Makes you proud to have been Lutheran

Although not, unfortunately, within the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

Chariton's Modern New Hotel

 

We're expecting announcements later this week about the future of the Hotel Charitone, so this seems like a good day to haul out and reprint this article about the hotel, published in the Herald-Patriot during the November, 1923, week after it received its first guests.

 

For the record, according to another article in this edition of the Herald-Patriot, the hotel "was opened for public inspection in Saturday, November 3 (1923). On the following Monday, the guest rooms were thrown open and a capacity house was accommodated on that night. The dining room of the new Charitone was opened on Monday, November 12, at which time the regular hotel service was started off."

 

It's interesting to note that when the hotel opened, the fourth floor had not been finished but was intended to be held in reserve for expansion --- and that the elevator had not yet been installed. And keep in mind while reading that little of this remains. The building was for the most part gutted some years ago during its incarnation as a furniture store.

 

 

CHARITON'S MODERN NEW HOTEL

OFFERS 75 ROOMS; COST $100,000

Building is Fireproof and of New Type in Lucas County;

Attracts Many Visitors; Junkin & McCollough, Builders and Proprietors

Hotel Charitone has been opened by the builders, W.D. Junkin and H.F. McCollough, to the public. This stately structure which stands at the northeast corner of The Chariton public square, at the corner of Grand street and Braden avenue, is the first four-story fireproof building to be erected in Chariton, in Lucas county, and, as well, in this section of Iowa. It is the biggest building project to be launched here. The opening of the Hotel Charitone is therefore an event of importance in the community.

Hotel Charitone is in the dimensions 40x125 feet. There are with the available floor space of the former White Front building, 75 rooms. Throughout, the structure is of the most modern and approved design. Its architecture and construction are new in Lucas county building types. The former White Front hotel building has been purchased by Messrs. Junkin and McCollough and will be operated under the name of Hotel Charitone.

The corner lot on which the new structure stands was purchased by the builders from G.W. Larimer. The White Front hotel was operated formerly by Mrs. Lizzie Crips. The location is one of he best building sites in the city.

Messrs. Junkin and McCollough have long been associated with Chariton business life. Mr. Junkin during his residence here was for some years editor of the Chariton Herald-Patriot. He is at the time financially interested in this paper.

Mr. McCollough was for several years connected with the former Chariton National Bank, before that institution was merged into what is now known as the Chariton and Lucas County National Bank. For the last two years he has owned and operated a dry cleaning establishment at Albia. Mr. McCollough, who has recently taken a course of instruction in the operation of modern hotels, will be active manager of the Hotel Chariton.

The new hotel structure is modern and up-to-date in the 1923 sense of the word. It is equipped with hotel conveniences of every description. It has been the plan of the builders to erect and equip such a building as will be of greatest service to Chariton and the traveling public.

Hotel Chariton is built of face brick. Every room has lavatory and telephone. There are baths, ice water is piped to each floor, while other conveniences are found throughout the various sections of the building. A refrigeration plant will have an output of 300 pounds of ice daily, while an elevator shaft extends from the basement to the top floor making provision for this equipment to be installed later.

 

The lobby of the Hotel Charitone is approximately 40 feet square. Its arrangement is comfortable and will accommodate many guests. The dining room opening off of the lobby is of approximately the same dimension, and like the lobby is floored with tile. Here, too, the provision has been made for comfort and accessibility. A party room just off the dining room is elaborately funrnished and uniquely lighted. This room will seat about thrity people. A good, spacious, well lighted kitchen is also on the first floor at the east end of the building. The main entrance is on the south side of the bilding about twenty feet east of the corner.

 

A barber shop will soon be occupied in the front basement. This is also floored with tile. Other rooms in the basement are fitted up as sample rooms and baggage rooms. The ice plant, refrigerators, the heating boilders and other equipment are also located on the lower floor.

 

There are approximately 100 tons of steel in the Hotel Charitone. The only wood used in construction is found in the doors, window casings, and lobby and dining room furniture. In fact all guest room furniture is of steel, modeled after the latest patterns and nicely finished. The steel furniture as furnished by a leading furniture company of this country for use specially in Hotel Charitone is the first steel furniture to be placed in an Iowa hotel. Several modern, larger hotels in eastern cities have been furnished with the new type, but in Iowa it is said that Hotel Charitone is the first to be so equipped.

 

Such a building as is Hotel Charitone cannot spring into place without plans mapped out and well defined. For this structure, W. L. Perkins, local architect, drew the lines which were accepted and followed as day after day the building took the intended form. P.E. Johnson and Sons held the general contract and theirs was the responsibility of constructing rapidly but well. Mr. Johnson and his sons, through the nine months required for the building, were constantly on the site and superintended and guided the labors that brought to materiality without a serious hitch this modern, steel and brick, four-story structure. G.W. Ensley & Company, local hardware firm, had the contract for the plumbing.

 

Hotel Chariton will fill a great need. That is has been built to serve, however, not only the pressing need of the present, but as well the needs of natural growth of the community in which it has been erected, is indicated by the fact that the builders carried to materiality a fourth and extra story. The three floors will accommodate the present patronage, it is believed. The fourth floor is ready to equip on short notice that the service of the Hotel Charitone may be extended many rooms. Looking to the future, provision has also been made in the new lobby to accommodate a downtown office of the Western Union Telegraph Company. The necessary inside wiring connections for such an office have been made.

 

Ground was first broken for Hotel Charitone on Monday, February 5th. Nine months after or on November 3, the building was thrown open, completed, for public inspection. A large force of men was employed through the summer that the building might be completed on scheduled time.

 

There is much for the eye to see in Hotel Charitone. Numerous details which cannot be listed and described must be inspected to be appreciated.

 

The guest will not realize, perhaps, when occupying a room at Hotel Charitone that he is in a room that cost more thatn $1,400 to construct and equip. For the hotel represents an expenditure beyond $100,000.

 

The view of the hotel given here shows the architectural lines of the exterior. The west and south fronts are of mat(te) face brick. The entire four walls, for that matter, are of face brick. On the north side along the entire length, there is at the top of the first story an area of 8 feet which allows the guest room windows of the second, third and fourth floors on the north to be exposed to light and air, nothwithstanding in later years a building of the height of of Hotel Charitone might be erected immediately joining. The photograph cannot show as well as can be told that the construction of the building throughout, is of steel, reinforced concrete, and brick. The whole building is thoroughly fireproof.

 

The entrance from the south on Braden avenue leads direct to the lobby. The lobby is a magnificent room. The ceiling is 12 feet high. The pillars are of steel encased in gypsum. The walls are finished in water and oil colors, the frieze in pleasing patterns, the wood work of oak, the clerk's desk of oak. The room is lighted by large handsome fixtures. The cigar stand is at the end of the clerk's desk, while the telephone switchboard is at the rear of the person on duty. In the lobby are found the ladies' reception corner, the lounge furniture and writing desks. In this room there is a profusion of rockers, arm chairs and davenports.

 

The dining room is charmingly decorated and furnished in shades of blue and ivory. The dining room furniture is of plain design and adapted expecially for their use. Windows to the street along the entire south frontage of this room are plate glass. Provision has been made in the dining room for the installation of the latest type of radio receiving apparatus. Soon, it is expected, the guests will hear with their meals the strains of orchestra music coming from either coast. In the smaller party room off the northeast corner of the dining room, the built-in china closets are of beauty. This room with its handsome furnishings will be used for parties, club luncheons and other functions.

 

In the kitchen there is much to awe the housewife. The large range has two ovens while meat blocks, serving tables and fixtures indicate the activity that belongs here. A refrigerator, connected with the ice plant in the basement, will at all times keep cool the dishes that may be placed in it. The refrigerator stores no ice, but keeps a constant frost temperature. A number of small compartments enable the individual and separate cooling of foods. The kitchen is a large wholesome room designed especially to facilitate Hotel Charitone dining room service. Over the kettles there is a vent shaft. The range, boileres, steamers, kettles, are all of the latst manufacture. The utensils and trays are all of aluminum.

 

The basement barber shop is finished in white and will be thoroughly up-to-date and sanitary in all its appointments. A shower bath is equipped in connection. This shop will be equipped and operated by Ben P. Cunningham, well known Chariton barber. The bgasement general store room is concrete floor throughout and well drained, dry and wholesome.

 

On the first bedroom floor the straight hall will be observed. This hall as on the upper floors, is four feet nine inches wide, carpeted. The walls and the ceiling are painted in ivory and green with celiing globe lighting. One each floor are separate public toilets for men and women, closets, plugs for the vacuum clearning system, etc.

 

The bedroom doors are of cypress. All door knobs are glass. There are a number of bath rooms, the tubs of porcelain built into the wall and floor. The rooms are white enameled with floors of ceramic tile.

 

The woodwork of the bedrooms is cypress. The carpets are in blude shades, this color predominating throughout the building. There is a consistent color scheme and all furnishings are put to harmonize with the carpeting colors. The windows are draped to harmonize and have stone color shades. Escapes from the building as required by law are found at the rear.

 

Opening a new hotel is more than a ceremony of opening a door. Every room must have its furniture, and in Hotel Charitone it must be furniture of the best grade. This determination led the builders to investigate and purchase the new metal furniture which is free from sagging, warping, cracking and other ills usually fallen heir to by light wooden pieces. With all, the investment in furnishing in each room represents a large sum.

 

Hotel Chariton is to stand in a class by itself for towns of the size of Chariton. There is now, it is said, no hotel in a county seat town in this section which approaches Hotel 'Charitone in service, comfort and moderate rates. It is the aim of the builders to put and keep Hotel Chariton in the king row with the traveling public.

 

 

Love & Marriage

This image of an acrobatic homecoming embrace uniting U.S. Marine Sgt. Brandon Morgan and his partner, Dalan Wells, has gained considerable traction since it was posted/linked by blogger Joe.My.God over the weekend.

Morgan was returning home to Hawaii after his third deployment to Iraq and/or Afghanistan. And the acrobatics seem to have resulted not only from enthusiasm, but also from the fact Wells is very tall and Morgan isn't.

Here's a more conventional view of Morgan --- a holiday greeting recorded late last year.

Reactions to the photo have been interesting. Thousands of favorable "likes" but a good share of snarkiness or outright vitrol, too. "I hope an IED comes your way" seems to have been a popular sentiment among the truly hateful.

I doubt that that many of the haters were military types with or without combat experience, more likely civilian types horrified by the fact the ground is shifting beneath them and they're off balance, ill equipped to stay on their feet and move forward.

Love, after all, is the most subversive (and revolutionary) of emotions --- and public displays of affection can be a substantial threat to the insecure.

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In a related area, The Des Moines Register's latest Iowa Poll, reported upon Monday, continues to show majority opposition to a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage --- 56 percent opposed, 38 percent in favor and 6 percent undecided.

Moving a propsed ban through the Legislature and onto a ballot remains a Republican priority in the Legislature, effectively blocked so far by Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstol (D-Council Bluffs).

It's not clear what the outcome of a public vote would be, since ballot-box success seems to depend as much on effective get-out-to-vote strategy as it does on majority sentiment. And same-sex marriage seems increasingly to be a ho-hum issue, especially among younger Iowans and others who might be tempted to stay home unless motivated to do otherwise. Whatever the outcome, it would be costly on several levels.

Christianist elements --- off balance, insecure and determined to stop the earth from moving --- are a powerful force, however. There still seems to be a feeling out there that inclusiveness is the major threat to  Christianity as we've known it when, in fact, perceptions of the church as intolerant, divisive, hateful, irrelevant and afraid pose far more hazards.

 

Hanging out in Trinity Parish



Wikimedia Commons/Daniel Schwen



I like to hang out at Trinity Wall Street --- virtually of course. It's been 40 years (yikes) since I last set foot in lower Manhattan. But that's OK. Trinity has developed what has to be among the best church-related Web presences out there and that trips several of my triggers --- liturgical, musical, historical and genealogical.

Trinity is an Episcopal parish that includes two points --- the glorious 1846 gothic revival Trinity Church (top) at the intersection of Wall Street and Broadway and the 1766 Georgian St. Paul's Chapel at 209 Broadway, the oldest public building in continuous use in New York City. Both house active congregations. Trinity was chartered in 1697 --- not the oldest congregation in New York, but close.

George Washington, of course, as well as various other founding fathers and mothers were among the early communicants of St. Paul's Chapel --- and Washington's pew remains in place.



Wikimedia Commons/Tony



St. Paul's, whose church yard is across Church Street from the World Trade Center site,  survived the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that brought the towers down (in part because church yard trees protected it) without so much as a broken window. It achieved iconic status as volunteers worked 24 hours a day for eight months to make it a spiritual and physical refuge for workers and the families of victims.

Wikimedia Commons/official-ly cool

The "Trinity Root" (below), a sculpture by Steve Tobin installed in the south courtyard of Trinity Church during 2005 and based upon a casting of the roots system of one of the sycamore trees that shielded St. Paul's and was destroyed in the process, is another reminder of the link between the two church buildings, as well as a memorial to those who died.

Wikimedia Commons/Navendu Shirali

Anyhow, here's a link to the main page of the Trinity site, providing well thought out access to all of its principal elements.

Two Sunday services, as well as a variety of special services, are live-streamed, then moved into an on-demand archive where they may be accessed at any time. Although you can watch sermon only in some instances, the complete services --- high church Episcopalians in full cry --- are the most rewarding. Keep in mind that the Eucharist, not a sermon, is the focal point of an Episcopal service. The renowned Trinity Choir is magnificent and the full-screen viewer for Trinity programming, recorded with a good deal of attention to detail, is wonderful.

Interspersed among service videos are concerts and recitals presented as part of the parish musical outreach program, featuring a broad range of professional artists. Access is either from the main page or from "Webcasts" on the index bar.

A link to the St. Paul's Chapel subsection of the Web site is found under "Congregational Life" and "History" offers access to a fascinating mix of historical and genealogical resources.

Wikimedia Commons/Gryffindor

The Trinity Parish owns and administers three cemeteries in Manhattan, the churchyards of Trinity (above) and St. Paul's churches, no longer used for ground burials, and the still-active Trinity Cemetery, linked here.

Genealogists with potential family links (or the merely curious) can access the Trinity Parish registers as well as interactive databases for both Trinity and St. Paul's churchyards by following the "Registers & Churchyards" link under "History."

Alexander Hamilton, who died July 12, 1804, of wounds sustained the day previously in a duel with Aaron Burr,  is probably the most widely known occupant of the Trinity Churchyard and various honoring events continue to be held at his gravesite. He is, after all, Wall Street's patron saint.

Old House Voyeurism: In Albia

We've played this game before here, but without a title. The goal is to mine Realtor listings for photos of and information regarding admirable old houses now on the market in southern Iowa, which I define as our two southernmost tiers of counties --- God's country --- although anything south of Des Moines could quality.

Listings describe this house in southeast Albia as: "... your opportunity to own one of Albia's most historic homes sitting on almost an entire city block. The home has been well maintained with lots of upgrades. Many of the original features have been preserved including original woodwork and grand staircase, 3 marble fireplaces and pocket doors. Ths home has been decorated with many pieces of Victorian furniture which are optional with the purchase of this home."

The address is 926 4th Avenue East and the asking price, an optimistic (although not impossible if someone with deep enough pockets comes along) $265,000. The style is Italianate and the Realtor build date, 1880, which seems about right.

I'd bet that, in Albia, it's known as the "old (insert surname here) place," but without that information I can't poke around for the name of its builder or history.

Albia is a town with a strong preservation ethic thanks in large part to the late Bob Bates and friends, who started work 50 or more years ago. Its beautifully restored, conserved and maintained city square is a National Register Historic District. There are a number of fine old homes, too, and this certainly is one of them.

I've driven by it many times, wondering what it was like inside --- but homeowners sometimes react badly when a guy walks up the door and asks, "how much for a tour?"

And I know a couple who considered purchasing it at one point. She wanted it. He didn't. Eventually, they didn't --- perhaps one reason why they're still married.

The house faces north in the middle of a block-sized lot in a neighborhood of more modest homes, most with plenty of elbow room. It presides over the area, several blocks east and slightly south of the square.

Obviously well maintained, it has been extensively decorated in a classic aspirational southern Iowa style, including plenty of "outdoors" prints and a mounted deer head over one of the original marble chimneypieces. The only piece of the scheme that makes me really nervous, beyond the glassy eyes of the dead deer (there are dead fish on the chimneypiece, too) is wallpaper of great gloom in the dining room.

There are five bedrooms, two and a half baths and 3,592 square feet of living space. The home's Trulia listing, which is here, offers access to 60 photos of the house --- including many of extensively decorated bedrooms upstairs --- in case you want to investigate further.

Dispatches from the Holy Wars: 02/25

Pima County, Arizona, Sheriff Paul Babeau's predicament offered a little comedy relief during holy wars of the week or so that was.

It's been eerily quiet out here in the Hawkeye state since "Resolute" Romney, "Courage" Santorum, "Consistent" Paul and "Cheerful" Gingrich moved on to campaign for President Obama in other states. Personally, I'm missing "Pitiful" Perry, but I'm sure Texans are glad to have him home again.

Fear and loathing at the Statehouse continues, but with the volume turned down --- in part because Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, gatekeeper for bills in the Senate, continues to block constitutional capers intended to end same-sex marriage.

There have been a few forays into other areas of divisiveness, of course, but HF 2033, intended to harass women who wish to have abortions and the doctors who provide them by mandating ultrasounds before the procedure seems to be dead in the water. That was a pet projet of Osceola Republican Rep. Joel Fry.

Tea Party loon Kim Pearson's HF 2298, which would have declared all terminated pregnancies (with the possible exception of miscarriages) to be "feticide" without regard for such factors as rape, incest or the likely death of the mother, failed to gain traction anywhere.

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The freak fringe of the NRA-backed cold-dead-hands contingent, after deftly slipping a dove hunting season through the Legislature last year and turning Iowa into a "shall issue state" in 2010, continues to introduce bills, including a "stand your ground" measure that as nearly as I could tell would allow Iowans to shoot and kill anybody they took a dislike to without penalty. Another bill would prevent government agencies from barring weapons in public buildings and House Joint Resolution 2005 would amend the constitution to in effect eliminate all restrictions on guns.

These are unlikely to go far this session, but you never know. A recent Iowa Poll indicates 57 percent of Iowans are satisfied with the current gun laws and 26 percent actually believe tougher regulations are needed.  

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My buddy Mary Ellen pointed me toward the news that Chuck "Iowa Boy" Offenburger, formerly a progressive Republican (and yes, Virginia, there used to be such a thing) has finally given up on the GOP and registered as an independent. If interested, you can read his announcement here.

Chuck, until a dozen or so years ago, probably was Iowa's most widely-known newspaper personality, writing folksy stuff for The Register as, you guessed it, Iowa Boy.

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Elsewhere, this week, the Maryland Legislature passed marriage equality legislation, which Gov. Martin O'Malley backed and has pledged to sign. New Jersey lawmakers approved marriage quality legislation a week earlier, but as promised, Republican Gov. Chris Christie vetoed it. Washington appoved equality earlier in the month, a measure since signed into law.

Maryland brings to eight the number of states, including Iowa, where same-sex marriage is legal, as it also is in the District of Columbia. Five states offer civil unions for same-sex couples --- Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Rhode  Island and New Jersey.

The usual suspects, including the Roman Catholic male and allegedly celibate heirarchy, are leading the charge to challenge via referendum legislative action in Maryland, Washington and elsewhere.

The high comedy here involves those bishops in self-appointed roles as family values guardians. It's a little like letting a coyote loose in the chicken house to guard the old hens.

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Arizona provided a little comedy relief this week in a "Cowboys are frequently, secretly fond of each other" vein, when Pima County's aggressively right wing Republican Sheriff (and congressional candidate), Paul Babeau, most widely known for his high profile war on illegal immigrants, was propelled out of the closet after allegedly threatening to deport his Mexican lover of three years, Jose Orozco.

Just a few days before, he'd been among freak fringe whackos featured at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C. Then it turns out, the good sheriff (who quickly resigned as Arizona's "Resolute" Romney co-chair) really did post those photos of himself with and without underpants to the Web.

The studly Babeau, an Iraq War veteran, has since declared himself in favor of gay marriage and a born again follower of Ron Paul as he attempts to hang onto his political career and find a niche among Republicans.

I wish him well, really. And it's a wonderful example of what the closet can do to a guy (or gal). Or, as Granny used to say, "O what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive."

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Kind of funny, too, is the "All Dead Mormons are Now Gay" Web site which allows users to make any dead Mormon gay for eternity.

This, of course, is a satirical take on the Latter-day Saint practice of baptizing the dead by proxy in line with church doctrine that requires all humanity, dead and alive, be offered the opportunity to covert (the dead actually have the right to decline).

Mitt Romney's candidacy, recent revelations that Romney's atheist father-in-law was dragged kicking and screaming into the church after his death, Jewish objections to the "conversion" of Holocaust victims and general LDS opposition to anything judged gay-friendly are among the factors in operation here.

I've always thought the LDS approach to conversion was rather nice --- much nicer than mainstream Christianity's habit of consigning anyone outside the fold to eternal hellfire.

But I just couldn't resist. So welcome, Joshua Saunders, whoever you may have been and wherever you may be, to the homosexual lifestyle.

Black & White & Read all over

Sifting through a small box at the museum yesterday, I came upon two extraordinary items --- one that we've been looking for for months, the other unexpected; both printed.

I've whined before about the sorry organizational state of the thousands of documents, scraps of paper, photographs and other paper artifacts that rest, for the most part out of sight, in Iowa's local history museums, including Lucas County's. This is no one's fault; volunteer-staffed institutions because of limited time to deal with high volume have been storing these items for years in the hope that sometime, someone would have time to deal with them.

If a paper item was accessioned individually, we know we've got it. When accessioned as batches, as in "50 miscellaneous photos," we don't really know what we've got. That's changing for all sorts of reasons, but the solution involves dealing methodically with a mountain of paper, still time-consuming.

Anyhow, the unexpected item was a single ediction of The Chariton Patriot from 1869. There just aren't any surviving Patriot editions from that year, due to fires and other disasters. Of so I'd thought. Now I know that there's at least one.

Because of the high rag content of the paper on which it was printed, the issue is in remarkably good shape --- still white, still pliable, only slightly torn along fold lines. It doesn't contain any remarkable news, but the fact it survived is remarkable in itself.

The other survivor is an 1865 edition of a New York newspaper reporting President Abraham Lincoln's assassination. That one, we knew we had --- somewhere. But it had been folded into small squares and placed by its original owner in a small open-ended document envelope with a printed cover suggesting that it contained something entirely different.

I didn't know what it was until I removed the envelope's contents and I still don't know much about it because it won't be unfolded until it can be dealt with properly. Unlike the 1869 Patriot, it appears to be serously deteriorated.

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The odd thing about vintage issues of newspapers is that they've become more desirable, primarily because 30 or more years ago when microfilm became widely available, depositories of old newspapers in many instances had their holdings filmed, then disposed of the originals.

In Iowa, the State Historical Society tried to subscribe for more than a century to every newspaper published in the state. These were collected, bound by year (or volume) and kept at the old Historical Society building (now Ola Babcock) in Des Moines.

Anyone who researched there back in the good old days remembers the drill --- walk into the newspaper room knowing which volume of which newspaper you wanted to examine; write it on a slip of paper and hand that to a staffer; sit down at a table with the bound volume when it arrived from the stacks; leaf through until you found what you wanted; note the item and page on another slip of paper; take both that and the bound volume to another staffer; and eventually receive a photocopy of what you wanted.

When microfilm came in, those bound volumes went out the door and most didn't fare well, although in a few cases repositories were found in the communities where the newspapers originated. In some cases, newspapers were cut apart, obituaries pasted in scrapbooks and everything else thrown away. And in many cases, volumes were burned to taken to the dump.

Even today, when asking about back issues of newspapers you'll hear, "not to worry --- they're on microfilm," which is not necessarily the case because the Historical Society's collection, although vast, was not complete and film from that collection remains the principal resource still available to researchers either on film or in a later digitalized (from microfilm) form. Heaven only knows what else is still tucked away in the store rooms of local newspaper offices.

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Of course I didn't have the camera at the museum yesterday, so the illustration here is my printer's composing stick, a souvenir from typography classes at the University of Iowa. Other than boilerplate, everything in that 1869 edition of The Patriot would have been set into type using a somewhat earlier version of this device.

Type was pulled letter by letter from a case and assembled line-by-line in one of these devices, then carefully secured between strips of lead or brass and transferred into the form from which the newspaper was printed and secured. It was a complicated and time-consuming process, which explains why in most instances --- until linotypes came along --- routine local news was shared in a few sentences rather than a few papagraphs.

The Quilt --- 25 years onward

Source: Wikipedia

The brief video (below), put together earlier this month by Sean Chapin to mark a 25th anniversary exhibit in San Francisco’s Castro District of 312 panels from the NAMES Foundation AIDS Memorial Quilt, caught my attention this week.

Twenty-five years. Wow. Silly thought --- I no longer fit into my NAMES Project sweatshirt.Considerably more serious: Roughly 617,000 AIDS-related deaths in the United States to date; more than a million deaths last year alone in Sub-Saharan Africa, where more than 23 million people are living with HIV.

Cleve Jones came up with the idea for a quilt during a 1985 march in San Francisco commemorating the assassinations of city Supervisor Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone. The project got off the ground during 1987.

Since then, more than 47,000 panels commemorating in excess of 91,000 souls have been prepared, then assembled into panels of eight each. These panels continue to travel the country for exhibit, although I’m not sure about the last time a display was held in Iowa. I remember several.

The full quilt was spread for the last time during 1996 on the Mall in Washington, D.C. That’s unlikely to happen again. It weighs more than 54 tons. Many panels now are fragile, in the hands of conservators. The NAMES Project and the quilt moved during 2001 from San Francisco to Atlanta.

There’s a good deal of symbolism involved in the quilt. Each panel is 3 feet by 6, roughly the size of a grave. In some instances, the panels are the only monuments to those they honor. It’s not been that long ago that some shamed families declined to claim the bodies of their sons, some undertakers refused to touch them. HIV/AIDS still, in parts of Iowa and elsewhere, is something to whisper about.

For all false judgments, for uncharitable thoughts toward our neighbors, and for our prejudice and contempt toward those who differ from us, accept our repentance, Lord. (The Litany of Penance)

Ash Wednesday

We sat in a circle in the parish hall as the sun was setting this evening to read the Ash Wednesday liturgy. No particular reason for the location, but we've gotten used to this intimate face-to-face setting for Evening Prayer and it somehow seemed more appropriate than the formality of the church with candles blazing, altar draped in lenten purple.

Admitting you're wrong is, too, best done face to face and this is the only day of year we go to church to have dirt rubbed in our faces quite so explicitly.

A single candle burning. Ashes produced earlier in the day by burning Palm Sunday fronds from last year ready in a saucer grabbed from a kitchen cupboard.

Lessons from Isaiah (58:1-12), Psalms (103), 2 Corinthians (5:20b-6:10) and Matthew 6 (1-6; 16-21).

 And then the ashes, "Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return."

Finally, the Litany of Penance:

Most holy and merciful Father: We confess to you and to one another, and to the whole communion of saints in heaven and on earth, that we have sinned by our own fault in thought, word, and deed; by what we have done, and by what we have left undone.

We have not loved you with our whole heart, and mind, and strength. We have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We have not forgiven others, as we have been forgiven,

Have mercy on us, Lord.

We have been deaf to your call to serve, as Christ served us. We have not been true to the mind of Christ. We have grieved your Holy Spirit,

Have mercy on us, Lord.

We confess to you, Lord, all our past unfaithfulness: the pride, hypocrisy, and impatience of our lives,

We confess to you, Lord.

Our self-indulgent appetites and ways, and our exploitation of other people,

We confess to you, Lord.

Our anger at our own frustration, and our envy of those more fortunate than ourselves,

We confess to you, Lord.

Our intemperate love of worldly goods and comforts, and our dishonesty in daily life and work,

We confess to you, Lord.

Our negligence in prayer and worship, and our failure to commend the faith that is in us,

We confess to you, Lord.

Accept our repentance, Lord, for the wrongs we have done: for our blindness to human need and suffering, and our indifference to injustice and cruelty,

Accept our repentance, Lord.

For all false judgments, for uncharitable thoughts toward our neighbors, and for our prejudice and contempt toward those who differ from us,

Accept our repentance, Lord.

For our waste and pollution of your creation, and our lack of concern for those who come after us,

Accept our repentance, Lord.

Restore us, good Lord, and let your anger depart from us;

Favorably hear us, for your mercy is great.

Accomplish in us the work of your salvation,

That we may show forth your glory in the world.

By the cross and passion of your Son or Lord,

bring us with all your saints to the joy of his resurrection.

--- The Book of Common Prayer, "Ash Wednesday," pp. 264-269.

1903: "Chariton is a Rich Town"

This article, republished from The Chicago Record-Herald in Chariton's Patriot of Aug. 20, 1903, intrigues me because of its insights into the character of Lucas County, as well as its bias, but also because it was written by a newspaper correspondent of some renown who was not part of the Chariton establishment of that day and therefore a little more likely to approach it objectively.

Curtis, a veteran Washington and international correspendent for The Record-Herald, also traveled the lecture circuit --- most likely why he happened to be in Chariton in the first place. You can get an idea of what he might have lectured about by taking a look at this prospectus, available via the University of Iowa's Digital Library collection.

He arrived at a time when Lucas County really was "one of the richest" counties in the state and was enjoying a burst of prosperity. That would change, of course, in part because, as Curtis points out, "the people do not seem to incline" toward diversifying and broadening its economic base.

The article also is peculiarly prophetic, but none of that was evident at the time. The absence of a town water system, noted by Curtis, was one of the reasons why just a few months later, in January of 1904, a major fire would wipe out the north end of the west side of the square, including the massive Mallory Opera Block and two adjacent structures. There was insufficient water to stop that fire and only the solidity of the Penick Building stopped it from claiming more of the square's west side.

At the time the article was written, a substantial majority of Lucas County's bank deposits were held by First National Bank, owned by the Mallory family and headed by Frank R. Crocker, both probably instrumental in bringing Curtis to Chariton to speak in the first place. Four years later, during 1907, the bank fell with a monumental splat because Crocker had been misappropriating its funds. In the aftermath, the remaining Mallorys were forced out of town, taking a still-substantial fortune with them. These were mighty economic blows that affected Lucas County for years.

It may have been aftermath of the bank crash that also brought down the Chariton Improvement Association (Jessie Mallory Thayer, as well as Margaret McCormick, a Mallory protege, were its major players) and the Noxall Club, two of the institutions credited by Curtis with moving Chariton forward.

I suspect that Curtis was moving around Chariton with Jessie, Frank and their contemporaries and that probably is where bias comes in. He pronounces the then-new St. Andrew's Episcopal Church "the best thing in Chariton." And of course it was a fine building --- until it fell down. But it's possible to argue that the new First Methodist Church was its equal and that the still-new Lucas County Courthouse surpassed both. St. Andrew's, however, was the church of the Mallory crowd, which included the Crockers, Margaret McCormick and others.

Whatever the case, it's a good read --- and here it is:

CHARITON IS A RICH TOWN

So Says Wm. E. Curtis In the Record-Herald
He Writes Up Chariton from Observations Made During His Visit Here --- It is Mostly Complimentary but He Indulges in Some Criticism --- The Article in Full Herewith Printed.

When William E. Curtis, the Chicago Record-Herald Correspondent, was in Chariton last week he gathered information for a write-up of the town. His article, in full as it appeared in the Record-Herald, is printed below. Read it and form your own opinion as to its correctness.

The Patriot thinks it is a pretty good example of good reporting done in a short space of time. Mr. Curtis took a drive over the town, especially through the parts in which are located our finer residences and he also saw our churches and school houses. His other information he gathered from citizens of the town. His write-up is very complimentary in the main and his observations are correct in nearly every detail. What he says of our streets can be said of every town in southern Iowa which is without paving. The article follows:

"Chariton, Iowa, Aug. 17 --- This is one of the richest towns in the state and Lucas is one of the richest counties, although limited in area and population. The First National Bank of Chariton has deposits amounting to $1,250,000 and total deposits of the six banks in Lucas county are $1,810,000 which, divided by the population of 17,000, gives a per capita of $105 of savings drawing interest for every man, woman and child. Few farming counties in the United States, if any, surpass this average of wealth, and I am told that all the money has been made here. None has been brought in from the outside. Almost every one of the rich men in Chariton began poor, and they have gradually accumulated their fortunes without speculation and from the fruits of the soil. All the bonds ever issued by the county or town within the last quarter of a century have been absorbed entirely by home investors. There is no county indebtedness and only a few thousands on the town, which were borrowed to erect the electric light plant, and that, the people say, would have been paid off long before this but for mismanagement. This is purely a farming and stock raising community, and its wealth comes from corn, hay, cattle and hogs. There are no railway shops and only two manufactories, at which carriages and brooms are made. The population is almost exclusively American. The only foreigners are Swedes, who are very thrifty, and most of them own farms. Several coal mines in the immediate vicinity furnish an excellent quality of fuel and the railway facilities are good, so that manufacturing might be made a feature, but the people do not seem to incline that way. Chariton is like the other Iowa towns in its beautiful homes and shaded streets, but it is far behind its neighbors in one of two particulars.

"Chariton is probably the only city of its size --- 4,400 inhabitants --- without water works. The people are entirely dependent for their water supply upon individual wells. Some families have windmills to pump the water into reservoirs in their attics and others use gasoline engines. There have been several movements from time to time for the introduction of a modern water system. A proposition recently submitted to a vote of the people was defeated by seventeen majority, which was a great disappointment to the progressive element of the community. However, it was their own fault. Everybody supposed that it would be adopted by a large majority, and the result was a great surprise. Those who were in favor of waterworks did no electioneering, hundreds of them did not even take the trouble to vote, while the opposition was very active and made a canvass of the poorer classes of the town, telling wild stories of the high taxes they would have to pay for water if the scheme went through and declaring that the wells would all be filled up. The result gave the town an unfortunate setback, but the proposition will probably be again submitted soon, with a different result. Eastern parties have been making surveys and are expected to submit a project this summer.

"The streets of Chariton are in a dreadful condition. Residents tell me that frequently in the winter and spring the public square is ornamented with abandoned wagons stuck in the mud and a circus that was here not long ago had an experience similar to that of Fort Dodge. The roads were so bad that the wagons could not be hauled through the town to the fair grounds, and the company was compelled to give only a part of a performance on the baseball grounds, which are near the station. But improvements in this particular have already commenced, and large gangs of men are now grading one of the main streets to lay the first pavement in the town. It will be made of brick placed upon a concrete base, and will cover the principal streets and the public square, while petitions are in circulation for similar improvements in the residence section. Brick must be used, because there is no roadmaking material in this part of the state --- no stone, gravel, sand or anything. It is a proverb that good soil makes poor roads, which is fully demonstrated in this part of Iowa. All the farm(er)s can do is to grade and drain, and that does very little good in rainy weather.

"The people of Chariton have good reason to be proud of their schools, which are the principal sources of public expense. A splendid new schoolhouse has just been finished at a cost of $40,000, and it is a pleasure to know that the salaries of the twenty-six women teachers in this town last year ranged from $35 to $65 a month all around. This seems a small amount, and it is insignificant to the tax payers, for it costs them only about $1.86 a month to educate a child. But it is a good deal for the teachers, who receive only enough to pay the bare expenses of living.

"Next year Chariton will have a free public library, for which Mr. Carnegie has contributed $10,000. This is largely due to the efforts of Miss Margaret Wright Brown, daughter of Joseph A. Brown, a local capitalist. She is a member of the state library commission, and spends most of her time promoting the free public library movement.

"The progress of Chariton is largely due to the women who, in 1902 (sic., the date probably should be 1892), organized the pioneer Improvement Association of Iowa under the leadership of Miss Margaret McCormick, a public-spirited woman of means, who became exasperated by the lack of enterprise on the part of the men folks. She called the women together, formed committees and commenced an agitation which resulted in arousing a spirit of enterprise here and set an example for the organization of similar improvement associations all over the state. In 1895 the association was organized, and men and children were admitted to membership. To the association is attributed directly the credit of transforming a repulsive dumping ground into a beautiful park, of introducing important sanitary improvements and of securing the present appearance of the lawn and gardens in the residence district. Its particular purpose is to beautify the city.

"The Noxall Club, which was organized in 1895 by a few young men for a frolic, has become a serious institution with a membership of over 100 business and professional men, with pleasant clubrooms just off the public square. It is not only the social headquarters of the town, but takes the place of a board of trade and the commercial organizations that are found in other cities. It has initiated several public movements and is growing in influence.

"The Chautauqua epidemic struck Chariton last year. No organization was effected, but a few business men guaranteed the expenses of the assembly because they consider it an advantage to the town. Because of the lack of other suitable ground a tent was erected under the shade of a grove that surrounds one of the public schools within three squares of the courthouse and some of the most expensive attractions were engaged, yet there was no deficit. An imported manager was paid a salary of $1,200, and a handsome balance was left for working capital. This, the second year, promises to be even more profitable because of its high-class programme. There is a nine-day course of lectures, concerts, dramatic readings and other entertainments, the principal stars being Mrs. Maude Ballington Booth, General O.O. Howard, ex-Senator Gordon, Attorney General Hamlin, Rev. Robert McIntyre and others.

"The best thing in Chariton is a church, St. Andrew’s Episcopal, recently erected by Isaac Purcell (Purcell was the architect, not the builder) of Philadelphia. The outside walls are of red Colorado sandstone and the inside walls of gray Bedford stone from Ohio. The finishings, the pews, the choir and a heavy grained ceiling are of natural oak and the windows are filled with stained glass. An altar of Dakota marble is soon to be erected, which will make St. Andrew’s one of the most beautiful little churches in the country. It was erected by bequests from the late Mrs. Elizabeth Hammer and S.H. Mallory, for whom memorial tablets will be soon placed upon the walls.

"The town suffered a great loss by the recent death of Mr. Mallory, who was the wealthiest and most prominent citizen, and always foremost in public movements. He came here in early times as a civil engineer, and his first wages were $5 a month. When he died he left an estate of about $800,000 invested in farm lands, business blocks, bank and railway stocks, mortgages and other property. He was a plain, democratic type of man, with high principles, great abilities, untiring energy and pride in his town and his state. He left a widow and a daughter, Mrs. Jessie M. Thayer, who has taken her father’s place in both business and social affairs. She is president of the Chariton Improvement Association.

"The Methodists are the strongest religious denomination here, and have a large, handsome new church. The Swedish Lutherans are also building.

"By the census of 1900 Chariton had a population of 3,989, and a subscription census of the city taken last spring showed 4,400 people. The growth was not due to a boom nor to the establishment of new manufactories nor to any particular reason or influence, but represents chiefly retired farmers from the surrounding country, who have sold or leased their lands or left them in charge of their sons and have come to town to live upon their savings and enjoy a well-deserved rest and leisure. During the last two years there has been an epidemic of farm sales in this section because of the high prices offered for improved land by young men from other states. The last six years have seen unprecedented prosperity. The farms have grown rich, and many of them have deposited enough money in the banks to give them a comfortable income for the rest of their lives without further labor. Others have turned their farms over to their sons or sons-in-law, and more have leased their lands to tenants and have bought or built comfortable cottages in town, surrounded by an acre or two of ground for gardens. They spend their time reading, discussing politics with their neighbors, grow their own vegetables, keep a cow and a horse and are enjoying life up to the limit. The books of the recorder of deeds shows that $2,850,000 has been paid for farms in Lucas county during the last two years. Some have brought as much as $125 an acre. The most of them, however, have sold from $60 to $75 an acre. --- William E. Curtis"

Chariton rises from the mud

The headline at the top of today's Chariton Leader reads, "Sales tax vote could mean better streets" and introduces a story about a March 6 referendum that would authorize reallocation of most local option sales tax revenue from the swimming pool, now on solid financial ground, to general infrastructure repairs.

That's pretty good timing, from my point of view, since I was working yesterday with this badly faded photo from the historical society collection that serves as a reminder of a time when Chariton didn't have paved streets to repair, period --- economical perhaps, but not too practical for an aspiring county seat town.

William E. Curtis, a correspondent for the Chicago Record-Herald who visited Chariton during the summer of 1903, described the situation like this in his report of August 17:

"The streets of Chariton are in a dreadful condition. Residents tell me that frequently in the winter and spring the public square is ornamented with abandoned wagons stuck in the mud and a circus that was here not long ago had an experience similar to that of Fort Dodge. The roads were so bad that the wagons could not be hauled through the town to the fair grounds, and the company was compelled to give only a part of a performance on the baseball grounds, which are near the station."

Curtis went on to report that even as he wrote, the situation was being rectified: "But improvements in this particular have already commenced, and large gangs of men are now grading one of the main streets to lay the first pavement in the town. It will be made of brick placed upon a concrete base, and will cover the principal streets and the public square, while petitions are in circulation for similar improvements in the residence section. Brick must be used, because there is no roadmaking material in this part of the state --- no stone, gravel, sand or any thing. It is a proverb that good soil makes poor roads, which is fully demonstrated in this part of Iowa."

Althoug this photo is undated, it probably was taken during that summer or fall as a crew prepared the surface of North Main for paving. It could not have been taken later because the three-story Mallory Opera Block and Storie Building plus the two-story Lockwood Building, all at the north end of this business block, burned during January of 1904. That left a big gap between the three-story Penick Building, which still stands just north of the alley, and the old Union Block, on the northwest corner of the square, which survived until succumbing to an overenthusiastic redeveloper during the later 20th century.

I wish the photo were in better condition. It's one of the few I know of that shows the north half of the west side of the square at its finest --- at a time when Chariton's aspirations soared to three stories. When the victims of the 1904 fire were replaced, their builders stopped at the more practical two-story level.

Laissez les bons temps rouler

What we really need about now in Iowa is a good party, suspended  drearily between Christmas and spring. But the culture's all wrong and so, most years, is the climate. Who wants to grab beads, go up town and march around the square in snow?

This year, however, South moved North and we could have pulled it off. But it's too late --- Mardi Gras season ends tomorrow on Fat Tuesday. I guess I'll just take down the Christmas decorations. Nope, haven't done that yet (other than the tree).

Maybe red beans and rice for lunch --- providing Hy-Vee down here stocks Zatarain's. I've never looked. If not --- back to meatloaf (Iowa's official state dish). At least my recipe includes a good dose of Cajun seasoning.

Morning after? Here's a guaranteed Fat Tuesday bloody mary recipe:

46-ounce bottle vegetable or tomato juice

half cup lemon juice

quarter-cup liquid from a jar of pickled okra

3 tablespoons Cajun seasoning

2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

2 tablespoons horseradish

teaspoon celery seed

pepper sauce (up to you)

2 cups plain or pepper-flavored vodka

Stir well, or shake. Must be very cold. Serve with ice, if you like. Garnish with pickled okra. Let the good times roll indeed.

Not up to it? Start the day with the Balfa Brothers and La Dance des Mardi Gras.

Quinquagesima

Preparing Sunday service bulletins is among the odd jobs, sometimes maddening, that have fallen into my lap. If you go to church and mindlessly pick up that folded sheet of paper with stuff printed on it as you enter --- show a little respect. At least half the church secretaries, preachers, preacher's wives and volunteers who produce these pesky but necessary items will have violated a commandment and cursed at some point during production.

There are compensations, however --- like pulling out, dusting off and remembering how to spell words like "Quinquagesima," not widely used any more. Especially since Roman Catholics in a fit of Vatican II revisionism declared the three Sundays prior to Ash Wednesday to be mere ordinary time and sent  "Septuagesima," "Sexagesima" and "Quinquagesima" to the liturgical scrap heap.

Episcopalians and Lutherans for the most part did too, but Quinquagesima still pops up among traditionalists of all three persuasions --- and while hardly a traditionalist, I like to use it, too. The alternative is "the last Sunday after the Epiphany," which doesn't resonate.

"Quinquagesima" translates from the Latin as "fiftieth," signifying that today is the fiftieth day before Easter if you count inclusively --- including Easter itself. Also, the Sunday before Ash Wednesday, or the beginning of Lent, a 40-day period of penance and reflection from which Sundays are excluded. One point of using the term today is to say, in Latin, "get ready!"

+++

My buddy who handles the flower end of things at Sacred Heart looked up the other day and said something like, "I really like Lent." I responded, "yea --- because you don't have to worry about altar flowers" --- a minor form of altar guild "gotcha."

Traditionally, altars are a little bare during Lent, a nod to its penitential significance. And coming up with altar flowers during the winter after Christmas red and green have been retired and before spring bursts forth, can be a challenge --- especially in parishes without bottomless running accounts with the florist or a rota of willing donors. Or where silk (gasp) is considered inappropriate.

But my friend is devout --- and the kidding wasn't intended to suggest that a break from beating the bushes for blossoms was the big factor here. I like Lent, too --- and am substantially less devout.

Everybody needs ashes on Ash Wednesday, from Baptist to Unitarian Universalist. Go find some. At St. Andrew's, the liturgy begins at 5 p.m. Wednesday. Ashes will be available (free) in Catholic and Lutheran parishes, too, and most likely in churches of some other denominations --- Protestants of all stripes have been rediscovering the value of Lent lately. Check your local listing for details. Or make your own (traditionally, ashes are produced by burning fronds set aside after Palm Sunday of the previous year but innovation is acceptable).

If you're paying attention, a key moment --- after that cross of damp ash has been applied to your forehead --- is the admonition: "Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return."

Those words operate on various levels related to faith, hope and practicality, looking always to resurrection. At the practical end of the spectrum, they're useful reminders that the human condition involves a recurring cycle of crashing, burning and rising again from the ashes. And that while crashing and burning are painful and inevitable, it is the rising --- and helping others to rise --- that's important. That is what I, at least, tend to think most about during Lent.

Shrove Tuesday preceedes Ash Wednesday, by the way, and that's traditionally a day for pancakes. St. Andrew's will serve a supper of pancakes, sausage and juice from 5 to 7 p.m. Tuesday at the church in return for free-will donations. All proceeds will go to the Ministry Center food bank. Everyone's welcome

John V. Faith and The Democrat

Those who think the volume and tone of 21st century political debate are aberrations might think otherwise after spending a little time with newspapers of, say, 150 years ago. In Lucas County, the best example of extreme partisanship would be The Democrat, founded by a firebrand named John V. Faith on the 12th of October, 1867, and still with us in the form of The Leader.

Although Faith didn't last long in Chariton, or anywhere else for that matter --- he lacked the sense of proportion needed to produce a newspaper with broad enough appeal to be financially viable --- he did leave behind the earliest surviving issues of a newspaper produced in Lucas County.

The Chariton Patriot, founded in 1857 by John Edwards and Republican in politics, was the first Lucas County newspaper to survive for any length of time --- and it, too, is still with us in the form of the Herald-Patriot. But the oldest Patriot issues that we have date from the early 1870s.

It's unwise to imagine that Republicans and Democrats of the late 1860s bore much resemblance to their counterparts today. At that time, Republicans tended to be more progressive and more liberal; Democrats, at the opposite end of the spectrum --- most jarringly on issues related to race. Faith presented the Democrat agenda of his era in what someone from the 21st century might call Tea Party terms, relying on the race card to fire up his constituency.

Dan Baker, a later editor of The Democrat/Leader who wrote Lucas County's 1881 history before moving on to California, described Faith as a "sharp, incisive writer, with occasional lapses from fairness, which often caused the loss of respect of his readers." That seems to be something of an understatement. "A distortion of facts," Baker continued, "invariably undermines confidence in the editor."

Faith apparently had difficulty at the start in finding suitable office space on a town square of ramshackle frame buildings grouped around what, when it rained, was a sea of mud. In late January of 1868, however, he moved his operation into the southwest corner room on the second floor of the old brick Lucas County Courthouse. It was common, then, for the county to rent courthouse space to professionals and several lawyers also had their offices in the courthouse at varying times.

Faith left town in 1871, press and all, taking his operation to Osceola --- but didn't last long there. The newspaper was relaunched in Chariton as The Leader during April of 1872 with Baker and Napoleon Bonaparte "Bone" Branner, recently returned to Lucas County after Confederate sservice in the Civil War, as editors.

As the years passed, the newspaper was known variously as The Leader and The Democrat, depending upon who owned it, until settling into place finally as The Leader. It's best-known owner probably was Smith H. Mallory, who restored The Democrat name during the years he was attempting, unsuccessfully, to become a political force in Iowa.

Although the first issue of The Democrat did not survive, the second --- of Oct. 19, 1867 --- has. In it, Faith republished the "Preface" that had appeared in the Oct. 12 issue with the following note: "We have received some two hundred subscribers since our last publication and it has been suggested that we re-publish our introductory in order that all might see it, the extra copies of our last edition having been exhausted before Monday morning."

Here's the text of that "preface":

"Custom has taught the public to expect, that when an editor issues his first paper, he will, in a long and windy "salutatory," introduce himself, and minutely foreshadow the course that he intends to pursue as an Editor. This is always an unpleasant duty, and we for one, would be glad to see the custom abolished.

"In sending out this, the first number of the Chariton Democrat, we feel that we are undertaking a work which is by no means trifling. The Democratic citizens of the County have long felt the want of an "organ" for the party, and now that the desire is about to be gratified in one respect, there is danger that they will expect too much of the Editor. They will feel like falling back in an attitude of repose, and depend upon him to do the work alone. Twice before has the attempt been made to establish a Democratic paper at Chariton, and each time the attempt has proved a failure. It is not for us to say where the fault lay, or whether this was the cause of failure. This is no apparent reason why such a paper cannot be made self-supporting in this city and county --- where all is enterprise, prosperity and hope. Yet we do not undertake the work with hopes of a golden future and easy life before us. We have twice before been "through the mill," and we still are only an editor. But we never have failed, and never had so fair a prospect as is here presented. To make the enterprise successful, we shall endeavor to identify it with the interests of the section of country from which it eminates, and to do this, we must have the encouragement and co-operation of those who are friendly to our work. Experience has taught us that this is essential, and from what we have readily seen of the Lucas County Democracy, we can freely say that we believe they will do their duty.

"As to our politics, of course we are Democratic. We shall, in our feeble manner, advocate only those principles which are Democratic. We cannot undertake to promise what we will do, but there are some things that we will not do, viz: We will not advocate the Negro Equality Radical doctrines; we shall not try to prove that a negro is better than a white man, or even as good a citizen; nor shall we insist that the negro race is more capable of governing the United States than is the white race. We shall not contend that it is just that a portion of the people on the one hand should be burdened with an enormous tax to support a monied aristocracy on the other; we shall not urge that it is right that the home-holder should receive his interest in gold, while the laborer is paid his hire in greenbacks; we shall not labor to show that it is for the best interests of the country that we should retain and perpetuate in office a general black-and-tan mixture of Radicals, negroes and thieves, to the exclusion and oppression of honest white man; and we shall fail to see the right by which a body of political demagogues who syle themselves the Congress of the United States can proclaim to the people that they are the makers and judges of the laws of the land, and proceed to establish and perpetuate a military oligarchy over a section of the country, the people whereof are more loyal and better citizens than themselves. These and many other like pernicious principles, we shall not adovcate. But we shall endeavor, by truth and consistency in all things, to show up the evils and corruption which now hold high carnival in every public department of our Local, State, and National Governments.

"We shall also endeavor to make the Democrat a Newspaper, giving as full a summary of the general news, from week to week, as the means at hand will enable us to do, and our space allow.

"We shall make our local department, the feature of our paper, and to this end we shall depend upon our friends to aid us, by sending to us such items as are of local interest, as they come under their observation. We shall also use care in the selection of our miscellaneous readings; and by industry in all these departments, we hope to make the Democrat a permanent institution, and a welcome visitor to every Democratic household."