I found this old newspaper. It was being used to fill the space between an antique beveled mirror and its wooden backing. You can imagine my surprise at not only its discovery, but the realization it was dated Tuesday, March 22, 1927. While only the Sports and Ad sections remained, the partial three cent publication offered a wonderful look back to an earlier time.
In historical context, 1927 was a prosperous year for most Americans. The U.S. population was just over 119 million, and the unemployment rate was 3.3%. The average household income was $2,400.00, of which a family got to keep around ninety-two cents of each dollar. There was no FICA, city or state income tax, as well as no sales tax. The Feds took 1%, but only after you hit $10,000.00 of income.
Only about 60% of American homes had electricity, and coal was still the primary fuel for heating and cooking. A new car cost $495.00, and a gallon of gas twelve cents. A loaf of bread was nine cents, a gallon of milk fifty-six cents, and a postage stamp two cents. Generally, it was an upbeat time in America that lasted until the stock market crash only two years later.
As I perused the brittle pages, I found some interesting ads in what remained of the old newspaper. The biggest and boldest were those for cigars and cigarettes. Seems you could buy twenty Old Gold cigarettes for fifteen cents, with the assurance there was “not a cough in a carload.” And you could chose Lord Salisbury, instead, if you wanted “the finest Turkish tobacco” available. Of course, there was always the Chesterfield brand that boasted, “They satisfy… and yet they are MILD.”
If something larger was your smoking choice, for five to fifteen cents apiece you could buy Ricoro Cigars which were described as, “Fresh, mild, and fragrant.” I guess, unless you’re a cigar lover, that seems to be a contradiction in terms.
There were also a lot of “health remedy” ads scattered here and there. For example, there was the amazing Musterole, a non-blistering alternative to mustard plaster. According to the ad, it gave prompt relief for almost every ailment known to man, including sore throat, bronchitis, tonsillitis, croup, stiff neck, asthma, neuralgia, headache, congestion, pleurisy, rheumatism, lumbago, back or joint aches, sprains, sore muscles, bruises, chilblains, frosted feet, and chest colds. Wow, talk about a forty cent ointment being “all things to all people.”
Another ad promised you could “end foot torture forever” if you bought Tiz for tired feet. According to the text, you’d have “Happy Feet In 3 Minutes” because Tiz “draws out the poisons and acids that cause foot misery.” I wonder if it worked on snake bites?
You could use Calonite Powder for facial blemishes. All you had to do was put it on a cloth and rub it over unsightly blackheads. Then, as clearly stated, “In a few minutes every blackhead, big or little, will be dissolved away entirely.” Sounds like it may have been good for unblocking clogged drains, as well.
Then there was Tartaroff at twenty-five cents a bottle, that “makes your teeth so instantly white and glistening that it seems almost a miracle.” Or Fresca Bath Salts and Body Powder whose ‘After the Bath’ powder “imparts to the personality an atmosphere distingue and aristocratic.” And if all this primping gave you a stomach ache, Coco Cod was available. It was billed as “the cod liver oil that tastes like chocolate.” Sounds like taste bribery to me.
Of course, if you wanted a live person to improve your looks, Mrs. Duncan could make you “Look Ten Years Younger.” She offered a permanent $12.00, non surgical treatment which she touted as “the original and only system for lifting sagging faces and old necks immediately without injury.” This, of course, was by appointment only, at her hotel. Interesting place for an office, I must say.
And finally, once you got looking and feeling good enough by using all these remedies, an ad invited you and the kids to the Wieboldt Stores to enjoy the personal appearance of Buster Brown and his talented dog Tige. An advertising gimmick, the Brown Shoe Company hired “little people” and trained dogs to tour the country as the mischievous cartoon character and his Pit Bull Terrier sidekick. They put on a free show at department stores, while promoting the Buster Brown brand of shoes for kids. Looks like the Billy Mays pitch genre started long before modern television.
Everything considered, the ads I found seemed almost primitive and naïve by today‘s standards. And whether their claims were true or not, they capitalized on a basic human “want,” to improve the quality and enjoyment of one’s life. Eighty-three years later, that same desire persists. So, if anyone knows where I can get some of that Musterole stuff, please let me know!
For those of you who don’t live in a border state, the issue of “illegal immigration” is probably just something you see on the evening news every now and then. But for those of us whose lives it impacts on a daily basis, it’s a serious matter that needs a solution sooner rather than later.
In my experience, then, if you need a practical fix to almost any problem, the most efficient way to find one is to ask a kid. Youngsters, when presented with a dilemma in terms they can understand, will almost always do a better job of figuring it out than their adult counterparts. That’s because their minds are uncluttered with prejudice and political bias, and their primary motive is simply to seek the easiest, quickest, and most practical solution possible.
President Obama, then, could benefit by having a couple dozen youngsters in his cadre of advisors. And one of the first issues about which he should consult them, is Immigration Policy. I’m sure, presented in the following visual way, it would be a snap for them to figure out, because that’s how kids understand things best.
Here’s how I’d frame the question: “What would be the first thing you kids would do if you found your room full of mosquitoes that had gotten in and were buzzing around because you left your doors and windows open?” I’d ask. “Would you chase them around and try to swat them? Would you search in every nook and cranny to find them hiding? Or might you just ignore them and pretend they weren’t there?”
Of course, you know what their answer would be. With an impatient look on their faces, they’d say mockingly, “Duh, before we’d do anything, we’d close the door and windows so no more could get in. Then we’d figure out what we needed to do, and do it.” Perfect logic, as usual. A simple but effective way to keep the problem from getting worse, while making plans to fix it.
My next question to the kids would be this: “OK, you’ve stopped any more mosquitoes from getting in. What would you do now with the ones that are already in your room?” Again, kids would find that easy to answer. “First we’d get rid of all the bad ones that tried to bite us, and swat them down so we could sweep them out the door,” they’d say. “And, if the other ones were really nice, and wanted to live in our room peacefully and by the rules, we’d probably let them stay until they acted up.” Wow, interestingly simple, if I must say so myself.
So in adult terms, then, here’s what the kids are suggesting to help the President begin solving the immigration problem:
1. Enforce all existing laws to secure the borders so that the flow of illegal immigrants is slowed, and finally stopped. Once success in doing that can be verified without political spin or skewed statistics, a chance to succeed becomes possible.
2. “Castrosize” the illegal population still left within our borders. Just as Fidel Castro emptied his prisons and mental institutions of criminals and social defectives in 1980, (and put them on boats to Florida, I might add), we should undertake a similar housecleaning. All undocumented convicted felons, gang members, sex offenders, and other criminals, then, should be systematically deported from our prisons to the countries from which they came.
3. Finally, once the previous steps have been undertaken successfully, begin to craft creative and equitable legislation to deal with the undocumented who remain. With cooperation from both sides of the isle, the options seem endless. They span the political spectrum from left to right… from “blanket amnesty,” to “creating a pathway to citizenship,” to the outright “deportation of anyone who’s left.”
So, there you have it. The kids have spoken, and while their solutions seem to be on the simplistic side, they definitely cut through the political bologna and get to the point.
And if asked for final comments, I think they would tell the President something like this: “Quit trying to do everything at once. Forget that grownup concept called the comprehensive approach. It doesn’t work, especially on big stuff like this. It just becomes an excuse to put things off or do nothing, and always creates a complicated solution that’s unworkable when applied. So move ahead in smaller but serious steps that work. After all, this mosquito issue has been bugging you grownups for far too long.”
Yesterday I received an e-mail from my buddy in New York. It was about a teacher who creatively involved his students in a real world experiment to test the long-term effects of the extremely liberal social agenda being championed by the current administration.
While I have no way of determining whether it’s an accurate account of an actual classroom occurrence, I’m recounting it here for two reasons. First of all, there are many great teachers out there that every day approach their craft with all the effectiveness and creativity shown by this e-mail educator. They, however, are routinely obscured by the bad press generated by those for whom education is a political football, and not a child-centered mission. So, hats off to good teachers! We need you now more than ever!
I also thought this e-mail points out an issue that many individuals in this nation have either forgotten, or chosen to personally overlook. Contrary to John F. Kennedy’s famous line about “not asking what your country can do for you,” too many have turned to Washington D.C. as the guarantor of their basic needs and overall stability in life. As such, they openly exhibit an aggressive attitude of entitlement which they consider is synonymous with being an American.
So I pass this e-mail on for your consideration. Whether it’s an account of superior teaching strategy in a real setting, or simply a creative political tract written to make some writer’s point about the dangers inherent in trying to engineer social equality, you be the judge. Either way, it’s excellent food for thought.
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To: Paisano
Subject: An Effective Lesson From The Classroom
An economics professor at a local college made a statement that he had never failed a student before, but had recently failed an entire class.
That class had insisted that President Obama’s social/political agenda would work, and that as a result no one would end up being poor, and no one would become excessively rich… a great equalizer.
The professor then said, “OK, we’ll have an class experiment to test the Obama plan. All grades will be averaged, and everyone will receive the same grade so no one will fail, and no one will receive an “A.”
After the first test, the grades were averaged and everybody got a “B.” The students who had studied hard were upset, and the students who had studied little were happy.
As the second test rolled around, the students who had studied little, studied even less. And the ones who had studied hard decided they wanted a free ride, too, so they studied less. The second test average was a “D.” Of course, no one was happy.
When the third test rolled around, the class average was an “F.” And as the tests proceeded, the scores never increased as bickering, blame, and name-calling resulted in hard feelings. And nobody would study for the benefit of anyone else.
In the end, everyone failed!!! To their great surprise, the professor told them that like their testing, such social manipulation would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great. But when the government takes all the reward away, few will try or work hard to succeed.
Could any lesson be simpler than that?
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All week long the History Channel has been broadcasting programs dealing with the devastating airplane attacks on the United States nine years ago today. Viewing the tragedy from many perspectives, one show focused on the many Americans who still believe that the whole incident was a sinister conspiracy pulled off by George Bush and our own government, rather than by Al-Qaeda hijackers under the leadership of Osama bin Laden.
The program, “9/11 Conspiracies: Fact/Fiction,” approached the subject by presenting specific allegations by groups such as the “9/11 Truth Movement,” and putting them to the test using research done my Popular Mechanics Magazine with over seventy consulting experts in every field of disaster forensics. In the course of an hour, then, each main conspiratorial charge was explored and answered using real world scientific and engineering measurements. And on each point, the allegations of the conspiracy theorists were disproved, that is, when rigorous academic scrutiny replaced suspicion and raw emotion.
Conspiracy theory is nothing new in America. I know that first hand having spent many hours of my young adulthood reading books like Mark Lane’s, “Rush To Judgment,” that denounced the Warren Commission’s Report on President Kennedy’s assassination as a blatant cover-up. And while I agreed with that conclusion at the time, I took it even one step farther by leaning towards the “Mafia hit” theory of the tragedy. That I based on my personal knowledge of their documented reliability in such matters.
Suspicion about historical events, then, seems to be in our blood. Whether it’s Roosevelt knowing about the pending attack on Pearl Harbor but letting it happen anyway, or the Apollo Moon Landing being faked and filmed on a Hollywood sound stage, nothing seems to go unquestioned. Even during Katrina, there were allegations that the government blew up the levies to direct flood waters toward poor black neighborhoods in order to save the homes of affluent whites in others.
Did I learn anything new from this 9/11 documentary, then? Other than regenerating the horrors of that day in my mind, not too much. But it did make me realize that I might have more in common with conspiracy theorists than I thought. Like them, I have a deep distrust of the degree to which our government really cares about its citizens. And like them, I’m convinced our ruling class would lie to us in a second if it felt an untruth would benefit its position on any given issue.
Similarly, I believe that those in power will always favor secrecy over transparency if it means unfettered expansion of their power over the people. And I‘m convinced they employ a cadre of underlings who are paid handsomely to come up with self-serving schemes of all types. Unlike the "truthers," however, I just don’t believe these government stooges are smart enough to pull off anything beyond the rudimentary, or to keep their mouths shut about it if they do.
So everything said, do I believe the World Trade Towers were brought down by a controlled demolition carried out by secret government agents? Absolutely not. Do I believe an uncontrolled government is demolishing our democratic traditions and quality of life? Absolutely YES. Considering that, other than our disagreement about what actually happened on 9/11, I guess the conspiracy crowd and myself aren’t really so different after all.
If you're a regular reader, you probably realize by now that I try to live the motto, “Just keep things simple, stable, sensible but satisfying.” So were there such a thing as a “Life EKG,” my sinus rhythms might well resemble a leisurely drive in the slower lanes of a flat, straight freeway… with a few rolling hills here and there, and great rest stops at every few exits.
That considered, I’ve always been convinced that the things I do during the course of an average day, seldom rise to the level of importance, uniqueness, or edification of the species to merit unsolicited blabbery. Red phone events they’re not, and thinking it’s necessary to drop everything the minute they happen just to share the details with others (who may not even be interested), seems more than a little narcissistic.
Of course, this attitude seems archaic to those who socially network. That includes some of my family and friends, who have lovingly urged me to get off my knuckles and begin walking upright. It's been tough, but with the exception of this Blog, I have resisted putting myself out there either socially or anti-socially. Perhaps it’s because I secretly fear criminal prosecution for boring someone to death with a minute-by-minute account of my life.
To me, it seems rather perverse that a human being so able to verbally articulate his thoughts and actions, would descend to the level of a feathered creature and begin “tweeting” to those around him about what‘s happening in his particular treetop. And even if such news chirps weren't annoying to most, who really gives a damn that the smell of pine is especially pungent in the treetops today, or that some pesky squirrel is shooting me dirty looks from behind a clump of leaves?
My point is simple. It would be an absolute waste of everyone’s time if I decided to regularly share the details of my daily existence. And to prove just that, here is what my “tweet log” might have resembled for a small portion of today, that is, if I had opened my electronic beak and twittered: - Just got another irritating solicitation phone call. Made me lose count while I was rolling pennies.- The clicker of my pen fell off when I was writing down the phone number to lodge a complaint.- Can’t find the clicker. Think it fell under the refrigerator.- Man, there’s a lot of crap under this refrig. Who would have thought?- Found the clicker, but spent forty-five minutes cleaning under there. Hate these unscheduled jobs.- Trying to figure out why the clicker fell off. Probably a cheap Chinese import!- Gluing the clicker back on. Had to borrow glue from the neighbor because mine was dried up in the bottle.- Think it’s going to work fine. A few more minutes and I can try it out.- Crap! I guess some glue got in the hole. Now the clicker won’t click.- Pried the clicker back off. The ink cartridge spring popped out when I did.- Think the spring went under the refrigerator. At least this time I won’t have to clean under there.- Found the spring. Think it stretched because now it’s too long for the pen.- Bent the spring back to it’s original size. Put it in and replaced the top.- Must have weakened the spring. The pen point won’t stay exposed.- Filled the entire pen tube with glue. Waiting for it to dry.- Glue is dry and I’m going to test the pen. Doesn’t click anymore, but the point sticks out fine.- Damn thing won’t write. Been trying to scribble circles on this pad for about ten minutes. Guess the ink cartridge dried up like my glue.- Just got another unsolicited phone call. Told him off, but found out I was talking to a recording.- Going to call and complain, anyway. Don’t like being interrupted when I’m fixing stuff.- Looking for a pencil to write down the phone number. Think I’ll check underneath the refrigerator.
I remember a time in my life when it was not only therapeutic to have a political discussion with someone who had a conflicting point of view on an issue, but intellectually stimulating, as well. And when the verbal exchange was over, no matter how heated the discourse had become, we always seemed to depart as friends, simply agreeing to disagree.
I think today, it would be rare to witness such a scenario being duplicated. For it seems that people are so polarized on issues, especially political, that their ability to discuss them objectively is no longer possible. And almost immediately, rather that “making a point, then listening to a counterpoint,” the whole thing degenerates into unproductive name calling and finger pointing.
This new type of “non discussion,” then, is very sad. And even sadder, is the fact that its net result is to separate people’s positions even farther, and generate bad feelings and an unwillingness to mutually solve existing problems. What’s more, the strategy has become a convenient tool to simply silence the opposition, that is, when one side runs out of strong points to offer on behalf of their particular views.
Examples of this are rampant on a daily basis. For example, if you criticize President Obama, you’re a racist. If you want a closed border policy, it’s because you hate Mexicans. If you think there should be cuts in government programs in a bad economy, you actually despise teachers and kids, want the handicapped to die, and are determined to let criminals take over the streets.
If you want to use incandescent light bulbs or drive a SUV, you’re a murderer of the planet. If you think the water shortage could be solved by legislating for humans instead of Delta Smelt, you’re an anti-Green, anti-environmentalist monster who wants a whole race of sardine-sized fish to become extinct.
If you shop at WalMart, you want to destroy Mom and Pop businesses in your own neighborhood. If you question the “man-made” part of Global Warming, you’re a dumb anti-intellectual with no respect for Science. And if you think the Pledge of Allegiance should still be said in our schools, you have to be a nutty, ultra right wing, reactionary Conservative Christian.
If you think taxes are way too high, you’re an unappreciative citizen who doesn’t want to pay his fair share. If you think people should work for and earn what they get, instead of sponging off those of us who do, you loathe the poor and want to rob them of their basic human rights. And finally, if you criticize your government for just about anything, you’re a downright reactionary who should move to another country where they won’t let you say anything at all.
So this is the sad state of discourse in America, today. And the once revered tool of discussion and compromise used by the Founding Fathers to hammer out our Declaration of Independence and United States Constitution, has all but died. And the ominous sound you hear these days isn’t just personal discord. It’s the beginning death rattles of a country that has somehow seemed to lose its way.
I found this old newspaper. It was being used to fill the space between an antique beveled mirror and its wooden backing. You can imagine my surprise at not only its discovery, but the realization it was dated Tuesday, March 22, 1927. While only the Sports and Ad sections remained, the partial three cent publication offered a wonderful look back to an earlier time. 
