ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO IN WARREN CO.
A Series Part 1
EARLY DAYS IN WARREN COUNTY
Taken From The Warren Review February 25, 1909
Good Action Never Thrown Away
Story of Billy the Brakeman and the High Bridge
East of Williamsport that was once a Low Bridge
A railroad section foreman or section boss as they were termed in the early days, was expected to possess about the same qualifications for handling men that the mate of an old-time river streamer did. That is, to be able to curse a man’s hat off his head or whip as many men as could get around him. A religious section boss would have been a great curiosity as a pious mate on a river steamer. Such being the case, it can be readily imagined what a sensation was produced in a quarterly meeting, at Independence in the early 70’s when a fine looking stranger who had been taking an active part in the meeting, was said to be the new section boss at Independence station. His name was Joseph Landry, he was a good foreman, and what a college boy would call an all around good fellow. He had been for several years in the employ of the Wabash road in one capacity or another and could tell many interesting stories of his experiences on the rail.
Landry was a great temperance and Sunday School worker and established a Lodge of the Temple of Honor at Independence and numerous accessions to the church roll resulted from his personal efforts. He thought nothing of wading through the muddy Wabash bottoms of a Saturday night to get from Riverside to Independence to meet with the boys and encourage them in their temperance work. One night after lodge he told the boys one f his best stories called "Billy the Brakemen." A lack of space will only permit a brief outline of the story which ran like this:
It seems that while Landry was firing on a freight that ran between Lafayette and Danville a certain wagon bridge that crossed the railroad just opposite Attica was not a great high bridge like it is now, but was quite low, freight cars could pass under it but the train men were compelled to lay pretty low or get knocked off.
Two or three brakemen had been killed or badly hurt there, yet as fast as one was knocked out there was a dozen more to apply for the job one wet, slippery, sleety night before leaving Danville a new brakemen was taken on in the place of one suddenly taken ill. This new man was a stranger and about all any body knew about him was, that he was called "Billy" and lived with a widowed mother in Danville. On the run to Lafayette as they were pulling out of Williamsport Landry asked the engineer if he thought Billy was posted about the low bridge just west of Attica. The engineer said he supposed so if not he would have to take his chances. Landry, however, could not bear to leave a man to take such chances and hurried over the long line of wet slippery cars, just in time to save the poor fellow from getting his head knocked off. While waiting in Attica for a passenger to pass, "Billy" told Laundry that he had, certainly saved his life and he would not soon forget him. Some years afterward Landry himself found him self at Fort Wayne. He had been discharged from a hospital that day as convalescent from a long sick spell. He was without money and wished to get to Lafayette.
He applied for transportation which was refused, and he sat in the Wabash station waiting room hoping to see some railroad acquaintance of whom he might borrow a little cash to supply present needs. He had waiting til evening in vain. The smell of good lunch from the lunch counter reminded him that a long lost appetite for food had returned with a vengeance. As lights were turned on he began to wonder where he would sleep. Finally the passenger train that would take him to Lafayette was made up, and a smart looking conductor in a very neat uniform stepped in for train orders. On his return he chance to observe Landry and his forlorn appearance attracted him. The smart young conductor was no one but "Billy" that he had saved near Attica while braking on the local. Of course "Billy" took his friend to Lafayette and supplied his wants and gave him his address with orders to draw on him if he was ever up against it in the future. And the moral of the story is that a decent all around good fellow hardly ever lacks for friends.
***
Whispering Willow
By: Willow
Every February all across the country, flowers, candy, jewelry all kinds of gifts are exchanged between loved ones and all in the name of St. Valentine’s Day. But does anyone really know how this holiday began. For that matter the story of it’s patron Saint, St Valentine is shrouded in mystery.
All we know for sure is that February has for a long time been a month of romance. The day St. Valentine’s Day as we know it today has its vestiges in Christian and ancient Roman tradition.
Who was St. Valentine? How did he become associated with this ancient rite? The Christian church today recognizes three different saints and all three with the name Valentine or Valentinus, and they are all martyred.
One legend suggests that Valentine was a priest that served in the third century of Rome. Emperor Claudius decided that unmarried men made better soldiers than those with wives and family. So he outlawed marriage for young men. St. Valentine didn’t agree with the Emperor and defied him by performing marriages for young couples in secret. When the Emperor discovered what Valentine was doing he ordered him put to death.
Another legend is that Valentine himself may have been killed for trying to help Christians escape the harsh Roman prisons and when he was caught he was beaten and tortured. According to legend it was Valentine himself who actually sent the first Valentine. It is believed that he fell in love with a young woman, who may have been his jailer’s daughter who would visit him every day during his confinement.
Before his death it is believed that he sent the young woman a letter and he signed it "From Your Valentine." This expression is still used today.
The truth behind the legend is murky but the stories certainly emphasize Valentine’s appeal as a sympathetic, heroic, and very importantly a romantic figure. So it comes as no surprise to learn that Valentine is one of the most popular saints in England and France.
Some believe that Valentine’s Day is celebrated on February 14th to commemorate the anniversary of his death or his burial that probably occurred around 270 A.D.
Until Next Week
Stay Warm and
Be Blessed
Willow
Willows Garden
By: Willow
"Let your food be your medicine, and your medicine be your food." Hippocrates
How To Release Herbs For Home Remedies
There are literally hundreds of thousands of growing plants. Some are poisonous to eat or irritating to the touch, such as poison ivy for instance, but a surprising number of herbaceous plants, or other plant substances commonly called herbs, contain volatile oils, antibiotics, and aromatic or other healing chemicals. Some cultures and tribes or families know hundreds of such healing plants.
Occasionally a whole plant with stem, twig, flower, leaf and bud is used for special preventive or remedial effect, usually only one part of a plant is used at a time. The whole plant or its various parts - such as berries, root, bark, rhizome, stems, twigs, seeds, leaves, or flowers can be considered a locked box of chemicals. If you want to use the chemicals within the plant, then you must provide a special key to unlock the box. This is true of both fresh and dried plant material. Incidentally, dried material is usually two to three times as strong as the fresh.
The chemicals in the plants may be released in a wide variety of ways. The method you use will depend on whether you are using fresh or dried material and whether you intend to use the material immediately or store it for future use. There are other factors that are important as to how you prepare the herb, such as what part of the body you wish to work on, or whether it is to be used internally or externally and the remedial effect you wish to produce.
Plants react to stimuli. Some plants are soluble in water. Most leaves and flowers, some berries, and most pulverized or powdered are soluble in hot or standing cold water.
Most plant material will dissolve and It can be extracted in a distilled alcohol medium. This is why I suggest the use of certain long-lasting wines and high proof spirits. While the rectified alcohol preserves the strained "extraction," you can also add a few drops of vegetable or animal glycerine, or drops of tincture of benzoin to further preserve any preparation.
Use glass, ceramic, stainless steel, or smoothly glazed cast iron. Do not use Teflon or aluminum. Metals are sometimes corroded by the plant ingredients, so glass, glazed ceramic, or earthenware products are the best choices. Do not use iron pots when astringent vegetables are being prepared for herbal remedies, but clean cast iron is preferred over any copper or brass pots, which must never be used in preparing herbs.
Herbs can be powdered or bruised and added to such solvents as boiling or cold water, milk, vinegar, rectified alcohol, (gin, or brandy will do), wine, fat, or oil. Herbs can be roasted, for example dandelion root or chickpeas, or used bruised or wet in form of external poultices. Many herbs can be added to a variety of water baths, foot, arm, full body and so on, to detoxify the body, relieve pain, release tension, relieve itching (oatmeal), soften the skin, or bring blood to the surface of the skin (mustard paste).
Herbs can be absorbed into fats or oils to produce softening, healing creams, ointments, or massage aids. They can be added to alcohol, vinegar, or water for body rubs; to water or sherry for delicious mouth washes or combined in dry from for tooth and mouth aids. Herbs can be added to various material to various materials to produce excellent healing douches, colonic irrigations, insect repellents, healing syrups, lozenges, pills, deodorants, suppositories, and other specific health aids.
Be Blessed
Willow
RECIPE
STRAWBERRY PIE
4 C. fresh strawberries, hulled and halved
(If frozen drain well)
1 ½ C. water
3/4 C. sugar
2 T. cornstarch
1 - 3 oz. Box strawberry JELL-O
1 Pie crust, baked and cooled
1 Pint heavy cream, whipped
Combine water, sugar and cornstarch in a pan and bring to a boil over medium high heat. Boiled until clear. Remove from heat and add JELLO.
Arrange strawberries in baked pie shell and pour warm JELLO over berries. Chill for several hours. Serve topped with whipped cream
4 C. fresh strawberries, hulled and halved
(If frozen drain well)
1 ½ C. water
3/4 C. sugar
2 T. cornstarch
1 - 3 oz. Box strawberry JELL-O
1 Pie crust, baked and cooled
1 Pint heavy cream, whipped
Combine water, sugar and cornstarch in a pan and bring to a boil over medium high heat. Boiled until clear. Remove from heat and add JELLO.
Arrange strawberries in baked pie shell and pour warm JELLO over berries. Chill for several hours. Serve topped with whipped cream
According To Big Al...
"Listen to what I mean... not what I say."
The Bugs
One of the things I have in common with my three brothers, besides having the same mother and father is, we all owned a Volkswagen Beetle at one time in our life. Later in my search for our dad, I found out that even he owned one. Now the V. W. was not a pretty car – it was down right ugly. It wasn't a fast car either – it was a real slug. It did get good gas mileage at a time when that wasn't very important unless you were a teenager, strapped for cash or just frugal. In the winter time you liked to freeze to death and you normally had to keep your window open in order to keep the windshield clear to see out of. However a "Bug" tended to grow on you and you would overlook its shortcomings. It was dependable and economical to drive. The rear engine gave you tremendous traction and you could go where most cars simply couldn't. It was virtually bullet-proof, the harder you drove it the better it ran. Some people made the mistake of babying their "Bug", this was a huge mistake. Lugging it around in higher gears tended to burn the valves in the "Bug". It was a "Cult" car – the backbone of the Hippie Generation. Everyone could afford one. The were only $1800.00 new in the early 60's and you could buy a good used one for a few hundred dollars. It would be the best investment you could make in a car.
I was the first in our family to purchase a "Bug", it was a black 1956. I was a newly wed and we had our first child, Blane. The storage area under the rear window became his "Crib". There were no child restraint seats in those days but the area under the rear window was a very secure place – you just had to be careful of the sunlight shining through the rear window.
Whenever he was in his "Crib", he was content – we ran all over in our little "Bug". To this day Blane has a tendency to fall asleep in a car – even while driving. I think this is because of his early experiences in our "Bug".
My ex-wife learned how to drive in the "Bug" - it was the easiest car in its day, to pass a drivers test with because of its small size and agility. She drove it all over after she got her driver's license. Our love affair with the "Bug" came to an end when we had to sell it for money for a down payment for our first house in Dyer. During the course of trying to sell the "Bug", I was told by a used car salesman that there was a bad valve in the engine because when the clutch pedal was depressed, the engine stalled. I refused to believe him, but when I got home I took a compression test on the engine and indeed, he was correct. I pulled the head an replaced a badly burned valve before selling it for $500.00. Later on we replaced the "Bug" with a P. V. 544 Volvo which in some aspects was an even better car than the "Bug" - in fact I ended up getting two of them – one for me and one for my wife.
My brother Sam bought a V. W. soon after I did. He made a trip to California and later a trip to Canada with it. He bragged that it cost him less than $30.00 to drive from L. A. to Chicago with it – but gas was only about 30 cents a gallon back then.
My other brother Richard got a V.W. Also in the 60's because he was tired of working on his American built cars. One day when he was over at my house, he had problem with the transmission being stuck in 3rd gear. Apparently someone had tapped the rear of his car while it was parked. We tried to get it out of gear for quite some time. Finally after about 2 hours of tinkering with it we decided that we needed to pull the transmission. In the V.W. This was no minor task as the engine and transmission were one integral unit. That meant that you had to pull the whole works out from the rear. Then you had to divorce the engine and rear end to get to the transmission. It is very similar to a motorcycle engine today.
It must have been after midnight before we got the transmission out and then we couldn't find anything wrong with it. Once we got the gears to slide it shifted fine. It must have been the "Bump" while it was parked that caused the gears to jam up. After a great deal of thought and deliberation, we put it all back together. It was now about 6:00 A.M. Monday morning. When we started up the "Bug" to test it we discovered that we had 4 speeds in reverse and only one forward!!! How could this be? It seems when we split the case that holds the differential, the ring gear can be replaced on either side of the pinion gear. We replaced it on the wrong side.
It was now time for me to go to work (with no sleep). I called off work and we spent the rest of the day pulling the engine and transmission unit back out of the car and reversing the ring and pinion gears. It was a very long and tiring day and the feeling that we had done a lot of work for nothing.
By early evening, we had the little "Bug" running again with 4 speeds forward. If anyone told me a story like this I would have refused to believe it, but I was there and experienced it and I find it hard to believe. What we learned was that most mechanics at that time refused to work on the V. W. cars. They were considerably different from American cars. They were not that difficult to work on, but different. This experience gave me a valuable lesson on how to work on motorcycle engines. Todays auto mechanics have to work on far more difficult things than the old "Bug". Nothing ventured – Nothing gained – nothing learned.
Big Al
DISCLAIMER:
The Articles written here do not necessarily reflect the opinions of all the writers or the owners of this publication. The articles are the opinions of each individual writer. They are not meant to cast judgment or take away from anyone else's opinion. If you would like to have your open stated here, submit you article By e-mail alittlebit@willowenterprises.net,and state your own opinion. It will be printed according to content, language and availability of space. All articles must be signed by the writer.
Also, the staff of A Little Bit News Publ. does not claim to be experts in the topics they write about. No one claims to be in the medical field. The herbal and medical articles written here are what we personally have found to work for us. We write these articles for your information and to pique your curiosity. It is up to the individual to critique the information and decide what steps to take.
Mallory's "Take"
by: Mallory Kerst
Her favorite color is pink and she graduated from the University of Illinois. She has two children Amy who is 23 years old and Colin who is 26 years old. Her son will be getting married this summer and her favorite food is pizza. In her spare time she likes to read books and exercise by biking......You guessed it! Moria Clark is the principal of Williamsport Elementary School.
I have learned through being a reporter that being a principal isn't easy. A principal helps teachers get what they need so that all students can learn. My school's principal was a teacher at my school before becoming a principal. She decided to become a principal to help all the students in the school instead of just the students in her class. Mrs. Clark says that "She loves being a principal because it's great seeing kids learn and grow from K-6." Mrs. Clark chose to work at Williamsport Elementary School because she loved the building and the principal at the time, Mr. Taylor. Mrs. Clark says that our school is special because it is very welcoming and the people are friendly. Mrs. Clark has been at Williamsport Elementary school for 23 years and she would like to update the technology in our school. One of the last questions I asked Mrs. Clark was what advice she had for kids moving to our school from another and she said "Be a friend and you'll make a friend!"
I think that being a principal is a tough job and Mrs. Clark does a good job at my school. I want to thank her for letting me interview her during lunch and helping me to understand what a principal does. Look for another article from me next week!
TOWN CRIER
Your Community Events
WEST LEBANON -Community Clothing Room - Free Clothing. Nazarene Church 503 High Janet Booth 893-4989 Margo White - 762-6319.
ATTICA AMERICAN LEGION VFW POST 52 has Bingo each Thursday evening starting at 6:30 pm. Fish Fry every fourth Saturday from 5:30 - 7:30 pm, Public Welcome.
UMC FOOD PANTRY will be om Service at the Williamsport Methodist Church starting Wednesday, January 14, 10 am to Noon and Wed. Jan. 21, 6-8pm. WARREN COUNTY RESIDENTS ONLY.
WARREN COUNTY CHAMBER OF COMMERCE: - meets the second Tuesday of every month at the Warren County LEDO office in Williamsport at 4:00pm. For more information call Jamie White at 762-6055. chamber@warrenadvantage.com
VEEDERSBURG - Food Pantry Operation Ministries (Church of God Ministry Center), 702 W. Second t. (765)294-5740. Food Pantry and Thrift Store Hours - Thursday & Friday 2-6 pm, Saturday, 9 - noon.
Fountain/Warren County - VFW hold Bingo every Friday at 7pm., and AYCE Fish and Chicken Fry the 2nd Friday of each month from 4:30 - 6:30.
BARIATRIC SUGURY SUPPORT GROUP
meets the 3rd Monday of each month at St. Vincent Williamsport Hospital at 6:30 - 8:00 pm, in the executive boardroom. This is open to anyone who has had bariatric surgury or would like to gather more information regarding the surgury. For more info call 762-4003.
CRYTOQUOTE
RVZTLFR
EXAMPLE
To solve the puzzle, one letter stands for another. As in the word "EXAMPLE" above "R" stands for "E". Sentence structure and grammar rules and sentence structure are another clue.
KBNZZ KBSXQR PVX'K FZ BSJJZX: PTMQBSXQ,
HTWZNKG, VXJ DTWZ. - VXTXGCTMR
Last Weeks Answer
Do not bite at the bait of the pleasure till you know there is no hook. - Thomas Jefferson
Here's a tip on this weeks puzzle: Z = E
