The frontier. (O'Neill City, Holt County, Neb.) 1880-1965, May 31, 1928, Image 7
Recognizing Our Debt To American Soldiers Once every year the American people acknowledge a sacred indebt edness to the soldiers who gave their lives in order that their coun try might in later years enjoy the blessing of greater security, greater freedom and greater prosperity. It is never expected that such an obligation can be met in full meas ure. but we make the nearest possible approach to that end when we follow with one mind and purpose the living comrades of the soldier dead. The ceremonies of Memorial Day are never remote in their appeal. There always has been, and there is today, a very direct and personal contact between those who receive and those who give the nation’s tribute. All the patriotic services of the day take their spirit from the thoughts of the living veterans who fought in the same battles and who knew better than anyone else can possibly know how a brave man can die for his country. — It is the prayer of the nation that the day may come when gen erations wholly inexperienced in war may at last observe Memorial day as the symbol of the soldier’s enduring triumph. No American sol dier has died for the sake of war. All have made their sacrifice for the sake of peace—not the peace of the moment for their own enjoy ment, but the peace to be purchased for their countrymen at IfCrgc. If the American of the future is to see perpetual peace,- there should be an even greater and more earnest disposition to honor the memory of American soldiers. An attitude of indifference toward Memorial day might well be regarded as one of the first signs of a declining civilization. Even the cruel wear of war is less a tragedy than the merciless rust of social decay. So long as the United States ex pects to be a great and prosperous nation, it must be a virile and heroic nation. There need be no fear for its future if Memorial day is everlastingly maintained as evidence that the American people re member and understand the price which their soldiers have paid for the blessings of peace. MEMORIAL DAY. Sixty years and more have slipped away since the last shot was fired in the war between the states. With those passing days has come a holy peace to the nation, an under standing and an accommodation that helps America pursue her des tiny with confident zeal. Only a few of the many millions of young men who marched in the ranks from '61 to ’65 yet linger. Feeble and wasted with the lack of time, they await the call that will sum mon them to Join the grand assem bly on the other shore. Honor is theirs, and quiet rest in their clos ing hours. And it should be so. Animosity and bitterness, born of the dispute that found i‘s issue and answer in bloody strife, have van ished. We think now not of the cause but of the devoted valor of the men who fought. Recognizing that it was Americans, freemen, struggling for what they regarded as right. Paying, as Abraham Lincoln ' voiced, “tile last full measure of ■ devotion in support of their views. Time’s never-failing ancndyne has soothed the fever of the wounds. Other interests and enterprises oc cupy the time of the people, other issues claim the boards for discus sion. And a united country presses forward along the road appointed for the nation, moving always to more magnificent heights of great ness. It was cut of that war the beau tiful custom of Memorial Day was born. We pay our tribute to the soldier, the man who faced the dan- j ger and sustained the vicissitudes | of war, from 1775 to 1919. All these are honored for their valor, their devotion, and their readiness to serve. For “a grateful nation re members its dead,” and no longer looks at the uniform the dead man wore. “Under the sod and the dew, Waiting the Judgment Day— Under the roses the Blue, Under the liliies the Gray.” A DAY DEDICATED TO MEMORIES West ol' the Blue Ridge and north of the Ohio they call it Decoration Day. East of these blue hills it is Memorial Day. East of them or west of them it is a day, regardless of its pleasure-hunting holiday crowds, that has a shadow of solem nity over it. Dedicated to memories, it offers to the soldier dead of the nation some enduring touch of immortality. He who rests under the green mound may be forgotten of men. His war fare is over. His battles may be no more than a dimming date or a far off echo of unhappier days. Wind and rain may have worn his name from his gravestone even as Time has wiped his memory from the minds of the living. Yet he is merged with all his sol dier comrades in the memory of his country. He is a part oi a great past coming down through Bunker Hill and Brandywine. Lundy’s Lane and Chapultepec, Gettysburg and Shiloh, San Juan Hiil and Manila Bay to the wheat fields of Scissons, to St. Mihiei and the Woods of the Argonno For old battles, half for gotten. blend with those over which still hovers the fcg of fighting. Memorial Day began in the North In memory of those who perished on Southern battlefields. Now it be longs to the dead of all our wars. \ The graves It strews with flowers have written into our soil the rec ord of tl c fears that were faced and the work that was done In molding a free people. , It is so easy to forget these dead when the guns are silent. New srnss covers a shell-torn field no faster than the story of thetr sacrl lices fades from the memory of the living. Life flows on over them, but the conscience of the Nation demands they shall not be forgot ten. These camps of the dead are Pity V\ > ted <>n Du,-. Gordon Cragl in the Dial. A leprnd was created around th* I late Eleonora Duse by persons not Quite In their senses I think I must have ablated at this In my youth. People around me were ever so ready to cry out, 1 Pcor. po.*r wo man’ on every occasion that her name sit mentioned: Indred th**v were rather too apt to do so atawi -very woman I dare say I t'o * *>k up the puse of one wlut felt qul:e sorry. It became % legend her sorrow, 'ud this legend about Duse be ln* a "poor soman' gather " t force until ah JSrgo; d »is gioarm* I I too full of meaning to America for them to be ignored. For yonder may rest a soldier of the Revolution. Without him the Declaration of Independence might have been so many empty words. There may rest a veteran who marched with Taylor or crossed the plains with Doniphan's men. With out him there might have been few er stars in the flag.. Or here sleeps one who fought at Chancellorsville or Chickamauga. Because of him, the Union remains one, free and indivisible. There are others who knew El Caney or who saw Cervera’s ships hunted down at Santiago. Because of them, Cuba is no longer a re proach to the western world. There are graves of those who, after *h« Vesle and the Marne, looked no more upon the sun for ever. Because of them, a menace against the freedom and peace of the world has gone and the nations can gather at Geneva and talk of disarmament. Until the day of universal dis arming and from generation unto generation thereafter the memory of all these should be kept as green as the grass which covers them. They may be counted as martyrs to the beast in humanity, and while others may have failed, they did not fail. They gave what was asked and they ate home from the wars. The time may come when war fare will be infrequent and almost unknown. That time is not yet. Un til then mankind must keep and cherish the soldier’s faith. When he passes he must not be forgotten or his sacrifices be ignored. This realization far down in the Nation's heart gives to Memorial Day its deeper significance. It is more than a day of flowers and bands, of solemn words and holiday crowds. It is a time dedi cated to memories of things that have been, of things accomplished and of things endured. 1HK Liirus GllEEN TENTS Only yesterday, as time goes, file upon file of grizzled but sturdy men who had worn the blue in the crit ical Sixties marched miles through flag-flung, cheer-echoing streets in the annual Memorial day parades. Today the relatively few surviv ors of that proud ble army, such of them as are able to get out at all, ride in carefully driven automo biles over the same pavements that only recently resounded to the timed thump of their marching feet. And each year that band of aged heroes dwindle’. That there will be surviving vet erans of the Civil war for years to come, no one doubts. The pension bureau last year still had on its rolls 17 veterans of the Mexican war. a war now four score years in the past, to say nothing of 21 widows of men who fought against the British in the War of 1812. That there are still alive some thing l.ke 125,000 Union soldiers of the Civil war. though the man who was 20 the year of Gettysburg is now 83. and even the lad who was but 18 in the closing year of the war is now 77. We would that these 125,000 could go on living, that the Grand Armv of the Republic, which still musters 56,000 men, could continue functioning forever. But we know that this cannot be. that the time must come—though it may be long In the coming—when there will be no Grand Armv of the Re 'die. Today the Grand Army of its kin dred organization keeps green the graves or the Bovs In Blue, scattered the length and breadth of the land they fought to save The rest of ms ewe to tomorrow the solemn duty of k-eplrg marked. In order and In violate, these little green tents for all time to come, for veari and vw after the last Grand Army post ha1 had Its final roll rail. In the lime to come, let us net forget that duty “Oh, the noor woman-—oh. the poor deer creature*** whenever she w** mentioned: adding “that brute d'Annumtlo!" What d'Annuntio had to do with it was no? r!»sr ?o me at the time nor has it t*ne# beocine anv clearer To ludgo (ram tht walling ohorua. 8-guora Ouse had me* but one man In hef llf» ar.d h* wvs eill**d d’An* nuiWto, whereat we know that Mlg nota Data* had met hundred* • • Q Win invented painting In otla* R. A 0 A Jan V »n K\h of the Pten.UI school lm b«»»n (eneraljy credited with th* inv’Mlon >r at le«Mi with the flral startle*, f painting lit a*' Ex-Film Actress Weds Katherine McDonald, former screen star, who has become the wife of Christian R. Holmes, Montecito, California, millionaire. Holmes is a nephew of Max l'leischmann, yeast manufacturer, and i* the owner of the Featherhill Ranch, one of the show places of the Pacific Coast. The new Mrs. Holmes was known as “The American Beauty” dur ing the days of her screen •prominence. ilnlai national Illuatratad Nawn) i Bremen’s Daddy Prof. Hugo Junkers, designer and builder of the now famous transatlantic flight plane, is now in New York with the trio of gallant fliers who made the epoch making flight in the Bremen. tlnternatlnna) Newsreel) Stoneham Held Liable Charles A. Stoneham. owner of the New York Ciiautl, is held liable in two test eases, according to a decision anded down by tbe Appella'c Divi sion of the Supreme < "'irt ol New York. Tbe court ■ h.irac tcrirrd tbe brokerage I < isiucss former!* rnndurted bv Stone ham “A hold and d> berate conspiracy, fraudulentlv to con vert on a large scale M Suits amounting to over $1 ^W.UOO "re nemlmg FOUR LOST; TWO SCORE SAVED IN BOAT CRASH ' This photo shows the upper structure of the ill-fated U. S. dredge “Navesink” after it wa3 sunk in a collision in New York harbor. Many vessels rushed to aid the crew, who were forced to take to the water and by quick actfoa' were able to save more than forty of the dredge’s crew of forty-seven. It is feared thati four lives were lost (International Nawaraal) ARLEN MARRIED TO COUNTESS Begins Atlanta Term H- —^ » MICHAEL ARLEN Countess Meroati became Mrs. Kouyoutujian, Michael Arlcn’s real name, in a civil ceremony at Cannes, France. The couple, who announced their engage ment several months ago, plan to take a trip around the world and live cn a South Sea Island for some time before coming back to civilization. (International Illustrated News) Lindbergh s Teacher l i-—--1 Lieut. Commander P. V. H. Weems of Washington, D. C., has been assigned by the Navy Department to tutor Col. Charles A. Lindbergh in cer tain phases of navigation in preparation for his (Jrecnland lceland-Ireland flight. (Irt«r«aUoMl After G!ojc Record » ■ ' —■ .— ■■■*! .. ^ John Henry Mear*, of Ne»v York, former record holder for circling the rIoI>€, i* preparing for anoi'c r attempt in rrg-in the tn!* an t hoj»e» to make the In*, iu .e * than 2J day*. I ■ ' ■ .. i i "** "" " 1 '■ ■—it -. ir ,rnr. MRS. MICHAEL ARLEN P pMKr’K. %:.*k v:-:-. V*i* ■■ ■■ »»■ mmwiii Colonel Thomas W. Miller, for mer alien property custodian, as he appeared at New York, enroute to Federal penitentiary at Atlanta, Ga. He was tried twice on conspiracy charges and now starts an eighteen month sentence. (International Newireel) SAY PRINCE STARTLES EXPERTS f— ■ ,m> m I !■■■■■- —■■—II . ■ Mv wordt What arc we coming to? Imagine wearing »»»•*»«• at the ra»M. Tint * ju»t *hat the Prince ol Wale* h.ia done when he tmle in a race recently, bhorle with golf ti'idiir.ga *rt the world of fashion all agog, but then the Prince u note* lofy ♦clung the ra.e tm atviei.