Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Seaforth News, 1958-05-29, Page 2Intimate.,Message From Trinidad Simply put, the people of this green island just: off the north coast of South America ` are charming. In the classic man- vier .of newsmen I've been inter-' vriewing'. taxi drivers regularly Indians- and Negroes as it happened. They have a wry cense of humor and are uni- formly articulate on all aspects of politics. Trinidadians area g e n t l e people with a quiet dignity. This le a happy tune for them as Princess Margaret has been vis - Ring here, and another step has been taken with the inaugura, lion of the legislature of the 'West Indies Federation. Bunting *bounds. Flags of the nation - lo -be sprout from every window In the business district an orange sun against a field of wavy white lines across blue. (The sun and the sea dominate the life and character of the ten Islands that make lip the fed- eration.) What is inescapable to the eye as you travel through Port of Spain are the people — Indians, Chinese, and Negro. Trinidad bas much in common with Ha- waii — the same polyglotso- ciety with racial lines blurred. Nlac, my favorite taxi driver, puts it this way: "The only race we don't have are Eskimos." Driving from the airport, after helping to welcome Princess Margaret, we passed goats nib- bling at the edge of the road, tethered cattle blinking in the brigh . sun, dark faces under spreading straw hats, and rick- ety wagons drawn by tiny bur- ros. And the 'flowers and trees! In Fort of Spain purple bougainvil- laea, red hibiscus, the white "Lucky seed" as they call- it, and trees — almond, poui, sea- man, banana, wild plum. All of, this is set against plaster walls of dark red, Light green, or White, The birds too have dcreaming color — in the palm outside my window they dis- play their yellow breasts and they whistle and cry rather than ling. Flowers, trees, and birds — like the dress of the people in orange, red, and green — are heightened to the eye of a Norteamericano. Trinidadians also love vivid around, lots of it, The calypsos and the steel bands made of oil drums epitomize this. These sur- prising songs with a shrewd twist are turned out at the drop of a palm leaf for you, and the. rhythm is inescapable you bounce in your chair almost im- mediately. I' met this year's Calypso King. Mighty Striker is the name (really Percy Oblington); and there are others just as famous —Mighty Sparrow, Lord Su- perior, and Attila the Hun. The writing of the' livid and topical jingles is almost a national sport writes Robert R. Brunn in The Christian Science Monitor. It is hard to believe that the music made from slices of oil drums has such character and precision. The instruments are the "ping pong" or "piano pan" which carries the melody; the "time boom" or "guitar pan" for the harmony; the bass, simply the "boom"; and last are the "'tittle booms" for the rhythm. For percussion? A metal bar banged against an old brake drums Joy certainly reigns un- confined., London must be delighted by the stories that have been corn - fog back from the Caribbean on Vrincess Margaret—with all the for the covey of reporters has Igen able to dish up. As usual Rtribute is being made to the oyal Family merely by the fact led blanket coverage of every de- tail of the Princess's movements. When ` you see what care and diligence are taken to give Brit- ish readers the minutiae, you conclude that millions must be fascinated. Every detail of the dress she wore when she arrived was duly reported (red and white flower - petal hat, pink and white chiffon dress, white gloves, a double strand of pearls, white handbag, and open -toed white shoes). And the reporters were avid to dis- cover that her airplane com- partment was decorated in pea- cock blue and red. More, the dining compartment was bright- ened by orange lilies, pink roses, and orchids. To top' it off Mighty Striker composed a welcoming calypso which ,chorused: So now let's shout out, "Wel- come Princess"; we are glad To see you again here in Trinidad, Maybe You Didn't Know That life does add up. At 70, for example, you'll have. eaten 75,000 meals and 'slept 200,000 hours. * * * That the average weight of the three ships with which Christopher Columbus discover- ed American was only 60 tons. You have got a good memory if • you can still recall their names: the Nina, Pinta and Santa, Maria, * * * That one of Benjamin Frank- lin's most unusual inventions was a bathtub shaped like a shoe. (He sure put his feet in it that time!) * * * That packs of wild African dogs on occasion will attack a lion and eat it alive Even the king of beasts has to beware the mob. * * * That the average Canadian spends 20 minutes a day on the phone. The figure definitely doesn't apply to teen-agers. * * * That more than 1,000 persons were killed and 100,000 injured last year in accidents caused by drivers swerving from objects thrown on the highway. * * That even the names of post offices can make a dieter hun- gry—such as Lamb, Ky„ and Chicken, Alaska. * * , That, according to the Catho- lic Digest, 10,000,0000 Russians are studying English, but fewer than 8,000 Americans are study- ing Russian. * * * That a department store in Allentown, Pa., is now selling .22 -caliber pistols in three colors —blue, gold and pink=to ladies who wont to pack their own after -dark protection. * * •r That a recent survey showed dandruff, as well as ulcers, is a high-tension occupational ail- ment among actors, newspaper- men and advertising executives.' That another survey disclosed 66 per cent of the admen who carry briefcases home admit they don't open them until they get back to the office the next morning. * +s * That, although the Old West seems to get tamer every year, wild burros have become a nui- sance in California. Yep, that's right—wild burros. BUY GAS STOCKS? "What," someone asked a par- liamentary candidate, "will you do if you're elected?" "Good gracious!" exclaimed the impecunious candidate. "What will I do if I'm not?" ow HAPPY NEW YEAR -Crowds gather around a chariot filled with children at Bhatgon, Nepal. The huge, wooden chariot is the. symbol of the New Year. People come from all over the country for the New Year festival, called Biskut Yatra. WATER-SKIING ELEPHANT—"Beatty Hamid", the world's only water-skiing elephant, gives folks a thrill by zipping up and down the Hudson River on high-speed skis. The water —loving pachyderm is featured with the Clyde Beatty and Hamid -Morton Circus. Marge Rusing, riding on his back, helped train the animal. 'TABLE TALKS 6am FIG BREAD 11/2 cups all-purpose flour 2 tsp. baking powder 3/ cup brown sugar tsp. salt BA tsp. coda 154 cups whole-wheat flour 1 egg, beaten 1'%a: cups milk BA cup honey 2 tbsp. melted butter 1 cup figs, chopped BA cuppecan meats, chopped Sift all-purpose flour before measuring. Re -sift with baking powder, sugar, salt and soda. Add whole-wheat flour. Combine egg, milk, honey and melted butter. Stir into the sifted ingredients and knead,in figs end pecans. Place the dough in a greased 6 -x -10 -inch pan or in two 4 -x -7 - inch pans. Allow to stand 20 minutes and bake in 350 -degree oven 1 hour, * * * JELLY LOAF 2 cups all-purpose flour, sifted 1/a tsp. salt 3A. tsp. baking soda 13/s tsp. baking powder 3/ cup sugar 1 cup chopped nuts, raisins or dates Grated rind and juice of 1 orange Boiling water 2 tbsp. shortening 1 egg, beaten 1 cup firm cold jelly (cran- berry, strawberry, apple), cut into small tubes. Sift dry ingredients. Stir in nuts, raisins or dates. Combine orange rind and juice in a measuring cup and fill re- mainder of cup with boiling water. Pour over shortening and stir until melted. Add egg to slightly -cooled li- quid and blend well. Add liquid to dry mixture, mixing together lightly. Blend— until flour is just dampened and carefully fold in jelly cubes. Turn at once into a greased and floured 8 -x -4 -x -3 -inch bread pan, let stand 20 minutes and bake in a 325 -degree oven for about 1 hour. _ * * * ORANGE LOAF 4 cups all-purpose flour 5 tsp. baking powder i4 tsp. salt 2 cups milk 3 whole eggs 1 tsp. butter, melted Juice and rind of 1 orange 1 cup mixed peel OR candied cherries 3 tbsp. sugar Rind of 1 orange Sift flour with baking powder and salt. Mix milk, eggs, butter, orange juice and rind, beat vigorously and fold in peel or cherries. Pour into small loaf pans and sprinkle the top with a mixture of sugar and rind. Let stand 20 minutes. Bake in a 375 -degree oven for 1 hour, * 5 * NUT LOAF 2 eggs L cup sugar ?a cup shortening, melted '-A cup molasses 1 cup sour milk 154 cups all-purpose flour 1 tsp. salt 1 tsp. baking soda 13/2 cups whole-wheat flour 1 cup raisins 1 cup walnuts, chopped Beat eggs with sugar. Add shortening and molasses. Mix thoroughly and 'add sour milk. Sift flour, salt, baking soda. Add whole-wheat flour. Pour dry ingredients over li- quid ingredients. Add raisins and nuts and mix , well. Pour into loaf pans and let stand 20 min- utes, Bake in a 350 -degree oven 50 to 60 minutes. * e r SPICE BREAD 2 cups all-purpose flour 1 tsp. baking powder 1 tsp. soda 1 tsp. salt 5/x tsp. cinnamon 1 tsp. ginger yin cup. strained honey 1 egg, slightly beaten 1 cup milk, Mix and sift dry ingredients together. Add honey, egg and milk and beat hard 15 to 30 minutes. Butter a 5 -x -9 -x -grinch bread .pan lightly and dust with flour. Fill and let stand fon 20 minutes before baking. Bake fqr 50 minutes in a 350 - degree Oven. Let rest 4 days. * * * CHEESE -DATE LOAF 1 cup boiling water i/s lb. dates, chopped fine 13A cups all-purpose flour s/ tsp. salt 1 tsp. baking soda 1 cup sugar 1 egg, beaten 1 cup mild cheese, shredded Pour boiling water over dates and soak for 10 minutes. Sift flour, salt, baking soda and sugar together. Add dates, egg and 'cheese and mix thor- oughly. Pour into loaf pans, let stand 20 minutes and bake in a 325 - degree oven for 1 hour. HAND TAILORING Joe Sugden .was a catcher in days of yore, and his fingers are gnarled with the trademark of his profession. One day he was introduced to a writer who ask- ed, "Mr. Sugden, did you get those hands from catching base- balls?" "No, sir," replied Joe. "I got them from not catching base- balls" A Village Weekly In New YOrk City A country weekly in the heart of New YOrk City! This is the distinction of The Villager which has just cele j orated its 25th anniversary and whose founders, the late Walter G. and Isabel Bryan, have had a bronze plaque dedicated to them in the Washington Square heart of Greenwich Village, their adopted community. Natives of Fulton, Missouri, and reared in a small Midwest- ern town, this unusual brother-, sister team built up a valuable newspaper property in a great metropolis 'already served by long-established and powerful dailies on the theory that many big city folk yearn for the neigh- borliness and identity with com- munity life they formerly knew or wished they had known. "Greenwich Village glories in a personality that has stirred all America," declared Louis 11. Solomon, president of the local Chamber of Commerce, at the dedication of the plaque. He was re((erring to the lit- erary it era ry men &nd'artists who lived, at various os, m the vicinity of Washing tijuare — Wash- ington. Irvi `g Magor Allan Poe, Henry Janie It Whitman, O. Hens+y, - ThIct1T Dreiser, John' Singer Sargent, 'V'E,.. ache1 Lindsay, Frank Norris, John Sloan, Wal- ter Lippman, Edwin Arlington Robinson, Edith Wharton, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Thomas Wolfe, William Dean Howells, and Sherwood Anderson. But there are others who hail the community because it has the same groups, clubs, and as- sociations and .the same com- niunity spirit found in thousands of villages from coast to. coast. Take, for instance, Curtis Roose- velt, grandson. of F. D. R., once known to the country as "Buz- zie," who is currently Regional Director of the National Citizens Council for Better Schools and a village resident. "I have been very impressed by. the thought- ful community spirit," he wrote in the 25th anniversary edition of The Villager. "When We' are no longer willing to stand •up and fight if our community is threatened, Greenwich Village will cease to be a community. It will then be merely another designation for a section of Man- hattan." On the platform at the plaque dedication, besides the Chamber of Commerce : head, were the counterparts of personages who might have been gathered at any similar ceremony in the Green Mountains of 'Vermont or the plains of Nebraska. Speeches were given by a leading Repub- lican and Democrat Carmine DeSapio of 37 Washington Square, West, who has had a finger in picking some recent presidential candidates. The chil- dren's choir, like any other New York Police Athletic League choral group, was made tip of several races and nationalities. All of which raises the que6- tient Does a newspaper make thecommunity or does, a 'corn.- munity make a newspaper? Those who worked with the Bryans recall that they often said: "The Villager succeedel because of, its good friends' Their successors on the paper,, say that the reason The Villager has continued to be a prosperous and. Widely respected newspaper, read far beyond the boundaries of New York City, is largely due to the firm foundations the Buy ans laid a quarter of a century ago. The foundations were these The Villager was to be a home newspaper,. without . sensation- alism and eschewing all that is indecent and degrading to family life and good conununity rela- tions. Second, it was to practice absolute honesty in all business dealings and in all that appears in its news and advertising col- umns, Finally, it fostered a quiet, conservative, basically American approach to all men and women,; regardless of race or creed,: rank. or station, as simply neighbors, writes Mary Hornaday in The Christian Science Monitor. Another characteristic of The Villager has been its horniness, or what Dr. Carroll V. Newsom, president Of New York Univer- sity, described at the dedication as a ,"delightful flare for the strifling but human detail. " This ;has gone hand-in-hand with the ;.coziness, that typifies the Green- :wich Village community. Regu- "'lar features of the paper are its "Town Crier," detailing the ac- tivities of village residents, and its "Scoopy Mewses" literary column, originally by-lined by the office cat and now signed by "Scoopy III." As for crusades, The Villager has a "hot" one just now - so "InOf" in fact that some of its anniversary writers turned their pen to it instead of to reminis- cences and congratulations. It concerns the cutting of a through traffic road across Washington Square, to many "the symbol of The Village." It was just five years ago that the first of a series of battles was waged to save the Georgian houses on the north side of the Square. Both the houses and the Square are still there,. Wherever newspapermengath- er today, they mourn the advent in America of the "one -news- paper town." Today The Villager has a competitor, the up-and- coming arty Village Voice. From • a craft point of view, this should mean a healthy situation for the more venerable The Villager, a unique American institution now entering its second quarter- century. PHOTO FINISH It was one of those raw mid- April days . and the manager, needing a pinch runner, looked down the bench for his third - string shortstop. The fellow sat in the corner, completely cov- ered by a horse blanket. "You'll have to wait a minute, Skipper," piped the club wit, "he's developing some pictures." HALO — That lucky old sun "beams down on pretty Shirley Myers. And Shirley beams right back in her new Halo hat. She's one of the famed Aquamaidt of Cypress Gardens. SHAGGY BOY STORY—One-year-old Maurice Tommey loses that moody poet look in an agonizirrg visit to the barb€r. At left Is long-haired Maurice before his transforms' ' n. At. center, barber Donald Hargrove plies his electric clippers while Maurice" nnothei, Mrs. Harold Tommey, soothes, her wailing boy. Finally, of right, a small smile shows on the face of shorn. Maurice as he adjusts to this new idea of short hair.