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Show THE April 19, 1945 COUHtKMOMER WOT 1RVICE THUS FAR: Amoi Croy lettied on a farm in Mis- llomer was born. Sunday company lor dinner and The Croys attended the Ition, where Homer had his the outside. He finished college, then went to New he secured a job as cub I Dreiser's woman'! maga- isit home he was glad to lebe, who had been his fa- leeper since his mother's marry his father. Homer tew York and had his first Stop," accepted for pub- I Hies were practically noth- look. I HAPTER XX make a living. We had more ambitious plans than burning a mortgage, and soon we were about them. Yes, actually on the way to Europe. One of the persons on the ship was Walter I wrote him a note I would like to meet him, and soon I was buying him a drink. How sweet it was to consort with the famous, elbow to elbow, no looking up and no looking down. And it was not long before we were in Paris. Wonderful Paris! That was the way I had always seen it described and that was the way it was always mentioned by returning friends. But I had to see it through my own eyes. It was disappointing. It was odd and strange and it was Interesting, but certainly not wonderful. Nothing seemed to be logical, and to me the people seemed to be slightly on the demented side. I looked at the French through what were, I supposed, cornfield eyes, but I was making up my mind as to what I saw and felt. They seemed aloof and artificial, some- Lipp-man- fettlers were going. He would get in the buggy procession. When there I. funeral, he would put blue uniform and stand Ive; then he would come I hang the uniform in the liext time. no more at all. Phebe's ays ended, "Your father ime home whenever you litable happened. One day "Your father is Ilegram. lame to meet me at the ;re was no one to swing But when I got out of the tebe was at the door to hooking old and worn, her framed in the gold glasses. Li asking all morning when here." gentleman was in the rm, in the house south of tower, in the walnut bed rought in from the farm. Lsd, misshapen hands were utside of the covers. He hand out to me and said t voice, "I'm glad to see I guess you got in on n I built a home in Forest Hills, Long Island, New York ("The Little House with the Big Mortgage" I called it) and wrote two more ping books. I wrote ail sorts of stuff, and that's just about what it was. There was my old trouble of never being able to tell whether what I was writing was good, or not. It all seemed good when the words were flowing; pretty bad when the words were stiff and cold. But I kept grinding away and managed to t East?" r r himself. opoke of events of years ago hey had just happened. Once drummer for a nnr-- 3td come to our house, driving livery team, and .me to drive around with him him to the farmers. Ivhich he would pay my father ollars a day a fortune. And father spoke of it. glad I didn't take it." id to rest and I crept out of Jm for a while. When I looked ain his blue eyes were still ! wish you'd pare my finger- - now I realized something that led me. He had never been to show open marks of affeo- ucb as putting his arm around s I have seen so many fathers o their children. But now in he wanted the V,last hours of his son. I had sense enough take the paring of the nails last a I could. 7ig ve got my v. a. k. sun nangtn ie closet I've always been proud ... ... V" s eyes closed; after a while "Do you remember opened. ime I bought the buffalo robe Christmas for your mother?" nodded, choked with feeling. "; wanted to ao something for me. ; it was some nnai latneny touch. Phebe and I have a good feather upsiaua were nui usin . now Jd you like to have It?" .urlo!n.f1 mm MAn1w mm T .I.'.U ; people in new ium aia not feather beds. I suppose not," he said with a . a e- ine was was nut Imug. iuciui k to the farm. "It's all free clear. It's been my ambition . ...... kM . ... ieT i w ;uu mat wnj ina m. fta what I'm doing. Don't ever mortgage on it. They eat like lancer." he time came when I must go k, and I went In and sat on the e. tke Dainty Frock for the Little Girl bvcoui To obtain complete patturn, finishing in Frock structions for the Frilled-Sleev(Pattern No. S850) send 16 cents in coin, ttern your name, address and the e S'O-O-T-H-I- they'r rol.y mcdicotsd Oi&L f' fe1 fMiwl. u. in tnW . V. t tt.M uiv 1mm 1991 finally wnen the moment i snooR nis gnarled band care of yourself. Homer.'! It last thing he ever said to kfter I had been back about a , I got word that the end had hne. I could not go to the funeral only In my thoueht- - A COUCH LOZENGES Due to an unusually large demand and current war conditions, slightly more time is required in ailing orders for a few of the most popular pattern numbers. Stud your order to: Soothe your throat all the way the bluebird chirping down robin far below the gargle line. red the and "red rows, three horses abreast now bob bob bobbin' around," baseEach F A F Lozenge gives your throat a 15 minute soothing, comswinging down a black loam field, a ball with all its future troubles is whole hill covered with steers, a feed forting treatment. Used by millions it than a still in far better way for coughs, throat irritations or lot alive with shoats. How be would SEWING ClKCt E NEEDLEWORK weeks ago. hoarseness resulting from colds or blink. Yet these French farmers looked to be some 149 New Montgomery St. lost have teams good many Many smoking. Only lUp box. knew tricks I didn't. If our MisSan Francisco, Calif. intersome still have but men, they in to arountf had souri farmers clop Enclose 18 cents for Pattern wooden shoes and plow with a four-inc- esting talent left. Is No have we that The main point moldboard . . . would we have had too Name many gonfalonic gallops in done any better? the last few seaAddress- In the spring we went back to sons where either Paris: The day after we arrived, as Yankees or CardiHomer, Junior, was riding his tri- nals were so far In cycle around the hotel grounds he front by August that put his hand on his back and said in nothing remained of his childish voice that his back hurt. the races except a By morning he was worse. We got cloud of indigo dust the doctors at the American Hos- Far down on the M m pital, and they also brought in the stretch. best professeurs in Paris to help This new season our little boy. How far frcnn home there is a strong we seemed! But it wasn't really so possibility for two of I far, after all, for five Americans the closest races in GrantlandRice A Y came, to our hotel to ask if there was many years, where somealmost anything can happen. anything they could do. But O il times no one can help. We put this point up to Larry nt Gnillis GrMt FBOds " colonel astute the and always He died in that lonely Paris hotel. T such confessed that might ITTLE girls of two, three and But in the next room were three coyly ' four years will adore this Americans we had never seen be- easily be the case. "We no longer have the matter of dainty frock with the gay four-inc- h fore who had come, as they said, "in case we needed them." Pretty and very picking one or possibly two teams duck applique. two leagues and tagging practical it opens out flat for iron When our little boy was buried from the one ing. Pattern includes sizes 2, 3 from the American Church, there them on notop in April. For and 4 years. Pieces from your knows today manager example must have been a dozen Americans lose will ball he what scrap bag can fashion the ap players just there we had never seen before and next week or next month. plique. who came up and offered their symner-e- r A had I man pathy. A Big Question seen before and have never seen, War Agent Lost "What team could you pick on top shouhis arm around my since, put lder and said: "The rest of them In the American league at this Draftees in asked me to say they know how you point? Or the National league? And two or one to if have so you happened far must feel when this happens A tombstone in a cemetery near favorites, how do you know how from home." look around the middle of Washington, Ind., bears this curi It made America seem very close. they'd of June? May or the middle ous inscription: In memory of When the coffin, covered with an "Take Detroit. The Tigers still Eli McCarty . . . killed while no e jr.. American flag, was taken through have Trout and Newhouser. Two tifying drafted men." the streets, the Frenchmen lifted fine pitchers two big 1944 winners. Wounded in one of the early bat their hats. That helped, too. It all But Wakefield Is gone and 60 is tles of the Civil war, Captain Mo a to such time, Pinky Higgins, and who is left helped and yet, at Carty left the Union army in nothing helps, for when the big give these two pitchers any runs March, 1862, and became a govtiff Joints Tired Muscles Sprains Strains Bruises crises come we enter them alone. to work on? You know where the ernment agent enrolling men for But some way or other we do stand Tigers were last summer until the draft. Aroused by the news of them, we do go on living, we laugh Wakefield returned. the draft a group of southern symagain. , "The Browns look as good as pathizers vowed to shoot a govern' Eumonths in After twenty-twany other baseball team, but this ment agent on sight. McCarty was rope we returned to 10 Standish is April not June or July. Even Joe their unfortunate victim. Road. (Item: fourteen windowpanes McCarthy doesn't know how the in our little house were broken.) It Yankees will stack up two months had been a lovely fling, but all of our from now. money was gone. "But that isn't the important One day a real estate neighbor point. The main idea is that each "dropped" in to see me. (On what league might easily have five or six small incidents does the door of life clubs through the sumswing.) I had known him for some mer all with a chance to win and time, and had seen his cars grow that's what makes baseball. Naturalbigger and rakier. Now what was I ly each home city likes to see its going to do? he asked. Well, I was team with at least a chance somegoing to plug along as best I could. where up with the bunch not 20 Then he asked me about how much I games or even more away. You saw expected to make without quite ask- what happened last fall when the rs and Yankees were ing it. And when I told him without Browns, quite telling him, he looked dis- all bunched up. No one ever accused tressed. It was a shame to see a them of being great ball clubs. But person work so hard and get so lit- still you couldn't get near their tle. He began to tell about "deals" parks, with thousands turned away he had pulled off. He wasn't the in St. Louis." only one doing that; everybody was making money in real estate. All a Race Counts Most We have had a few ball players person had to do was to get "control" of a piece of property, hang on who could draw out the populace, a while, then sell at a whacking no matter how far out their clubs price. My tongue was soon hanging were. SOIL is the very foundation Representative, his County Agriout. He mentioned two or three Babe Ruth was the top party in cultural Agent or his Vocational and American prosperity men who, as he said, were playing this list. I recall one season when and the game. I began to think of my- the Babe played in Boston and Agriculture Teacher. The land that progress. Our independence self as playing the game. each farmer cultivates is a national rooted before overflow crowds, our opportunities are deeply Philadelphia There was a piece of property although Boston and Philadelphia, it. in , heritage. It should be passed on to coming onto the market by forced far out of the race, had been playthe next generation better than it than a thousand morbid sale; it was an easy way for some- ing to fewer In our For came to him. That is a trust which thought Bob souls people Fel years, later to daily. some years pick up easy money. body a on was land the attraction New ler inexhaustible. soil big monwas each man assumes when he makes days never I had picked up any easy farms could be ey in my life and now under his hyp- he worked. So was Ted Williams. New was his living from the soil. plentiful. But in the main it has been the notic powers it seemed about time. wilderness of the carved out club crowd that drew ball the If I could raise some money and Firestone believes that soil conmake a down payment, he could buy the ball club up in the race. I have cheaper and easier than old farms is fundamental to the servation So a when maintained. be that corner lot for me. The way always believed that a few seasons could of welfare our country and its property was jumping, I could sell It ago the Dodgers, playing in the farmer the lost its farm fertility, in no time at a neat profit Why, Yankee stadium, would have passed We believe soil conservapeople. and his family simply moved to a I could make five thousand dollars! the 2,000.000 mark. Is business. That tion everybody's still rate Detroit and Brooklyn new piece of land. "That's nothing In comparison to asI the two best ball towns in the is extensive are we conducting why what some of the boys are making!" country, and that isn't barring New the on is different a it he said. experiments story. Today, York or Chicago. There was a time Firestone Homestead Farm near When I told him it seemed big to when Boston Most of the good land has been in this prebelonged me, he smiled pityingly. I'd just ferred list. But when you get right is being farmed. When and cleared Columbiana, Ohio, where our never waded around in real estate. down to the big check-u- p most of loses its farm founder, Harvey S. Firestone, was a productive capacity, Then he told of another man, who, them need a team somewhere In the born. That is why we are sponsoras he phrased it, had hit the jack race. there may not be any place to WITH h Vifh Frufri 9 yf7 Y jA 5 85 Mac-Pha- " " hf f kind-face- Mark d Civil Life Draft Notifying Ruj Wore U S. War BonJU d not long before he began about the farm. Homer, got a good farm there." The toucnea me. ne was re- rify I his hold on the farm. "Some li laughed at me when I got it Xr there wasn't any timber on it worked out pretty well!" Jm in his eyes there, for now he 1 best farm in the neighbor-- I "Your mother was always Ifond of you." He was not one compliments himself, and I IS that he was also saying .ntkafllTMl ltrwovB REALLY o ce was drawn, but his eyes blue as ever. The same mutual understanding we ays when we got together, ing separated, leaped up. e questions were about me. your wife. Homer?" "What weather have you been hav- - 1 Often I thought how I would like to take one of them to my farm and show him the long straight stone-les- s PS SEWISG URCLE KEEDLEVTORK MUSCULAR ACHES jtoot of the bed, next to the 11, was the old tin, camel- nk I had taken to the uni- It was now covered with a Cianket, and I sat down on i. NEPHI. UTAH TIMES-NEW- Ti' The crooked narrow streets, the e sidewalks. yard-wid- times on the verge of childishness. Now that I look back, this may have been because I mat only the French who came in contact with the public. I did not get into a home where I could meet "the real French," as my wiser and more experienced friends called them; and I could not parley their language. So I had to judge by what I saw. And that was what I have done all my life. I realize much of it has been wrong, but still it was my own point of view. We went to the Riviera and took rooms at the Grand Hotel in Sainte Maxime and I went to work on an idea for the novel that was to follow "West of the Water Tower." The guidebook said Sainte Maxime was one of the lovely spots on the Mediterranean, and the two or three Americans we met said it was delightful. To me it was just plain The crooked narrow cockeyed. streets, the yard-wid- e sidewalks, the nonsensical carts, the mailman carrying his letters in a tin box suspended from his shoulders. The people eternally sitting in cafes swigging beer or tiny drinks. Such a place was interesting to see, like a pumpkin show, but certainly not the place where I wanted tq live. Or the kind of life I wanted to live. Dale Carnegie, who was born on a farm a few miles from where I was, came to see me. He had seen much more of Europe than I had; in fact, had lived there. But when we got down to cases, he felt about it much as I did. I suppose you can't ever get a farm out of a person. For that matter, I don't know that I want to. r The part I liked best was to see how the French farmed. Of course I couldn't talk to them, but I walked across their land and watched them working. I must have watched sympathetically, for none chased me off. I was fascinated by their market days and, no matter how hard I was supposed to be working, I managed to be there. Taking pigs to market in basketsl Carrying sheep with their feet lashed over a pole! It was play farming. Having a manure pile just outside the house. It waa disgusting. But when I looked a little deeper and saw the handicaps the farmers had to overcome, and their poor oil and primitive machinery, my respect went up. It was toy farm ing, but, everything considered, they ; turned In a good job A MESSAGE TO AMERICA ABOUT AMERICAN SOIL THE 141-year-o- ld pot He came several times and several times I walked across the corner lot that was bound to skyrocket. He was a bit shocked when I confessed how little money I had. Well, writers were simply not business- men. Bit by bit it got around to putting a mortgage on our house. I would not put one on the farm. I stood out against that. Should we, or should we not? It would be only for a brief time, then we'd clean up (as my friend said), wipe off the mortgage and have a neat sum In the bank. The more he talked, the more plainly I could see he was right. But there was a catch. I would have to pay $210 a month interest and taxes, a staggering sum. But It would be, he explained, only for a short time. Then there would be that neat sum. After days of swinging between and we confidence hesitation, marched down and put a mortgage on the little house with the lovely rounded doorway, and became the owners of a corner lot. There It was, when we walked across It, oursl Every inch of It; well, at least every other Inch. Now would really have to work No doubt of that (TO BE CONTINUED) For some odd reason, although ball players come from all over the map, from the unknown hamlets and the farms, from spots more than 2,000 miles away, home town pride is always concerned This has always been a deep mys tery to me but there it is. For some years the National league had two or three teams neck and neck down the stretch such as the Cardinals and the Dodgers. When that was happening, the Yankees usually had their race packed away on ice by late July or early August Then, last fall, the American league suddenly switched into a finish as the Cardihot three-clunals were wrecking the National. This all speaks for the complete honesty of baseball, which 1 believe today is taken for granted by every known proof, bat it Is of no vast help to nationwide interest. I agree with Larry MacPhail that the 1945 season may easily give us five or six clubs from each of the two big leagues which might easily be under a blanket from time to time during the coming months. It is my tip that baseball is on its way to one of the most interesting seasons in many years unless it is so badly riddled that it isn't given a chance. their ; move. And the nation's supply of food and fiber is reduced. That is why soil conservation has become so vitally important. ing soil conservation contests More than one hundred million acres of land have been seriously damaged by wind, water erosion, Firestone Champion Farmers incorrect farming practices and other causes. Each year millions of acres more are being damaged, some beyond redemption. Soil conservation methods are efficient, effective and easy to practice. Contour farming, terracfertilizing and ing, strip-croppin- crop rotation are the principal methods used. Every farmer can get complete information and specific recommendations from hit local Soil Conservation Service Clubs, cooperatthrough the ing with the Future Farmers of 4--H America and promoting the exchange of ideas through the Association. We have also recently published a new booklet on soil conservation entitled, "Our Native Land, a Trust to Keep," which you may obtain without cost. Simply send your request to the Firestone Farm Service Bureau, Akron, Ohio. I feel sure that you will find this booklet interesting and instructive. Chairman The Firestone Tire &. Rubber Co. |