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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Seaforth News, 1960-07-07, Page 6Earth Shook And The Seas Heaved There seemed no end to the horror, Ali through a long and terrifying week, Chile, that thin ellver of a country that runs down the western coast of South America, writhed in agony. Without respite, earthquake +after earthquake convulsed the land, ripping apart lettildings and burying thousanay in the debris, In the mountal5ss, six long -inactive volcanoes errupt- ed,spewing out boiling hot lava, smoke, and ashes. In one com- munity at least eleven persons were immolated by the lava. "The whole world seemed to be shaking and shivering," one quake survivor said. "Every- thing danced in a terrible rhy- thm." When the dance of death was done, 2 million Chileans — a quarter of the country's popula- tion — were homeless and fight- ing for bread and emergency food stocks. But for others the horror was Mill to come. Giant sea waves set in motion by the quakes roll- ed 6,800 miles across the Pacific and smashed into Hawaii, rip- ping up the city of Hilo, They continued on to hit Japan, leav- ing 150,000 people homeless, In the Philippines, the toll from the earthquake - triggered wall of water was lighter. Some nine- teen dead and thirteen missing, Then, in a freak of nature, the Philippines were hit by a second eatacylsreio force: Tropical storm Lucille lashed across the main island of Luzon with tor- rential rains and 50 to 70 -mph winds. In her wake, rain poured steadily down to eighteen straight hours. Much of Manila, the capital city with a popula- tion of 2 million, was under wa- ter. The death toll from drown- ing alone climbed near the 100 mark at the weekend. Lucille was in no way caused by or connected with the Chilean earthquakes or the Pacific seis- mic sea waves. With summer ap- proaching in the Northern He- misphere, the season of the big storms had commenced in the Pacific. That week the Joint Ty- phoon Weather Center on Guam was already looking out for signs of Lucille's succesors, Eighty per cent of the world's earthquakes occur in the wide circle that surrounds the Paci- fic. The cause of the tremors in Chile seemed to lie in a line of cracks (faults) and weak spots he the earth's crust, beginning offshore and sloping under the mountainous land. Slow pressure built ttp tension along these lines until the crust finally let go in a series of upheavals, rocking the long, narrow land from end to end, setting off more quakes at other weak points, stoking up old volcanoes and creating new ones. Since the first tremor hit oe May 21, Chile has suffered a dozen earthquakes. The sixth one, which was the biggest (equal to the San Francisco quake in 1906), apparently caused an underwater landslide or similar disturbance that generated a train of seismic sea waves. The waves ("tidal waves" is a misnomer, since they have nothing to do with tides) raced across the Pacific at about 425 miles an hour, showing only a 2 or 3 -foot crest, But when the shock waves reached the era - dually sloping shore of Hawaii, which produces such beautiful breakers for surf riders, the wa- ter was lifted up into a huge moving wall that rolled inland for hundreds of yards. Four big waves hit Hawaii within one hour, the biggest one 15 feet high and with enough strength WORRIED, PERCY? — Guinea pig Percy squats on a pillow while three-year-old Nina Saure examines him with a ate.thosoope. Percy thinks les a megaphone. to pick up whole buildings and toss them across a street. This has happened before. But, until 1946, when 165 Hawaiians were killed, seismic waves were accepted as a fact of Pacific life. After that, the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey set up a seis- mic.sea-wave warning system — a chain of ten earthquake -re- cording stations and twenty wave -measuring stations around the Pacific. The system worked well, Ha- waiians were alerted to the pos- sible approach of damaging waves twelve hours in advance, and were told that disaster was indeed on the way five hours and 35 minutes before the waves struck, When they hit, just af- ter midnight, the houses and hotels along the beaches were virtually empty. Those who were killed had apparently ignored the sirens and radio broadcasts. Just after Hawaii received word of danger rushing toward the island, five cabled warnings went out to Japan. The last mes- sage, advised that the "sea wave has spread across the Pacific," but at that time only two duty officers of Japan's Meteorologi- cal Agency were at their posts, Most of the others were at a pirzefight in Tokyo. No warn- ing was given. to the hundreds • of thousands of rice farmers and r fishermen living in flimsy wood- en shacks along the shores of e the Japanese Islands. Nine hours after the last warning was re- • ceived, the waves struck. One of them was the largest wave in Japan's history. Except in a few villages, where early rising fishermen had looked at the sea and guessed what was coming, the first warning to inhabitants was the arrival of the first wave — luckily, not the biggest. The next day, the agency di- rector tried to blame the warn- ing system. "The wave reports," he said, "referred only to waves in the South Pacific," But a spokesman for the Coast and Geodetic Survey told Newsweek: "We sent our information to Tokyo and the seismologist there knew it was a seismic wave. He's trying to cover up. He should have listened to the radio." By the end of the week, the agency director had sub- mitted his resignation. The seismic warning system proved that it can save lives when heeded by both officials and the public, But little can be done about the loss of pro- perty caused by such waves. And, as of now, there is no de- fense against an earthquake. Un- til the land of Chile ages and settles down, its inhabitants will have to live in fear of more quakes. TNR BIKINI'S THE Tk11NG — The bikini is catching on accord fug to stores across the country, More and more girls will depend: an two hankerchiefs and hope this summer a3 ore thew surf• splashing lovelies, hexing fun ad a beach. ABLE TA i1 I( ,2Jac A-acdttews. "Of the making of many books their is no end" according to the Bible, and that was written long before the flood of cookery books started coming off tate presses. And today I thought you might like to hear something about some of the earliest and most famous of alt these household guides, Mrs. Beeton's book of House- hold Management, was written by Mary Isabella Beeton, was published just about 100 years ago. Today it is regarded as a highly desirable piece of Vic- toriana, Directed to budding house- wives of the period, it ran to 1680 pages of more than half a million words and it its time was a best seller, grossing over two million copies. No array of Vic- torian wedding gifts was com- plete without a copy to inspire and direct thebridein the taste- ful and tactful management of her new household and, one might add, her new husband, for Mrs. Beeton had much discreet advice to offer concerning' the man of the house. In this latter connection, Mrs, Beeton certainly practiced what -.she preached. It is recognized that her tireless devotion and love for an ailing husband and her desire to aid him in his busi- ness constituted the motivating force behind her book, which was so richly rewarded in its massive sales, Prior to this, she had had good reason to observe the need for a manual on house- hold management, as we shall shortly see. The eldest of a family of 22 children, Mary Isabella early be- gan to learn the rudiments of household management the hard way, so that later she wrote: "What motivated me in the first instance to write a work like this was the discovery of the suffering brought upon men and women by householdmismanage- ment." The force of this realization was to be wonderfully manifest in the comfort she later brought into the life of Samuel Orchart Beeton, the young publisher she married in 1856 and whose busi- ness she did so much to prosper. Seldom has there been, one gathers, such wholehearted and joyous collaboration between au- thor and publisher as there was in the emergence of Household Management, produced by the House of Beeton, published by the House of Beeton, and dilig- ently promoted by the House of Beeton. If ever a work was pro- duced by a united family, House- hold Management surely was it: Smell wonder that it was to be- come one of the all-time best sellers in its chosen field. Mrs. Beaton produced more than a book on household man- agement. She recorded the modes and manners of one of the most celebrated periods of British history, a period best re- membered, perhaps, for its faith- ful practice of the social graces,. Other women emulated her and in our home today is a yellowed copy of a no less mas- sive tome on household manage- ment, not far removed from Mrs, Beeton's own heyday. The edit- ors were two ladies of scholar- ship, assisted by several others professionally heading such ap- propriate institutions as a college of housecraft, a school of cook- ery, a ladies' poultry club and a farm. Another lady editorial as- sociate was a lecturer on bee- keeping. The disciplines represented by the entire editorial array made a lengthy list. Between them, the group contributed more than 7,000,000 words of text on what the preface described as the "doe mettle woman " "A glance at the contents," said the preface, "will show how varied le the list of subjects of epeaial interest to women." This was something of an understate- ment. The list was $o formidable that the editors declared that successful mastery required qualities demanded of a field marshal "and a few not unim- portant qualities 'in addition," Any fair-minded field marshal, reading the list, would undoubt- edly agree, writes Albert E. Nor- man in the Christian Science Monitor. The 700,000 word course in household management began with a study of the fundamen- tals of domestic architecture, The wisdom of this inclusion, it seemed, was to prevent young newlyweds from falling into the trap of buying a jerry-built house, No jerrybuilder could sell a house to a woman capable of judging the comparative merits of domestic construction as taught by this book. In such sub- jects, the book was also a mina of sound information for hus- bands. Water supply was an impor- tant consideration in those dist- ant times, as the book revealed. In many homes, perhaps a ma- jority, in cities and towns, it was necessary to store water in tanks or "cisterns," How many house- holders today give more than a passing thought to the constant supply of pure water that is theirs at the turn of a faucet? But in grandmother's time, the young bride was wise to ask the builder just what arrangements were made for water supply. The illumination of the house was another matter requiring careful consideration. The "Edi- son light" that we today take so much for granted was not available. But there was "air gas," as it was called, generated on the premises, if you had the price of the equipment. How many young couples used it we do not know, but in the speci- men shopping list offered in the book, candles were never omit- ted as a regular item of stores. When inspecting the heating arrangements of the new house, the bride was advised by the editors to look for fireplaces lined with brick rather than iron plates, the latter tending to transfer the heat more readily up the chimney. For those who desired some elegance in heat- ing equipment, there was the "boudoir grate," described as "an almost perfect imitation of a homely log fire." As the name suggests, these harmonized best with their surroundings when insalled in bedrooms, and the editors noted with evident satis- faction that this elegant piece of cast iron was "designed by e woman." In case the newlywed reader had not realized the potential gold mine represented in her husband's possible skills as a handyman about the place, the book gave her a reminding nudge that "some men have a taste for carpentering and carv- ing, Then how can this taste be more satisfactorily employed than In the furnishing of the home?" A good question. In case the candidate carpenter should demur, there it was in black and white that "cosy window seats and pretty ottomans can be turned out by the home uphol- sterer and carpenter at a trifling cost." "Do not aim at handsome effects which cannot he achieved with the small sum at your com- mand," warned the editors. "Cheap imitations should be shunned," That little escape clause 'could have been inserted by a skilled lawyer. It certain- ly offered non -carpentering grandpa a very handy loophole, If, grandpa was thereby ,suc- cessful in not being pressed into knocking together cosy window. seats and pretty • ottomans, he atill•needed plenty of tact when it came to selection of furnish- ings. The book said that"knowl- edge of the ins and outs of fur- nishing is best attained by ex- perience, and for this reason the bride's mother will often be able to make many useful sugges- tions."' In those days; the bride'$ mother and the bridegroom's mother both knew, as the book testifies, the importance of grandpa's getting a good dinner. To help keep him happy, the bride was advised to serve some- thing along the following lines for dinner: Iced Melon Clear Soup with Quenelles Turbot with Shrimp Sauce Beef Creams with Mushrooms Lamb with Mint Sauce Sorbet Roast Pheasants with Orange Salad Nest of Chestnuts with Cream Jelly Cheese Straws Strawberry Ices Dessert It seems quite reasonable to conclude that any loan, having had a dinner of that caliber, would not be averse to a little job of knocking together a few cosy window seats and pretty ottomans. The book laid great stress on tact, the editors devoting to the subject a good deal of the 37,000 words found in the chapter on Etiquette. Tact, as they pointed out, was not enough, Good man- ners also were essential, "Every period of history," they wrote, "had its recognized code of man- ners, and though the etiquette of our forefathers differed con- siderably from our own social rules, yet the governing prin- ciples of true politeness have always had their - foundation upon the practice of true kind- liness, courtesy and considera- tion for others; for `Manners are not idle but the fruit of loyal nature and of noble mind.'" To give practical direction to this advice, the editors quoted from a little 17th -century gem: The Accomplished Ladies' Rich Closet o£ Rarities, or The Ingen- ious Gentlewoman and Servant Maids' Delightful Companion. Refraining from inquisitive questions at the table of one's host was just as de rigueur then, as it is today. Thus The Accom- plished :Ladies' Rich Closet of Rarities advised readers: "Be not inquisitive (for that is uncome- ly)to know what such a Fowl or such a Joynt cost, nor discourse of Bills of Fare." And again: "Eat not your spoon meat so hot that it makes your eyes water, nor be seen to blow it," One wonders whether the young bride of today has .such excellent and comprehensive sources of advice as those I have mentioned, and, if she has, to what extent she uses them. "People are easily entertain- ed," says a magazine.. All you have to do is listen to them. French Made Easy Once upon a thee, the U.S. Ar- my in Europe tried to teach Gia French, The Testilts were some- times hilarious, A new language, "fractured French" produced such adapt renditions as chateau- briand ("Watch out, The castle's burning"), pas du tout ("father of two"), and Jeanne d'Aro ("No light in the bathroom"). Of late, the U.S. Army has giv- en up the task as hopeless. But now it has devised a new ap- proach to Franco -American re- lations, which may well fracture some Frenchmen, In future, said an Army spokesman, all U,S, military ve- hicles in France will carry print- ed cards that "will enable Ame- rican drivers to help stranded French motorists even if they cannot speak each other's lan- guage." Thus, when an Army truck whips along Route Na- tionale No. 7 and comes onto a French car parked by the way- side, the GI driver will stop and, with a flourish, hand a card to the Frenchman which reads, in French: "Dear Fellow Driver; It ap- pears that you aro having diffl- culty with your automobile and although I do not speak French, I would like to offer my assist- ance. If you would check the ap- propriate sentence below, I will know how to assist you: 1—I am out of gas , , 2—I have a flat tire and am without a spare . , , 3—My engine stopped and I do not know the cause. I need a mechanic . 4—Would you send someone from the next service station up the road . , . 5—I need to borrow some tools. 6—I am not in any difficulty ... 7-1 need an ambulance . , , And what if the poor fellow is just parked and whiling away the time with his girl? Pas de quoi, which means "Don't ask questions." Kitchen Trick Most women have struggled with getting paraffin off of a jar of jam or jelly. Sometimes a press of the thumb would do it, but more often than not you got your fingers sticky, or, as a last resort, you used a knife to pry it off. This last method usually re- sulted in your eating some bits of paraffin or in wasting some of the jelly. You took your choice! Gone is all this struggle, waste, and Inconvenience, if, after you pour on the hot paraffin, you place a piece of string in it, The string becomes anchored and serves as a handle when you are ready to open the jam. ISSUE 27 — 1960 Styled For Slimming r:rata:i THE CITY SHEATH keeps its perfect poise through luncheon or late -day occasions, It's styled to slim the short, fuller figure of a cool, carefree fabric of "Dacron" polyster fiber and "Orlon" acrylic fiber with a smooth silky texture. Printed Pattern 9583 eemes 10 Half Sizes 12% to 22%. Send Fifty Cents (stamps can- not be accepted, use postal note for safety) for each pattern. Send to Anne Adams, Box 1, 123 Eighteenth St., New Toronto, Ont. Please print plainly YOUR, NAME, ADDRESS, STYLE NUMBER and SIZE: