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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Seaforth News, 1958-09-25, Page 2ScrAnnb a For Royal Souvenirs Princess Margaret once had a champagne cocktail at a fashion- able West End club — and left her deep -red lipstick hnprint on the glass. The bartender prompt- ly put the glass aside, And com- plete with lipstick imprint it occupies a place of honour in the ehina cabinet of his home, A Yorkshire housewife once welcomed the Queen to her little council house. Ever since then the doormat on which Her Ma- jesty wiped her feet has been switched to the place of honour in front of the hearth. Though it's a commonplace cus- tom in Britain, Dutch burghers were shocked when guests poc- keted the place cards after a State banquet for the Queen during her recent visit. Yet such souvenirs as Ascot royal enclo- sure badges, invitations to royal garden parties and tickets for investiture at Buckingham Pal- ace are cherished today in thous- ands of homes. The souvenir habit sometimes troubles royalty. When the old royal yacht Victoria and Albert was broken up the Queen her- self stipulated that there should be no souvenirs. An astute dealer realized, however, that much of the fur- nishing would pass through a Portsmouth auction room with other ex -government stock. He awaited his opportunity and entered his bids—and in due course a reconstruction of the state -rooms of the world-famous yacht was staged in a New York store, where many of the fur- nishings of the vessel' subse- quently changed hands at gross- ly inflated prices. Not long ago a casual crayon drawing by a boy of nine, scrib- bled on a sheet o£ writing paper, was offered at Sotheby's world- famous are auction room, But the paper was headed Windsor Castle, the artist had been King George V as a boy—and an art collector considered the trophy a bargain at $100. It was structly souvenir value, too, when Queen Victoria's gold cloth coronation canopy was sold at Sotheby's for '6120. A woman who has always kept a tiny piece of the Queen's wed- ding cake recently rfeused $900 for her treasure. Each in a small white cardboard box with the royal initials "E R" on the lid is silver, thousands of such pieces — from eleven cakes! — were sent out from Buckingham Palace. Though the contents were nearly always gobbled up for luck, it is likely that most recipi- ents have kept the boxes. Thousands of homes, too, treasure crested salver forks and spoons from Buckingham Palace. Be many disappeared with garden party guests years ago that when a private firm took over the catering it was decided that ordinary cutlery — stamped with the firm's name — should be used. Naturally enough. few of these vanish. Pince Philip has often been the target of souvenir hunters. He made no attempt to conceal his indignation when yet an- other of his hats vanished from a royal car. Not long ago, too, he suffered a plague of radiator cap snatchers. When he was in- volved in a trifling motoring col- lision, souvenir -hunters even ran off with the glass splinters. At one time, clergymen would often write to Buckingham Pal- ace to ask for a pair of the Queen's old gloves to be auc- tioned to help a church sale of work. The Queen, of course, wears out one or two dozen pairs of gloves each year, but when it was found that royal gloves sometimes found their way into chop windows as curios, such donations to charity bazaars were discontinued. Naturally, members of the Royal Family cannot take part in a souvenir "traffic." A rare exception was made when the Queen Mother drove with . Prin- cess Margaret to receive the freedom of the City of Landon and autographed a menu card for the Lord Mayor. At a train- ing centre for the disabled, too, the Queen and Prince Philip once watched a man with me- chanical arms type a message of welcome, They were both so impressed that, ignoring formal procedure, they autographed the message as a souvenir. No doubt the grisliest royal souvenir was snatched when the coffin of Charles I was opened in the vaults below St; George's Chapel, Windsor, The purpose of the opening was to settle sch01- ary doubts on the exact position of interment, but one of the' gen- tlemen present could not resist snatching a lock of hair from the severed head, a piece of neck vertebrae and a tooth. ''Years later King Edward VII heard of the existence of these grim relics and insisted that they should be restored to the coffin. One wonders, too, what has happened to all the souvenir horsehairs stolen from the Royal Mews, Some 300 people a week are privileged to visit the Mews to see the Coronation coach and other exhibits and the other exhibits and the grooms who show them round have to watch souvenir snatchers. Not long ago one of the veteran horses, Snow White, had his por- trait painted. So many people had surreptitiously pulled hairs from his tail for luck that the artist asked for a false tail to be fitted. Record Sneezes Photographers have been snap- ping our sneezes. High-speed camera shots reveal that when we sneeze germ -laden particles shoot from the mouth—not the nose—at the amazing speed of 10 feet a second. Not to be sneezed at, too, is the astonishing fact that sneezes are often a symptom of frus- trated young love, according to a doctor who has studied them. In the United States a man was taken to hospital because he had sneezed so hard that he dis- placed his shoulder blade. Doc- tors gave him a whiff of ether which caused him to sneeze again so violently that the bone slipped back into place. For four months a steel en- graver worked on the resign of a new banknote for a South American republic. One day he sneezed, ruined the design and had to start all aver again. You never know with sneezes. One terrific "atishoo" brought down a war veteran's nose a bullet which had remained in his head since he was shot twen- ty years earlier. A woman in Portugal told her doctor that she had seen her husband almost prostrate with sneezing- all because a speck of flower pollen happened to blow in a window or a tiny soap bub- ble got into his nostril while he was shaving, "A particle of dust brushed from his overcoat or hat sets him sneezing for hal' an hour or more," she said. Such sneezes, say the experts, are symptomatic of a sensitive nose rather than a germ -laden state. They keep out germs in- stead of spreading them. The record sneezer' An Edin- burgh man sneezed 690 times in succession in 1927. A Stowe schoolboy in 1949 sneezed about 1,200 times an hour. Mrs. Betty Grose, of Califor- nia, was called the world's greatest sneezer. She sneezed 200,000 times and er*ery time complained of a piercing whistle lasting ten recon .s in her left ear. AT THE POLLS — Old timer Tom Gibson, who crrived In the Klondike gold country In 1898, is helped to the polls in Fair- banks to cast his vote far statehood for Alaska. ELECTRONIC NURSES' AIDE—There's a boxful of service at Dionne Benson's finger tips in Wesley Memorial Hospital. She can make house calls as well as outside calls on the one-piece tele- phone. Electronic cabinet enables her to adjust room temp- erature, make adjustments of her hospital bed, open or close windows, control room lighting and operate closed-circuit TV connected with the visitors' lobby. In addition, she can talk via intercom to nurse on duty at the desk, tune in favorite radio programs and see the time on a built-in clock. The device, manufactured by a leading electronic control firm, is designed to boost patient morale and help solvethe acute hospital personnel problem. TA OLE s;t(- eJaue 4r dvws. 4US Streusel Coffee Cake, with the purple plums and crunchy brown sugar bits atop and throughout, has unusual texture, richness, and flavor — and is just plum good eating! It's easily and quickly prepared for a leisurely breakfast, excellent a second day served cold or heat- ed, and still delicious enough to serve warm later in the day as dessert, topped with slightly sweetened whipped cream, dairy sour cream or cream poured from a pitcher. STREUSEL 34 cup brown sugar 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour 2 teaspoons cinnamon i s teaspoon salt 3 tablespoons softened butter IS cup finely chopped walnuts Combine sugar, flour, cinna- mon, and salt. Mix well. Work butter into dry ingredients, using a fork or pastry blender to form crumbs. Stir in the nuts. BATTER 16 plums, halved and pitted Le cup sugar for coating plums. last, cups sifted all-purpose flour 2 teaspoons baking powder s4 cup sugar le teaspoon salt ?!t cup softened shortening 1 egg, beateR Is, cup milk Mix plum halves gently with the Ye cup sugar until fruit is evenly coated. Combine in sifter the sifted flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt. Sift into mixing bowl. Cut shortening into dry ingredients with pastry blender. Add egg, beaten until thick and. lemon -colored, combined with the milk. Stir just until dry ingredients are moistened. Spread half of batter into but- tered 9 x 9 x 2 -inch baking dish. Sprinkle with a half the streusel. Distribute 16 of the plum halves evenly over the surface. Spread remaining batter over the plums; cover with rest of the streusel and top with the other plum halves. Bake in a 350" P. oven until done, about 50 minutes. Yield: 16 generous scares. Note: Wrap any leftover cof- fee cake in foil to keep fresh for eating cold or heated the next day. a. If you are canning peaches, you may think they might re- quire a flavor booster and a very good one is a combination. of vanilla end almond extract— about V4 almond to se vanilla, Add this, a little at a time, to the syrup until the taste is right for you. Orange peel is another good booster; just drop a few pieces into the syrup when you start cooking it and fish them out when the syrup is delicately flavored. ,, • Beet Relish 2 cups cooked beets, chopped 1 cup horseradish • cup sugar 2 tablespoons lemon juice 14 cup vinegar Combine all ingredients. Cov- er and let stand overnight, o * 5 Piquant Relish r' cup hot vinegar 1 cup tomatoes a/ Cup diced cucumbers ,4 cup chopped onion 1 cup cropped celery Vs teaspoon each, mustard seed and celery seed ?/ teaspoon salt Mix all ingredients together. Chow -Chow 2 medium heads of cabbage t4: peck bell peppers (sweet) peck green tomatoes 1 dozen sour cucumber pickles 2 each, red and green peppers (hot) 8 large onions 4 pounds sugar 3 quarts vinegar 1 tablespoon ground horse- radish 1 tablespoon ttuneric (to color) 1 tablespoon dry mustard 2 tablespoons each, celery seed and ground cinnamon 3 tablespoons each, allspice and cloves Put the first six ingredients through the meat grinder, using coarse blade. Sprinkle lightly with salt; let stand half a day, or several hours. Place vinegar, sugar, and spices in a large ket- tle and bring to boil, Squeeze as much juice as possible out of first mixture and add mixture to sugar -vinegar -spice mixture In the kettle. Bring to boil and boil 20 minutes. Pack into clean jars which need not be airtight, but should have good covers. * • • "I make a cranberry ice that is not used entirely as a dessert, but can be. I often serve it in sherbet glasses at the side of the plate to be eaten with turkey or special holiday dinners," writes Mrs. Myrtle Campbell to the Christian Science Monitor. Cranberry Ice 1 quart fresh cranberries Juice of 2 oranges and 2 lemons 314 cups sugar 1 box lemon -flavored gelatin 1 quart boiling water Cover cranberries with water and boil until soft. Put through sieve, reserving liquid. Add the liquid to pulp. Add orange and lemon juice. Let cool. Dissolve lemon -flavored gelatin in the quart of boiling water. Let cool. Combine the 2 mixtures. Put in ice cube tray and freeze. Makes 3 or more pints of ice. - 5 5 5 "Here is a candy recipe that is more than 100 years old. It came from the farm home of my great -great grandmother in Rhode Island," writes R. T. "When cold, it should be chewy but not brittle." Chocolate Taffy 1?4. cups sugar 1 cup molasses (scant: 3 cup milk 2 squares chocolate 1!.i cups chopped nuts (walnuts or butternuts) ?3 cup butter Combine sugar, molasses, milk and chocolate and bring to boil; boil until quite thick. Add but- ter and continue boiling to the hard -ball ,stage. Remove from heat and fold in nuts. Pour into buttered pans in thin layers. When candy is cold, mark into squares. • 5 "This candy recipe of my grandmother's is about 80 years old," writes R. T. Butterscotch Candy 1 cup sugar 1 cup molasses 1 cup butter (less will do) Combine ingredients and cook to brittle -ball stage. Pour into buttered pan (or cooky sheet). When hard, tap pan to break Cindy into irregular pieces, Parson invented Knitting Machine England was a sad and sav- age realm in the early years of the first Queen Elizabeth. Later she was cheered and hailed as "Good Queen Bess," but during the early part of her reign voices in taverns and market. places were constantly raised against her. The old religion, perverted by Henry Tudor and made a mock- ery by the persecutions of Bloody Mary, still lingered as an aching memory in the hearts of the people. Statesmen might clamour . for reform, but common folk mur- mured of revolution. The fires " of Smithfield and the block on Tower Hill might hold terror, but they were not strong enough to uphold tyranny, It was during this uneasy per- iod in English history that Wil- liam Lee was born. The ne'er- do-well` son of a middle-class family, he studied at Cambridge and became a clerk in Holy Or- ders. — that is, a parson of the reformed church. Lee seems to have had his share of the vices of youth, but little or no vocation for his spiritual calling, He might have lived and died in obscurity had it not been for his inventive mind, The tavern seems to have ap- pealed to him much more than the pulpit, and before long he found himself forced to marry a barmaid in whom he had taken rather more than a spiritual in- terest. The lilac -scented village of Cambridge held' no attraction for Young Willem. There is no rec- ord of his having been posted to any living, and it seems un- likely that he ever practised his calling as a parson. What he did do was to invent the frame knitting -machine. What impelled him to this achievement can only be guess- ed, It certainly brought him lit- tle or no reward, although it was destined to make a fortune for his successors, Was it a nagging wife, weary of child-bearing and drudgery, who drove Lee to seek distrac- tion in the invention still asso- ciated' with his name? Or could it have been the monotonous clicking of knitting needles in the smoke-filled hovel where he lived? Whatever it was, Lee laboured until he had, developed a knit- ting frame with automatic lock movement that would knit hosiery in a tenth of the time it took on knitting needles, When he had perfected his machine, he wrote to the Queen begging an audience, His aim was to demonstrate his marvel to Her Majesty and gain her pa- tronage for his invention. The audience was granted and Lee, with hope pulsing through his joyous heart, demonstrated his machine at Court, A few days later the Queen wrote to Lee refusing the monopoly rights he sought, and affirming, in no uncertain terms, that she wouldn't finance his nefarious scheme for making hosiery by machine. One can almost hear the strid- ent, masculine voice of the Queen when, in refusing assist- ance, she writes: "It is of no avail to seek our assistance, lest it may take the bread from the mouths of my poor subjects who earn their livlihood by the craft of knitting." It is an amazing thought that, about two hundred years before workers attempted to destroy machinery which they maintain- ed was endangering their liveli- hood, a precedent for this reae- tipnary behaviour was set by the Queen of England! Some years after his - stormy interview with the domineering Queers, Lee, travelled through France and Belgium still trying to sell the machine that he hoped would make him his fortune. No one was interested. All his ard- ent endeavours to free women from drudgery were of no avail, Broken in psirit, he died in ob- scurity somewhere on the Con- tinent. Then suddenly, and with ter- rible irony, the tide turned. Lee's brother returned to London bringing with him the cast -out and forgotten fraine knitting - machine, He tried to win the in- terest of woollen merchants who were slowly migrating from London to the Midlands. After some weeks he met with suc- cess and a small company was formed to manufacture the ma- chines and use them to produce hosiery for sale at home and on the Continent, The new industry thrived; soon several home factories were equipped with the revolutionary knitting frame - and whole fami- lies were finding regular employ- ment in the manufacture of jer- syes, jackets and stockings. So successful was the venture that, a century later, the hand- knitters of Leicestershire sent s petition to the mayor and alder- men of Leicester, seeking pro- tection from the encroachment of the frame knitters on the hand -knitting industry. An obscure parson's dream had become a reality. Theidea scorned by a queen and rejected by the people had become so much part of the industrial life of developing England that the Worshipful Company of Frame Knitters had been called into being. It exists to this clay, and of course knitted products are a big part of British trade. SL'U14IBER TIME The Dodgers had a big inning going and Chick Fewster, sitting next to manager Robinson, be- gan pounding the dugout steps wit a bat to rattle the opposing pitcher. "Stop that!" comanded man- - ager Wilbert Robinson, Chick looked at his manager in astonishment. "Why?" he asked, "Ain't we got a rally going?' Robbie pointed toward a cor- ner of the Dodger bench where his star pitcher, Jess Petty, was snoring away. "Don't wanna wake up of Jess," he whispered. E FOR EUROPE—A symbolic bird of peace perches atop a large "E" in this new 40 -pfennig (about 10c) Europa (Europe) stamp to be issued by West Germany Sept. 13. It is blue in color, with a red stripe within the "E". Younger Set Fashion Hirst