Utilizing the Mayor

Dec. 1919

Several infuriated citizens took it on themselves to jump all over Mayor Chamberlin last week because of a current rumor that "the rest of the towns were getting all the coal they needed," says the Pleasant Hill (Mo.) Times. But the mayor took it good-naturedly and said that's what a mayor is for.


"Nobody Home."

Real prosperity item from the Springfield (Mo.) Leader: Despite the cold weather in Springfield during the past week, the city jail has not yet had any of its "annual guests" who apply for refuge from the elements. The record made by the city's "hotel" so far this year has been remarkable, Chief Rathbone said, as in previous years the holdover usually was in great demand by persons known to the police department as "sleepers."

Gum Chewing Girls Bother Movie Fan

1920

Their Jaws Work So Rapidly That His View Is Obstructed

UNIONTOWN, N. Y. — Andrew Touser is the movie bug of the village. Touser has not missed a picture since the show was started five years ago, but he threatens to quit if the management does not draw the line on the girls chewing gum during the performance.

Recently Touser entered a protest. He says that every night several young ladies take seats in front of him; that they do not remove their hats and as soon as they are seated commence to chew gum. Touser states that the girls work their jaws so rapidly that their hats bob up and down, thus obscuring his view. He says it is the bobbing of their hats which bothers him.

Manager H. H. Whaley promised Touser that he would talk to the girls and try to get them to give up the practice of chewing gun in the house.


Oldest Dog Is Registered

Canine Aged 19 Now Has Gray Hair Instead of Black

SANDUSKY, Ohio — The oldest dog in Erie County was registered for taxation here recently. It has just passed its 19th birthday, and is the property of H. M. Andress of Vermillon. When he came to the line in the application for registration referring to color, Andress wrote: "He was black, but he now has so many gray hairs that he is an iron gray in color."

When the Waltz Was New

1916

I have a letter in my possession written by a friend to my great-grandmother in the year 1817, at Christmas time, in which the lady expresses her grave disapproval of the "modern" tendency toward rapid dancing. The paragraph runs as follows:

"I was yester evening at your Cousin Betty's, where I was much struck with the new fashioned dances, which seemed, to me at any rate, to be out of keeping with the propriety and modesty which we look for in young ladies of our class. I can only regret the disappearance of those 'mazurkas' and 'gavottes' as well as the 'minuets' and hope that these new dances or 'valses,' as I think they are named, will quickly disappear from respectable society." —Letter in London Telegraph

—Stevens Point Daily Journal, Stevens Point, Wisconsin, July 29, 1916, page 3.

Mothers and Flappers Agree That Modern Man Is Lacking In Morality

Appleton, Wisconsin, 1922

Two Letters Indicate That Women Do Not Think Much of Young Men of Today as Material for Husbands — Fears for Boys

We have been too hard on the modern man, perhaps, in saying that he is absolutely unfit to marry the modern girl, worldly wise and frank to a fault as she is. Surely many young married women and engaged girls must feel that our tirade against men like their husbands and fiancés is unjust and untrue. They are happily certain that the men whom they have chosen are all that can be desired in a husband and father for their children.

You women who feel that the modern man measures up to standard have as much to say in his favor as those women who claim that of all the applicants for their hands, none has been suitable as a husband. Tell the readers of the Appleton Post Crescent that your man was worth marrying and that you wouldn't exchange places with any girl who spends her days from 8 to 5 in a stuffy office or crowded store.

One reader of the Post Crescent sends this emphatic statement about the men of her acquaintance.

"Dear Editor — It is with great pleasure that I accept your invitation to express my opinion of the modern young man as a husband. I, for my part, would not marry the modern young man if it were the last chance on earth to get a husband. Who would want to marry a man that stands on the street corners, stares at ladies from the heels up and passes lewd remarks? The men remark about short skirts. In the olden times all women wore short skirts but the men did not think this a reason for insult.

"The modern man invites a girl out and if she doesn't permit kissing he calls her a stiff. It also seems as if they cannot enjoy themselves without a flask in the hip pocket, especially when at a dance and cannot refrain from smoking in ladies' presence. I do not know what it looks like to see a man tip his hat when greeting a lady. It simply isn't being done. And I think the reason why these men refuse to marry the modern flapper is that they cannot pull the wool over their eyes, because the flapper is too wise." — "NINETEEN"

And a more mature woman has this to say about the modern bachelor who is nearing 50.

"Dear Editor — Your contest interested me from the first and I have been giving it considerable thought because I have two sons of my own. My determination to write my opinion crystallized at a dancing place recently where the antics of an elderly "man about town" were nothing short of disgusting. My only hope for my boys is that they marry girls who will make them into men if I have failed to do so and keep them from being a menace to society such as this man is.

"He brought a rather young dancing companion and upon entering the ballroom, she went at once to the women's rest room to remove her wraps. The "old man with the young ideas" checked his hat and coat more speedily and spied a couple of men of his acquaintance who were with loud talking and evidently intoxicated women. Without hesitation he went at once to them and began dancing almost immediately with the better looking of the women.

"He continued to dance with her for at least 20 minutes and their exhibition was anything but encouraging to a moralist. In the meantime his poor little companion returned from the dressing room and sat forlornly waiting for him to return. The poor child looked as though she wanted to cry and who could blame her?

"And this man is the financially able suitor for the hand of some little girl, flapper though she be, who should not be allowed to be seen on the street with him. Let me repeat again, I hope nice girls will marry my boys and keep them from development into the type which has occasioned that now overworked statement: 'No fool like an old fool.'" — "A MOTHER."

You have to read these letters with interest. Write what you think of the modern man, young or old, as a husband for the modern girl who is just what men have made her. Your identify will not be disclosed in any way.

—Appleton Post-Crescent, Appleton, Wisconsin, January 3, 1922, page 9.

Refused 15 Cents Refused 15 Cents For Haircut, Man Asks For Divorce

La Crosse, Wisconsin, 1917

James B. Taylor is what some women would call a "model husband." He admits that every month he brought home his pay envelope to Friend Wife, whom her fond parents had christened Rena, and it seemed natural to him that he should have some rights with respect to the contents of the package for which he worked hard six days of the week, but—

She refused to give him 15 cents for a hair cut and once she hit him over the head with a book because he failed to account for 80 cents of his wages.

Those are the allegations which he makes in a divorce complaint filed in circuit court here Monday. James charges his wife with being "penurious, stingy and miserly" and nagging him for eight years. On top of that he charges that she admitted being in love with one Joe Crockeroff and also names one Louis Kinnear. both non-residents. The complaint recites that she left her husband to keep house for an uncle at Kendall, telling her provider that she "could not live with him if he was the last man in the world."

—The La Crosse Tribune and Leader-Press, La Crosse, Wisconsin, January 23, 1917, page 1.