This Date in History – George Washington

*     *     *

WASHINGTON’S DEATH

One hundred and thirty years ago today, on December 14, 1799, George Washington died.

On Dec. 12 of that year, Washington was exposed in the saddle for several hours to cold and snow, and attacked with acute laryngitis, for which he was repeatedly bled.

Washington sunk rapidly and died two days later. His last words were characteristic. He said: “I die hard, but I am not afraid to go. I believed from my first attack that I should not survive it. My breath cannot last long.” A little later he said: “I feel myself going. I thank you for your attentions; but I pray you to take no more trouble about me. Let me go off quietly. I cannot last long.”

After some instructions to his secretary about his burial, he became easier, felt for his own pulses, and died without a struggle.

Mourning was almost as widespread in Europe as it was in America.

Kokomo Tribune (Kokomo, Indiana) Dec 14, 1929

1893

*     *     *

1911

*     *     *

1928

*     *     *

1929

*     *     *

1967

*     *     *

The Warmth of Perfection

Image from Etsy

Glowing Heat From Every Ounce of Fuel

The News (Frederick, Maryland) Dec 24, 1907

Clean Dry Heat

The Gettysburg Times (Gettysburg, Pennsylvania) Dec 9, 1911

Houses Without Chimneys

Olean Evening Times (Olean, New York) Dec 24, 1912

Baby’s Morning Dip

The Frederick Post (Frederick, Maryland) Dec 12, 1914

A Touch of a Match Brings a Touch of Spring

The Frederick Post (Frederick, Maryland) Dec 18, 1915

Emergency Heating

The Frederick Post (Frederick, Maryland) Dec 18, 1918

Don’t Waste Coal

The Gettysburg Times (Gettysburg, Pennsylvania) Dec 18, 1918

Gareth to Lynette

Image from ARTMAGICK

Poem in College Magazine.

The following poem which appeared in the University of Virginia Magazine, published by the students, was written by L. Travis White, of Frederick, who is studying law at the institution:

Gareth to Lynette.

Then Gareth: “Here be rules. I know but one —
To dash against mine enemy and to win.” — Tennyson.

More soft than silken strands the hair
That tumbles round thy temples fair,
Tossed by the summer air;
Like roses bloom thy cheeks;
The droning bee they near deceive,
When proffered sweetness to receive
Some brim-full flower he seeks.

Thine eyes, like twin stars on the deep,
Soft-mirrored when the billows sleeps
And moaning winds their silence keep,
Shine tenderly; yet seem
They like the dewdrops when the lawn
Gem-strewn, doth greet the Sun of dawn —
And mockingly they gleam.

Near thee the lark on tireless wing
Hovers his sweetest song to sing;
To thee the zephyrs tribute bring,
With violent-laden breath.
The buds whose fragrance is most sweet
Are gladly crushed beneath thy feet —
Thrice blest in such a death.

But thy heart is as hard to lover’s pain
Like the rocks beside the storm-swept main —
Against them dash, in vain, in vain,
The waves of a passionate sea;
Yet slow to ocean yields the land,
The proud rocks crumble into sand —
So will I conquer thee!

— L. Travis White.

The News (Frederick, Maryland) Dec 4, 1912

L. Travis White is number 4 in the picture above.

Frederick High School’s Class of 1911 is once again part of the scene at the local school, at least in the form of the official class photograph presented to the school recently by Robert J. DiDomenico, executive director of Goodwill Industries of Monocacy Valley Inc.

The full story of where the old fashioned studio picture spent the last 60 years will probably never be known, although it can easily be visualized gracing the living room of some proud graduate’s home.

Whatever its history, the picture complete with handsome frame and glass, turned up as part of an anonymous donation to Goodwill and was spotted by Mrs. Barbara Coulter, secretary to DiDomenico, who recognized it as an interesting bit of memorabilia for the school.

DiDomenico agreed that this was a fitting disposition for the photograph and it was presented to George Seaton, principal of Frederick High School.

The picture, taken in the era of the old Boys High School, now Elm Street Elementary School, reveals several points of contrast with more recent high school class photos. Most obvious, of course, is the fact that the class is composed of only 19 members, all boys.

It is also interesting to note that the students are pictured in a West Point type military uniform, an indication of the schools’ past presently reflected only in the nickname “Cadets,” used by Frederick High athletic teams.

The students’ haircuts, on the other hand, are a bit on the full side with moderate sideburns not too different from today’s more conservative styles.

Most familiar, however, are the surnames, most of which are still prominently represented in Frederick County today. No effort has been made to tell how many members of the class survived, but Principal Seaton would be pleased to hear from any who might still live in the area.

Names of those identified in the Smith Studio (of Frederick) photograph include: Clyde E. Burgee, Allen G. Quynn, Earl E. Zeigler, L. Ray Burgee, Louis A. Rice, James R. Keller, J. Ernest Haifleigh, R. Dorsey Sappington, Willis D. Witter, George L. Rothenhoefer, Dean W. Hendrickson, David L. Johnson, William H. Solt, Marvin L. Shirley, Prof. Amon Burgee, Edgar J. Eyler, J. Roger Fisher, L. Travis White, John L. Shaw and J.F. Minor Simpson.

The Frederick Post (Frederick, Maryland) Dec 15, 1971

The News (Frederick, Maryland) Jun 6, 1912

The News (Frederick, Maryland) Jun 20, 1914

The Frederick Post (Frederick, Maryland) Apr 11, 1931

Image from Gamblers Book Club

From Bridge Guys – Bridge Books:

White, Littleton Travis – (July 3, 1894 – December 1973) – Littleton Travis White

Odd Tricks, c1934, Edited by Albert H. Morehead and Clifford A. Bender, Publisher: The Bridge World, Inc., New York City, United States; also Odd Tricks, 1978, Edited by Albert H. Morehead and Clifford A. Bender, Publisher: GBC Press, Las Vegas, United States, ISBN-10: 0896508102; also Odd Tricks, 1983, Edited by Albert H. Morehead and Clifford A. Bender, Publisher: Casino Press, ISBN-10: 0870190334 / ISBN-13: 9780870190339, LC: 34041970

Note: Mr. Paul Ryan has contributed this information in addition to a scanned version of the newspaper article in the El Paso Herald Post upon the publication of the bridge book. This information is included in a .pdf file for the interest of the bridge visitor and, in addition, a visually more acceptable version, also in a .pdf file format. Mr. Paul Ryan has also included the scanned version of the World War I Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918, of Littleton Travis White and also the scanned information collected during the 1930 United States Federal Census. Also include is the Social Security

*     *     *     *     *

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
The Work Done By The Just Government League:

[excerpt – L. Travis White’s mother was involved in women’s suffrage movement]

The News (Frederick, Maryland) Dec 15, 1915

The News (Frederick, Maryland) Dec 17, 1901

*     *     *

Evidently, his sister was a bit of an artist:

The Frederick Post (Frederick, Maryland) Oct 15, 1917

Image from HCAP

L. Travis White’s sister, Roxanna, married the president of St. John’s College. What I found interesting were his comments to the Rotary Club about the educational revolution, and St. John’s “counter-revolution”:

COLLEGE HEAD TALKS TO CLUB

St. John’s System Explained To Rotarians By President

Educational counter-revolution by St. John’s College, Annapolis, shared discussion with the shortage of Maryland oysters as topics of discussion before the Wednesday luncheon meeting of the Frederick Rotary Club.

Dr. John Spangler Kieffer, president of St. John’s College and also of Annapolis’ Rotary, described the 100-book foundation of knowledge system inaugurated by the school in 1937.

W.R. Slemmer, chairman of the local Rotarians’ committee for an oyster-roast to be held later this month, changed the after-dinner talk of members from the day’s topic of  “Education in Revolution”, to “will we be able to get oysters to roast?”, when he refused to continue sale of tickets for the proposed affair, until weather conditions and the bivalve market assures delivery of the food.

Introduced by his uncle, Rev. Henri L.G. Kieffer, the speaker of the meeting explained St. John’s College new system as anomalous, in that it is designed to maintain the “aura of college aristocracy, with democratic ideals.”

The highly honored Harvard graduate was made president of the Annapolis college last year, succeeding Stringfellow Barr in continuing the “nationally observed new-trend for education, started in 1937.” President Kieffer’s wife, the former Miss Roxanna White, is a native of Frederick.

Called Revolutionary

Dr. Kieffer explained that the St. John’s program is actually a revolution against the nineteenth-century revolution in education. That classical education of the past hundred years was not the complete fundamental knowledge necessary to developments of laboratory sciences and that elective courses were a compromise which undergraduates are not capable of choosing.

He deplored over-specialization in teaching undergraduates and summed up the program of his college system, as one intended to complete adolescence of students by training the mind to think generally and adultly; thereby being acquainted with the “principles” of the civilization in which he will live.

“We are living through a revolutionary period, as evidenced by the present loss of standards, faith and belief in things,” Dr. Kieffer said, “There is skepticism, dogmatism, on every hand. There is a general lack of knowledge and faith in fundamentals. We have lost the stability of the nineteenth century minds, because the atomic bomb disproved Maxwell’s system of physics,” the speaker concluded.

The Frederick Post (Frederick, Maryland) Feb 12, 1948

*     *     *     *     *

Interesting “men vs. women” note in this article excerpt:

PARTY FOLLOWS FINAL SEMINAR

Mr. And Mrs. Kieffer Are Honored By Group At Library

Women may control the wealth of the country as statistics indicate, but it was the men who defended its economic system as opposed to the Communist theory in a lively final session of the Great Books Seminar in the C. Burr Arts Library, May 2 during the discussion of the Communist Manifesto. John S. Kieffer, director of adult education at St. John’s College, Annapolis, who has been conducting the Seminar, presented. The session concluded with a party given by Between-the Book-Ends Club in honor of Mr and Mrs. Kieffer….

The Frederick Post (Frederick, Maryland) May 12, 1952

*     * Census Records *     *

John Kearnes White, the father, doesn’t every appear to be with the family:

1900 Federal Census – Frederick, MD

1910 Federal Census – Frederick, MD

In 1920, Mrs. White and Roxanna are still living in Frederick, MD, sans father, and Littleton Travis White is a roomer in Virginia, practicing law.

*     *     *

By 1940, Littleton Travis White was finally married, and to quite the YOUNG lady:

Living in El Paso, Texas, with his mother-in-law, young wife, and baby daughter.

*     *     *     *     *

According to his mother’s obituary, she was a member of the United Daughters of the Confederacy:

The Frederick Post (Frederick, Maryland) Apr 30, 1954

Travis’s father appears to have authored a book of poetry. The interesting part is the dedication:

To My Mother, not My Wife.

HATHI TRUST Digital Library has the book online: THE WHITE ROSE

*     *     *     *     *

Littleton Travis White died in Annapolis, Maryland, while visiting his sister:

His death was front page news in the El Paso Herald-Post (El Paso, Texas) Dec 8, 1973

The End

All this for a poem!

Postermaster Makes a Christmas Concession

Image from Old Pictures

WILL PERMIT WRITING “DO NOT OPEN UNTIL CHRISTMAS”

“Not to opened until Christmas” written across packages sent through the mails at his season of the year will not be considered by the postoffice department as writing, and as a result such packages will be passed and delivered by carriers.

This is one of the many concessions being made by the authorities in order to induce the general public to send gifts early and thus relieve the congestion that is sure to result if everything is deferred until near the holidays.

Orders have been issued by Postmaster General Hitchcock, at Washington, to the effect that this year the rule prohibiting the writing of a message of any kind on the face of mail matter except the address will not be enforced so as to permit persons to write “Not to be opened until Christmas.” This has come about through the fact that express companies and other common carriers permit the practice, and Uncle Same desires to extend the same courtesy to gain a two fold benefit from this concession, both getting from this a large volume of business, because hundreds will send parcels by mail now who would otherwise have used the express route, and also inducing persons to send their mail early and avoid the Christmas rush.

The Gettsyburg Times (Gettysburg, Pennsylvania) Dec 9, 1911

Everything Cranberry

All images of cranberry workers from cranlib’s photostream on flickr

THE WINTER BERRY.

In cooking cranberries it is well to remember that they should never be put into a tin dish. Either agate or porcelain dishes should be used.

Cranberry Conserve. — Extract the juice from an orange, then cover the peeling with cold water and cook slowly until tender. Scrape out the white bitter part and cut the peel into narrow strips with the scissors. Simmer one and a half cups of raisins until tender; add the orange peel and the juice and a quart of cranberries. If needed, add more water to make a cupful of liquid. Cover and cook for ten minutes or until the berries are done. Then add two cups of sugar and simmer until thick.

Cranberry Trifle. — Cook a quart of berries with one pint of water until the berries pop open; rub through a sieve, return to the fire and add one pound of sugar. Stir until it is dissolved, then let boil two minutes; cool and beat until light with a wire egg beater, then fold in the stiffly beaten whites of two eggs. Pile in a glass dish and serve. Cranberry shortcake and cranberry pie are old favorites for desserts..

Baked Apples With Cranberries. — Select large, perfect, sweet apples, remove the cores and fill the cavities with thick cranberry jelly. Set the apples in a pan of water in the oven, and bake until the apples are done. Put each apple in a glass sauce dish and serve with whipped cream.

Cranberry Roll. — Cream two tablespoonfuls of butter, add a cup of sugar, a half cup of cold water and two cups of flour sifted with a tablespoonful of baking powder and a dash of nutmeg.  Beat until perfectly smooth, then add another cup of flour and roll out the dough to an inch in thickness. Spread thickly with jam or jelly, roll up closely, pressing the ends together. Lay on a plate and steam for three hours. Cut in slices and serve with cream.

Sheboygan Press (Sheboygan, Wisconsin) Dec 11, 1911

*     *     *     *     *

*     *     *     *     *

*     *     *     *     *

CRANBERRY COFFEE CAKE

1/2 pound cranberries
1 cup sugar
1 cup water
1 cup flour (bread)
1 egg
2 teaspoons baking powder
3 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup butter
2 tablespoons milk

Inspect and wash 1/2 pound of cranberries. Make a think syrup by boiling the sugar and water for 10 minutes. Add the cranberries to the syrup and simmer until they are clear and transparent. Pour this into the bottom of a cake pan. Mix the flour, baking powder, sugar and salt. Blend the butter with the dry ingredients. Beat the egg with the milk and add to mixture. Spread this batter on top of the cranberries and bake 45 minutes at 375 degrees. Cut in squares and serve with hard sauce. This amount will fill a pan 8 inches square.

HARD SAUCE

1/3 cup butter
1 cup confectioner’s sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla or lemon extract
2 tablespoons boiling water

Cream butter, add gradually while beating the sugar. Add vanilla or lemon extract. Beat gradually into the mixture the boiling water. This makes unusually fluffy and light hard sauce.

Sheboygan Press (Sheboygan, Wisconsin) Dec 7, 1935

Magic Cranberry Pie

1 1/3 cups Borden’s Eagle Brand sweetened condensed milk
1/4 cup lemon juice
1 cup Eatmor cranberry pulp, drained
2 egg yolks
Baked 9-inch pie shell of Krusteaz

Blend together sweetened condensed milk, lemon juice, cranberry pulp and egg yolks. Pour into baked shell. This pie may also be served with a meringue made of two egg whites beaten still and sweetened with two tablespoons of granulated sugar, browned in a moderate oven (350 degrees) for 10 minutes.

Oakland Tribune (Oakland, California) Nov 20, 1936

*     *     *     *     *

*     *     *     *     *

Cranberry Relish Right Complement To Turkey Dinner

By GAYNOR MADDOX
NEA Staff Writer

For brilliant color in the Thanksgiving menu serve this jellied cranberry molded salad:

Jellied Cranberry Relish Salad

Two cups fresh cranberries, 1 lemon, quartered and seeded; 1 apple, peeled, cored and quartered; 1 orange, quartered and seeded; 1 cup sugar, 1 package fruit-flavored gelatin.

Put cranberries and fruit through food chopper. Combine with sugar and let stand a few hours to blend. Prepare fruit-flavored gelatin as directed on package, reducing water by 1-4 cup; chill until syrupy. Stir into drained cranberry relish mixture. Fill mold and chill until firm. Unmold on lettuce or watercress and serve garnished with orange sections.

Or if you want your cranberries in the salad course, just combine pineapple and pears, bananas and walnuts, lettuce and watercress. top off with a generous handful of crunchy fresh cranberries for color and texture.

Finally — and what an old-fashioned and zestful end to the Big Meal of the Year — there’s cranberry pie.

Cranberry Pie

One recipe favorite pastry, 2 1-4 cups sugar, 1-2 cup water, 104 cup raisins, 2 cups apples slices, 4 cups fresh cranberries, 2 tablespoons cornstarch, 2 tablespoons water.

Roll out half pastry and fit into 9-inch pan. Combine sugar, water, raisins, apple slices and cranberries in saucepan. Cook until cranberries pop — about 10 minutes. Make a paste of cornstarch and remaining water, stir into fruit and continue cooking until thick and clear — about 5 minutes. Cool and pour into pie shell. Roll out remaining pastry and cut in strips. Arrange criss-cross fashion over top. Bake in hot over (425 degrees F.) 25 minutes.

Denton Record-Chronicle (Denton, Texas) Nov 16, 1950

*     *     *     *     *

Henry Ford’s Model T

Newark Advocate (Newark, Ohio) Mar 4, 1911

The Model T – Introduced by Henry Ford in the fall of 1908

FORD ECONOMY

Indianapolis Star (Indianapolis, Indiana) Apr 23, 1911

Atlanta Constitution (Atlanta, Georgia) Apr 28, 1911

The Period Frock

The Bee (Danville, Virginia) Jan 19, 1927

The robe de style, as the French call the picturesque period frock, has been the easiest vehicle for exploiting the flounce ideas, and the great houses have turned out some bewitching models of the sort this summer, some hinting vaguely at 1830 models though far from all suggestion of crinoline, many reminiscent of the Grand Monarque and his court or Marie Antoinette’s days.

The Washington Post (Washington, D.C.) Aug 6, 1911

San Antonio Express (San Antonio, Texas) Mar 28, 1926

FASHIONED FOR YOUTH.

Period frocks, those charmingly youthful models with little bodices and wide, full skirts, have not by any means been relegated to the background. They are, if anything, more intriguing than ever, for they reveal a distinct Spanish influence which makes for certain picturesque qualities. Not the least interesting of these frocks are those which have an overdress of black Chantilly lace over a slip of satin which is a rich valencia pink in shade. Others of the same beautiful pink tone are flounced with black lace and the effect is enchanting.

However, the period frock is distinctly the costume of youth. While youth may be a matter of actual years, in modern days it frequently is a state of mind aided and abetted by all the arts of the modiste, the hairdresser and the beauty specialist. At all events, youthful contours are essential to the successful wearing of these piquant costumes.

The Davenport Democrat and Leader (Davenport, Iowa) May 10, 1925

Kingston Daily Freeman (Kingston, New York) Aug 17, 1927

The period frock, a headliner for spring, is no longer confined to the young set. Matrons are constantly demonstrating that one need not be overly slender to wear these frocks with distinction.

Decatur Herald (Decatur, Illinois) May 14, 1928

San Antonio Light ( San Antonio, Texas) Jun 6, 1929

Orange Compote

Image from The French Pastry Chef

ORANGE COMPOTE.

Take oranges of medium size,
The peel remove I pray;
From each a round cut from one end
And scoop the seeds away.

Fill up the little cups thus formed
With strawberry-preserve —
That flavor mixed with orange-juice
Is more than most deserve.

Then top each orange with whipped cream,
A cap all soft and white,
Made up of puffs, while for rosettes
The strawberries gleam bright.

On separate plates the fruit then serve
With lady-fingers slim
And I’ve no doubt a king would say,
The dish was fit for him!

— Woman’s Home Companion.

The Daily Northwestern (Oshkosh, Wisconsin) Jun 19, 1911

Swat the Fly, Wisconsin

Sheboygan Press (Sheboygan, Wisconsin) Jun 1, 1921

DO IT NOW

by Berton Braley

We must show no ruth or pity
To the fly!
In the country or the city,
He must die!
Do not cherish, do not pet him;
When you see him, go and get him,
Swat him quick and do not let him
Multiply!

Oh, he flits in all the breezes,
Does the fly,
Bringing various diseases;
That is why
We should slay him very quickly
Lest he swarm about us thickly
And we suddenly grow sickly —
And we die!

There’s not one redeeming feature
To the fly;
He’s an evil, loathsome creature,
None deny;
And the only way to treat him
Is to fight him when you meet him —
Smash, abolish, and delete him —
Swat the fly!

He’s a menace — we must pot him,
We must swat and swat and swat him,
While we shout our battle cry,
“Swat the Fly!”

(Copyright, 1921, by The Sheboygan Press.)

Sheboygan Press (Sheboygan, Wisconsin) Jun 1, 1921

FLITTING from dish to dish, taking his morning bath in baby’s milk, regaling himself in the butter and preening himself on the sugar bowl, the house fly again is with us. His feet covered with millions of disease germs, he goes on his way leaving death in many forms in his trail. Scientific experiments have shown that musca domestica, the ordinary house fly, is the most industrious and persistent spreader of contagion in the world. Countless thousands have been numbered among his victims and his toll of death among infants is appalling.

War to the death must be waged against this death-dealing insect. No other duty is so important to the housewife as the extermination of the fly. And the task is much easier now than it will be later when the breeding process has multiplied his numbers.

Swat the fly!

On of the most remarkable advances in modern medicine and sanitary science has come from the knowledge of the fact that many of the most murderous diseases of man and animals are caused by the bits of infected blood-sucking insects. The pioneers in this discovery were Theobald Smith and Kilborne, who showed a quarter of a century ago that the deadly Texas fever of cattle was caused by the bite of a fly — the Boophilus bovis, which had become infected by sucking the blood of affected cattle. This great discovery was soon followed by that of the relation of the mosquito to malaria and yellow fever, the relation of the tsetse fly to sleeping sickness and other forms of trypanosomiasis, the relation of the tick to tick fever, of the bug to relapsing fever, of numerous ticks to anaemic diseases in cattle causing vast economic losses.

In temperate climates it would appear that man is largely immune from blood-sucking infected insects. Recently, however, the house fly has been found to be a danger if in a manner somewhat different in so far as it is unable to penetrate the skin owing to the construction of its mouth apparatus. Whatever disease germs it carries it is a passive process, the chief danger being the contamination of foods by bacteria carried on the surface of its body or in its bowels. Of all insects the house fly is the most constant companion of man, tasting his food by day and frequenting his abode by night whether in the far north or the far south, whether on the land or on the steamers that ply on the great oceans. Its very name, Musca domestica, suggests its relation to man.

If the fly were a cleanly insect he might perhaps be tolerated, but from the double life he leads there is no question that he should be exterminated hip and thigh, for he spends half his day in the latrine or manure heap amid the most foul putridity that it is possible to imagine, amid dead, decaying and diseased matter, from which at intervals he comes to bathe in our mild jug or to poise himself on your pat of butter or your meat. Many of his habits have until recently been a riddle but are now becoming understood, and in consequence his presence is as much feared as many of his congeners who have forsaken the dunghill for a meal of good human or animal blood.

All modern experiments concur to show that the principal breeding place of the house fly is the moist, warm manure heap, cesspool, or latrine, although perhaps it must be admitted that some flies are more fastidious. If collections of filth were destroyed the fly plague would be kept largely in abeyance. As things are he can breed in countless numbers and at a great rate.

The evolution of the house fly is complex, for from the moment that the female deposits her eggs in warm purtrefying manure the young go through various stages of development. Within a matter of hours the egg splits and a minute grub creeps out. At the end of twenty-four hours it moults and passes into the second larval stage, which in a day or two moults again and finally becomes a sort of chrysalis. At the end of three or four days of chrysalis life the case opens and the fly emerges to commence its life work. Within ten days or a fortnight it may be sexually mature and commence to lay great batches of eggs. As a rule breeding goes on rapidly between June and October, although under certain circumstances it may go on all the year round. It is a common observation that flies seem to disappear in winter. This must be explained by their ability to hibernate, the first warm day waking them from their slumbers.

It is a fortunate circumstance that they are liable to various forms of destruction, for apart from the magnificent work carried out by the bird, by the spider, and other insects, the fly is subject to devastating diseases, particularly an infective condition set up by a fungus, the Empusa muscae. This plant, in the form of a spore, lights on the surface of the fly and begins to grow, throwing out a slender process which makes its way between the fly’s scales, and thus gains entrance to its body. In the course of a few days the fungus has invaded all its organs and tissues, and now sick unto death the fly may be easily caught or may drop dead where it has alighted.

Sheboygan Press (Sheboygan, Wisconsin) Apr 21, 1915

As was said above the chief danger of the fly is that it may be a carrier of foul putrefactive or disease germs to articles of diet consumed by man. This is not a figment of the brain of the medical scientist; it is a proved fact. Indeed, long before accurate experiments proved this to be the case it was already supposed that the fly stood in some relation to typhoid fever, especially the typhoid of military stations and camps. There seems to be no doubt that much of the typhoid in the Spanish-American and South African wars were explicable on no other theory. In America this belief became so current that it was spoken of as “the typhoid fly.”

Accurate experiments carried out in this country and elsewhere have demonstrated the disease-carrying propensities of the Musca domestica. Typhoid germs have been recovered from its body days after it was infected. In the case of some germs it has actually been found that where the larva is infected the infection may persist throughout the moultings and be present in the adult or imago stage as late as nineteen days. Not only as a typhoid-carrier, the fly is also believed to carry the disease germs of tuberculosis, cholera, dysentery, and summer diarrhea of children, a disease which sweeps away vast numbers of bottle-fed children in every civilized community at the present day.

The necessity of removing or destroying all putrid organic matter and filth comes home to us when we remember that the fly is capable of long and rapid flights. In actual experiments marked flies were released and were captured half a mile away within forty-five minutes. That flies carry filth on their bodies can be readily shown by taking one from any place and allowing it to walk over the surface of a sterile nutrient jelly. Within a day or two masses of bacteria will have grown wherever its feet have touched. Picture to the mind the gross contamination which will occur when a fly weary with its half-mile flight from a dunghill takes its morning bath in your jug of milk at breakfast. This will bring the problem home to all, and by concerted effort the doom of the house fly will be sealed.

Sheboygan Press (Sheboygan, Wisconsin) Jul 3, 1912

The fly-swatting crusade has been taken up seriously by a number of large cities, either officially or by self-constituted committees of public-spirited citizens. In Cleveland a two-weeks campaign against the fly has just been closed. The warfare was conducted under the direction of a citizens’ committee of fifty-five. A scale of prices was arranged to be regulated by the supply. The market opened at 10 cents a hundred and went down to 10 cents a quart when the swatters got to going right.

Sheboygan Press (Sheboygan, Wisconsin) Jul 8, 1912

The artistic fly swatter was guaranteed a profitable market under this scale of prices, while 10 cents a hundred as the top limit made it impossible for a Napoleon of fly fiances to fill the cold storage warehouse with flies and ever after have champagne for breakfast. As it takes 10,000 flies to make a quart, the price per quart ranged from 10 cents to $10. A similar range in price in stocks within two weeks would set the country by the ears. The Cleveland plan gives the gambler chance enough, and the rights of the consumer and producer are safeguarded.

The Daily Northwestern (Oshkosh, Wisconsin) Sep 27, 1911

Ten cents a quart was the price established in Washington two years ago, but hat was a September price. One female crawling out of a warm corner in the month of April will start a family tree which, without casualties, would have a September membership of about three trillions.

A decrease in the price of flies from $10 a quart, the May figure, to ten cents. the September figure may seem great, but we must remember that the supply may have increased three trillion times.

Sheboygan Press (Sheboygan, Wisconsin) Jun 3, 1912

Sheboygan Press (Sheboygan, Wisconsin) May 15, 1912

A Prank of Nature

A PRANK OF NATURE.

I laid out a garden
My spacious back yard in,
On April the first or somewhere thereabouts.
I dug and I spaded,
I sowed and I graded;
For two weeks thereafter I watched it for sprouts.

When Sol shone and baked it,
I watered and raked it,
As Burbank, I fancied myself quite as wise.
I worked so discreetly;
Each bed made so neatly,
My neighbors gazed at me with envious eyes.

How well I remember!
The first of September
Arrived, and my heart fluttered, sickened and sore.
No shoots were up peeping;
My garden lay sleeping
As sproutless and fruitless as five months before.

“It’s either enchanted,
Or hoodooed or haunted,”
I thought as I gazed at each somnolent bed.
That night came a frost, and
I said, “All is lost,” and
I bundled my garden tools off to the shed.

A week or two later,
Just back from Decatur,
I entered my garden, but what a surprise!
For pease and tomatoes,
Beans, corn and potatoes
Loomed smiling, to gladden my wondering eyes.

The wind of November,
The sleet of December
Worked overtime urging the young shoots to grow
You may not believe me,
But  that doesn’t grieve me,
My vegetables ripened in two feet of snow.

EMMETT R. BAILEY.
Syracuse, May 17th

Syracuse Herald (Syracuse, New York) May 21, 1911