Flag Again On Pike's Peak

1916

Thanks to a Patriotic Kansas City Woman.

KANSAS CITY, Missouri — Mrs. Emma Howell, 2614 Olive Street, while on her vacation in Colorado this summer, stirred Colorado Springs to provide funds for keeping the American flag waving above the summit house on top of Pike's Peak. It is said to be the highest point in the world where the Stars and Stripes are displayed regularly.

While on the peak, Mrs. Howell noted the absence of the flag. She asked about it when in Colorado Springs and was told a flag was whipped out by the wind on the mountain top in a few weeks and "it cost so much to buy new ones."

"For shame," the Kansas City woman said. And when she was asked to address a meeting of an auxiliary of the G. A. R. she advocated obtaining a permanent fund to buy flags. The money was found.

Mrs. Howell is a member of the women's auxiliary of the Sons of Veterans here.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Sept. 16, 1916, p. 3.

Crippled By Fall on Ice

1919

Fractured Bone Can Never Heal, Say Physicians.

DENVER, Colorado — Joe H. Ruffner, widely known mining man, secretary of the Sons of Colorado, will be crippled for life as a result of falling off a patch of ice, according to the report of a physician who made an X-ray examination.

Ruffner is 49 years old. The fall resulted in a fracture of the femur bone of the hip, of such character that it can never heal, according to the examining surgeon.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Jan. 3, 1920, p. 12.

Fiendish Mexicans Slug American Boy

1919

BANDIT ASSAULTS HIM WITH CLUB AFTER ROBBERY.

Victim Tells of His Escape After Three Days of Torture in a Lonely Shack.

DENVER, Colo. — After three days of terror in the custody of two Mexican bandits, who on the third day slugged and robbed him and left him for dead, Granville Coster, 18-year-old Denver boy who disappeared recently from Allison, N. M., has turned up alive at the office of the Allison Coal Company, by which he was employed as a truck driver, according to word received by his mother, Mrs. William Coster, of this city.

Five hundred and twenty dollars, which he was taking to Gallup for deposit in the Gallup State Bank, was taken from him by the bandits. According to his story, he reached Gallup and was driving his delivery truck into the suburbs when two Mexicans sprang from the side of the road into the truck, jerked the curtains down, drew their guns and ordered him to drive according to their direction. He was compelled to drive across the Arizona border, fifteen miles away.

"Just over the line we came to a farm house," said Coster. "The Mexicans told me if I made a sound they would kill me. We got out of the truck, and they made me walk the whole distance to Winslow, more than 100 miles. We arrived there the morning of the third day.

"They took me into an old shack on the outskirts of the town. They had already taken the money from me. One of them grabbed a club from the floor and struck me over the head with it. That's all I know."

The boy did not regain consciousness until evening. He staggered into Winslow, where he fortunately found friends, who supplied him with enough money to return to Allison. The bandits took everything from him except a bunch of keys, he said.

Coster has been employed driving a delivery truck from Allison to Gallup three times a week. The day before he was kidnaped he carried $5,000 to the Gallup bank.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Jan. 3, 1920, p. 7.

A Use for Grasshoppers

Editorial observations, 1910

A Colorado farmer has gathered 125 bushels of grasshoppers, which he intends to dry, so that they may be used for chicken feed next winter. Since a use has been found for grasshoppers we may expect future crops of them to be failures.

A new comet has been discovered. There ought to be a stop put to this. If the former one brought about all the trouble which has been going on the earth since, we can spare any more of these heavenly mischief makers for some time to come. And those who are looking for trouble and read their answer in the stars should be legally enjoined, at least until the world has had time to catch its breath.

Look over your small change carefully; there are several counterfeit five-dollar bills in circulation.

Owing to the fact that their wives are away for the summer a good many men are almost forgetting how to button waists up the back.

Cincinnati surgeons are to amputate a citizen's six-inch nose. To use a Pittsburgh word, the gentleman really is "nobby."

No picnic can claim to have been destroyed by rainy weather this season.

Hearing for the Deaf on Pike's Peak

Editorial briefs, Sept. 1910

A deaf man who climbed Pike's Peak found he could hear at that altitude. But the difficulty of the cure practically lies in the fact that it takes up his residence where he can hear there will be nobody for him to listen to.

Tarred, feathered and bitten is the New Jersey variation according to that story of the victim wbo was left thus scantily attired as the prey of the mosquitoes.

When a young married couple go away by aeroplane on their honeymoon their destination is sufficiently uncertain to fulfill all the requirements.

Perhaps the same fellows who are searching for germs in ice cream this summer will be hunting for them in our buckwheat cakes next winter.

If they insist on confiscating ice cream cones the small boy and some big ones, too, will be robbed of one of their most palatable enjoyments.

Will the insurance companies demand increased premiums from those who love to see the airships go round?

Takes Surname of Bride

1910

It is one thing to ask a girl to marry — quite another to ask her to change her name. So thinks the man who used to be John Melephant Williams. He loved Miss Agnes A. Wood, but it was as Agnes A. Wood that he loved her, and he did not desire to change her name to Agnes A. Williams. So he married Miss Agnes A. Wood recently, and her name is now Mrs. Agnes A. Wood.

Incredible as that looks on the face of it it is true, says the Denver Republican. For John Melephant Williams had his own name changed before the ceremony to John Melephant Wood. His petition for the change was granted by Judge Dixon of the county court. Without leaving the courthouse the man with the new identity went down to the first floor and signed his new name to an application for a marriage license.

—Gettysburg Compiler, Gettysburg, PA, July 20, 1910, p. 3.


She Knew Her Dick

He — Darling, I swear by this great tree, whose spreading branches shade us from the heat, by this noble tree I swear I have never loved before.
She — You always say such appropriate things, Dick. This is a chestnut tree!

—Gettysburg Compiler, Gettysburg, PA, July 20, 1910, p. 3.

Captured Baby Lynx

1905

W. W. Bridges of Athens, while hunting recently, came upon a peculiar track of some animal, which he followed. He captured the animal, which is pronounced by people who profess to know to be a baby lynx, a very fine specimen, weighing 22½ pounds and measuring four feet from tip to tip.


Boat Made From Paper

In Vienna a paper boat, sixteen feet long, has been built out of the back numbers of a leading daily paper of that city. Hull, spars and sails have all been made from the pulped brains of the literary staff. Four hundred thousand copies of this journal will make a yacht — sails and all.


Many Sheep From Colorado

One hundred thousand sheep will be prepared for the market this winter at the beet-sugar factories in the vicinity of Eaton, Greeley, Windsor, Longmount, Fort Collins and Loveland, Col. The beet pulp makes the best of feed for lambs.


Cost of Removing Snow

Removing snow in New York City is a large item in the city's annual expense bill. It costs about $35,000 for every inch of recorded snowfall. Last year it cost the city $755,000 to remove the snow from the streets. The average fall in New York is thirty inches, but though the snow season hardly has begun, twenty-three inches have fallen this winter, and the cost this season promises to reach considerably over $1,000,000.

Child Carried Off by An Eagle

1901

Child Rescued Half a Mile From Where the Bird Flew With Its Prey

Denver, Col., Jan. 31. — Tony Giovanni, a 2-year-old child, was seized and carried off by a gray eagle while playing in the yard of his home in a Denver suburb. The child's screams brought the father and two other men to the door of their home in time to see the bird and child disappear over the bluff of the Platte river. The men gave chase and saw the eagle alight on a small island covered with undergrowth, half a mile from the child's home. When the men arrived at the island the bird attempted to rise again with the boy, but his clothing caught in a bush and the eagle, seeing the men close at hand with clubs, dropped his prize and flew away.

—Davenport Daily Republican, Davenport, IA, Feb. 1, 1901, p. 3.