The Lampasas Daily Leader. (Lampasas, Tex.), Vol. 5, No. 1439, Ed. 1 Tuesday, October 27, 1908 Page: 2 of 4
This newspaper is part of the collection entitled: Lampasas Area Newspaper Collection and was provided to The Portal to Texas History by the Lampasas Public Library.
- Highlighting
- Highlighting On/Off
- Color:
- Adjust Image
- Rotate Left
- Rotate Right
- Brightness, Contrast, etc. (Experimental)
- Cropping Tool
- Download Sizes
- Preview all sizes/dimensions or...
- Download Thumbnail
- Download Small
- Download Medium
- Download Large
- High Resolution Files
- IIIF Image JSON
- IIIF Image URL
- Accessibility
- View Extracted Text
Extracted Text
The following text was automatically extracted from the image on this page using optical character recognition software:
HE BOMBARDS
THE
When onr balloon left St. Louis, and
got up in the air so far that the earth
looked like a piece of rag carpet, with
popcorn scattered oyer it, which were
villages, and F realized that if anything
busted, we would be dropping for
?io*irs before we struck a church steep-
le, and would be so dead when we hit
the ground, and stiff and cold, that
wc would be driven down in the mud
so far no one would ever find us, and
I looked at the two fool men in the
basket with me, who didn’t seem to
care what became of them, as though*
they were unhappily married or had
money in a shaky bank, I began to
choke up, and the tears came to my
eyes, and I took a long breath of thin
air, and fainted dead away.
POPULACE
the: crowd, and the fountain
was smashed to pieces, and
the pirates in the balloon compliment-
ed me, and yet, when those men were
at home, on the ground, they are
Christian gentlemen, they told me, so
I made up my mind that if ballooning
became a fashionable pastime, those
who participated in it would become
murderers, and the people on the
ground would shoot at a balloonist on
sight.
We went up so high that we were
out of sight of people on the ground,
so you couldn’t pick out any particu-
lar person to hit with a bundle of
pickle advertisements, so you had to
shoot into a flock, and run chances ot
winging somebody, so I did not enjoy
dies hit the grand stand, and explod-
ed, and about a million circulars ad-
vertising pills and breakfast food
struck the track, and of all the stam-
pedes you ever saw that was the worst,
horses funning away, riders fell off,
carriages tipped over, and the people
in the grand stand falling over them-
selves, and as we sailed along none
of us seemed to care two whoops
whether anybody was killed or not.
It was the craziness of being up in the
air, and not caring for responsibility,
like a drunken .chauffeur running
a crazy automobile through a crowd of
children, and acting mad because they
were in the way of progress.
We laughed and chuckled at the
sensation we had caused, hut cared no
more for the results than a hired girl
who starts a fire with kerosene.
It came on dark after a while, and
all we had to do was to look at tfie
stars and the moon, and it seemed to
me that the sta,2 were as big as lo-
When I fainted we were being driven
south, and when I came to, with a
smell of ammonia on my hair, we were
going east, and the balloon had gone
down .within a mile of the earth, and
the men gave me some hot tea out of
a patent bottle, and pretty soon I be-
gan to enjoy myself and wonder if I
could hit a mess of negroes picking
cotton in a field, with a sand bag.
When you are up in the air so far
that a policeman cannot reach you,
you feel loose enough to insult men
that would knock your block off if you
should give them any lip when you
were on the ground.
We came down a half a mile more,
and I asked the boss man if I might
throw a sand bag at the negroes, and
"he said I might throw a bundle of ad-
vertisements for liver pills at them, so
X yelled: ‘‘Hello, you black rabbits,”
and when the negroes looked up and
saw the balloon; they turned pale, and
dropped on their knees, and I guess
they began to pray, and I didn’t mean
to interfere with their devotions, so I
threw a bottle of ginger ale at a mule
hitched to a wagon near them, and
when the bottle struck the mule on
the head and exploded and the ginger
ale began to squirt all over the colored
population, the mule ran one way with
the wagon, and the negroes ran for
the .cane brakes. The boss man in the
balloon complimented me on being a
good shot, and said I had many char-
acteristics of a true balloonist, and
probably before we got to the end of
the trip I would get so I could hit a
church steeple with a bag of ballast,
and break up a Sunday school in the
basement. He said that being up in.
the rarefied air made a man feel as
though he would like to commit mur-
der, and 1 found out that was so, for
the next town We passed over when
%I1 the people were out in the main
I Didn’t Want to Interfere with Their Devotions So
linger Ale at a Mule.
Threw a Bottle cf
Hit the Chief of Police with a Bottle,
street,, and the balloon man told me
to throw over a. bag of sand, so we
■could go up higher, instead of trying
to throw the bag into a field, where
there was nobody to he hurt or fright-
ened, do you know, I shied that bag
at a fountain in' the public square and
laughed like a . crazy person
the water splashed all over
it, but along towards evening we
passed over a town in Tennessee or
Kentucky, where there was a race
track, and races going on, and just as
we got over it I said to the boss baV
loon man: ‘‘Just watch me break up
that show,” and I pitched overboard a
whole mess of advertisements ef dif-
ferent things we carried, and two bun-
comotive headlights, and that you
could see into them, and on several
of the largest stars I was sure I could
see people moving, and the moon
seemed so near that you could catch
the smile of the man in the moon, and
see him wink at you.
The two men had to remain awake
all night, but after awhile I said I
guessed I would have my berth made
up, and the boss man handed me a
shredded wheat biscuit for a pillow,
and laid me down by the sand bags
and. the canned food, and threw a
blanket over me, and I slept all night,
sailing over the states, the balloon
| moving so still there was no sound at
all.
I woke up once or twice and
listened7 for a street car, or some noise
to put. me to sleep again, and found
myself wishing there was a fire, so a
fire department would go clanging by,
making a noise that would be welcome
in the terrible stillness.
I dreamed the awfulest dreams, and
thought I saw pa, in another balloon,
with a rawhide in his hand, chasing
me, and the great bear in the heavens
. seemed to he getting up on his hind
legs, with his mouth open, ready to
hug me to his hairy chest. ,
It was a terrible night, and at day-
light the boss man woke me up and I
J looked over the side of the basket and
I we were going across a piece of water
I where there were battle ships lined up
like they were at Santiago, when Ceve-
1 ra’s fleet was smashed, and the men
said now was the time to demonstrate
whether balloons would be serviceable
in case of war, and told me to take
a bundle of malted milk advertise-
ments, and imagine it was a dynamite
. bomb, and see if I could land it on
the deck of a big white battleship. I
took a good aim and let the bundle go
and it struck on the deck just in front
of a cross looking old man in a white
uniform, and scattered all over the
deck and the sailors and marines came
up on deck in a wild stampede, and
threw the malted milk advertisements
overboard, and as we sailed on there
was an explosion ot red hot language
from the cross looking man in the
white uniform, and the boss balloon
man said: ‘‘That is a good shot, Bub,,
for you landed that bundle of alleged
dynamite square on the deck of Ad-
miral Bob Evans’ flagship. Didn’t you
hear him swear?” and then we went
on, and the man in the white uniform
was shaking his fists and his mouth
was working overtime, but we could-
n’Lhear the brand of profanity he was
emitting, but we knew he was going
some, for before we got out of hearing
the bugles were sounding on more
than a dozen battleships, the men
came up from below and took positions
in the rigging and everywhere, and all
was alive with action, and the boss bal-
loon man said the fleet was preparing
fpr its trip around the horn, to San
Francisco, and then I told the bal-
loon man that he couldn’t land me a
minute too quick, because I was go-
ing to join that fleet and go with Bob
Evans, if I never did another thing in
my life.
The inspiration came to me up
there in the rarefied air, and I was as
sure I was going around the horn as
though I was already on one of the
ships.
We sailed along part of the day
and the gas began to give out, and
I had to throw over ballast, and open
cans of food, and bottles of stuff to
drink, and I made some good shots
with the sand bags and the bottles.
Once I hit right in front of a brake-
maa^on a freight train with a bottle
of soda water, and again I hit an
oyster schooner with a sand bag and
must have chuckled at least a barrel
of~ oysters. The gas kept escaping,
and presently we came down in a
field in Delaware, after I had hit a
chief of police in Wilnjington with a
bottle of beer, which is a crime in a
prohibition country, and after we
landed the police arrested the two
balloon men, and tied up the balloon.
They paid me $30 for my services,
and I took a train for Fortress Mon-
roe to join the fleet, and left the two
balloon men on the way to a whip*
ping post.
(Copyright, 1908, by W. G. Chapman.)
(Copyright in Great Britain.)
Doctor's Only Earmarks.
“Speaking of typewriters coming
into such general use,” remarked B.
F. McNulty, of San Antonio, former
superintendent of the state Deaf and
Dumb asylum, “I have a friend over
in San Antonio, Dr. T. T. Jackson, who
corresponded with me all the time I
was in office in Austin. The doctor
writes such a miserable hand that
half the time I could not\ tell what he
was writing me about.
“When he got appointed surgeon of
the Southern Pacific over there he
fixed himself up an office on a larger
scale and engaged a typewritist. The
next letter I got from him after that
was turned out in faultless style on a
typewriter, and the only earmark of
the doctor’s in it waa his signature.
I knew from its contents and7 from
the letterhead that it was from Jack
son.
“So I sat down and wrote him:
‘Dear Doc: I am glad you have got a
typewriter. I was able to read all of
your last letter except the signature.’ "
—Houston Post.C
■ , >____ x.
Snakes’ Ears.
Snakes have no external ears, but
inside the head the ear bones are
very crude, says St. Nicholas. Snakes
“hear,” however, by feeling vibration
of sound on their delicate scaly cov-
ering, and searching for sound vibra-
tions by protruding the wonderfully
sensitive tongue which is filled with
thousands of microscopic nerves. Their
sight is very keen in distinguishing
moving objects.
Something New for the Dead.
Glass headstones are the latest
mortuary device sent forth to order
from inventive Pittsburg. Not only
the epitaph, but also the photograph
of the deceased person, will be blown
into the glass, thus giving a joint in-
destructibility to both fame and
features.
Reassuring.
A lady on one of the ocean liners
who seemed very much afraid of ice-
bergs asked, the captain what would
happen in case of a collision. The
captain replied: “The iceberg would
move right along, madam, just as if
nothing had happened,” and the old
lady seemed greatly relieved. >
Genealogical Trees.
I make little account of genealogical
trees. Mere family never made a man
great. Thought and deed, not pedi-
gree, are the passports to enduring
fame.—Gen. Skobeleff.
A Matter of Taste.
A doctor calls buttermilk the elixir
of life. Unless you get it early it usu-
ally tastes like an elixir of tin can.
COUNTRY IS REAL AMERICA.
Great Cities Do Not Worthily Repre*
sent the Nation.
One. of those sent to the couttry this
summer by a New York fresh-air mis-
sion was a 14-year-old Hungarian boy:
His parents, when they came to
America, had remained in the city
where they landed. They lived In
squalid poverty. The father, mother
and four children all slept in a small
room lighted by a single window open-
ing on a foul-smelling alley. The hoy
played in the streets, and had to
dodge the club of th^. policeman who
strove to keep order in the over-
crowded district.
Injthe country he found the open
fields to play in, with no policeman to
interfere. He saw the people friendly,
helpful and sympathetic, living their
lives in comfort and independence.
“When I get home I’ll tell them I’ve
found the real America,” he remarked
one day.
He was not far from the'truth. The
America which has drawn hundreds of
thousands from the countries of Eu-
rope is .not the America which they
find, in the densely populated cities.
For the foreign-born poor, or the na-
tive poor, either, the large city, with
its fierce competition, is a hard place
in which to live.
The real France is not Baris. One
has to go outside of London to find
the real England. The Germany that
is growing rich and powerful is a big-
ger thing than Berlin. And the real
America is not discovered in her great
cities. The ideals of the big city
are notr theideals toward which the
nation is striving,' and their standard
of living is not the standard which
appeals to the people at large. Amer-
icans ruled from the homes and the
firesides of the smaller communities
and from the farmhouses on the hills
and in the valleys of the east and the
south, and on the plains of the west.
Most of the statesmen who control
congress are country-born and coun-
try-bred. The issues on which elec-
tions are decided are those which
seem vital to the plain, every-day man,
living the natural life of the less poy
ulous districts.
That immigrant is to be congratu
lated who discovers where the reaf
America lies; and that rural Amef*
ican who knows that he lives where
the destinies of the nation are shaped
is in no danger of losing his poise or
of fgrowing discontented with his lot,
I—Youth’s Companion.
The Oldest Flower.
The lily is the only flowering plant
that has no poor kin. Every other fine
flower has relatives in low life, that
it left behind to worry along in pov-
erty when it took a start and became
rich and fashionable, the pet of the
florist and the admiration of the ladies,
but the lily, if it ever had any poor
kinfolks, has outgrown them so com-
pletely that they are either forgotten
or not recognized as belonging to
the same family. It was among the
earliest flowers cultivated. On the
Egyptian and Assyrian monuments,
3,000 years before our era, the sculp-
tured lily appears. It is known to have
been popular in Europe for 2,500 years,
and in the east for a much longer pe-
riod, so it is justly entitled to the
honor of being the oldest flower cul-
tivated by man. There are probably
150 to 200 varieties, but every one
belongs to the same royal family.
Inoculation Picnics in India.
The inoculation of natives against
the plague at Bangalore has become
mere of a social event than something
to be dreaded and feared. The na-
tives do not like pain of any kind made
by the instruments of the English
sahibs, but they love music and things
to eat. Therefore, a magnificent
inoculating pavilion has been erect-
ed by the municipality of Bangalore.
The important natives of the town
gather there, the Indian band dis-
penses sweet music, attendants dis-
pense sweet cakes and fruits, and the
physicians operate to their hearts’
content.
Always with Your Blankets.
Ou Shotchun of the Chinese em-
bassy on a sultry evening in Cape
May condemned the American climate.
“It is much worse than the climate
of China,” he said. “It is perhaps the
worst climate in the world. And yet
you can joke about it.
“A physician joked me about it the
other day.
“ ‘Accustom yourself, Mr. Ou Shot-
chun,’ he said, ‘to our climate’s ways.
Our winters are arctic, our summers
are-subtropical. And very often our
climate gets mixed, and arctic days
and subtropical ones alternate. In-
ure yourself, like me, to these changes.
I, summer and winter, sleep with four
blankets.’
“‘You do?’ I gasped.
“ ‘I do. In summer,’ he added, T put
them under me.' ”
A Question.
Mrs. Astoria—Yes, my daughter is
summering at Newport, and she’s go-
ing to winter at Bermuda.
Mrs. St. Regis—How interesting!
Now, if she should decide to spring
in Florida. I wonder where she’d
fall!
Upcoming Pages
Here’s what’s next.
Search Inside
This issue can be searched. Note: Results may vary based on the legibility of text within the document.
Tools / Downloads
Get a copy of this page or view the extracted text.
Citing and Sharing
Basic information for referencing this web page. We also provide extended guidance on usage rights, references, copying or embedding.
Reference the current page of this Newspaper.
Vernor, J. E. The Lampasas Daily Leader. (Lampasas, Tex.), Vol. 5, No. 1439, Ed. 1 Tuesday, October 27, 1908, newspaper, October 27, 1908; Lampasas, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth900454/m1/2/?q=%22%22~1: accessed July 15, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Lampasas Public Library.