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About Medford mail tribune. (Medford, Or.) 1909-1989 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 16, 1955)
Meteorite Ownership By J. HUGH PRUITT Pacific N. W. Director, American Meteor Society Interest aplenty has been aroused by recent reports In the press regarding the nine-pound rock which came tumbling down from the high heavens over Ala bama one afternoon late last November. It tore a three-foot hole in a roof at Sylacauga where Hulitt Hodges and his wife were living, bounced off a radio and severely bruised Mrs. Hodges, who was resting on a sofa. Almost immediately the Air Force took possession of the celestial missile for examination. Reports at Christmas time indi cated that some institutions had offered $5000 for the bruising meteorite, although the Smith sonian Institution had said it was not worth $500. The house where the Hodges lived they have now settled elsewhere was rented property. The owner, Mrs. Birdie Guy, has 'filed suit to get possession of the unique sky rock. Mrs. Hodges says, "It's mine!" Each side has retained legal help, o Other Noted Cases . There are two noted meteorite possession cases on record in the uniisa oiaies. me earner one was the 'Wennebaao case in Iowa. The tenant on a rented property had seen the actual descent of a comparatively small meteorite which buried itself three feet in the ground. The next day the tenant dug it up and assumed ownership. .Later he sold it. The owner of the land, finding such objects were valuable, claimed it was his and brought suit for its recovery. After several years of litigation, the courts decided "such objects belong to the owner of the soil upon which they fall." A still more noted case was that of the famous Willamette meteorite, almost 16 tons of metal, the largest object of this kind ever found In the United States and Canada, and the fifth in size for the entire world. In the fall of 1902 Ellis Hughes near Oregon City, Ore., recog nized as meteoritic this huge mass which rested on the prop erty of the Oregon Iron and Steel company adjacent to his own land. Trusted No On In 1903 Hughes reasoning that "possession is nine points of the law" decided to move the mass to a spot near his own house, three fourths of a mile away. He trusted no one to help him except his wife, his 15-year-old boy and his horse. After three months of hard work he had brought the meteor ite to its destination,-ready for display for a fee. Soon the com pany from whose land the ob ject had been moved brought suit to recover it. While the case was in the circuit court, public sympathy was generally with Hughes. The plaintiff was finally awarded the meteorite by the court's decision. After the award the defend ant appealed the case to the Oregon supreme court. This court on July 7, 1905, announced: "Meteorites, though not im bedded in the earth, are real estate and consequently belong to the owner of the land on which they are found . . . Seeing there is no error in the record, the judgment of the circuit court will be affirmed." Um Mail Tribune Want Ada Wheat, Hay, Rye Stocks on Oregon Farms on Decrease Portland (U.R) Wheat, hay and rye crops stocked on Oregon farms showed a marked decrease in the Jan. 1 census taken by the U. S. Dept. of Agriculture. The USDA Marketing Service said Saturday, however, the drop was offset by increased storage of oats, barley and corn. Totals Listed Wheat stocks totalled 5,755, 000 bushels on Jan. 1 as com pared to 7,546,000 bushels a year ago. Hay was down from 1,306,- 000 tons in 1954 to 1,250,000 m 1955. Rye storage dropped from 128,000 to 83,000. Barley stocks showed the greatest gain during the period, rising from 2,673,000 bushels in 1954 to 4,364,000 on Jan. 1, 1955. Oats rose from 4,017,000 to 5,131,000. Corn was up from 359,000 to 497,000 bushels. Longest on Records The USDA said the 2,302,000 bushels of corn held on North west farms was the largest on record. The total was 33 per cent larger than last year and almost double the average. On a na tional level, the corn crop was slightly below the figures re ported last year. Elsewhere, the northwest trends followed the same pat tern as in Oregon. The greatest east-west dis tance across Texas is 773 miles from Newton county to El Paso county. mi S2 ei .... X1' When You Make A Habit of Drinking 9 77 II A . ... PREMIUM E1ILK M Nearly 10 More Food Value jkw Ufa GD2Q33 0j0MB3 iftUH'0! 1 MJ RINK LOTS of the milk that has such a gen erous measure of "what it takes" to build hardi ness and health. Jorgensen's ALL JERSEY PREM IUM MILK has near 60 MORE energy units per quart than ordinary milk - has MORE VITAMINS above the cream lino. MORE calcium, protein and sugar below the deep cream line. Drink it at meals and between meals . youll LIKE IT - You'll FEEL BETTERI At Your Grocer or Phone 2-7191 for Daily Delivery Is That So? Humans may think that some members of society ere low- down parasites but as far as some of the lower orders are concerned, Minnie the Moocher was an open-handed philanthro pist. In fact, the most ruthless gangster is a soft-hearted sissy in comparison. Consider the skua, a gull. It gets its food by power-diving other birds. The frightened vic- tis disgorge their partially di gested meal in mid-aif while the skua gobbles it up with' such dexterity that the handout sel dom hits the water's surface. Even the most crass human male preying upon widows main tains a show of independence: not so an angler fish which in habits the dark mid-water of oceans. Up until 1932 no one really knew where the male kept himself only females were captured. Then, one day a 40-inch-long female angler fish was captured near Iceland and at tached to . her side was a little four-inch fish. You guessed it, the male. Another female, no more than two-and-a-half inches long had a tiny two-fifth-inch male attached. In both these females, the males had gripped them with their mouths, and the lips and tongues had united with the fe males' skins, becoming complete ly fused. Mouth, jaws, teeth, gills and fins indeed almost all the organs except those connect ed with reproduction had de generated in the males and they were nourished wholly by the blood of .the females which coursed through their bodies. Since then, many other such paired fish have been captured. Rides Inside Female The male bonellia hasn't even as much pride as the angler fish: he spends most of his undignified life riding around inside of the female, attached to her excretory organ. The tapeworm is another voracious parasite which when given an inch takes an all. It doesn't even make the pretense of digesting his food. Without a digestive tract, in fact, it sim ply latches on to the digestive tract of animals and soaks up its food juices almost like blotting paper. Thriving on this diet, it may grow -to be 10 feet long. A tiny beetle simply hitch hikes on the heads of worker termites and when nutritive liquids are passed by mouth from nurse to worker, it imbibes free ly. . To those tired of paddling their own canoe, or powering the canoe of others, such a para sitic existence may sound idyllic. But is it? When one animal has worked out such a favorable ex istence for itself, others are quick to pounce upon it. As a result, most parasites are infested with much smaller parasites and these in turn may support a host of still smaller ones. "The great fleas have little fleas upon their backs to bite 'em, and the little fleas have lesser fleas. And so ad "infinitum." Might Kill Host Because a parasite can seldom live long if it exceeds the host in size should it harm the host too much, it might kill him end thus in turn itself . As a result, parasites are usually compara tively small and it is not unusual for one host to support many tiny parasites and these in turn to support many more much tinier. - This business of mooching upon others seems to be almost as old as life itself. Perhaps as soon as the first free-living organisms arose on earth, a num ber adapted themselves to this comparatively easy form of de pendency after all, as far as the moocher is concerned, it's an advantageous, economical way of life. Degenerate in practically all ways, the parasites excell how ever in one department. Because they have difficulty in getting from a dead host to a live one, the death rate is high. To sur vive, they have developed a fan tastic reproductive rate, much greater than that of their hosts. As a consequence, counting the vast ; number, of tiny parasites living upon one another, the par asitic animals in this world may well outnumber the nonparasitic in individuals, if not in species. (Copyright, 1954, by Eugene Burns) , (Released by McClure. Newspaper Syndicate) By Eugene Burns Ranger-Naturalist Free: By special arrangement with the editors of the Enclo pedia Americana, my panel of judges will award .each week to the reader who sends me the best question on nature and wild life a complete 30-volume set of this world - famous reference work' in a handsome Sealcraft binding. Each week, new ques tions will be considered. Sorry, I simply can't answer your many friendly letters. Please address your questions to: IS THAT SO! care Medford Mail Tribune, P.O. Box 575, Sausalito, Calif. In the Day's News By FRANK JENKINS Interesting note from Salem: The nine members of the house tax committee, of the Oregon legislature who are faced with the task of finding $63,000,000 in new revenue for the next two yean, went back to school to learn all about taxation. The school will run five days a week for 23 days, with sessions starting at 8:30 a. m. Outside experts are being called in - to lecture to the committee. The first one, scheduled to speak to day on "Theories of Taxation," is Dr. C. Ward Macy of the fac ulty of the University of Ore gon. The dispatch adds that the instruction course is necessary because only one of the nine members of the committee ever served on a tax committee be EXPERTS or no experts, I have an idea that in the long run the legislature will fall back on the ancient principle that "that system of taxation is best which gets the most feathers from the goose with the least squawking.'.' BUT Seriously ' I hope these experts who are instructing the members of the committee on taxation of the Oregon house of representatives go rather exhaustively into the effects of taxation on industrial development. Everyone who has ever had anything to do with efforts to balance . Oregon's economy by bringing more industrial develop ment to the state has run into the fact that the tax systems of all of Oregon's neighbors (with the possible exception of Idaho) are MORE FAVORABLE TO IN DUSTRY than Oregon's system. That is a serious roadblock in the way of further industrial development. SPEAKING of tax problems, here is a typical one from Washington: "Congressional reaction - to President Eisenhower's federal pay raise proposals seems to be generally favorable. Most mem bers apparently support the idea of giving prompt increase to fed eral employees, but the compan ion proposal to increase postal rates has met considerable resistance.". llfELL, gentlemen, it's as broad ' as it's long. If you raise wages without raising postal rates the increase will come out of the pocket in which the people keep their tax money. If you raise postal rates, the increase will come out of the pocket in which they keep their' stamp money. In either event, the people pay the bill. Fhis postal message this week, , President Eisenhower said that second-class postal rates which apply on newspapers and magazines should be increased "until such matter makes a fair and reasonable contribution to postal revenues.". With that statement I am in complete agreement. If news papers and magazines are car ried at a loss in the mails, it amounts to a subsidy. As one newspaper publisher, I want NO subsidies. Incidentally, less than ten per cent of this newspaper's circula tion is carried in the mails at second-class rates. . Two Performances Set By Circus January 27 Afternoon and evening per formances of Kaye Brothers In door circus have been scheduled for Medford on. Thursday, Jan. 27, it was announced Saturday by members of the Medford 20 30 club, which is sponsoring the shows here. Scheduled on the program, which will be held in the sen ior high school auditorium, are performing dogs, ponies, a baby elephant, jugglers, wire walkers and clowns. Tickets may be obtained at the door or from members if the 20-30 club. Returned to Medford Dr. ROBTV E. LEE, Optometrist 7 OFFICES NOW OPEN AT THE BIG Y MARKET BUILDING 1912 N. Pacific Hwy. EASY PARKING Phone 3-5923 Sunday, January IB, 1ISS MEDFORD (OREOOK) MAE. TRIBUNE FIVE Change in Oregon's Law on Bids Studied Salem (U.R) Officials of the State Finance department and the attorney 'general were re ported Saturday to be studying a change in the state law which would allow bids with erasures to be accepted. Finance Director ; Harry S. Dorman said the plan under study would allow the bid to be accepted providing the change does not affect the figure or basic specifications. Dorman said he thought the idea behind the existing law was basically sound, but that if it was modified, the state would be able to save considerable sums of money. Recently a controversy de veloped when a state tire bid was thrown out because of an erasure, despite the fact that it was lower than any of the others received. Added Financing Of Natural Gas Set Seattle U.R) Two officers of the Cascade Natural Gas Corp., which serves 17 commun ities in Washington, Oregon and Idaho, left this week for New York to complete arrangements for financing a $7,000,000 ex pansion program, the firm an nounced Friday. . Stewart Matthews, president, and C. Spencer Clark, chairman of the board of directors, were to talk with investment bankers and underwriters in preparation for the company's program of financing . which includes the proposed issuance of 170,000 shares of common stock in addi tion to common shares already outstanding. The firm said the expansion contemplates a 300 per cent in crease in company employment and increase in sales activities 30 times greater than at present, after the arrival of natural gas in the Pacific Northwest. 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