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GRABBING OAR AND JABBING killer whale In eye. H. W. Van
Buren, 50, of Petaluma. Cal., saves self and fellow fisherman when
whale clamped Its jaws on craft's rail and keel, ripping two holes
In boat while pair were fishing 30 miles north of San Francisco.
Pillow stuffed in hole, fishermen rowed to Island. (International)
A Nichols? Worth of
Comment On This and That
IY HARMAN W. NICHOLS
United PttM total-Writar
Harmon Nichote
Washington (U.R) You pen
write a letter to mom and post
it and what is the cost? Paper,
practically
nothing, ink
the same, and
stamp three
cents.
But say you
are a wheel in
business or the
gover nmen t,
and brother,
the cost runs
up to about a
dollar a letter.
I got my in
formation from John M. Breen,
educational director for the cor
respondence improvement divi
sion of the Kemper Insurance
Group.
"In 1950," Breen said, the cost
per letter was about 85 cents.
Last October, the price went up
to 96 cents. As of this writing,
it is 100.3 cents.
The figures, according to
Breen, were gathered in a sur
vey and are based on "efficient
letter operations."
Machines Involved
These involve the use of dic
tating machines in typical big
business offices, that send out a
combined total of 70,000 letters
a month.
Gf course, if you are a small
firm, the cost would be consider
ably less.
But for the big operator, the
cost breaks down like this:
Salary of the person dictating,
25.3 cents.
Cost of the paper, envelopes,
and printing, 6.3 cents.
Machines use repairs, replace
ment, new machines, 4.2 cents.
Rent and overhead, which
takes in a lot of territory, 4.1
cents.
Employee benefits like group
accident, health, and life pro
grams, including girdles ripped
on wooden chairs, 1.5 cents.
Typist Gets More
Salary of typist for transcrib
ing, 40.5 cents. And I wish you
would note that she gets more
than the dictator, or perhaps it
takes her longer to transcribe it
than it does the man to dictate,
, Stamps and cost of mailing,
6 cents.
Miscellaneous, including about
20 different items, 12.4 cents.
The folks who made the sur
vey had so many files on the
miscellaneous they could not
break it down by the item. .
But anyhow, it ali' adds up to
100.3 cents.
Eight Minutes Common
How long does it take a ttg
shot to dictate a letter?
"Sometimes a couple of min
utes, sometimes a lot more,
Breen said. "But commonly you
could say about eight minutes."
The average time of transcrib
ing the typing from the dictating
machine disc is about 13 min
utes." A lot of that depends on the
hemming and hawing of the per
son who is dictating and the
speed of the secretary as she
takes it off the record player.
Record Cheaper
The record playing-back deal
is cheaper, of course. If a secre
tary has to use shorthand, you
have to consider something else.
It is going to duplicate her effort
to have to transcribe the letter
onto paper, and maybe have to
do it over if she misspells a
word.
The people who made the sur
vey have a few little tips on
writing letters. If the man you
want to write to is in the same
town pick up the phone. Or
hand-write him. And if you must
write, don't "goozle."
A "goozler" is a person who
turns fires into "conflagrations"
and makes "soon" read "at an
early date." . s
3y sTsn Gfekens
Back Yonder
The axmen of the old days in
the Lake States went up the tote
roads in the autumn. In virgin
woods the boss picked a site for
a camp, the ground was cleared,
and log bunk and cook shanties,
a stable and a feed shed were
thrown up. While the camp was
in the making the boss blazed
the skid trails. A main road for
the sleigh-haul was marked first,
usually , along a creek which
would provide the water for an
ice bottom in winter. It ran from
the projected loading skidway
in the woods to the banking
ground on the river. From the
skidway, trails led to all corners
of the woods.
The camp up, the roads and
trails were cleared, and the crew
began to get out the logs. In the
early days felling was done by
the axe alone. Brawny choppers
faced off in pairs, with a kingly
pine between. Rivalry ruled. The
first to cut into heartwood was
the king-jack of a chopping team.
Along the trails the pines fell
with a crashing thunder. Bull
whackers with oxen or teamsters
with horses snaked the logs to
the skidways, or hauled . them
on travois. sleds.
Sleigh Logging ...
At the skidway another team
ster, his horses hitched to block
and chain, and cant-nook men
piled the logs. There the pine
logs waited for the snows. With
the first heavy storm and freeze
ef winter, the main road was
iced, and the sleigh haul was on.
The sleighs were ponderous
bobs, with bunks nine feet wide.
' The first log loaded was an
chored in the middle to balance
the . bunks. Then a log was
chained to each side and others
packed in by the loading team
and cant-hook men. Binding
chains secured the load. On the
peak log the teamster halooed.
The huge 'horses bellied down,
their calks gouging the ice. The
iron runners screeched. The logs
shook and settled. Over a glassy
track the great load slid to the
banking grounds. Hay was used
on the hills to hold the runners
off the horses. .
A hard and primitive life in
the deep, dark woods. Heavy and
dangerous labor from dawn to
dusk. Sourdough- bread, baked
beans, salt pork and boiled tea
on hewn-log tables. Hard double
decked bunks for sleep. The fire
a blazing pyramid of logs on the
open "camboose" in the center
of the bunk shanty, the smoke
escaping through a hole in the
roof. Nine and ten months of
such a life in the primeval forest
before, the drives were down.
. Such was the life of men in
pipneer Michigan lumbering.
They were mainly Irish, Canadian-French
and Scotch, the "shan
ty boys." In camp they made
a tribal life, the boss their chief,
with their own lore and tradi
tions. From their isolation and
the entertainment of camp nights
the mighty- myth of Paul Bun
yan was born, to follow lumber
ing to the Pacific, and eventu
ally to astound the professors
and the literati of New York.
Later . the logging railroad
penetrated the woods, to rival
Screwball Escapades at Oregon
State Penitentiary Revieved
By WILLIAM WARREN
United Piatt Correspondent
Salem, Ore. (U.PJ Screwball
comings and goings at the State
Penitentiary.
A woman prisoner calls a cab
and escapes.
Dimes are counterfeited at the
hog slaughter house at the Pris
on Farm annex, smuggled out
and passed-r-all for a total pos
sible sum of five dollars.
A guard smuggles in a gun,
ammunition and dynamite so
three men in the bull pen can
break out on their promise to
stage a benefit holdup for him.
A couple of convicts hide in a
laundry truck hamper destined
for Portland.
Taxicab Caper Relished
Those who collect queer hap
penings the way some connois
seurs collect old wine and young
women relish particularly the
taxicab caper.
A woman, prisoner working
as a practical nurse in the dep
uty warden's home outside the
walls but within the spacious
grounds, called a cab one night,
strolled nonchalantly down
through the gate, caug'nt the cab
at a street corner near the pris
on and had the driver take her
to Portland. She paid for the trip
with money she had stolen from
the purse of the deputy warden's
wife. In Portland, state police
believe, she met a chap who had
been paroled from the prison
only two days before and last
rumored of, they were bound out
of Seattle apparently for
Canada.
State police picked up the
common law wife of a convict
and found half a Bull Durham
sack full of counterfeit dimes.
They said she admitted passing
some of them in Salem stores.
State police said her convict
companion admitted smuggling
the tobacco sack full of phonies
to her. He had found them on
Hog- Hill. State police theorized
with the aid of some witnesses
that an old timer who had
served before - for counterfeit
ing but who was doing a stretch
in Oregon for another crime, had
made the phony dimes out of
babbitt in the slaughter house
boiler room. He denied the
charge, and the federal grand
jury in Portland did not return
a true bill against any of the
three. But state police do know
that some of the phony dimes
were passed around inside the
prison walls, where they were
used for gambling purposes and
for buying an occasional pack
of contraband cigarettes. All
money is contraband within the
walls, so the boys were just play
ing with a reasonable facsimile
of the real stuff. It is believed
that whoever made the phonies
did so with that sole purpose in
mind of using them instead of
real dimes or poker chips just
intramural, you might say; with
in the walls. Apparently the
WWTiA
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CUTTING COSTS-Secy. of the Army Frank Pace Jr. fleft) is
escorted through mock battle area at Fort Hood, Tex , by Maj.
Gen. R. B. Woodruff. The maneuvers are the largest in history.
The cost has been trimmed from original estimate of $9 000 000
to $5,300,000. Another million is hoped to be cut from the cost
before the operation it concluded April 1L
the river drives. The "big
wheel" succeeded the travois
sled and rivaled the sleigh, mak
ing summer logging, and civil
ization entered the camps. But
the sleigh haul and the river
drive remained the romance of
the woods.
sack full of phonies was forgot
ten by the maker and were later
found by another trusty who
passed them on to his unlicensed
spouse.
Hid in Hamper
A couple of convicts hid them
selves in a hamper aboard a
truck load of prison-laundered
linen bound for the state tuber
culosis hospital in Portland and
got outside the walls into the
prison garage. There the truck
was to be driven to Portland at
midnight. But guards missed the
two, made a check and found
them. But it was an intriguing
try attempting to make a wean
getaway in a load of laundry.
A guard got behind in his fis
cal affairs and made a long
chance attempt to some quick
cash by smuggling a gun, a few
rounds of ammunition and some
dynamite inside the prison. The
explosive contraband .was hid
den in a cell. Prison authorities
discovered it before it could be
smuggled to the three men in the
bull pen who were going to
make the escape try" It is sur
mised they planned to use the
dynamite to blast the rail gate
through which freight cars pass
in and out of the prison. The gun
was to stage that benefit holdup.
The guard is still working with
in the walls but without pay
and in prison garb for his part
in the escape plot.
These are all recent screwball
business. But the Rube Goldberg
of them all occured during war
years when one convict master
winded a plot to burn down the
prison flax plant in the hope
of more paroles. There was a
manpower shortage then, re
member? And the convict reas
oned like this:
Made Fire Bomb
The parole board wasn't
granting paroles because the
prison needed men to man the
flax plant. Ergo, burn down the
plant and the state wouldn't
need the men and so would
parole them.
He made a fire bomb by wrap
ping string he got in the laundry
where he worked, into ball with
a few matches at the score. He
persuaded one of the men work
ing in the flax plant to drop this
fire bomb in a pile of tow in the
flax plant just before quitting
time. The con did so without de
tection. The string burned slow
ly round and round like a fuse.
When the smoulder reached the
matches voom! Fire in the flax
plant! Two hours or so after all
the men were locked within
their cells. Sure looked like an
accident.
But the state police arson
squad went out, anyhow, to
make a routine check, and it
took them all of five minutes
to uncork the plot.
And what do you know? No
paroles!
Monday. March 31. 1SS2
MEDFORD (OREGON) MAIL TRIBUNE THREE
Iroquois Still Practice Sacrifice
Washington (U.R) Sacri-arie in the last half of the seven-
fices to ghosts still survive in
the Iroquois nation despite the
inroads of the white man's so
ciety. '
The principal act of faith still
practiced by the Iroquois is the
feast of the dead. The ritual is
based on the belief that members
of the tribe have two souls one
that enters the spirit land, leav
ing behind all concern with af
fairs of the world, and the other
that remains earthbound, circu
lating among the living.
It is to this second soul or
"ghost" that sacrifices of burned
offerings, food, music and dances
are made, says the Smithsonian
Institution. Any illness, real or
imaginary, called "ghost disease"
is attributed to some dissatisfied
ghost and good cause for the
various "feasts. The general
features of the ritual for any
cause are essentially the same.
This great and elaborate cere
monial was witnessed chiefly by
French explorers and mission-
teenth century. Since that time,
however, few outsiders have seen
the "feast" ritual because con
temporary Indian generations
have tended to modify and re
strict the occasion to single
tribes, communities, or families.
GOT MORE THAN COFFEE
Syracuse, N. Y. (U.R) He was
only "in search of a cuppa cof
fee," pleaded Frank S. Ilacqua,
41, when police nabbed him in a
diner after closing hours. Skepti
cal detectives charged Ilacqua
with burglary when they found
on him: Two wrenches, two
screwdrivers, one hammer, $1.08
from the cash register and 18
nickels from a pin ball machine.
NOT FOR GARDEN USE
Corinth, Miss. (U.R) One
mistake cost Mrs. G. B. Voyles'
children their vegetable garden.
fertilizer. J
Lamps Proposed To
Dry Playing Fields
' Cleveland, O. (U.R) Heat
lamps, long a standby In sports
dressing rooms for lame athletes,
are moving out into Vie playing
field.
At least Robert T. Dorsey,
sports lighting expert far West
inghouse, believes it is possible.
Dorsey contends that if infra
red lamps are used to dry off
wet playing fields, a great many
games would not have to be post
poned. "
The technique of drying play
ing fields by infra-red lamps has
been used at least once and Dor
sey considers it a success. That
was last November before the
game between the University of
California and Stanford.
In addition to drying off soggy
gridirons and baseball diamonds
and helping ' heal aches and
sprains, Dorsey suggests that infra-red
lamps also be used to
keep players warm on the bench.
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