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EDITORIAL RAGE The Atlanta Georgian THE HOME PAPER
THE ,£S2F gi an In the Movies In Real Life
Published Every Afternoon Except Sunday
By THK QEOROIAN COMPANY
At 20 Eaat Alabama St . Atlanta, Oft.
Entered aj second-el a sh matter at poatofflce at Atlanta, under act of March 3.1*73
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The First “Airship Commuter”
Rather Dangerous Commuting for a Man With Plenty to Make
Life Worth While. But It's Exciting. And in War Time
Airship Knowledge Would Be a Fine Advantage.
(Copyright, 1913.)
Harold F. McCormick, of Chicago, is the first “airship com
muter.” Any fine morning, on the Chicago lake front, just op
posite Michigan avenue’s big office buildings, a person may see
a combination floating and flying ship settle quietly upon the
water, like some big darning needle.
The ship that had been flying a mile a minute through the
air moves slowly over the water to the dock, a young man gets
out, shakes his feet to take out the stiffness, and goes over to his
office to work.
This young person, who is probably the world’s first actual
COMMUTING airship passenger, has flown from his home at Lake
Forest, twenty-eight miles away, in just twenty-eight minutes.
This sort of commuting McCormick takes quietly if you ask
him about it.
He says that ho considers sailing from his home to his office,
in that kind of a craft, not much more dangerous than going at
fifty miles an hour on rough roads in an automobile. He says also
that SOMEBODY has got to make the flying and floating ship
useful, that he might as well be one of the starters, and adds:
“There were no crossing policemen, no cinders, no ‘bridging’ at
the river. Those omissions make up the attractions of aero com
muting. And then look at the time!’’
Perhaps he is right, as he has plenty of money to give extra
strength to the wires that give the machine resisting power and
plenty of money for his family if anything should happen to him.
The world in general would not share McCormick’s idea as
to the safety of the flying ship, YET, although the whole world
expects to fiy before very long.
Mr. McCormick runs an excellent risk of being killed each
time that he flies up and down in his machine.
Probably that fact adds to his enjoyment. This is a tiresome,
monotonous world, real excitement is scarce.
It is probable that McCormick does not really know WHY
he goes back and forth as an airship commuter.
The fact is that mere business, no matter how big, is tiresome,
If you do not happen to need the money or care much about it.
Figures of sales, and reports of salesmen, even reports from law
yers who tell you what prospect there is of your going to jail
be/i* use your business is too big, get tiresome after a while.
McCormick is a broad shouldered young man, with keen blue
eyes, extraordinary vitality and exuberance of spirit.
If he had lived in Napoleon’s time he would probably have
led cavalry charges and been killed early in his career.
If he had lived in the days of DuGuesclin he would probably
have enjoyed the kind of fun that DuGuesclin had after the Span
ish captured him.
But in these days there are no cavalry charges, no DuGues.
clins, very little fun.
And so McCormick, having inherited from other blue-eyed
ancestors the desire to fight something, goes out and fights the
air, and fights fate, sailing back and forth in a flying machine.
The risk that he takes is not entirely wasted, first, because
it is a good thing that rich men should use their money in perfect
ing the machine which is destined to solve man’s transportation
problem.
And it Is good for those well to do to prove that they have
not yet joined the ranks of the “rois faineants,” or do-nothings,
and that they are willing to take risks that other men take.
Probably the best that Mr. McCormick can hope for is ex
citement and amusement, and, if he is lucky, escape from a fatal
ending to some one of his flying trips.
But he might get out of his present experience something
worth while, more exciting even than anything that happened at
Agincourt, or the battle of Chevy-Chase, where they said of one
good soldier that when his legs were both cut off, "he fought
upon his stumps.’’
Some of these days, in spite of common sense, education and
decency, this country MAY have a war. The foolish Japanese
might “reason’’ that if they could thrash Russia, with a popula
tion as big as ours, they could also thrash the United States.
In that case young McCormick, knowing how to run a flying
machine, might live through an exciting hour.
He could go to the White House, see Mr. Wilson, who used to
be his college professor, and say, “Professor, the Japanese fleet is
expected. I have got a pretty good little airship that will carry
five hundred pounds of nitroglycerin.
“And I have built at my own expense fifty others like it.
Each of them is in charge of a first class American air chauf
feur, who would enjoy dropping dynamite on a Japanese deck.
Give us your sublime permission and we shall start out after
dark, meet that fleet about three hundred miles out and help to
make Japan realize that this is not Russia.’’
The man who makes a good cavalry officer is the man used
to horses as a boy.
The American farmer of revolutionary days who made the
dangerous marksman was the man who had practiced with his
long-barreled gun from the time he was old enough to balance it
on a fence rail and pull the trigger.
Young McCormick is practicing as the first airship com
muter. If there SHOULD be a chance to demonstrate the su
periority of the flying machine over the steel ship, and the su
periority of the United States' over our little brown friends
acro*s the Pacific, McCormick would j^turally come in for the
first chance to enjoy the fun.
WINIFRED BLACK
Writes on
Stitches in Time
How Happy Thoughts
May be Engendered
Through the Exercise of
the Gentle Art of Needle
Work.
It’s a Better World Than 25 Years Ago
The Improvements That Have Come Are Almost Beyond Man’s
Belief and in Many Evils a Crisis and Change Is Near.
O VER in London a certain
periodical celebrated its
twenty-fifth anniversary not
long ago.
The editor asked many people
to say wherein they thought the
world had improved In that quar-
ter of a century.
It seemed an easy question to
answer.
Improvements in World
in Twenty-five Years
Beyond Belief.
The improvements in the world
in twenty-live years have been al
most beyond the belief of man.
We all know how many won
derful inventions have come into
use in that period of time.
Most of us consider these in
ventions improvements, because
they are conveniences and pro
vide for human comfort. A few
old-fashioned types of mind regard
them as hindrances to mental and
moral developments, leading to
sloth and idleness and lack of
physical prowess.
But while the elevators which
lift us upstairs do not develop the
leg muscles, and while the har
vesters and binders and vacuum
cleaners do not develop the arm
muscles, and while the automo
biles and airships prevent us from
walking as our ancestors walked,
yet all these modern Inventions
are waking new cells In the hu
man brain and giving the race
greater opportunities to explore the
wonderful realms of mind and
spirit, which hold secrets unsus
pected by the world at large; se
crets which shall yet be revealed
to the patient student and which
shall revolutionize science and
medicine and religion.
By ELLA WHEELER WILCOX.
Copyright, 1913, by Star Company.
a ripple of amused
Now that the drudgery of the
earth is being done by machinery
and that time and distance are
made as nothing by motor power,
all these discoveries are becoming
more and more possible, and the
hour of their revealment is com
ing nearer and nearer.
In the last twenty-five years all
this talk of peace and disarma
ment has come to be heard.
War is still rampant, yet twen
ty-five years ago such a thing as a
great Peace Congress would have
seemed too ridiculous to deserve
more than
comment.
Now it is a GREAT FACT.
And this congress is composed
of many of the most brilliant men
and women of the country.
Religion has broadened and
grown in this period of time amaz
ingly. There was a strong wave
of materialism a quarter of a cen
tury ago.
It was the wash on the shores
from the passing of the ship of
Bigotry.
Now that wave has suDsided,
HIS LESSON
By WILLIAM F. KIRK.
T HE rich man trudged along the road.
His car had broken down;
And through the summer heat he strode
To reach the nearest town.
A fat, old farmer came along
And, with a cheery grin.
Said he: “This rig Is plenty strong—
Git In, stranger, git in!”
He drove the rich man to the town
As one might help a child;
And when the rich man sought to pay
He shook his head and smiled.
“You mean it right, thar ain’t no doubt.
And I ain’t rich,” said he,
"But helpin’ of a feller out
Is pay enough for me.”
Back to his home the rich man went.
As one who knows his faults.
And never put another cent
In safe deposit vaults.
He learned to help his fellow men.
And help them with a grin;
And how he chuckles, now and then,
jf Git in. stranger, git in!”
and the ship of Larger Faith is
sailing the high seas.
Many evils have grown worse in
twenty-five years.
Just as a fever grows worse till
the crisis and then subsides.
Many Evils Are Worse,
But Crisis Is Near;
Change Will Come.
So even in the intensified aspect
of these evils there is a better
ment of the world In general; for
the crisis is near and the change
will come.
THE BROADER WAY.
Lord, in this quarter of a hundred
years
What mighty progress in Thy world
appears!
Though strife and loud dissensions
do not cease,
get louder still is this great talk of
peace.
Red war exists, but stands in ill re
pute,
Were Homer back among us with
his lute
He couild not, and he would not,
sing of war;
For Peace Is what the world Is
craving for.
Lord, In this quarter of a century,
How man has grown in conscious
ness of Thee!
Though not by dogmas or by
creeds enticed.
Each earnest soul looks IN. and
finds Its Christ.
Spurning old narrow paths, men’s
feet have trod
In larger ways, and found the
larger God.
Now Thy great truth is dimly un
derstood— ^
Religion lies in loving brotherhood.
T \LL and straight and fair
they stand, the marguerites
—blue and pink and purple
and yellow and green. Oh. no,
they are not real marguerites,
they couldn't bloom in such colors
as that. They are just embroid
ered posies on the curtain at the
fair window.
Just a long, straight, simple
row of them; heads up, stems
straight and prim, something
puritanical about those flowers.
I wonder who did them? Some
one in that home there where
the window Is, I’ll be bound. No
one ever did them for sale;
they’re too full of character for
that
One, two, three—why there’s
one missing from the perfect line.
There, I said; they were never
done for sale, two up and two
down and three pink and three
blue; there’s fancy about these
flowers, and Imagination and
wistful hope and a kind of quiet
resignation.
Old and Tried.
Is she old and tired, and dalm
and settled, the woman who did
those flowers, and did she do them
Just to spend the long, happy
hour* of peaceful age? Is she
young ana and full of
high hope and surging discontent,
and did she do those flowers to
keep from quarreling with some
one? Oh, yes, they’re a great
safety valve, flowers are, when
they are embroidered.
I know a woman v/ho goes to
her room, locks the door and
chews gum as fast as she can
when she’s cross, and she has the
reputation of the sweetest temper
on earth, and she deserves It.
She takes her fury out on the
gum. Emborldery is the finest
kind of temper-killer.
“It’s unjust, it’s cruel. Td like
to"—one, two, three, four, then a
cross stitch—“I wish I could”—
one, two, three, four—“how pretty
that blue is going to be!"
“How she can think”—one, two,
three, four! “dear me, it’s prettier
than I thought it was!”
“I’ll show ’em”—one, two, three,
four—“there, what sweet flow
ers!
“How pretty those flower fields
were up there Is the mountains
last summer, blue as the azure of
the sky. and acres of them, acres
and acres, and above them the
enow peaks, and the water laugh
ing down Into the green valley
below.
*1 suppose It’s all show up
there now—deep, deep, quiet, pure
snow—as white as—as—snow,
and so calm, so restful. Just the
green pines and the great rocks '
and the snow. How far away all
these little things that bother me
do seem. So far, so far, and so
By WINIFRED BLACK.
little of account; what do they
care, up fhere In the hills, wheth
er he did right about the party.
A Cynical Fellow.
"How fast the little rabbits run
over the snow ;nd the chip
munks, too, what bright eyed 1K-
tle rascals they are, to be sure!
I don’t believe they know what
worry means, and yet they seem
Just as happy as if they did.
“Sc-r-e-a-m, scre-am, there’s a
magpie; what a handsome, cyni
cal fellow, to be sure; so know
ing, so sure of themselves. But
the old gray, cht got the one who
came to visit us; for all his wis
dom, she was wiser than he—the
old gray cat.
“I wonder If the coyotes are
crying up there In the rocks back
of the cottage? I saw one play
ing with his own shadow In the
moonlight last summer, one fair
night In June, ‘Woof,’ he barked,
and sprang at the shadow’s throat.
Over and over he rolled, the co
yote puppy, playing there ir. the
moonlight so gayly.
“And the sweet breeze sprang
up and the light clouds floated
across the silver moon. Heigh,
ho! How far away It all Is, how
far away!
“Gone the ranger—past the folly
of rage—quite gone the Irrita
tion of the little mind over little
things, past as the clouds pass,
high up there In the mountains.
One, two, three, four, here’s an
other flower growing under the
needle; who will look at these, I
wonder, and dream what they
meant to a heart so sore dis
quieted?
"Tall, straight and fair they
grow in the soft white curtains at
the fair window of my neighbor
—the marguerites—pink, purple,
blue and green. Oh, that’s Just
her harmless Joke, the green one,
I rather like it, don’t you? Peace
to your gentle heart, you who
made the fair flowers to grow
there in the sw r eet curtains you
made to keep the eyes of the cu
rious from the quiet secrets of the
home you love. One, two, three,
four. Where’s my embroidery
needle?
‘Brighten My Heart.”
“And that soft gray thread for
the lichens, and the brown for
the tree bark; no, that Isn’t the
right blue for those flowers,
something a thought deeper and
yet light, too; there, that’s It;
one, two, three, four—see, they
grow, the flowers, under my busy
hands.
“One, two, three, four—come,
this Is better than idle anger at
what can never be helped. One,
two, three, four—spring up, sweet
blossoms, and brighten my heart,
and the hearts of those who look
upon you—the work of my hands.”
The Battle of Lundy’s Lane
By REV. THOMAS B. GREGORY.
T HE Battle of Lundy's Lane,
fought 99 years ago, during
the American Invasion of
Canada in the “War of ’12,” was,
In point of numbers, a mere skir
mish; and yet for reasons which
will presently appear the battle
deserves a firm place in our mem
ories.
In the first place, the battle had
a setting such as f’eldom falls to
the lot of contending armies. It
was fought within sight and
sound of the mighty cataract of
Niagara. The roar of the great
falls mingled with the thunder of
the artillery and the crackle of
the musketry, and with the battle
smoke was interwreathed the mist
of the “Hell of Waters." By all
means, the affair should have
been named the "Battle of Nia
gara.”
It was a most bloody battle.
The Americans had about 1,000
men, the British about 1,300, and
the losses In killed and wounded
aggregated some 900; more than
a third of the total force engaged.
That was worse than the “Light
Brigade” at Balaklava, or Pickett
at Gettysburg. It may not have
been “war,” but certainly, from
the viewpoint of courage, it was
“magnificent.”
The battle is distinguished from
most other battles, too. by the
fact that the men fought during
the hours when, as a rule, soldiers
are In bivouac.. The fight began
“just the sun went down.” and
was finished along about mid
night. It was fought not only to
the accompaniment of Niagara’s
roar, but under the great stars
and suns, which looked down on
the combatants so uneonoemedly
as they tore away at each other's
throats in their madness.
While the stars, from their dis
tant vantage-ground, and the
“Man in the Moon,” from h1s eafe
position above the “firing line,"
were looking down so calmly upon
the strange antics of the earth
lings. the American General
Brown observed that a British
battery on a high hill was play
ing havoc with his line. Calling
Colonel Henry Miller to his side,
he said to him: “Colonel, do you
see that battery over yonder on
the hill?” "I catch a vague out
line of it, sir,” replied Miller. “Do
you think you could take It?”
nervously inquired the General.
“I can try, sir,” answered the
Colonel. And he did try
what is better, he won. with
loss of two-thirds of his men.
Three times the British rallied
for the recapture of that battery,
and three times Miller drove them
back, held the battery, and won
the field.
Niagara did not hear that “I
can try, sir,” the stare did not
hear it, the "Man in the Moon”
did not hear it, but the muse of
history caught the sound of the
heroic words, and will keep them
sounding down the
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