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VOL. XIII. NO. 661. Wished Every Friday by W. O. Saunders t 505 E. FearinR St.. Klizabcth City. N. C ELIZABETH CITY, N. C r FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 1920 Entered as Second" Class Alattei ai tiie 'Popt-ottice .at Elizabern City. N C.. Jojie . 1908 $2.00 A YEAR WE'RE LIVING IN CLOVER AND PONT REALIZE IT If You Want To Be Glad You Live in The Eliza beth City Territory, Just Take a Trip Way Down South By W. O. SAUNDERS Cheer up! Elizabeth City and this immediate , northeastern North Carolina territory is busy, prosperous and secure against panic, compared with other sec tions of the country right at this time. I have just returned from a trip to Atlanta, Ga., the great financial, commercial and indus trial center of the south. I did n't go to investigate conditions prevailing in the south. One doesn't have to. One with eyes can see that the south is bank rupt. From the windows of a railroad car on any southern road one can see thousands of acres of cotton unpicked and know that back of the railroads are millions of other unpicked acres. And the cotton that has been picked and ginned and baled is not stored in warehouses, but K ing out in the yards exposed to the weather, because the cotton farmers farther south have few shelters. One sees little else but cotton in the south and one used to the black lands of northeast ern North Carolina wonders how they can even raise cotton on the red clay soil of Georgia and South Carolina. Every day looks like Sunday in the southern country to-day. The stores are neither buying nor selling goods and no one is navinsr bills. The south has de pended Tiporr -cottoir-aTid cottorr 1ia; atrain wrecked its hopes The rank and file who prospered j temporarily when prices were high last year have spent all the easy money they made last year, expecting easier money this fall. They bought silk shirts and au tomobiles while the going was good. To-day they whine for credit for corn meal and sow belly, and the repair man is swearing he won't work on their automobiles for less than cash. The southern markets are glutt ed with second hand automobiles for sale at any price. There are not hundreds , or thousands, but millions of human i heings in the south to-day with nothing but cotton to realize on. And they can't sell their cotton; they can't eat it ; they can't even patch their rags with it until the mills spin it into yarn and weave it into cloth. And thousands of mills are not spinning or weav ing More than half a million textile workers are out of em ployment. That is the woeful picture of the south to-day. It is duplicat ed in the tobacco growing re gions of eastern and central North Carolina. In the big industrial centers tip north, millions are out of em ployment and facing a hard win ter with only a Republican plat form promise . of prosperity to mock them. How different' things are here in this little God favored corner of North Carolina. We are , not wholly dependent upon any one thing under the . sun. If cotton fails us, we have our . peas and corn and hogs. The ginner may not want our cotton, the miller may not want our corn; but thank God we cleaned up on po tatoes earlier in the season and haven't spent it all yet. Money may be . little tight and the hankers reluctant to lend; but U:A one legitimately in need may borrow enough to scrape along ' We may have to postpone t, ( purchase of new automobiles 'I the building of new homes, ' with our garden truck, our '" "'try. our eggs, our pigs,- our ' our fish, our lumber and '1-r resources we can scrape HERE'S A CLUB OFFER YOU'VE WAITED FOR The Progressive Farmer to Readers of This Newspaper For 25 Cents a Year . Many readers of. THE INDE PENDENT also want the PRO GRESSIVE FARMER, the great Southern farm paper. By special arrangement THE INDEPENDENT is enabled to supply The PRO- GRESSIVE FARMER to its read- ers at a saving of 75 cents on the yearly subscription when clubbed with this newspaper. . Here's the offer: THE INDEPENDENT, I yr. $2.00 PROGRESSIVE FARMER, I year 1 $l.00 Total $3.00 Club Price $2.25 You save $ Just send your check or P. .75 o Money order for $2.25 and have your subscription to this paper ex- tended one year and get the PRO-. GRESSIVE FARMER for one year. Don't put it off. All subscriptions must me sent toTHE INDEPEN- DENT, Elizabeth City, N. C. SAYS VIRTUOUS GIRLS WILL BE OSTRACISED Raleigh Preacher Speaks Plainly Quotes Plaint Statement of Prominent Maa And la a sermon last Sunday that made his congregation twist in their seats, Dr. Weston Bruner, pastor of the Taber nacle Baptist Church in Raleigh applied the analogy of the cloud that came down from Mt. Sinai four thousand years ago and out of which the Lord God spake? tolMosea .and thru him .to -hi people, for a scathing arraignment of the present pursuit of sensuality and greed that is sweeping America. In sub stance, Dr. Bruner's remarks as report ed by the Raleigh News and Observer, issue of Nov. 22 were as follows: ( "There has come to light out of the cloud of war so amazing a spirit of sen suality and immorality as would make the days of heathen Rome blush with shame," he declared to his great con gregation. "When the brazen immor ality of the City Auditorium dances and the Country Club dances came to light, some of us hoped that it was a local epidemic of leprosy, but, alas, it is wide spread. , "The automobile, the dances, and the laxity of parental discipline, raise the tide of licentiousness to an amazim' height. Not only in Raleigh, but in every quarter of the State this terrible thing that is eating away the souls of our young people goes on. A man whoir you would all know, and in whom yon have the utmost trust, told me that in his town, in the set that stands highest in society, every young girl in that ot had been guilty of gross immorality save two, and that the boys had told them that unless they surrendered their vir tue they would be ostracized. LOVELORN COUPLE HAD HARD LUCK ah Wm Briaht anil Rosy, But Mama Got Busy and Spoiled Everything Charles Bright, a 17 year old youth of 28th street, Norfolk, Virginia, ran- away with his lady love Miss Martha Diioa 18, also of Norfolk and came to Elizabeth City last Saturday to become one. Everything seemed going fine when the couple got here and feeling secure -the couple dined at the Eagle Cafe, only to find a member of Jfinza beth City's vigilant Police Force wait hie for them oat side when they finish ed lunch. Mrs. C. C. Bright, the mo- rtpr of the boy having in the meantime got busy and phoned from Norioin toj nave uku Biwjiywii - - noon train and took the couple back with her. SPECIAL'.R&O MEPt, SERMON There will be a special Bed Men's ser mon preache at the First Baptist Church Sunday evening November 28th. All Bed Men are revested to meet the hall Sunday evening and attend this special sermon in a body. Along somehow without missing our three squares a day. Elizabeth City and the coun ties which it serves as a trade center are wonderfully blessed in these depressing times by a wonderful diversity of resources not generally found in the south. We may not be doing the . busi ness we did last year or making the money we made last rear, but we are far better off than we were in 1914, .1915 and 1916. 'Fess up! Isn't it so? CAN N. CAROLINA AFFORD TO PAY! Dr. Claxton Says She Can And Presents Astounding Facts To Prove It .The people of North Carolina paid into the Federal Treasury last year more than $162,000,000 in indirect taxes. The state of North Carolina exbended last year only $8,157931.63 cents for public education in elementary any secondary"' schools. North Carolina " has expended for all public educational purposes only $130,038,896 from the founding of the first public school system in 1840 down to the present date. A simple example in substraction reveals the startling- fact that North Carolinians paid into the Federal treasury in indirect tax es last year over 25 million dol lar smore than they paid in tax es for education in all the history of the state. The foregoing information, of vast importance to every one interested in education is taken from a carefully pre pared statement of the educational sit uation in this state by Dr. P. P. Claxton, U. S. Commissioner of Education. Dr. Claxton says that North Carolina needs to spend three or four times more, mon ey than she now spends on public ed ucation. And being a practical man he attempts to show that North Carolina is able to do as much. The records show, according to Com missioner Claxton that for elementary and secondary schools the total has been a little more than $107,500,000; for high er education including universities, col leges of agriculture and mechanic arts, normal schools, schools for the deaf and the blind, a little less than $22,500,000 Allowing $5,000,000 for defectiveness in records, the tax expenditures for edu cation has been lass than $135,000,00. The people who pay taxes for ' other purposes" in" fffese-amounts can, without disaster, and , the comparatively small amount needed for education. How Money Could Be Raised Commissioner Claxton further says: "Last year the people of the United States paid an average of $20 per cap ita for tobacco, cigars, cigarettes, chew ing tobacco and snuff. If North Caro lina is an average tobacco using State, as I have reason to believe it is, ther the people spent last year more than $45,000,000 for tobacco. If in some high moment of enthusiastic devotion an self-sacrifice they had agreed amonr themselves to smoke two cigars instead of three, burn two cigarettes instead o' three, chew two chews instead of three take two dips and leave, the third un dipped, and had put the money thus sav ed into the school fund, they could havo paid all the teachers of the elementary and high schools of the State three times as much as they were paid. A smnl' fraction of the money spent for joy riding saved for education would have done the same. "Far be it from me to suggest either of these means for increasing the schoo1 funds for the pay of, teachers. It is not necessary to use either. people who can spend money in large amounts for these other purposes as the people of North Carolina do, can easily pay also whatever may be necessary for the education of their children to pre pare them for life, for citizenship and for increasing the material wealth of the State as can only be done through edu cation. I know the people of North Carolina well enough to believe they will do so when once they fully under stand the need. CELEBRATE COMPLETION OF INLAND WATERWAY! Congressman John Small WW Be There And Invites Everybody To Go On Monday, November 29, 1920, a simple celebration. will be held at Great Bridge on the Kne of the Inland Water way for the purpose of commemorating the completion of that section from Nor folk to the Albemarle Sound. A letter from Congressman John H. SmalL : member of the committee on Ri vers and- ..Harbors, - to the local Cham ber" of Ctemnwree-' invites -; the ' organiza tfcra- to send delegates to partcipate on the occasion of the celebration, and an nounces that arrangemets will .be made Ute.take from Norfolk Grcat Bridge The exercises will be under the aus pices of the Atlantic Deeper Waterways Association, and that body is hoping that Elizabeth City will be well repre sented at Great Bridge on Monday next. Secretary Case of the Chamber of Commerce asks any . who will be able to attend the celebration to notify him at once, either by letter, or by phone. Any citizen of Elizabeth City, whether a member of the Chamber of Commerce or not, is invited to attend the celebra tion, but it wjll be necessary for all such to send in their names in order that the needful arrangements may be made. T. P. Nash, Sr. is in New York this veek visiting, his son T. P. Nash, Jr. T. P. Jr. is professor of chemistry in the medical branch of Cornell Univer- l sity this year. , PETER SHIPP DEAD AT THE AGE OF 74 YEARS A Native of England (and For 41 Years a Useful and Exemplary Cit izen of This Community P. S. SHIPP Peter S. Shipp, age-74, died at his home 303 First St. in this city at 5 o'clock this morning, following an ill ness of several weeks.;- He had been un conscious for several days and the end came slowly and peacefully. The fune ral and interment will take place at 3 o'clock to-morrow afternoon. Mr. Shipp was one of the oldest and most highly respected citizens of this community. He was j& native of Eng land, his parents settled in this country when he was -a child and his early life was spent in New York state. He came to Elizabeth City 41 years ago, physi cians having sent him south on account of his health. He was told he had only a few, weeks or months to live. He com pletely recovered his health, his wife joined him here. a few months later and they made Elizabeth 'City their home. He was ever an active, useful and ex emplary citizen. He is survided by his wife to whom he was married 52 years ago, and by one son, Fred Shipp, of New Bern, N. C. COME TO BOOST BETrM ROADS North Carolina Roads Boosters Here In Full Force Next Week The North Carolina Landown ers Association and the North Carolina Good Roads Associa tion are cooperating with the Elizabeth City Chamber of Com merce in the series of meetings to be held thruout. Pasquotank, Camden and Currituck counties the week of November 29. Dr. Low, whom the federal govern ment loaned to the state for a few months; W. A. McGirt, Manager of the Landowners Association, and President of the North Carolina Good Roads As sociation ; Miss Berry, Secretary of the Good Roads Association, and other pro minent workers in the state, will parti cipate in the meetings. Dr. Low has been lecturing in various parts of North Carolina, and the news papers have given glowing accounts of his talks jn the interest of better health conditions, better roads, better methods of agriculture, etc. His lecture is pro fusely illustrated with steropticon views. The other speakers are all intimately familiar with conditions in this section of the state, and are striving to bring about the changes needful to he made before Eastern North Carolina can hope to make a successful appeal to the out side .world. Startling facts and figures will be brought to the attention of the people, and the series of meetings pro mi sea to be the most interesting and profitable ever staged in this part of the state. The big meeting, of . the ' week will be held at Elizabeth City Thursdayi Dec ember 2, when each' of the above men tioned speakers will be present. The proposed state highway system, which will connect Elizabeth City and the sur rounding country with the rest of the state, will be featured on that oeca sion. Maps, charts, etc., will be shown. An effort will be made to bring to Eliz abeth City most of the members of the County Highway Commissions and County Commissioners of the : several counties, in North eastern North CaroJ- Jlna, and all who are interested in bet ter s roads. A movement was long since started to bond the state for the construction of a system of state highways, and meet ings have been held in all parts of North Carolina to awaken interest in the movement. Word comes the peo ple are everywhere interested in the proposal to . have the state construct certain roads in every county, leavj: each county free to expend its money on the roads that are merely local And for the purpose of crystallizing pub lie sentiment before the January ses sion of the Legislature, and effort is being made to reach the people of every section of the state before the first o the year. A list of meetings to be held nex week follows: s ' Monday, Nov. 29, Newlahd; Tuesday, Nov. 30, Poplar Branch; Wednesda Dec J, Moyock; -Thursday, Do".'. Elizabeth City; Friday, Dec. 3, Salem; Saturday, VDec; 4, Camden. - TIME TO BUY IS NOW-OT LATER Too Much Waitingr Will Surely Result In Still Higher Prices The "ultimate consumer" may be overplaying the game in waiting ' for prices to go lower than now. before supplying his needs. Regardless of price conditions, peo ple must eat and wealr clothes. When production decreases as it must when people stop buying and consumption goes on, something is bound to happen; and inevitably it means higher, instead of lower, prices! In the matter of wearing apparrei for example there is not a factory ir the whole country that is to-day run ning on full time, and many of them are shut down in the effort to meet recent ly developed conditions." With the gradual depletion ot the supply on hand, and with the consum ers requiring the same necessities before, it. is inevitable .that the point of exhaustion of the present available supply will be reached. Then it will follow that when every body goes into the market for new sup plies, all wanting the same goods at the same time, the result will mean only one thing, whether its effect be- good, bad or indifferent. Under such a condi tion higher prices would be unescapable. The New York Times correctly ex presses the situation in the statement "That the present seasons fall in prices will go on uninterruptedly, how ever ,no one imagines. Labor costs are still disproportionately high, and the present year's forced closing out of speculative holdings means relaxation, when the active business season ends, jn the strain on credit which has been primarily responsible for this month's violent fall in prices. But that prices and cost of .living will rise again to tfte high point of 1919 or last spring i: wholly jmprobable." The consumer has, to a large extent, been out of the market for his necessi ties durinz the last few months. He has delayed the purchase of ne- Ritie in' the hope that the decline ir prices had not reached the bottom. There never has been sucn a maricea slump in prices in . sou short -a time as that which "has- taken -place "recently There have been greater variations in price, but not so short a tune. Reports from all parts of tne coun try indicate . that the consumer is now going again Into the market for his nec essities. This conclusion is undoubtedly wine, for the probability is that longer delay would mean that when he doe? go into the market it would be under higher price conditions. Retail business all over the countrj is evidently acting upon a decision that the wise thing to do now is to make it- turn-over." eet what it can tor its stocks that were bought at the pre vnilinff hieh prices during the last year accept its loss and enter the new year under readjusted conditions. There is not a retailer in tiizanexr City who is not offering consumers ol umarina anoarei of every kind an op portunity to buy at retail at lower pric es than some of these goons cost i wholesale! Thev will not carry over high-pricet' stocks, which will be shelf-worn antf out of date, to come into competition with noods to be made available under lower price jobbing conditions next year. So they are now unloading mucn 01 this stock at sacrifice prices actually lower than the prices that will prevail next year. ' The wise consumer will take advan tage of the opportunity offered in these sacrifice sale offerings being made b practically every retail establishment ir Elizabeth City. The danger in delay lies in the fac that it probably means higher prices for the same merchandise late,r on. SQUIRES, THE GREEN GOODS MAN IS HERE THIS WEEK P. C. Squires, . nationally famous ae "the I green goods man," is IniEKeafceth City this week. Mr. Squires' particu lar brand of green goods' is holly and mistletoe and he knows the market for these Christmas greens. He began com ing to Eliizabeth City about 15 years ago and once it looked like he had clean ed up all the holly and mistletoe in this section. But after an absence of seven yeara be is back again, a new crop bav m developed during hla absence. ...He has observed also that Elizabeth City has grown wonderfully in seven years. My. Squires' home ; ia i in Ocean City, Md, HatfoawavSavs ; If you wear glasses, have your, eyes and glasses both examined from time to time, and' go to the place where you can afford to pay a reason able price for real professio nal work. Remember your eyes are your bread-winners. Take care of them. - You have your teeth ex amined twice a year. Why not you eyes? They are . more important. Dr. J. D. Hatha way. Optometrist Phone 999 , Bradford Bldg. ELIZABETH CITY BONDS ARE GIVEN A Bl ACK-EYE Solemn Obligations Repudiated Just When City Talks of Issuing Half a Million in Bonds And The Man Who Could Have Saved The Situation Didn't A DESERTED FAMILY SUFFERING FOR FOOD The. Cohoons on Panama Street Have Been Living on Six Dollars a Vyeek There is a family in Elizabeth City in need of help almost within a stone's throw of two of its biggest churches. Mrs. Ruth Cohoonv a voung mother, with two boys, ages five and nine years and an infirm mother to support is pit ifully struggling to keep up respectabil ity on the , small sum of six dollars a week which she manages to earn at the Avalon Hosiery Mill where she works when the power plant furnishes enough current to run the mill. The Cohoons came here two years ago from the Kilkenny section of Tyr rell county. The husband B. F. Co hoon found work herein one of the mills and made a living for the , family of five. The wife worked in a hosiery mill and contributed to the weekly earnings. Things went along very well until about six months ago when Cohoon went away to look for work. " Since that time ac cording to Mrs. Cohoon, he has contri buted only about $10 to the support of his family and apparently forgotten it completely. . They haven't heard a word from him in several months, but he wrote his mother in Gum Neck that he was going to California. Repeated ef forts on the part of Mrs. Cohoon have failed to locate him. The Cohoons live in a neatly kept but barren little home at 505 Panama street. There is a big lithograph of the First Thanksgiving on the wall. Thanksgiv ing this year didn't means many good things at that home as are on the load ed board in. the picture of the First Thanksgiving, c but thru the efforts of citizens of Elizabeth City a neat little sum was presented and the family did afford a good dinnec The matter was taken, np--with-the City Manager-'- and he also saw that some provisions were sent. Mrs. Cohoon was married when she was about 15 years old. Her husband was a little older. Both were uneducat ed and totally incompetent to support the two children that have come Jto the family. Here is an example for the ed ification of society wbSch permits a couple of children to start out in the biggest business in the world. "Who loses when . these two children make a failure and leave heavy liabilities ir the shape of hungry, healthy, normal offsprings which for a time at least will be a burden upon society. MIDWIVES TO RECEIVE EXPERT INSTRUCTION State Board.jf Health Will Send Train ed Nurse To This Section " Next Week According to the Bureau of Vital Sta tisties, North Carolina State Board ,of Health, about every other child born in Eastern North Carolina has an- ignorant nidwife to see that it is started alonf the journey to a healthy lifer This means that during the days before and after birth one half of the mothers trust their lives in the hands of these women. Some midwives do very well or ar well as they know how; others caus deaths of mothers and babies. They know no better and must be taught. With the aim to improve the situatio- the Bureau of Epidemiology and . th' Bureau of Infant Hygiene and Public Health Nursing of North Carolina State Board of Health, are carrying on ar extensive campaign .t jeducate these women, most of whom are negroes. , Important things are to be done at the birth of - a hild other than rendering surgical and medical ' aid. There must be filled a complete ana" accurate birth certificate to assure the child of its age for school attendance, etc. Silver ni trate must be dropped in the eyes U prevent blindness. Such must be done if physicianor midwife attend the birth With view to. instructing the midwives along these lines a nurse from the State Board of Health, Raleigh, N. C, win visit the- following .places.' Please in form any one you know acting as a midwife and tell them to attend - the meeting. : r-H -'i Snowden, Depot, 10 A. MV, Monday, Nov. 29th. Elizabeth City, Court House, 10 A. M., Tuesday, Nov. 30th. Hertford, Court House, 10 A. M. Wed nesday Dec. 1st Edenton, Court House, 10 A. M., Thursday, Dec.. 2nd. Gatesville, Court House, 10 A. M., Fri day, Dec. 3rd. Ahoskie, Colored School House, 10 A. M., Saturday, Dec. 4th. HE FOUND IT Miles Jennings tells a story on s man about town who went over into Washington county to look for some or' that Washington county moonshine corn. The fellow was gone four days. When he got back Jennings asked him if he found what he went after? "I guess I did, he replied, "because there ar two days of my time.. I can't accomr' for," . ' Two thousand dollar Elizabeth City Graded School Bonds held by an Ohio bank and due Oct. 1, 1920 have been returned to the holders unpaid and the coupons on more than $30,000 of the same bonds have also been returned unpaid, giving Elizabeth City and ' Elizabeth City school bonds a blackeye among bond buyers. There is an unwritten law in the world of finance that the princi pal and interest on bonds must be paid when due and bond, buy ers have no patience with ar no respect for a municipality that violates this law. The Savings Bank & Trust Co. of Elizabeth City acts as treasur er for the Board of Graded school lrustees. r. r. Ayaiett, president of the school board is vice-president of the Savings Bank & Trust Co. Mr. Aydlett's indorsement on a note,, or the in-7 dorsement of any of Mr. Ay dlett's friends would have spar ed Elizabeth City the odium of this repudiation of a sacred ob ligation at a time wben .Eliza beth, City purposes to go before the country with another issue of bonds to sell. If Mr. Aydlett wanted to make Elizabeth City school bonds a drug on the mar ket, one can understand why he as chairman of the Board of Graded School; Trustees permitt ed the bonds due Oct. 1, 1920 to go unpaid. The fact that these bonds were sent back adds weight to the charges made by this newspaper that some one on that school board is trying to kill the proposed new, bond is sue. It is explained at the Savings Bank & Trust Co. that the bonds were not paid because the schools didn't have a sufficient sum in the treasury to cover the amount. That is not unusual in this community where niggardly management has always contriv ed to provide too little money to run the school. , It is usual for for the school treasury to be at low ebb at this season of the year when the tax collector has only begun his work and has not be gun to turn new funds into the treasury. All this was to have been anticipated and a properly directed School Board with a chairman heartily interested in the success of the schools and the credit of the city could have easily negotiated a loan to have, taken care of those bonds. This newspaper" is reliably in formed that either of the banks in this city would have arranged .a loan to-have taken care of those bonds if Mr. Aydlett had asked them to do-so. But he madeno move except to insist that the bonds be returned unpaid. And no one knew better than Mr. Ay dlett that the return of those bonds might be "expected to in jure the credit ' of "the ; city and make it so much harder, for the city to sell school ture s in fu- f 3! This newspaper is aware of the fact that " it is considered high treason in some circles to say anything at all in criticism of the immaculate Mr. Aydlett. No act or motive of his must ever be questioned: But this newspaper is determined to expose every move , to block the new school bond is sue. The future of the children of this city depends upon the immediate and thoro rebuilding of our public school system. This newspaper .? intends to fearlessly stand by this school bond is sue and to expose its enemies regard less of whom jt offends. Not even a cry for Burke Culpepper to come over andielp them will deter this newspaper from doing what it believes a be its duty to the people. - . V