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Atlanta Georgian
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1 hr National Southern Sunday Newspaper
EDITION
ght. 1906,
Georgian Co
PAY NO
MORE.
DEATH BARES SECRET
OF RICH CITY HERMIT
Charles B.
Gas kill,
Atlanta's "man
of mystery, ’ ’
who was found
Hearst Bill of 8
Years Ago Urged
U. S. Wir eControl
The hermit is
seen above,
with one of his
pets and com
panions, a
chicken. Below
is his flock of
pigeons, which
now coo
mournfully
about their
dead master’s
silent home.
EIGHT YEARS AGO almost to a
day Representative William Ran
dolph Hearst introduced in the
Fifty-ninth Congress “A bill to
enable the United States to ac
quire, maintain and operate elec
tric telegraphs." etc. The bill pro
vided a specific method of fair,
legal purchase of "any or all ex
isting lines," and their operation
for the benefit of the people as the
postoffice is operated.
A stand-pat Republican C onress
regarded Mr. Hearst's bill as dan
gerous, if not revolutionary.
Mr. Hearst’s bill of EIGHT
YEARS AGO was reintroduced in
substance in the Sixtieth and Six
ty-first Congresses.
TWO YEARS AGO Postmaster
General Hitchcock, a Republican,
recommended it in a report to
President Taft and to Congress.
TO-DAY a Democratic Postmas
ter General makes the recommen
dation the principal feature of his
annual report.
The sehsationa! report of Dr. S. A,
Visanska’s committee exposing; milk-
supply evils in Atlanta was still th*>
object of careful and even cautious
consideration by the directors of the
Atlanta C’hamber of Comment
Thursd ty.
After another meet ins; Wednesda y
afternoon and a. prolonged discussion,
in which Dr. J. P. Kennedy, of tin*
City Health Office, and Dr. Claude
Smith, City Bacteriologist, took part,
the following information was given
out Thursday morning:
It was agreed that additional milk
inspectors and a City Veterinarian are
needed.
In view of the fact that the present
city force of milk inspection consists
of two dairy inspectors, one sampler
and no veterinarian, and that this
force is expected to look after the
6.000 gallons of milk furnished Atlan
ta daily by 700 dairymen and handled
by 235 dealers and 41 dairies in the
city, the foregoing attitude does not
appear startlingly revolutionary.
New Committee Named.
But further than that the famous
milk report continues to be shrouded
in mystery. #
By way of clearing up the situation,
Advises Destructor and Fire Alarm
Companies Against “Spend
ing Money to Beat Him.”
Famous Chicago Surgeon Also
Predicts That Operations for
Disease Will Be Rare.
3n Calls Acquisition
on Only Method of
Solving Monopoly.
or Woodward practically placed
ii sell squarely in the race for re-
. . lion Thursday when he told of re
port? of sinister efforts to oppose him.
I have been informed from several
i sources that the Destructor
N-.rip.tny of New York, the builders
the crematory, and the Okonite
ompany of New York, the builders
;’ie new fire alarm system, don’t
intend to try to make any settlement
wit-i the city during my admlnistra-
ioo, but are endeavoring to get out
m o other candidate who would ap
prove the contracts.
Then, when my administration is
• they would get their contracts
nproved without friction.
His Advice to Companies.
"I have not said whether I would
•»r would nof run for Mayor. I can
fell those companies, though, that if
'Tey w ill use the money it would take
to beat me with a candidate who
"oulrl approve their contracts, in re-
ucing their prices I will approve the
purchase of their plants at once, and
everything would be settled without
further worry of taking any chances.”
Mayor Woodward said that while
the last crematory contract had been
approved, no effort had been made by
the Destructor Company to get a final
settlement with the city. He said
' e plant w as not coming up to speci-
tications and it would do no good to
to him for money until it did.
The plant is completed and has been
burning garbage for several months
Likely To Be Big Issues.
Mayor Woodward has refused to
recognize the $106,000 moral obliga
tion contract for the fire alarm sys-
>tu. He has intimated that he would
• y a lump sum of $85,000 for the
system, but the Okonite Company
infuses to make a greater reduction
'han 2 per cent.
Unless these two contracts are set-
"d before the next election they un-
•>ubtedly will be important issues in
'be Mayoralty election, without re-
*A r d to the reports heard by Mayor
Woodward.
Council will attempt to make agree-
i,enr< when the new budget is made
: P in January.
The coming of a virtually “love
less” age. when the doctrine of eugen
ics will be in general application and
when marriage contracts will be
based more on the laws of health
than on sentiment, was predietji
Thursday morning by Dr. A. J. Osch-
ner, of Chicago, one of Americas
most noted surgeons, who is in At
lanta attending the convention of the
Southern Surgical and Gynecological
Association at the Georgian Terrace.
“Mankind is unmistakably drifting
toward an era whep health will play
a most important part in marriage,
said Dr. Osehner, 'and it is not Im
probable that there will come a time
when sentiment will be a minor fac
tor in the formation of marriage con
tracts. The doctrine of eugenics is
rapidly coming inlet greater favor p.i!
over the world, andlhe trend of mod-
WASHINGTON. Dec. 18— Govern
ment experts estimated to-day that
the cost of taking over the operation
of telegraph and telephonic lines, as
recommended bv Postmaster General
Burleson in his annual report, would
be more than $1,000,000,000.
The Postmaster General's recom
mendation projected into Congress an
issue over which there is already
marked difference of opinion and
which President Wilson himself may
have to determine. A party caucus
may be held for the purpose of get
ting the exact view' of the President
and a majority of the party leaders.
Burleson’s report follows conferences
ont he subject between .»e Postmaster,
General and President W r ilson, and
reports that the President was about
to make P'ederal ownership of the
Wilson Will Spend
Xmas Vacation of
3 Weeks in South
WASHINGTON, Dec. 18.— Presi
dent Wilson will take a Christmas va
cation ff about three weeks, begin-
ring probably next Tuesday. He will
leave Washington for the South as
soon as he signs tlie currency bill.
"The President has not yet decided
where le will spend his vacation.”
said Secretary Tumulty to-day. “He
will stay away from Washington all
iof three weeks, but his plans wiil
largely depend upon what Congress
does.”
President V\*i son was feeling some
what improved to-day. and took an
automobile ride.
Suffrage League to
Probe Atlanta Vice
Headed by Mrs. Amelia Woodail,
the Atlanta Equal Suffrage Associa
tion soon will prosecute a searching
probe into vice conditions in Atlanta.
Prominent vice crusaders and po
lice officials will be railed upon to as
sist.
U.S. Employees to Get
Month’s Pay Dec. 23
••
WASHINGTON, Dec. 18.—A merry
i Christmas to Uncle Sam s thousands of
i employees is assured by the issuance of
| an order permitting them to draw full
I December nay on December 23.
three Stamps Found
in Garret Bring $150
THE WEATHER.
Forecast for Atlanta and
Georgia—Cloudy and cooler
Thursday night; Friday fair.
XING. N. Y.. Dec. 18.—Three
stamps, SObyears old. found in a
b Elliott Bunt, were sold for
two utilities an administration pol
icy- Mr. Burleson points to the suc
cessful inauguration and extension
of the parcel post system as a guar
antee that the Postoffice Department
is capable of handling further coun
try-wide business of great magnitude
and importance.
U. S. Should Control.
The report asserts that there is a
surplus in his department for the
year ended June 30, 1913, estimated
at $3,841,906.78, and that* this is the
first real surplus since 1883.
In regard to taking over the tele
graph and telephone systems, Mr.
Burleson says, in part:
“A study of the constitutional pur
poses of the postal establishment
leads to the conviction that the Post-
office Department should have con
trol over all means of the communi
cation of intelligence. The first tele
graph line in this country was main
tained and operated as part of the
postal service, and it is to be regret
ted that Congress saw fit to rnlin-
A myster> r which has puzzled many
Atlantans was somewhat qleared
Thursday by the death of Charles B.
Gaskill, the eccentric and wealthy old
bachelor who lived a hermit in the
heart of busy Atlanta, and who was
found dead in the bathroom of his
solitary little home at No. 126 South
Forsyth streer Wednesday afternoon
The Coroner’s jury returned a ver
dict of death from heart failure and
complications His death was sim
ple and not unexpected by those who
knew r him, but his ways of life had
been one of the city’s Stranges: mys
teries for many years.
Alone he had lived in his little
house until the steps had decayed and
the ever closed green blinds at the
front began to rot and fall apart.
People saw him walk out to the gro
cery store and, with a few packages
under his arm return. Sometimes he
i would extend his journeys to a stroll
j about town, but the secret of the in
side of that siient house and the cause
for his queer wavs he kept a mvs-
know that he was quite sane, but that
was all. It took death to draw* back
the veil. He
needs, but it was unusual that he did
not surround himself with more com
forts and a better home. He even
cooked for himself, which is not so
bad on a trail in the woods, but rather
monotonous in a city like Atlanta,
especially w r hen one has money.
One of his acquaintances revealed
why he live 1 this life.
As a young man he had gone to old
Oglethorpe Gollege He was a. class
mate of ex-Governor Joseph M.
Brown His instincts there were so
cial and toward good fellowship.
He was a charter member of the
chapter of tire Phi Delta Theta Fra
ternity there, and founded the chap
ters at the University of Georgia ant*
at Mercer. No matter what his views
of the world became later, he held to
that bond of brotherhood. When he
avoided almost all mankind his inter
est In his fraternity still lived, and
probably the only true human asso
ciations he* knew in later years was
to attend a banquet of his young fra
ternity mates in Atlanta occasionally
To one of thesA he told w hy he led
such a lonely existence.
Once hr had fallen in love—desper
ately in love—and the woman had dis
ap potnted him.
So he with drew from tb*> world, and
■* vorld forgot him—until he became
mystery.
it was decided to try another commit
tee on it, and these were named: Ivan
E. Allen, chairman: J. R. A Hobson,
V. H. Kriegshaber, John S. Ow ens and
B. JVJ. Hood.
This combination is now' scheduled
to grapple with the milk report,
.which, dealing with so presumably in
nocuous a fluid, appears to the cas
ual outsider to contain considerable
“pep,” judging by the gingerly way it
is being handled.
Since the submission of the report
last summer, meeting after meeting of
the directors has approached that for
midable document, and, so far as all
publicity is concerned, has rebounded
in disorder from the attack
Prom the known circ urns lances it
might even be fair to infer that the
energetic Dr. Visanska is in danger of
deportation for revolutionary politics,
should the unexpurgated report be
made nubile Certainly the original
Continental Congress spent a good
deal l**ss time qonstdering the Decla
ration of Independence,
NEXT
Sunday’s American
IS BARRED FROM THE
Atlanta Penitentiary
was found dead on the
floor of his home by Mr. Derracote.
He was fully dressed. That was cause
I lor the few who knew tils history to
talk and for the curious to look into
the house
Around the envfv* of the little house
a huge flock of pigeons hovered and
moaned—-one wmuld vow—in sorrow.
In a corner of the living room of the
house sat several cats in uncanny
silence, their green eyes gleaming at
the empty fireplace. They were the
mourners. The people there w'ere
Because it contains an expose of that insti
tution. written by Julian Hawthorne, but
Atlantans can secure this great story by or
dering from a dealer, or by phoning Main
100. There ai - e dozens of interesting features
in it.
Continued on P