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About The frontier. (O'Neill City, Holt County, Neb.) 1880-1965 | View Entire Issue (Dec. 6, 1928)
^ Hi It ■ —Ic*g——ft I Jumping MeridianslI By LINTON WELLS and NELS LEROY JORGENSEN I I It took several precious sec onds for Natalie to compre hend the full significance of what Crane had said. She ■tared wildly at him for a mo ment, wide-eyed—and then sud denly broke and ran. She tore unheeding through the crowd, toward where the first of the planes stood ready for the start. Jimmy was already in his ■eat. As she neared him, she ■aw him adjust his goggles, pulling them down from over his helmet, and the mechanics under him were kicking out the blocks from under his wheels. “Jimmy!” she cried- at the top of her voice. Jimmy!” He leaned forward with set features, his left hand on the ■par): and gas controls. Then be seemed to have heard her. Turning, just as he pulled on bis stick, he caught aid < i h. and flashed a cheery smile. “Jimmy—stop!” bnnling happily, his motor drowning out every sound be yond itself, Jimmy tossed her a final adieu. She stood trcin Mmg with emotion, dully ob servant of the fact that Rogers’ pilot was taking off. Jimmy Brandon’s plane moved for ward. Natalie saw it go, watched it as it taxied gently down the field—and then the wheels left the earth. He was in the air, receding against the sunny bank of clouds to the westward. Natalie turned at a groan be K:dr her. Jt was Billy Crane, hit- eyes on the winged tiling that became smaller and small er with each second, high in the sky. Frantically she caught Ms arms in her tiny hands. “Help him, Billy—help him! There’s only you, and if you don’t help him—he’s lost!” CHARTER VII Once in the air, Jimmy Bran don became aware of an old thrill. The earth and the people with whom lie did not particu larly count were left behind licre. He was in his element again; New' York and its strange life lay behind him. .Here he was master. Not even it ogc:-s and his millions coun ted a straw. «nuuy enough, however, he came to speculate for the first time on winning the race. Pre viously there had been rush and Lurry; their start had been made with less time for prep aration than an ordinary sea trip to the West Indies. lie liad taken for granted the fact that once he was started, lie was on his way to victory. Now, ns he roared across the tip of Manhattan Island and headed westward o"ac New Jer sey, he glanced sidewise at Austin Roger’s plane. The lat ter had chosen a slightly higher altitude and was a trifle be hind him, Thy entire trip was not by air, he reminded himself. There was only one practical way of Retting across Siberia and Rus sia, and planes would be useless there. Weather conditions, ; lack of landing fields, a total 1 lack of p'lots for thousands of : miles and of opportunities to | refuel—the' o things made the journey across Russia the most j difficirt of the trip. It had to be mad ' on the Trans-Siberian ■railr >ad ; there was no other way. ?. ger' was dropping farther tw»fc' id. Jimmy speculated on •whether he had found a more •satisfactory air current, but de c'ulrl against altitude. It did not matter anyway. This was not a reek and neck race, this to the West (heist. Barring ac eid«nts -which were always, lie realized, likely- they would "have plenty of time to reach 5scat*le before the Adrienne was to sail from the port at mid ni"1'1 of the following day. ♦St’dh there was no time to spare He had to refuel at Clove Technical Loopholes Prom Milwaukee Journal Another of the oil scandal cases ’hat collapsed. “Collapsed is a more precise word to use in referring to the failure to convict Col. Robert W Stewart on the charge of per jury thin to say that he was found no- faulty. Technically the jury piu.ed on his case and returned the -not guilty” verdict. But really he was not tried at all on the question oJ whether he gave testimony that toe knew be untrue in his answers to qua ies propounded to him before the Senate committee that was ini vestigating his connection with the Continental Trading comnany I I land. Cleveland, he told him self, glancing at his wrist watch, was bptween four and five hours off. He had time as he expected to get there about dusk. He throttled down his motor slightly to a steady push. Rogers’ ship forged ahead slowly. Jimmy saw the tail of his rival’s machine, a moment later tearing off into the westward. He watched it disappear into a low bank of clouds, appear further on, and then it was lost. He was at a loss to ac count for the maneuver. New Brunswick came be neath him; there was a glimpse of its streets, dotted here and there with the bushy green of late spring, and then it lay behind. The next town of any size that he could expect to pick up would be in Easton, in Pennsylvania. Jimmy sat back and advanced his throttle, tak ing speed slightly as he sailed over the lowlands of west ern New Jersey. The Homing Pidgeon purred on as smoothly as the bird from which it had taken its name. Jimmy, settling comfor tably into his seat, had time to think. Behind him were New York and Frances, and a life in which he realized he had little to place. Yet—there be was rounding the world in order to win a place in that life. Es sentially, that was what it menat. He must win and then return. What was it Billy had saidf Odd words, those. Particularly odd for Billy, who was always repressed: cynical and aloof be cause he did not dare show the real tenderness underneath. “By the time you get back here, I hope you’ll have dis eovercd for yourself that you don’t have to go around the world to win love. Not real love. That is where von always find it.” Somehow, though its signifi cance was lost upon him even now, in its entirely, Jimmy Brandon knew that he was go ing to remember that. He was going to know, too, its real meaning. The conviction of it was deepening. Possibly it was only because Billy had said it—Billy who said so little that was in the least prodigious, but even above the motor’s roar Jimmy eould hear the deep sin cerity of his voice. He looked down. Pennsylvan ia had begun to spread out below, a queer procession of ribboning roads disappearing into towns or hamlets, tiny, crooked rivers. Mountains loomed far in the distance : be yond them, he recalled. Cleve land was not far, and the first leg of their flight would be completed. Tearing onward, his eves rov ing speculatively over the coun tryside and over the clouds nearer at hand, lie wondered where Rogers could be. Un doubtedly, his rival was making every ounce of speed he could, prepared to anticipate trouble in advance. Jimmy’s features took on an earnest expression, and he pushed forward his gas throt tle. Possibly Rogers was right; thin* might be obstacles ahead somewhere. It was as well to make time while he could. Strangely, the sense that Rog ers was ahead of him lent a tingling cxeitment to the mom ent. Time! The race, after all, was against time as well as Rogers. He leaned forward and roared on. The countryside, wilder now, bright green with spring and splashed with vir gin blossomings, unrolled like a staged p°norama underneath the outspread wings of the sil ver bird in which he sat. Jimmy sat up with a sudden start, as, without warning, his He was tried on the issues of wheth er there was a quorum ot the Sen ate investigating committee ’"•esent and whether its stnograpi ' em ployes did their work corre' v. By one of those twists so we'1 mown in the American adminlsti 'on of justice, the jury convicted 1Sen ate committee and its emp’. s and let Mr. Stewart go free. The termination of this c. pro vides no satisfaction for anybody. Certainly not for the A lerican people, who mark it down s one more blundering trial In tu crim inal prosecution of the o‘l cases that ends in failure. Certa ’’v not j for ihe Senate committee and the i motor gave n sudden cough. Tie bent over to listen, but the sound did not come again at ouee. About to sit back and relax, be was startled to hear the rhythm of the motor broken a second time. “Might be almost anything," he murmured consolingly to himself; but there was a frown between his eyes. A motor cough might be produced by any one of a number of things, some of them serious, but most of them only temporary dis orders. The mechanics had worked over his machine, and later it had been carefully in spected. There was no reason to expect any radical trouble. He kept on, searching the horizon for a sign of Rogers’ ship. But the horizon was empty, for that matter, as the sun approached more closely to the western horizon. Lonely farmhouses were scattered here and there over the wide, life less area. For ten minutes he drove for ward. The sporadic breaks in the rhythm of his motor per sisted ; they were even growing more frequent, if anything, coming now with an amazing regularity. Jimmy’s frown deepened. “I can’t be out of gas,” he assured himself. But to make certain he inspected the gauge before him. It registered a half tankful. Then, biting his lip, he cut in the reserve supply from the emergency tank, in case the gauge were out of or der. When this move, however, refused to allay the trouble, he swore quietly under his breath. The thing was getting seriou*. He decided to search out a land ing field and examine bis gas. With anxious eyes, he swept the terrain * below. ‘‘A jay bird couldn’t land in this part of the world without breaking his leg,” he grunted. Low, undulating hills, with the gray and blue bulk of the Alleghanies in the distance, presented a far from inspiring picture, lie recalled the dar ing air mail pilot who had crashed somewhere just beyond where he was, not long before. No area of sufficient size to offer a landing place presented itself. He was facing actual danger now, he knew. It was abso lutely essential that he get to eaj-th and examine his ship, else it might stop under him in midair at any moment. His keen eyes, roving ahead, at last picked out a comparatively dear space which looked as though it might offer a chance to land. Jimmy dove five hun dred feet and inspected it more closely. lie shook lus head. It was far from inviting and contained almost very trap known for a landing. But, “Got to do,” he muttered between his tight lips, “—so here goes!” Gripping his stick tenacious ly, be banked, swerved sharply to the left, losing altitude; and then, sticking the nose of his ship into the wind, dropped lower and lower until he was less than 10 feet above the ground. Ahead lay a stone fence which lie must skim. It was a breath-taking nioin Outting his motor, Jimmy glided over the fence, missing it by inches, and in an instant had placed the wheels of his ship on the ground. He hound ed forward, keeping the tail of his plane down—when, without warning, disaster came to meet him. A low hillock—a miniature bunker, though it might have borne the proportions of a mountain so far as the danger it represented meant—loomed directly ahead of him. His mind reacted instantly, with out volition, to the impending danger. He was confronted with the alternative of swerving to one side and thus risking the loss of a wing, or of attempting to jump tlie obstruction and trust to luck on the farther side. He accepted the latter. Pushing forward his throttle, he pulled slightly on the stick, soared easily into the air. and. Senate, both of which have Riven a demonstration of how loosely gov ernment business can be conducted. Here wrs a witness coming up be fore the committee from whose ex amination important developments might come. Yet the committee did not take the trouble to have eight - members pnysically present In order to insure a watertight case in court. Nor did it take the trouble to have the transcript of the stenographic notes certified in order that they might not be successfully attreked later. It was a deplorable exhibition of looseness of which Chairman Nye cannot be proud. Nor ia **>«••«* sat'afacU(>n _ fn r a few seconds later, had again placed the tail and wheels of liis ship on the ground. But the added impetus that the jump had given had carried him too far. Directly ahead was a second stone fence! Jimmy realized through the red haze of the danger that he could not hope to stop his ship before he reached the obstruc tion ahead. Digging his tail skid into the ground sharply, he attempted to turn and make a ground loop. But the turn ing radius—last hope that it was—was too slight. With a groarfi of anguish a momentary sensation of sickening dread, he watched fascinated as his right wing collided with the fence. In the same second, there was a rip of tearing, rending fabric and the crash of splintering framework. For a long moment, he sat still in the cockpit, his hands still gripping the stick. Tlu Homing Pidgeon was still, life less, like its namesake at tin bark of a hunter’s gun. All about the lonesome field there was the same dead, complete silence. Slowly Jimmy came to real ize that he was safe and un harmed ; that, dangerous though the landing had been, he was not hurt. On the heels of the realization he gave vent to a hitter laugh. Safe—unhurt. . hut so far as lie was concerned the venture in which he had risked everything was lost be fore it had fairly begun. Automatically, he disengaged himself from the seat and craw led stiffly out of the cockpit to examine the damaged wing. It took scarcely an instant for him to convince himself that it was wrecked beyond hope of immediate repair. And he was miles away from help of any kind! iwen to tramp to the nearest telephone—wherever it might be!—and order another ship was futile ; it could not possibly arrive in time to enable him to make connections at Seattle. He thought for a flickering sec ond of Billy Crane’s half threat to follow or aid him, and then tossed off the thought with a shrug. He had refused Billy’s aid, though lie wished that he hadn’t. The bitterness of his thoughts was too much to bear in the lonely, ticking silence of the empty fields. It was of nc avail, anyway, to sit still and bemoan his fate. Tie decided that lie might rather busy him self with an inspection of the motor. Throwing back the protective cowling over the engine, lie be gan his inspection. In a few minutes muttering to himself, lie had exhausted the possiblity of the trouble having been in either the oil line, which was perfectly clean, or the ignition Next lie was prying into the carburetor. For a moment he poked at it, fumbling about W'onderinglv, and when its vi tals were revealed, he stared Bewildered, he stuck a tenta tive finger into the liquid There was a peculiar feel to it— none of the freshness of tin high-gravity gas. Withdraw ing his finger, he stuck it in his mouth; then bent his head and drew a deep breath. Suddenly lie started, his gray eyes wide with disbelief and anger. “I’m damned! Naphtha— moth balls!” The thing seemed fantastic and impossible, yet there was a real doubt of it, after the first surprise. Someone had dropped moth balls info his gasoline tank. Stunned by the realiza tion, which came slowly, that it had been intended lie would have to land, he’sat down on a stone to consider. At last lie shook his head with a long sigh. (TO BE CONTINUED) Q. What is “Queen Anne's Boun ty?” P. E. N. A. This is a fund set aside b\ Queen Anne in 1704 to augment th« poorer livings of the Church of England. In 1913, 170 livings were augmented, besides benefactions and grants made to the extent of about 50.000 pounds sterling; the capital fund at that time was more thar 7.600.000 pounds sterling. Colonel Stewart himself, except the satisfaction of keeping hh freedom Since the case turned not on th? perjury issue but on the secondary question of the government s meth od of doing business, he cmnot help but know that thousands will not regard it as settled whether he told the truth or not. He won a technical victoryt. In its larger aspect, th? case adds one more to the long roll of crim inal prosecution failures. Doheny Fall. Sinclair, now Stewart. And people will be ssying. cynically again, about these cases things that are not good for us to have to think I or say..Bui b<v* can it be avoided? | OF INTEREST TO FARMERS | tt-z——•— . - : —-t— — — ■■— c *r THE FURROW DRILL Some of the more common prob lems in profitable wheat production in the northern and northwestern portions of the hard winter wheat section are those of obtaining ready germination and good fall growth, of reducing winter injury and of preventing injury and of preventing soil blowing. Much of the injury resulting from these factors may be overcome to considerable extent by seeding the wheat in furrows somewhat deeper and farther apart than can be done with the ordinary grain drill. The furrow drill which has been de signed for this purpose plants the wheat in the bottom of furrow which are about 12 inches apart and from 3 to 5 inches deep. Thus, if there is moisture within a reasonable depth, the grain will be placed in contact with damp soil, the furrows will help hold snow and protect the plants against winter injury, and the surface of the field will be rough and not so subject to injury from soil blowing. One of the most striking and most important davantages of using the furrow drill is the protection the furrows offer the grain from winter injury. The furrows prevent drift ing of the snow to a marked extent and thus retain it on the field, where it will protect the plants. It is generally recognized that when soil is cultivated in such a manner as to leave the surface as rough as possible the tenderency to blow is greatly reduced. Because of this fact seeding wheat with the furrow drill reduces the danger of blowing. When the soil is very dry and fine, continued blowing for con siderable time may fill the furrows with soil and they will no longer be effective, but even under these con ditions fields that have been seeded with the furrow drill will not be in jured by soil blowing nearly so quickly as will those that have been seeded with the ordinary gr?bn drill. Although the furrow drill has many things in its favor in the northern and northwestern portions of the hard winterwheat region, it apparently has no distinct advant age over the ordinary type of drill in the central and southern portions of this region. LATE MODEL HOGS Constructive hog breeders are much encouraged by the type of hogs that is now meeting favor in the show rings of the leading state fairs. The extremely long-legged, shallow-hammed individuals no longer win the blue ribbc*is. In their place are found hogs with enough length, and, in addition, well-sprung rib, full loins and deep, well rounded hams. This improve ment is not confined to one breed; all of the breeds, including the ba con breeds, are breeding toward a type that will be more likely to meet the feedlot requirements of farmers and feeders producing hogs for market purposes. Pure breds introduced into scrub or grade herds are potent not alone in fixing type but also in transmit ting qualities. Long legged, narrow backed hogs do not have economical feeding quality, and for that reason have been forced into the discard. Farmers everywhere are giving greater attention to lowering cost production and developing hogs that most often are market toppers. Breeders are awake to this demand for more efficient pork producing breeding stock and are breeding the type of hogs to meet it. The Institute of American Meat Packers is co-cperating with hog men in all sections of the country in advising them as to the type of hogs that is most likely to sell best in the 10-year period just ahead. They strongly favor the intermedi ate type mentioned, because of its increased carcass and yielding value. The fact that the breeders, the feeders and the packers are working toward the same goal will result in increased profits for all parties con cerned. A FINE FEED Where a legume hay is being fed the concentrate is 200 pounds of corn meal, 100 pounds of ground oats, 100 pounds of wheat bran, 100 pounds of cottonseed meal and five pounds salt. Where a mixture of grass and le gume hay or silage and legume hay is fed the ration is the same, ex cept the cottonseed mc|l is in creased from 100 to 120 pounas. Where the rouugnage is a grass hay two changes are made. The corn meal is reduced from 200 to 150 pounds and cottonseed meal in creased to 200 pounds. The rule for feeding it is to feed daily one pound for each two "and a half or three pounds of milk. The rule for feeding hay in connection with it is two pounds of hay for each 100 pounds of live weight of cow. If silage is available feed three pounds of silage and one pound of hay for each 100 pounds of live w-eight. CLOVER AS FERTILIZER While most growers know that It is not a good plan to plow under spring seeded sweet clover the first fall after seeding, there seems to be quite a number who are not aware of this fact. When this is done the clover comes up in the crop the fol lowing year and acts as a weed. This is especially true in a wet spring or even in a spring that is average so far as soil moisture is concerned. To get rid of the clover the ground had to be double disked two or three times before planting to corn and still no doubt some of it was left to bother the crop later in the season. The thing to do, if the clover is to be plowed under for corn, is to let it stand and give it a chance to make a good growth the following spring and then plow it under the last week in April or the first week •n May. Even if the seed bed for ISN’T IT THE TRUTH? A great many men have beautiful heories about farming, but they do not stand the test of actual experi ment. These men are like those dreamers who write books telling people how to get rich, but who have to borrow money to pay the rent. -»» - ■ - ■■ GOOD "DAILY DOZEN" If you need reducing exercises luring the winter months, try haul ng and spreading lime on some of the fields. This will keep the sur plus fat away, and trick some of the fields into growing good-sized crons. the corn cannot be made ready till May 15, no harm is done because the corn will grow faster on a sweet clover field than on one where such a crop has not been plowed under. The clover seems to decay last enough so that the plant food that is liberated in this process becomes available at the time when the corn draws most heavily on the sod con stituents. The fact is that there is a waste of valuable plant food when spring seeded sw'eet clover is plowed in the fall. At that time the clover roots are well stored with plant food so that an additional amount of or ganic matter is produced early the following spring which gives just that much more to plow under. To fully understand why spring plow ing Is preferable to fall plowing, it is well to recall that the first spring after seeding swtot clover growth starts from the root crowns and these crowns are not destroyed by fall plowing. It is true that the roots are cut but most of the crowns are turned under and cov ered up and they contain enough stored plant food to start growth in good shape as soon as warm weather returns in the spring. On the other hand, as scon as the root crowns have sent up sprouts in the spring and a fair growth has been made, the clover is as effectively killed by plowing as if plowing were deferred till the latter part of Aug ust when the crop has matured and reached the end of its two-year life. These facts, as previously men tioned, are well known to experi enced growers but they are men tioned here for the benefit of those who are not familiar with the hab its of growth of this valuable plant, wThich has often been condemned by men who tried to grow it before they understood these details. -. - — A A FEEDING EWE LAMBS Farsighted is the sheep owner who prefaces his winter program with the assumption that a ewe Iamb given all she can eat the first winter is likely to produce more and bigger lambs, more wool, live longer and easily be worth $1 or $2 more as a 2-year-old than one fed barely enough to get her through. Several significant sheep deals made re cently illuminate the importance of adequate winter feeding of ewe lambs. One lot of 2,100 2-year-old ewes sold this past summer for $16 per head. Not long ago another large lot sold for $15. Such prices are comparable to the high figures at wrhich ew’es were exchanged during the peak war period. Of course the trend toward expansion in wool growing explains to a certain degree the high value, but basically import ant is that the ewes were properly developed. One of the ewe lots exceeded a 100 per cent, lamb crop the first lamb ing period, which is a marked de viation from the usual first lamb crop of 15 to 25 per cent, below that of the older ewes. Secondly, the first lambs from these properly de veloped ewes attained weights com parable to those of lambs from the older ewes. Sheepmen ordinarily ex pect first lambs to be lighter. The ewes also returned a heavier fleece than sheepmen expect from their 2-vear-old ew'es. Obviously these ewes were of good blood and were the product of high class breeders, but the significance of ample feed the first winter can not be minimized. SUCCESS ESSENTIALS Here are four rules for the care of hogs that are essential to a sat isfactory degree of success. Cleaning the farrowing quarters and scrubbing them with scalding hot lye water—one pound of lye to 30 gallons of scalding hot water— and then spraying them with one pint of compound cresol solution to four gallons of water. The hot wa ter kills worm eggs; the lye loosens the dirt; the disinfectant destroys germs of infectious diseases. Washington the sow’s sides and udder with soap and water before putting her in a clean farrowing pen. This removes worm eggs frcm the sow so that the little pigs will not get them when they suck. Hauling (not driving) the sow and pigs to pasture where no hogs have run for at least a year. Pref ferably, this pasture should be a field which has been cultivated since last used by hogs. This avoids contamination frcm iilthy hog-lots. Confining the pigs to clean pas ture until they are at least four months old. Pigs so raised without access to contaminated hog-lots or pastures until four months old are usually relatively thrifty. After this age and until market weights are reached, the pigs seldom are in jured noticeably by exposure in quarters long used by hogs. FARM PANORAMA There's a something most majes tic ’bout the fields of waving corn, bout the efflorescent acres where tranquility is born, and a person always wonders at such grandeur from the scd. till he feels that all the acres are just handiwork of God. There’s a something awe-inspir ing ’bout the splendor of the wheat, with the pompous panorama that no artist can repeat, be his touch howrever skillful still he is as one who lurks, for the artist of the uni verse alone perfects his works. Then the orchards with their bloom or fruit seem nature in par ade, and the meadows offer luster in the scene the painter’s made— then the trees—some statelv aged and the birds upon the limbs—add the crested hills and valleys—and the dusk when daylight dims. Oh, some may sing of cities—of their magnitude and show—of their vastness, ostentation that gives them exalted slow; but I cite you to the land that people till and harvest from for those elements respendent of which majesty is sum. -«« - SUNLIGHT AND EGGS y Direct sunlight increases egg pro duction and hatchability. That thia Is due to the presence of ultra-vio let rays in sunlight is indicated by tests with quartz mereury-vapor lamp. Window-glass does not allow the ultra-violet rays to pass through, and so poultry kept behind glass windows needs this deficiency made up. Feeding cod-liver oil, chapped alfalfa hay, use of glass substitute instead of window-glass_ ill hese help to keep up egg produc tion and hatchability. ■ Experiments prove that a heifer a easier to fatten than a steer.