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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Seaforth News, 1942-11-12, Page 6PAGg' SIX TI -IR S.+ ORTU MINS THURSDAY, NQYBMBER 12, '1942 Some Misconceptions (From .a broadcast by x, D. Priest- ley.) 'Every tine 1 tails with anybody Who has just returned from the United States, he or she always asks me to stress in my broadcasts what war means to the average British citizen, I am always told that folks overseas donot understand our war conditions. They imagine, I am told, that we are still living,' one kind of life,, when in fact we are living a very different kind of life. You ought to make all this quite clear, these pec, pie . just back from the United States say to me. I therefore am going to correct, simply and forcibly, some miscon- ceptions that I am told by our most recent arrivals from the United States are fairly common overseas. 'First, Clothes Rationing: I myself read some months ago in a famous American weekly an article that gave quite a false impression of rationing in Britain, I don't mean that the deliberately misrepresented the situ- road quite intimately you simply anion, But I do mean that 111 order to can't drive a night. All this is still necessary, even though, for the time being, the Luftwaffe can't organize the big .blitz period raids, What We Are Paying for This are bard et it trona morning till night at least six days a week. I don't myself Consider this tiny great hardship. The best way to get through a period of total war sue- cessfully is, to my mind, to be as busy as possible doing what you feel are useful jobs. If you're In it you night as well be in it up to the neck. Now About the Blackout:. was astonished to hear the other day from a -man who had just returned from the United States that fifty per cent of the Americans, he talked to did not realize that we here have a nightly blackout which really is a blackout, But of course we do. We've had an almost total blackout from dusk to dawn for thirty-four 'mouths now, and most of us have forgotten what outdoor lights look like. I for one ani quite used to finding my way about London in an ebony darkness or, at best, a faint glimmer of star- light. Out in the country, because there stili might be an invasion, there are no signposts to tell you the way, so that unless you know the be amusing and dramatic the writer distorted the whole situation. Thus, for instance, he suggested that second-hand clothes are not rat- ioned as new clothes are. He had War: Nearly all the workers in fact - found one of two shops that were m'ies pa yincome tax for the first really selling new clothes that passed I time in their lives and, in addition, as second-hand clothes, therefore this our indirect taxation such as the rationing of clothes was a farce. duties on sugar, tobacco, liquor and This is completely misleading, the heavy purchase taxes on goods of Clothes rationing here isn't a farce at all kinds, is very high indeed. The al]. $t has worked well, Nobody in my family, nobody I have ever talked to, has ever tried to get round the clothes rationing by buying second- hand garments that are really new ones. I have nohesitation in saying that this suggestion was nonsense. Secondly, the Rationing of Food: It is true that at one time a fairly large black market existed which en- abled the well-to-do to eat pretty well. But that black market is rapid- ly dwindling and, it must be rememb- ered, it never did affect the country at large very much. It operated chief- ly in and for the West End of Lon- don. The West End of London is no more Great Britain than Fifth Avenue is the United States. Probably the bes tway to give you some notion of our food rationing is to be direct and personal about it. Now I am not a poor man and, as you may guess from my appearance or even perhaps from my voice, I am a man who enjoys a good dinner. So that you may bet your boots that I am going to take my share of any decent food that's going. I have had just one small piece of steak, about three inches square, in the last twelve months. I have not had a single lamb or mutton chop• I do not think I have had even one square inch o'f fried ]tam. In normal tines I eat plenty of fruit, but now of course there just isn't any fruit. Oranges go to our children. Cream vanished long ago. I have a sweet tooth but 1 do not suppose that 1' have a bit of dessert that seems to be anything like sweet enough, more than once every two or three Weeks. We aren't hungry and we are pretty healthy but, except an a few special occasions, dining is 110 lager much of a pleasure. All the best food, especially the best meat, goes to our men in the services, and of course nobody grumbles about that. At 3 A. M. I Walk CANADIAN PARATROOPERS READY FOR NEXT HOP ' Like a football squad waiting for the kickoff, a group of Canadian paratroopers in training at Fort Benning, Georgia., with full jumping equipment, awaits the next ho p, All these lads have completed their course at Fort Benning with the U. S. Army and now form the nucleus of the Canadian army paratroop force at Camp Shilo, Man ENEMY DRIVEN FROM EGYPT; combined income and surtax on ALLIES TAKE FRENCH N. AFRICA larger incomes, has reached a truly 11ved ver fantastic proportion. I y comfortably before the war. Now it New Offensive Phase of War would be quite impossible for me to Opens for the United Na - earn ' enough money to leave me tions With Extensive Opera - enough, after paying taxes, to live at tions that rata. Tbe battered remnants of Field No matter how Successful anyone may have beau before the war he realizes that he will have to start all over again after the war. There is nothing to grumble at in that. Be- lieving that the bad old world can be replaced by a new and much bet- ter etter world I am delighted, even if it means that every single thing I ever possessed vanished with that old world. Then World Would be Wealthier I am beginning to understand, at last, that national wealth consists of resources and labor and not of financ- ial figures in books. This may mean that, at the end of this war, we real- ize that the world has developed its resources, and organized and im- proved its labor. Then the world is Potentially wealthier than ever—and that men have only to co-operate sensibly, and to stop snarling, plot- ting and grabbing, to enjoy that real had uo desire to oppose the entry of wealth. American troops into this territory, Meanwhile, please accept my assur- The United Nations .are on the ance that the people of this island move,' the long dismal period of Be- are geared, as never before in their fence is over and the day of the of - history, to fight this war to a Huish. fence is breaking. I believe our lighting men have never That is the general interpretation been tougher. I believe our workers being placed in Washington on the have nevem before made such col- electrifying news that the United ossal efforts. I believe our whole States forces have landed in French civilian population is willingly and North Africa to clear the Axis front thankfully making the innumerable Marshal Roamers once proud African army was being pursued this week across the. border between- Egypt and Libya, and the British announced that the Germans had abandoned their Italian allies to capture or an- nihilation. Rommel's tank force was in full retreat before the British 8th Army, whose Egyptian offensive had touched off the whole Allied North African onslaught. On Saturday night the American government announced landings by United States forces. on the Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts of Mor- occo and Algeria in French ' North Africa. The American forces were well equipped and sufficiently large to coke with an opposition. The lack of resistance encountered at 'nibift of the beaches indicated that the French armed forces in North Africa. sacrifices demanded of it. Though we may differ on this prob- lem and that, for we are no driven herd but a company of democratic men and women with minds of our t own, I believe that never before as a 1 nation have we been so single- ' minded and so devoted to one tom- ' mon task. Now For Transport: This is getting tough, and if you feel like grumbling about your new restrictions just re- Mrs. Martha Castle, Bayfield — member ours. From July 1 on there • is no such thing as private motoring In the passing of Mrs. Martha in this country. Any use of gasoline Castle, widow of George Castle, which for purposes of pleasure will get you occurred Sunday at her home in Bay. into trouble at once. Taxi cabs and field, in her 82nd year, Stanley town• bus services have been cut down and ship has lost a lifelong resident. She are being cut down still further, I was formerly Martha Heard, a daugb Nobody knows much more about ter of the late Thomas and Mrs this than I do, or about the situation , Heard, and was born in Stanley 11 in the country. When I broadcast to : 'February, 1861. As a young worrier overseas audiences I have to do it she married George Castle and they late at night. I'll tell you how I get,farmed on the Sauble Line, Stanley to and fro the studio—I walk. I am until 40 years ago when they took in supposed to be doing a fairly import- residence in Bayfield. There aurvir ant piece of national service, but I; four 'sons: George Castle, G$ericb am not allowed the use of a car, nor I Thomas and John R., fishermen n any gasoline. At three in the morn- I Bayfield, and Sidney, Simcoe. A. al' ing I walk. f ter, Mrs. William Howard, 1)etroi' Our train services ar ebeing cut down too, with the result that most long distance trains are very crowd- ed indeed. Traveling to the Midlands the other day to make a speech, I had to stand five hours in a packed corridor. Furthermore, I never take much baggage, no more than I can carry myself, because porters are ex- ceedingly scarce. Next, Hours of Work: It stands to reason that we could not have mobil- ized so many men and women and raised our war production to such a stupendous height without amnions- ' ly increasing our hours of work. Most people are working at least one -arid. a -half times the amount that they worked before the war, In additional bear everybody is doing some other .job of national service. Most people also survives, Mrs. Castle was r member of Trinity Anglican Churcl Bayfield, The funeral was held o' Tuesday, ' AUCTIONEER ii. W. AHRENS, Licensed Aur' +er for Perth and Huron ream sales Solicited, Terms on Appli' ''arm Stock. chettols and real *" lropet4y. R. R. No 4. Mite' "hone BRA r 6 Apply at this nt• HAROLD JAO;KSON Licensed in }TIMOR and :Perth r" ties. Prices reasonable; sal isfactr guaranteed. Por Information. wr tr phone Harold Jncltson. phone on 661; R. R.4. Seaforth. the strategic cradle of the Mediter- ranean in conjunction with Lt. -Gen. B. L. Montgomery's British 8th Army now chasing the broken and disorg- anized remnants of Rommel's Afrika Korpe westward. The Allied command made clear the sweeping scope of the drive from Egypt and its closely associated American pincer from West Africa. "The battle just won is only the beginning of our task" the 8th Army was told by Gen. B. L. Montgomery. The Vichy radio reported Monday that British and United States naval forces entered the port of Algiers following its caitulation. It was said that Lieutenant -General Dwight D. Eisenhower, commander-in-chief of the Allied operations, .signed fol' the United States. A Vichy -French communique Mon- day reported fierce fighting is pro- ceeding in French Morocco and said naval engagements were in progress Or Casablanca along the Atlantic coast. Other forces closed in upon Oran, French Norht African naval base. after swift seizure of the airfield. President Roosevelt broadcast to the French people over the week -end, appealing for co-operation with the Allies, and requested that the Ameri- can landings in French North Africa would not he oppo-sed by the French forces. Want and For Sale Ads, 1 week 250. Tatty - The most thrilling moment of a paratrooper's training comes with his first jump. Here a few of the Canadians who took a full parachutist's course with the U. S. Army at Fort Benning, Georgia, await the jump master's command to take off on their first jump. Gounter' Check Books • We Tire Selling Quality Books Books are Well Made, Carbon is Clean and Copies Readily. All styles, Carbon Leaf and Black Back. Prices as Low as You Can Get Anywhere. 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