"Shooting the Moon"

1895

It is curious to remark how differently men of different races comport themselves in the presence of identical emergencies.

When an Irishman, for example, finds that he cannot pay his rent, he insists on remaining in his homestead all the same, and when an organized effort is made to turn him out he climbs up on to the roof of his domicile and throws hives of bees at the invaders.

When an Englishman finds himself in a similar predicament, he breaks the law by stealth — that is to say, he moves his furniture secretly, by midnight, to another lodging and leaves no address behind him.

And, as all the world knows, "shooting the moon" is the technical term for this nefarious performance. If one were asked by a stranger how the poor live in outcast London, one would have to answer that it is largely by "shooting the moon" that a great many of them are enabled to eke out a precarious subsistence. — London Graphic.


Fish We Have Learned to Eat

It is hard for the younger people to believe that so good a fish as the halibut was considered unfit for eating not very many years ago, yet many old fishermen yet live who remember when it was first offered in the market, selling then at 4 or 6 cents a pound. It was many years since that that the swordfish first found its way to the frying pan and the table, and a Rockland fisherman recalls the time when haddock were about as highly esteemed as sculpins are now. — Lewiston Journal.


Meaning of the Precious Stones

The meanings attached to the different precious stones are as follows: The garnet is constancy; the amethyst, sincerity; the bloodstone, courage; the sapphire, innocence; the emerald, success; the agate, long life; the carnelian, content; the pearl, tears; the diamond, purity; the opal, sorrow; the turquoise, happiness; the malachite, prosperity. — Ladies' Home Journal.

Women Venders In Paris

1895

The streets of Paris, particularly old Paris, are vocal with the mournful cries of women venders. They sing out the merits of newspapers, toys, fish, vegetables, fruits, flowers and small wares. Existence with many is a pitiful struggle, and poverty makes thief inventive.

After the marketing hours the greatest anxiety is caused by the perishable foods. Nothing is left untried to keep them from spoiling but ice, which is not to be had. One way of keeping up the appearance of the fish is painting the gills with cochineal or vermilion. Even the fresh fish are painted to quicken sales: Every now and then an unfortunate fishmonger is arrested, but she meekly takes the judge's lecture, pays a $10 fine and touches up her stock the very next morning. — Paris Letter.

Salmon and Ice Cream Cause Death

1920

BELLEFONTE, Pa. — Canned salmon and ice cream caused the death of Clarence Musser of Spring Mills. Musser and Eugene Slegel purchased some canned salmon; later they followed up the eating of the fish with some of the frozen cream. Both became very ill. Slegel recovered, but Musser died from the poisoning.

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

He Lands 95-Pound Catfish

1916

Winona Man's Catch Is Thought Season's Record.

WINONA, Minnesota. — William Dixon of this city made what is thought to be the season's record catch along the upper Mississippi, when he landed a catfish weighing 95 pounds, near Dresbach, this county. The fish measured four and a half feet from tip to tip. It is said to have been caught on a set line.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Sept. 16, 1916, p. 5.

Golf Ball Kills Big Carp

1916

Man Comes to Town With Remarkable Fish Story.

BEDFORD SPRINGS, Pennsylvania — E. S. Kuhn of the Stanton Heights Golf Club, Pittsburgh, told how when he was playing the third hole, which is across a water hazard, the other day his tee shot landed in the water and killed a four-pound German carp, which was coming up to feed. He said his caddy waded into the water and returned with the fish, which he ate for dinner.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Sept. 16, 1916, p. 7.

Queer Compact of Osprey and Eagle

1916

WHY FISH HAWK FEEDS KING OF THE AIR.

Bird of Freedom Watches Fisher's Nest While It Dives for Prey for Both.

PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania. — Everybody who summers on the Jersey coast has seen the fish hawk at work, tho of late years the number of such birds seems to be decreasing.

The negroes down in Charles County, Maryland, in that faraway region of Rock Point, on the lower Potomac where the river broadens out like a sea and where the fish hawk is common, have a story about it and the eagle which is interesting. While the fish hawk, or osprey, dives into the water for its food, which consists of fish and eels, the eagle is a "landlubber" and would starve is he had to undertake a livelihood by braving the watery depths.

The story that has its place in the folklore of the "Black Belt" of Maryland is that one day the eagle was very hungry and meeting the fish hawk as he was flying home with a fine fat fish in his claws, said:

"Mr. Fish Hawk, you and I might as well be friends and join together and work for our mutual advantage."

"I am willing," said the fish hawk, soaring along with the eagle by his side, but keeping a tighter grip on the fish.

Fish Hawk Feeds Eagle.

"As you agree with me, I'll tell you what we can do," said the eagle. "If you will catch all the fish you can and give me half of what you get, I'll keep watch in the old pine tree next to your nest and protect your wife and children from the sparrow hawks and your other enemies while you are at work fishing."

"All right," said the fish hawk, "I will do it."

From that day on, the story goes, the fish hawk has fed the eagle. He does this in an odd and interesting manner. His eyes are very keen and he can see to a considerable depth in the water, and as he skims along over the surface of the deep he picks out the fat fish he wants. Quick as lightning he plunges down, extends his claws, and in the next instant rises with the wriggling prey in his talons. After taking a firmer hold on his victim he ascends by a spiral flight into the heavens. The eagle has been watching from a tall tree or crag, and, as the fish hawk rises, the eagle also darts into the sky above him. This is notice for all the fish hawk's enemies among the feathered tribe to retreat.

"Throw and Catch" in Air.

Just as the fish hawk gets to a point on a plane that is level with that of the eagle, he relaxes his grip on the fish and it begins to fall. It is then the eagle's time for quick action. Like a shot from a rapid-fire gun he dives and in a second or two has the fish in his claws.

The aerial "throw and catch" game between the two great birds goes on continually over the broad waters of the Potomac, much to the edification of the onlookers. Of course there must be times when the eagle fails to catch the fish as he swoops down thru the air after it, but it cannot be proved by any one who has witnessed this particular aerial feat on the part of the "bird of freedom." Nobody seems to have ever seen the eagle miss and nobody seems to have ever known the fish hawk to fail to catch a fish when he dived for it.

As the fish hawk rises in the air oftentimes, especially on a sunny day, the sheen of the fish can be seen like a piece of silver in his claws, and sometimes the "silver" can he seen wriggling, impressing one strangely as his eyes witness this tragedy in the air in which the victim can have no hope of rescue.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Sept. 16, 1916, p. 7.

Sea Lions Helped to Detect U-Boats

1919

Design of Hydrophone Was Changed to Resemble Head of Acute Water Animal.

In the late months of the war some wild stories were published to the effect that the British naval authorities were training sea lions to catch German submarines. Of course this was ridiculous, but the story was based upon a fact, and that fact has only just been revealed.

It was at the recent meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, when Sir Charles Parsons, the president, delivered an address on "Science in War and Peace." In it he described the development of the binaural hydroplane, with which submarines are located by the sound they make. Early in the game it was discovered that the first forms of these instruments were useless when the vessel bearing them was in motion or when the sea was rough, because the noises made by the vessel's motion and by the waves drowned the noise of the submarine. This is where the sea lions came in.

Hear at Six Knots an Hour.

Sir Richard Paget, the eminent biologist, made experiments to learn how far these interesting animals could hear under water and at what speed their directional hearing ceased. These proved that the directional hearing of the lions was good up to six knots an hour.

Dr. Arthur Keith informed the naval experimenters that whales' ears are too small to receive sound waves in the usual way, but that the animals heard under water by the transmission of sound waves thru the bones of the head.

Design Was Changed.

Now, the whale's organ of hearing resembles the hydrophone. So the design of this was changed, and those used in the last year of the war were hollow bodies in the form of fish or porpoises, made of celluloid, varnished canvas or thin metal, filled with water and towed by the ship. The hydrophone was fixed in the head, and the towing cable carried the insulated wire leads to the telephone receivers of the observer on board the vessel.

These were towed some distance behind the ship, thus losing most of the noises made by the swift motion of this, and it was found that they registered directional sounds when traveling thru the water at speeds of fourteen knots and at considerable distances.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Jan. 3, 1920, p. 9.

Puny Children Need Vinol

Read this doc on Scribd: Puny Children Need Vinol

An Iowa Fish Story

1900

Here is an Iowa yarn that raises the limit on fish stories:

"We wet our lines in Shell Rock river, a few miles below Cedar Falls, and caught a catfish that weighed 190 pounds. Being without fish, flesh or fowl at the camp, we put a pole through its gills and shouldered it half a mile for dinner. On opening it we found that it had swallowed a smaller cat that weighed about 15 pounds, so we said we'd eat the latter for dinner instead of the big fellow, as it was perfectly fresh. But when we opened No. 2 there was a still smaller cat in its gullet, one that weighed five pounds, and as the party consisted of only three we made a dinner on that. I have abundant witnesses."

A Kettle of Fish

1904

The phrase "a kettle of fish," meaning an awkward entanglement, most probably has no connection with our word kettle, a vessel in which water is boiled. It has been with much reason derived from the word "kiddle," French "quidel," a stake fence set in a stream for catching fish. Inspector Walpole reminds us that this kidellus net, or kiddle, was mentioned in Magna Charta and in other early statutes. — London Standard.

Prince Discovers New Fish 20,000 Feet Down

1920

PARIS, France — The Prince of Monaco has discovered a new fish which lives at a depth of 20,000 feet under a pressure of 600 atmospheres. Although at such a depth there is practically no light, the Grimaldichthys profundissimus, christened after the Prince's family name, has rudimentary eyes.

The fish was brought up during one of the Prince's oceanographical cruises off the Cape Verde Islands. Two other species not hitherto known were caught at a depth of over 16,000 feet.


Invents Music Sheets for Piano

A Frenchman has invented piano music printed on long sheets, so mounted on motor driven rolls that they are advanced as rapidly as a user wishes saving the work of turning pages.

Meant to Have His Life

1910

Vicious Attack by Australian Natives on Trespassers in Their Country

Men who venture into the interior of northern Australia are likely to meet with adventures at the hands of hostile natives. Here is a matter-of-fact yarn concerning one James Runine McPherson, engaged in pearl-shelling operations:

On July 18 he was fishing for trepang (sea cucumber or sea slug) at the mouth of the Liverpool river. He landed in a dingey on the east bank of the river, where a bush smokehouse for the curing of trepang had been erected. He dispatched a Malay with canoes and working natives to gather trepang around a distant point, while two natives who paddled the dingey went off to the lugger, which was anchored more than a mile out, with a load of fresh water. He remained at the smokehouse with three old Junction Bay natives, who assisted him in manipulating the trepang. At 3 o'clock in the afternoon, feeling tired, he was reclining on the floor of the smokehouse, with a rifle across his knees, when he was startled by the loud swishing sound of several spears passing through the bough-covered enclosure.

McPherson immediately rushed out and saw seven or eight Liverpool river natives at the back of the smokehouse with spears shipped and with murder in their faces. Another shower of spears fell around him and he retired toward the water's edge and as he dodged one another long-barbed spear struck him in the hip. He felt no more, he says, than a burning twinge from the wound at the moment and instantly broke it off with his hand, leaving about eight inches of the barbed point buried in the fleshy part of his hip, The natives at this time were about forty yards away, having never shifted from their first point of attack near some thick bushes.

The man who had wounded McPherson was in the act of throwing another spear when McPherson shot and hit him. He then emptied his revolver at his assailants, who immediately disappeared in the adjacent scrub. Hearing shots, the two Daly river natives came hurrying ashore with the dingey, and conveyed McPherson to his boat, where he subsequently succeeded himself in tearing the barbed spearhead from the wound. Several barbs shaped like fishhooks were broken off in the process and remained in the wound.

The following day McPherson shifted his trepang gear and crew to another part of the coast and started for Palmerston to report the matter and have the wound attended to.

Report Real Sea-Serpent

1905

Rudyard Kipling has seen his second sea serpent, according to a story which comes with some seriousness from Cape Town. People who read Kipling's first sea-serpent story thought it was merely a brilliant piece of fiction. This second sea serpent story is not told by Kipling, but by the skipper of the steamship Armadale Castle. The sea serpent was seen — in fact, it was struck by the ship and probably killed — while the Armadale Castle was on her last voyage to Cape Town, in latitude 3 degrees south. Mr. Kipling was aboard the ship.

Commander Robinson is not sure whether the creature struck was a real sea serpent, a queer whale or a greatly overgrown shark. Whatever it was, the thing was hit by the bow or the ship where, in all properly regulated fishes, the pectoral fin exists. The head was doubled across the port bow and the tail trailed away along the starboard side. The violent struggles of the creature to free itself from its painful and embarrassing position led to its striking the soft brown paint of the "boot-topping" on the ship's side with the powerful fluke of its tail.

This was observed by the boatswain and some of the men who were watching the affair through the side ports immediately over the tail of the fish. The marks enabled the commander afterward to make fairly accurate measurements. From mark to stem it was forty-five feet. In girth it was apparently about the volume of one of the ship's lifeboats at the broadest part, say eight feet in diameter, very gracefully tapering away toward the tail. The body appeared to be of a greenish-brown color with large dark spots all over the back and sides, the lower parts being of a dull white.

It was first observed by one of the seamen, who heard a knocking against the ship's side. When the news was passed along the decks all the passengers, young and old. performed a mad stampede into the forecastle to look at the unhappy prisoner. The engines were stopped as soon as possible and reversed, but fully a quarter of an hour elapsed between the first discovery and the final clearance, by which time the creature was either dead or completely exhausted, for it sank slowly, tail first.

How Fish Eat

1905

The curious ways in which fishes eat form a study. Some fishes have teeth, and some have none at all. In some the teeth are found upon the tongue, in some in the throat, and in some in the stomach. Some draw in their food by suction; the sturgeon is one of this class. The jellyfish absorbs its food by wrapping its body around the prey it covets. The starfish fastens itself to its victim, turns its stomach wrong side out and engulfs its dinner without the formality of swallowing it through a mouth first, much less asking permission.

Then there is a peculiar little crab — the horseshoe crab — which chews up its food with its legs or claws before it passes the morsels over to its mouth, while other crabs and lobsters masticate their food with their jaws, and afterward complete the work with an extra set of teeth which they find conveniently located in their stomachs.

So there are all sorts of methods for those regularly toothless, and the fishes which have teeth show almost as great a diversity in the number, style and arrangement of them. The ray or skate has a mouth set transversely across its head.

Lassoing Fish Through Ice

1905

Unique Sport Enjoyed on a Potomac Branch Stream

In Hardy county, W. Va., the south fork of the south branch of the Potomac resolves itself into a series of fishing or swimming holes connected by riffles. The water is from two to five feet deep and quite clear.

When the ice forms on these ponds the men and boys indulge in a unique mode of fishing.

Three holes are cut in the ice in line across stream, at which are stationed as many men with snares or strip loops of soft copper wire that will tighten on being drawn round an object. These men kneeling by the holes watch for the fish to pass.

The others in the sport go, some to one end of the pond, others to the other. Those downstream, by stamping or beating on the ice with rails, start the fish upstream, when the men stationed at the holes try to snare them. The men upstream in turn drive the fish back past the holes.

The process is repeated again and again, until the mess of fish is obtained, or the enthusiasm of the fishermen is exhausted. — Country Life in America.

Hunter is Shot By His Dog

1915

Act of Playful Animal May Cost Master's Life

OSKALOOSA, Iowa, Dec. 16. — Wilbur Kentfield may die as the result of a strange hunting accident near here. He was shot by his dog. Kentfield was leaning with crossed hands on the muzzle of his shotgun, which was cocked. His dog jumped at him for a caress and his paw struck the trigger, discharging the gun. The charge tore off Kentfield's right hand and badly mutilated the left. Part of the charge entered his neck.



Rare Fish is Caught

Six-Foot Acrotus Willoughby Landed at Gig Harbor

GIG HARBOR, Wash., Dec. 16. — In 1887 Charles Willoughby, Indian agent on the Quinalt reservation, forwarded to the National Museum in Washington, D. C., a most peculiar fish, which was named the Acrotus Willoughby. Another fish of the same variety has recently been taken here. It is six feet in length, has no scales and has a small head shaped like that of an oyster. It is smooth and brown and in shape resembles the perch, but is larger.

Fish Bites Girl's Finger

1915

She Lands Prize Pickerel but Loses the Digit

MONTICELLO, N. Y., Dec. 16. — Miss Kittie Evans of Jersey caught one of the largest pickerels of the season here, but she is now minus one of her fingers as the result of her prize catch.

Miss Evans with her arm bared to the shoulder, reached down under the log to dislodge the hook, which had caught on the log. An instant later she fell back screaming into the boat, and when she drew her arm from the water a large pickerel came flopping into the boat. When Miss Evans attempted to loosen the hook, the large pickerel, which apparently must have been under the log, "struck" at the live minnow and also seized Miss Evans' finger.

The young lady was taken in an automobile to a physician's office at Centerville. The fish's teeth had so badly mangled her finger that the doctor found it necessary to amputate the injured member. The pickerel's weight was four pounds and three ounces.

Eskimo Bill of Fare

1905

Salmon the "Staff of Life" of the People in Far North

You are indebted to recently returned explorers from Eskimo land north of Kotzebue Sound, Alaska, for information in this article.

A whole winter spent near the villages of these curious people afforded an intimacy in regard to their regular bill of fare which in some respects is new to us. It is hardly consistent with the truth, however, to mention "table fare" in this connection, since tables there are none. Each person eats from his hands, nor are finger bowls to be mentioned, for use either before or after meals. There are circumstances incident to meal time in an Eskimo igloo which, to a refined stranger, are surprising. The process of mastication is carried on with faithful observance to gastric demands, and in utter oblivion to the presence of others than the performer. The teeth of the men and children are good, while those of the women are notably poor. This last is on account of the constant chewing of skins and sinew which is necessary for the proper softness of clothing. "The chewing mill" must operate all day long, and all the long years of an Eskimo woman's life.

Salmon is the staff of life to the Eskimo. In the absence of cereals of any sort, it is corn and wheat. During the three or four months of summer time the fish are caught in nets and harvested. Long lines of rawhide are stretched between trees or poles, upon which the fish are hung to cure. When dried, this harvest is placed on a high scaffold by the side of the igloo, or native house, out of reach of dogs and other animals. This scaffold, always to be seen with its accompanying igloo, is the cellar, pantry, kitchen cupboard and preserve closet of the family. It is also the refrigerator. Perfectly cured salmon is not a food to be despised by anyone. The natives strip off a piece, as salted codfish is stripped by any Yankee, and hold it over the lamp or fire. When the skin begins to crack and writhe, the fish is "done." This heating liberates the oil and improves the taste. It is then bitten off in small pieces and chewed for a long time.

When Food Supply Is Short

The Eskimo are sometimes neglectful in harvest, and their supply of food runs short. They then resort to decayed fish, which has died on the river banks after spawning in the fall. During the winter they go to these wholesale slaughter houses and sled the provisions back to their igloos. This food, eaten often with rancid seal oil, so infests with its offensive odors the persons and houses and vicinities of these people that association with them at this season is almost impossible.

Little cooking is ever done, much of the flesh of beast or bird being taken raw. When on a journey up or down the water's edge, it is no great trouble to row ashore, draw the kayak up on the beach, invert it for a roof, and under its cover prepare dinner or supper.

One of the white men whom I know spent a night in a native igloo and was waited upon by the "lady of the house" in true hospitable fashion. After the dried salmon had been divided and handed around among a half dozen Eskimo and the one white man stranger, this "lady of the house" dropped down on her knees, crawled through the low, long entrance to the igloo, and returned with a birch-bark basket. Glancing at the stranger with an assurance that "the best on the scaffold was at his pleasure," she proceeded to break in pieces the contents of the basket. It was frozen huckleberries in chunks, for even seal oil cannot resist a temperature of 70 below. She reached into a corner and brought out a true white man's frying pan, which she put over the fire and into it dropped the chunks of preserves. As it melted, she stirred the mass with her fingers, now and then putting them, dripping with the purple oily juice, into her month, and sucking them with a peculiar sound of satisfaction, again passing looks of assurance to the stranger for whom she was taking all this trouble. When the mass was melted she poured it into a dirty can and passed it to her guest. Not one of the family was offered so much as a mouthful. It was a "company dainty."

Every sort of bird is trapped or shot by the native Eskimo. Little birds, like the chickadees and red poles, are given to the grandparents of the family. Whether this is on account of superstition, or the idea that these little things are really the proper diet of old age, no one knows. It may be simple courtesy. The main supply of bird food is obtained from the flocks of ptarmigan, a bird closely allied to the prairie chicken of the Western states. These birds do not fly, but walk long distances. They may be easily tracked after a light snow. They subsist, during the winter, on willow buds along the ravines and watercourses. The natives lay snares for them in the same way in which they catch the fish under the ice.

Snaring the Ptarmigan

Branches are woven together and laid along the margin of a willow thicket, here and there being left an opening about which a noose is placed. The ptarmigan have a method of pushing their way through any obstruction, and so, when they come to these little openings apparently among the willows, they push, and are caught in the nooses. One reason why these birds do not fly is from the fact that they are so gorged by their food that they are too heavy. They eat as many as they can hold of the willow buds, which expand in the crop to immense dimensions, giving an almost deformed appearance to the bird. Only the tiny center of the bud is edible, the husks being of no service, and so large quantities must be taken to make a square meal. These soften by reason of the snow taken with them melting in the crop of the bird.

Another bird which the native Eskimo eats is the spruce grouse. It subsists upon the spruce buds and the flesh is highly flavored with this, to the white man, objectionable feature. During the winter prospectors drink freely of spruce tea, believing it to be preventive of scurvy, though they could be induced to partake of spruce grouse only with difficulty, it may be that the bird does possess some remediable agency to the natives. Hawks and owls are eaten with the rest of the birds. One exception, however, exists in favor of the Alaskan jay, which may not be so much as touched by the natives. These birds are never hunted, and are so fearless that they would come in at the door of the white man's cabin, and help themselves to anything in the line of cheese or pie or cake. One daring and curious fellow went so far as to snatch a piece of laundry soap and carry it away to his home in the pines. Whether this was for common family use or for food no one knew; probably the latter, since the native Eskimo are said to eat soap when they can obtain it. Little marvel when they are so fond of decayed fish and rancid seal oil.

Birds that are caught are simply stripped of their feathers before being eaten, unless the skin is needed for wearing apparel, when it is stripped off and hung away to dry before being chewed by the women tanners.

The greatest delicacy of any bird is the eye. This is always given to the babies or little children of the family. It is plucked out and eaten at once with great relish, while the older members look on with pleasure, very much as civilized parents look on when their children partake of gumdrops or gooseberries.

Eating Parrots, Albatross, Weeds, Acorns

1896

Food Can Be Almost Anything

Few of us, or, indeed, of any people, would think of eating parrots, especially if anything else could be gotten, yet the Romans esteemed them for the table, the Boston Traveller writes.

Cranes are sometimes used for food.

The American ostrich, of South America, is eaten, both flesh and eggs. The eggs of the African ostrich are used, and the flesh, when the bird is young.

The albatross, largest and strongest of birds, produces eggs that are edible.

There is a weed in this country, much cursed by all who have to do with the soil and its products, called a vulgar phrase "pussly." No one in this country would think of eating it, yet this foe of farmers and gardeners is used as a salad in Europe and Egypt.

Acorns in this country are put to no use, unless it be for swine; but in Saxon times "mast" was valued not only for herds, but for man. In times of dearth acorns were boiled and eaten by the poor in England and in France, as one species is still in Southern Europe.

Whales are no longer eaten by civilized men, but in the thirteenth century their tongues were held in great esteem in parts of Europe. Whales are now, with seals and walruses, the chief food of many inhabitants of the Arctic regions. Of the narwhal the Greenlanders eat flesh, fat and skin.

Isinglass is a strange food; it is a gelatin prepared from the air bladders of different kinds of fish from large rivers that flow into the North and Caspian Seas.

$25 Reward for Missing Wife

1911

Editorial Quips

An Illinois husband has offered a reward of $25 for the return of his missing wife. "That's all she is worth," she says. That is love.

The Marquis of Landsdowne's Rembrandt, valued at $500,000, may go into the National gallery and then again it may be brought to America.

A Chicago professor says that lack of money is the bane of wedlock. In the matter of feeling this lack as a bane, wedlock has plenty of company.

Nearly 2,000,000 brook trout fry are ready for planting in Wisconsin's streams. They will probably develop into 2,000,000 fish stories later in the year.

Australians have perfected the milking machine so that it milks a hundred cows in two hours. But the milkmaid will continue to live in poetry.

Flat-wheeled trolley cars and all auto horns are to be regulated in New York.

The center of population, unlike most of the sons of Indiana, remains in that state.