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About Medford mail tribune. (Medford, Or.) 1909-1989 | View Entire Issue (March 22, 1960)
1 g MAIL TRIBUNE, Medford, Or. Tue$day, March 22, 1960 Fire Truck Crash Fatal to Captain Denver-(UPD-A fire captain was killed and seven persons were injured Sunday when a speeding fire truck, respond ing to a false alarm, collided with an automobile near downtown Denver. Capt. Robert W. Parrahm, 39, was killed when he was pinned between the car and the overturned fire truck. RECORD AMOUNT Salem -IUPD- The state pub lic welfare recovery division last month took in $23,810, the largest amount collected in the history of the program. Entertainment Seen No Longer Diversion But Goal for Pleasure-Loving Americans Our Glut of Pleasure "Let's live it up!" has be come the password of our time. And we might possibly do just that. When any nation has become overly pleasure seeking, history has already begun its epitaph. "Eat, drink and be merry," shouted the Romans, "for tomorrow you may die." And on the morrow Rome died. Entertainment has become one of our basic goals; not just a diversion, a momentary relaxation, so that we can re charge our batteries for the important goals of living. En tertainment has become a goal REVIVAL Continues This Week, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, 8 P.M. (No Meeting Friday Night) Evangelist ALLEN L. CRABTREE Special Music Every Meeting, Vocal and Instrumental APOSTOLIC FAITH CHURCH N. Central at 3rd, Medford Loyce C. Carver, Pastor Phone SP 2-2757 F T -ll II 111! UP Tl HI 1 "M $ M'i I K in itself. Some of our best television programs die be cause they're' not "entertain ing enough," while entertain ment drivel of the tinniest quality keeps a nation mes merized for hours every eve ning. "What are you trying to do - entertain your selves to death?" a visiting European sociologist asked a colleague over here. "No, I'm afraid it's just our passion for escape," the col league answered. "Escape? That's a good one!" the European rejoined. "You have the richest, most bountiful civiljzation in all of history, and you have the most satisfying way of life in the world - to hear you talk of it - and yet all you want to do is escape!" Templed by Pleasure? Think of it a moment. What do we have here, a Siberia, that so many of us spend so much time "escaping"? Or have we, like errant civilization? before us, been tempted into a glut of pleas ure simply because so much is so easily available? Have we just kept sopping it up? While over our shoulder looms the lengthening shadow of a rival culture which sternly hews to its labors, with little time for pleasure - seeking, aspiring to topple us. we made a name for our selves in the past through the sweat of many brows. We ww-kml is A 1 Giant corkscrews help speed new phone lines into service It often used to take a phone crew a full day to put up five or six telephone poles. But today, with the help of huge power augers, a crew can easily dig holes and set 15 poles in a day. This is an example of the tools we develop to do the job better and faster. For saving time on the job helps us give you the most value for your telephone dollar. Pacific Telephone-Northwest PART OF THE NATION-WIDE BELL SYSTEM earned the plaudits of the world. Now that we're on top it may be time to heed John Ruskin's warning: "The great est efforts of the race have always been traceable to the love of praise, as its greatest catastrophes to the love of pleasure." Our pursuit of kicks, sen sation, and the soft, indulgent life has produced in many, as it must, an inner emptiness. We have the highest level of living in the world and prob ably also the highest level of neurosis. We offer every form of pleasure-producing escapism, and when the jag of it wears off we offer a bottle of hap piness pills. When these wear off, those who can afford it go to psychiatrists. We Avoid Work "What can I do? I've tried all the things that are sup posed to make me happy and I'm miserable," says the patient. "Have you tried accomplish ing something? If you did something worth while you might like yourself better. Then you'd feel happier," says the doctor. How we have perfected the art of avoiding work and ex ertion! We have turned the genius of our drawing boards and factories to the creation of labor - saving devices of every kind; we have put our economic brains to the task of producing leisure, leisure, and more leisure; we have shorten ed the day, cut down the work, and made it a sin of the first sociological magnitude to require any individual to take the slightest overdose of that horrible potion known as toil. The venerable Albert Sch weitzer made his own com ment recently on our passion for avoiding exertion - a com ment without words. In Brus sels last November to receive an award for humanitarian ism, Schweitzer saw ahead of him both a staircase and a moving stairway in the build ing where the award was to be conferred. He, at age 85, chose the staircase. Dignitaries who were es corting him quickly got the message and followed Sch weitzer up the stairs all but a few officials who had gone ahead and were already, some what abashed, gliding upward at their ease. Far Enough Schweitzer was not making a case against moving stair ways (they re wonderful in department stores and big buildings). He was merely saying to fellow humans, in his inimitable, unpredictable way, "Haven't we gone far enough in this worship of ease? Let's not be afraid of a little effort and exertion." We have succeeded so well in our production of ease that in some instances - we have overshot the mark and de veloped a breed of people who get mired down emotionally in the leisure of it all. We have to give them occupa tional therapy" - work medicine. Samuel Johnson wrote in the 18th century, "Labor, if it were not necessary to the ex istence, would be indispensa ble to the happiness of man." Modern psychiatry recog nizes this every time an emo tionally mixed up patient is put to work doing something productive. Worthwhile ac complishment is the greatest happiness pill there is. Why so? Here one can liter ally answer, "Only God knows." For this is one of the mysteries He built into us. We see the results. We see, re peatedly, the jaded emptiness of people who get too much and give too little. We know the playboy idler is unhappy. We're familiar with the night c 1 u b neurotic, the painful pleasure - seeker. We are aware of the coddled woman who is given everything she asks for but is strangely un able to discover any joy in life. A 'Personal Evaluator' It is as though God has built into us a "personal evalu ator" just as He built in a conscience. It sums us up, in side ourselves. If it decides that we have worked hard, accomplished something worthwhile (or at least tried hard), and thus earned our pleasure - it lets us have that pleasure. But if this mystical force within us sees that we have earned nothing it will give nothing. We can go to fancy places, spend gobs of money, gorge ourselves with entertainment - and still be unhappy. It is a verdict we pass upon ourselves. "I force my son to work hard, even though he kicks like a steer and tries to get out of it," a wise father said to me. "You see, I know that after the work's done he'll feel all good inside at having done it. If I let him loaf, he'd enjoy the loafing while it lasted but feel miserable af terward." A golfer I know remarked, "It's a funny thing, but if I take a day off to play golf and don't feel I've really earn ed it, I just can't enjoy the game. But, on the other hand, when I've been working like blazes and feel very good about what I've accomplish ed, I can knock off a day for golf and enjoy every minute of it." A metropolitan newspaper recently carried a classified ad by a man who had retired with a $20,000-a-year income for the rest of his life. He was looking for work. Wasn't Happy "I've tried a dozen ways of being happy - some of the finest pleasures I know: hunt ing, sailing, travel, marvelous restaurants, theater, ball games, races - the works. But they're nothing. I feel like a free loader," the man explain ed. "I'll never get a kick out of those pleasures until I get back to doing some work, earning my keep." The man got a job in the trust department of a bank. Six months later he told a friend, "I get more pleasure now out of sailing, or just loafing on Saturdays than I used to when I could go pleas ure - seeking seven days a week." The very satisfaction a man feels when he has worked and worked well is the living indication that work is good for the human species. Con versely, the gnawing inner feeling of worthless ness, amounting often to neurosis, which besets the loafer and free-loader is another indica tion that God intended man to pull his weight. Must Earn Happiness "Work is given to men not only because the world needs it, but because the workman needs it," wrote the Scottish philosopher, Henry Drum mond. Work has been slighted in our time. It's been regarded as a necessary evil, to be duck ed as skillfully as possible, whenever possible. Like naive children, we haven't wanted to enter the contest; all we wanted were the prizes. There is a very big contest going on in the world right now. wot just a materialistic competition to "catch up, stav ahead, or outstrip. But a more important contest to find man's best way of living. Thomas Carlyle gave us one clue to it: "Even the meanest sort of labor, the whole soul of a man is composed into a kind of real harmony the in stant he sets himself to work." He's earning his happiness. Tomorrow Let's Find God (Distributed by The Register and Tribune Syndicate) Great-Great-Grandpa Never Spanks Kids Dallas, Tex. - Grant Lund, 96, said he has seven children, 36 grandchildren, 164 great grandchildren and 19 great- great-grandchildren. "I never spanked a child in my life," he volunteered. Edmund E Hass Vice-President Heine Northwest Compact SUITE 303, FLUHRER BLDG. PHONE SP 3-7319 5 SOUTH CENTRAL AVENUE Consult With Mr. Hass on Investment and Retirement Programs Using the' Securities of . . . Utilities Banks Insurance Industrial Mutual Fund Shares Other offices in Portland, Salem, Eugene, Seattle, Spokane, Tacoma, Aberdeen, Bellingham, Yakima, Weiiatchee and Walla Walla. Cop's For for Music Catches a Burglar Essex Center, Vt. A po Jiceman's ear for music help ed catch a burglar. The officer heard a radio playing in the coat of a young man and ask ed him where he got it. The youth said he took the radio as security for a loan to a friend. The friend admitted that he had obtained the radio when he broke into a house the pre vious night. FREE OF PESTS Hamilton Bermuda is a land free of snakes, poisonous spiders and rabbits. Make Your Own ! University Alumni To Elect Officers Eugene - Joe A. McKeown, University of Oregon gradu ate of the class of 1929 and a member of the executive com mittee of the Alumni associa tion since 1957, has been nom inated for the position of pres ident of the University of Ore gon Alumni association. McKeown is an attorney in Coos Bay and one of three state commissioners on uni form state laws. Nominated as vice president of the associa tion is Judge A. T. Goodwin, former circuit judge of Lane county who recently was named to the supreme court bench of Oregon. A' mail ballot will be held during spring term for elec tion of the officers. ROBS PRAYING WOMAN Richmond, Va. -(UFO- John James Neeman, 21, pleaded guilty Monday to charges he beat and robbed Mrs. Francis Solari as she knelt in prayer at the altar of a Roman Cath olic Church. Sentence was not passed immediately. Cor Wouldn't Start For Logical Reason Omaha, Neb. - There wa one good reason why Norma Briller's car wouldn't start, he told police. Someone had stolen the fuel injection system. NEED 220-100 AMP SERVICE LET SEARS ARRANGE INSTALLATION JL AS LOW AS Nothing Down, 3 Years To Pay On Sears Modernizing Credit Plan Includes: Service for Range, Dryer and Hot Water Tank Up to 30 Feet Each. Plus 8 Circuits. PHONE SP 3-6661 FOR FREE ESTIMATES Does your room need a new look? Rejuvenate your chairs, sofas with fresh slip covers that you have made. Easy to make with these clear step-by-step directions. Instructions 7168: directions for slipcovers for chairs, sofas. 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