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Show To Clear Up A Misunderstanding After thirty-two years in the newspaper business one should learn something about open letters, and one does. When the urge comes upon a person to write an open letter for publication he should sit right down and write it. The next day he should read it over carefully and cut out one-third one-third of what he wrote. The next day he should read it again and cut out another third. After reading it the third day he should chuck it in the fire and forget it. And probably this open letter should end up as prescribed above and it would be if there were not some misunderstanding and errors that should be cleared up. We have recently run two open letters. The first, had it receeived the recommended treatment, would have found its main objective accomplished within the week. That was the Sjostrom case which was being cleaned up by officers of the law, even before the letter was written. The second was a bombshell dropped among us, and was of major concern to most of the so-called "signers" of the letter. This particular letter has caused a lot of hard feelings because many of the "signers" did not know of the letter, its contents, and had no knowledge that their name was being used, on it. The purpose of this open letter is to try and clear up a misunderstanding and also to apologize to many of the "signers" who did not sign the letter. The letter of last week was handed to my by Grant Snow rather late Tuesday evening. It was in three parts. One page was typewritten, another page was hand written, and the third page contained a list of names that were written in by the hand of but two people. Mr. Snow asked me if I would make further comment and I told him that I did not have time that week, as we had lost a day on account of the holiday Monday. That was the first misundersttanding. Mr. Snow took it to mean that I would not publish the letter until the following fol-lowing week. I then read part of the letter and Mr. Snow pointed out some paragraphs that he wanted left out. These were crossed out and were not published. In reading over the list of names I asked Mr. Snow if these men had signed and I understood him to say that they had either signed, had been called by phone and agreed that the use of their name was permissible, or had been contacted by Mr. Snow in person and had agreed. That was where I misunderstood Mr. Snow. He maintains that it was a list of names he was going to call or and get their permission. So there was a considerable difference of ideas and a misunderstanding between two men in a simple conversation. At this point I want to sincerely apologize to Archie Gardner, Otis Walch, Paul Adams, and and to any others whose names appeared without their permission. I should have been careful and demanded and accepted only genuine signatures. Everyone knows that these men are substantial men in our community and are for anything that is for the good of our community, but they do object to having their names used without their permission, and without any knowledge of what it is being used for, which is the way most of us would be, and their feeling on the matter is readily understandable. We all know Mr. Snow as being a man of high moral integrity with the sole thought of cleaning up an unsavory mess. This incident of the "unsigned signers" has taught us a valuable lesson and one that we should have known before, and that is: In the future NO open letters will be accepted by the Chronicle unless the text is written on one sheet, or if more are necessary each page must be initialed by each signer; The signers' names must be notarized; and the letter will be held up from publication until all parties have hade a reasonable reason-able length of time in which to cool off. Now here is the comment asked for by Mr. Snow I would have made had I had the time last week: I like Delta and West Millard and I wouldn't trade a square, yard of its area for all of Manhattan Island, if it mean't I had to leave here. Delta has been a boom town most all of its history and accordingly has been rough at times, but with each passing year I have noticed a big improvement over the preceding pre-ceding year. It has been the place I call home for the past 37 years, so I believe I can speak with authority. There is no question that everyone wanted the Sjostrom case cleaned up and did not hold with actions of that sort. The town has seen wide open gambling, but that has been stopped and that condition cleaned up. There will always be some gambling going on here just as there is in any other town, whether it be cards, raffles, betting on ball games, or elections, or whether the sun is coming up the next morning. There is most always easy money here and we have the reputation rep-utation of liking to get it out of banks and circulate it. Which is another reason why we have such a good business community. commun-ity. I would like to see gambling curbed, but I personally dont' think it will ever be stopped. As long as there are peeople who think they can get something for nothing there will be gambling. gam-bling. As to indecent exposure and such I dpn't think we have any more of that than other towns our size. But that should definitely be stopped and perpetrators given heavy jail sentences. sen-tences. As to prositution I am not familiar with it and can not speak with authority on that subject, so will skip it. I am for law and order and believe that our officers are iroing a good job in one of the most thankless tasks that can -be wished on to anyone in a small town. Our city council carried car-ried out its duties in excellent shape, and we should at this time thank the outgoing council for the work they have done in the past years. The city council has asked for clean up drives in the past, only they have handled them a little different. It was asked by the council that we clean up our own premises first, and then tackle the rest of the town. Which is a good idea, because if one was to jerk open 90 of the closets around here there would be enough skeletons fall out to put Fibber Mc-Gee's Mc-Gee's closet to shame. Delta isn't perfect, but it is continually getting better. Personally I don't want it to get so good that it will be taken to heaven like the city of Enoch, because from hearsay I think it would be quite boring up there, I don't like harp playing, and, too, it would be mighty lonesome without any of my friends. I like the open spaces around here where one can get out, stretch and enjoy the invigorating air, but when I do it I don't want some stool pigeon breathing down my neck, intent in-tent on doing a job of railroading. Frank S. Beckwith (We receeived an anonymous letter Tuesday morning about a gambling den in Delta. If the person will sign same before a notary public we will print it, not necessarily using the name on the article, but we want to know definitely who it came from. The columns of the Chronicle are open at any time to a person with a grievance, and as long as it is not libelous we will publish it.) |