride ourselves
The new, futuristic Citizens and Southern Branch Bank located on North
Avenue, Atlanta. Architects: Aeck Associates, Inc. /Electrical Engineers:
Bush-May & Williams/Mec/ianica/ Engineers: Lazenby & Borum/General
Contractor: Beers Construction Company /Electrical Contractor: Bagby
The new
C&S Bank Building
is all-electric.
Naturally. Who knows more about
a wise investment than a banker?
A banker doesn’t make big mistakes and stay
in business. Nobody does. Any enterprise needs
low-cost, dependable energy. But C&S also
wanted a structure of elegance and practicality.
Given these problems, the architect designed an
exciting solution. A round building. With all
floors suspended from overhead trusses and a
central core. And a profile which sparkles
with sun and city lights.
Electricity was a good choice for this design.
Because electricity adapts to any space without
wasting it. And in business, space is money.
The owners of 7,720 commercial buildings in
Georgia feel the same way. If you want to learn
more about why. see Georgia Power’s commercial
representatives. They can help make your
money work hard for you, too.
Georgia Power Company
in this nation on clinging firmly
to standards of honor and de
cency even in time of war ... or
perhaps especially in time of war.
There is little in which we can
take pride in the accounts of
what occurred at My Lai.
The only real hero emerging
in the events of that day more
than a year ago is, interestingly,
a Decatur, Ga., man—Chief War
rant Officer Hugh C. Thompson
Jr.
Thompson, a helicopter pilot,
won the Distinguished Flying
Cross for bravery at My Lai on
March 16, 1968—the date of the
alleged slaughter of civilians. He
received the award for landing
his helicopter and saving the lives
of 16 Vietnamese children at
“personal disregard for his own
safety.”
American troops were in full
control of the village that day.
Was it from our own soldiers
that Thompson saved the chil
dren?
That’s not clear, really. But
Secretary of the Army Stanley
i ‘Whatsoever Things’
BY DONALD E. WILDMON 5
HOPE
Hope.
It’s a big word. An extremely big word. It has
many meanings. It means going on when folks say
there is no need to go on. It means another try
when we have had our last try. It means a match
in our pocket when the candle has finally burned
completely out.
Some people find the secret of living with this
word. They are the happy people. They are the successful people.
They are the people who cannot be daunted, cannot be detered,
cannot be dismayed.
Worked Wonders
Hope has done many a thing for many an individual. It made a
light bulb for Edison while the world laughed at him. It created
a steamboat for Fulton and lifted him immortality. It made a wire
less for Marconi, and sent messges around the world. For Bell it
built a telephone, an “impossible” machine! And it also made a
hospital for Nightingale.
What is hope? Hope is going
against the odds. Hope is playing
the game of life and risking your
all on the good and pure and just.
Hope is believing it can be done
when the experts say it cannot
be done. Hope is giving life your
best, day after day regardless of
what life gives back.
Who needs it? We do, you and
I. We cannot live without it.
What would life be if we tried
to go on without it? Why would
we care if the sun came up to
morrow if we did not have it?
None of us are ever so rich that
we have no need for hope.
Where does it come from? It
comes from above. For there is
no hope is not founded in
Him. He is the Author of hope.
He says the world can be better.
We believe Him. There is hope.
He Had It
The Carpenter had it. The nails
Resor told congressmen last week
that the original inquiry stemmed
from a helicopter pilot who “sug
gested there might have been un
necessary killing of non-combat
ants at My Lai.”
This is all a tragic business.
It raises the question, again, if
our presence in Vietnam aids or
helps the war-battered people of
that numbed country.
THE BOOKS ARE NOW OPEN FOR THE PAY
MENT OF 1969 TAXES. WE SINCERELY URGE THAT
YOU MAKE IMMEDIATE PAYMENT TO AVOID
EXTRA COST AND EXPENSE.
STATEMENTS HAVE BEEN MAILED SHOWING
THE AMOUNT EACH TAXPAYER OWES FOR 1969.
IF YOU DID NOT RECEIVE A STATEMENT THIS
DOES NOT MEAN YOU ARE EXEMPT FROM THE
TAX. IT IS EITHER AN OVERSIGHT OR AN ERROR.
Mary Will Hearn
Tax Collector, Butts County, Ga.
ripped through His flesh and the
blood gushed from His side. The
multitude laughed and the sol
diers gambled. But He had hope.
“Forgive them, they are igno
rant.” Hope carried Him there,
you know. Hope lifted Him from
His knees in the garden. Hope
restored the ear of the Roman
soldier. Hope freed the criminal
and took the Carpenter’s life.
What right do we, the Fol
lowers of the Way, have to live
without it? If hope was so much
a part of Him that it carried
Him over the hates and doubts
and fears, can it not carry us
over our little problems and
through our lives? Why are we to
scorn when He exclaimed it?
It’s a sorry world. Man robs
man. Little children die of star
vation. Man kills man. It’s a
cruel world. Why doesn’t He send
a mighty gush of wind and wipe
the whole earth from the face of
the universe? Why doesn’t He
strike the world with His little
finger and blast us spinning into
space forever and ever? Because
He has hope. After centuries and
centuries of trying, and our re
fusing, He still has hope.
If He refuses to let go of it,
who are we to try to live without
it?—FIVE STAR (Copyright,
1969, Donald E. Wildmon.)
NOTICE TO
TAXPAYERS
of Butts County .
THURSDAY, DEC. u, 196 g
396 Inmates Of
12 State Prisons
Freed by Maddox
ATLANTA, (GPS) Along with
their freedom, 396 inmates i 2
Georgia prisons received , ;r ,e
fatherly advice the other day
from Gov. Lester G. Maddox
when he presented his third an
nu a 1 “Thanksgiving - Christmas
gift” to deserving prisoners -re
leasing them before their * , as
were up.
It took place in House cham
ber in the State Capitol, about
250 of the released prisoners vare
brought to Atlanta to hear the
governor urge them to “go out
and find a little more lov in
your heart.” The others were re
leased directly from their respec
tive prisons.
At the end of his address, Gov.
Maddox shook hands with each
man and the 20 women who were
released and wished them luck.
One prisoner presented Maddox a
water color portrait of the gov
ernor.
Gov. Maddox smiled and chuc
kled and appeared very much
touched as he told the unique
gathering: “You’ve got to find
a little more love in your life
some way . . . Put a lot of your
thinking into loving your family
... If you put your love of your
family and your life first, you
won’t have to worry about com
ing back.” He told them to read
the Bible.
The prisoners turned out rep
resent about five per cent of the
state’s prison population. All
would have been eligible for re
lease Feb. 28.
ANCIENT YORK
LODGE NO. 127
F. & A. M.
Regular Meeting Nights
Second Saturdays
Qualified Brethren Invited.
CARLTON MORRIS, W. M.
AUBREY HARVEY, Secty.
WORTHVILLE, GA.