To Mark 300th Year
of Boston Common
Pageant Next Summer to
Depict Historic Events.
Boston.—Saved from modern
road builders and street wideners
only bj the high-powered Indigna
tion of the Boston Common society,
the tercentenary ot fifty acres of
cowpaths, lawns and shrubbery, un
crossed by rapid transit line or
highway, will be celebrated next
summer.
Of course, thousands of persons
are Inconvenienced each day be
cause of the disinclination of Bos
ton antiquarians to let go another
foot of land from the Common for
needed street widenlngs or permit
the building of roads across It, but
other thousands revere It for Its
place In American history and the
breathing space It affords In the
heart of downtown Boston.
For this renson, a committee Is
now raising a fund, tentatively
placed at $300,000, to reconstruct
the scenes and homes of vanished
days, the duels, ducking stools and
hangings, during the 193ft celebra
tion of Its three hundredth anni
versary.
As It Was 300 Years Ago.
With the help of the Emergency
Belief administration, the commit
tee, headed by Everett B. Mero,
hopes to draw from the past a rep
resentation of three hundred years
of history—to show the plot as It
was when Quakers and pirates
dangled from Its elms, ns It was
when young Woodbrldge and his
rival dueled at forty pacea for the
favors of a Boston belle.
The committee, If sufficient funds
are raised, hopes to reproduce the
Common’s ducking stool; show the
smoker's circle where "henpecked”
devotees of nicotine repaired when
driven from the home; reproduce
the spinning bee of 17ft3 when young
ladles revealed theli matronly traltB
for the edification of iheir swains.
The anti-slavery meeting of the 'ROs,
Earl Percy and his Itedcoats before
the Revolution; William Blaxton
(or Blackstone), Boston’s first set
tler who sold his land, now the
Common, to u community which he
found too crowded and moved to
Rhode Island; Beacon Btreet "when
respectability stalked unchecked";
the coming of the railroad In 1830;
the water celebration In 1848, when
a public system was first Installed;
the nrrlvnl of Lafayette on the Com
mon, June 17, 182ft, when he came
to attend the Bunker Hill exercises;
Metoposaurus Is Back
After 140,000,000 Years
Berkeley, Calif.—After an absence
of qome 140,(XX),000 years the metop
osaurus has returned—but he Isn’t
his old self.
In fact, the miniature amphibian
In the University of California Mu
seum of Paleontology Is only a clny
model of the extinct creature, which,
scientists say, was n distant relative
of the present-day salamander.
The model was constructed by
sculptors, Adele Stnckpole and Au
drey Horn. It was modeled from a
skull and »ther skeleton remains
dug up In the Painted Desert of
Arizona recently. Paleontologists
estimated from the fossil remains
that the metoposaurus was about
eight to ten feet long.
Lake Erie Is Prolific
Source of Peat Moss
fJrndusky, Ohio.—What has been
Identitied as “peat moss” has been
coming from ljtke Erie recently In
large quantities. Its source Is a
mystery. Never until this year has
there been more than a little of It.
Now tons are available.
The moss, when bleached and
treated, mny la* used In beautify
ing rock gardens. It commands
high prices.
V
recruiting for the Civil war In tents
near Tremont street—all this and
much more Is In the scope of a
celebration which could almost de
pict a nation's history and progress
as well ns a city’s.
First Woman In Boston.
Anna Pollard, a woman noted for
her plain face, her fine tavern on
Beacon street, and the fact that
she was the first woman In Boston,
may well find some mention In the
ceremonies. She was a favorite of
the Harvard class of 1688 as well
ns of 10fJS> and 16-40, and others who
loved her entertainment until at
last she went to her reward. In
those days Beacon Hill, according
to a recent description, was "the
tenderloin district.”
More than sixty of America’s
great—soldiers, poets, statesmen.
Presidents, preachers, architects—
were wont to roam In leisure hours
the routes that criss-cross this patch
of tree-studded green in the heart
of a city.
Old Alphabet Aid to Language Study
- <&—
Canaan Cuneiform Writing
Important Discovery.
New Haven, Conn.—Discovery of
a hitherto unknown preblbllcal
Semitic language, rcvcnllng the
source of the undent and modern
alphabets and offering a new key to
controversial passages In the Bible,
was announced by Dr. Julian J.
Obern-ann, visiting professor of Se
mitic languages nt Yale.
Cuneiform tablets, found at Rns
Sharnra, near Antioch, In northern
Syria, disclosed the language of
Canaan, and, according to Doctor
Obermann, "are written In a new
MANY-WAY LACE HAT
By CIIICIll K Nil HOl.AH
All credit to Worth for the tricki
est hat of the year. It solves the
problem for a hat thut can be
worn In the evening, for dress-up
occasions In the afternoon and the
cocktail hour, for the movies and
theater, and for tucking away In
one’s suitcase for a trip.
Made of five seven-inch squares
of lace, with french seams to the
right side, and folding down like
a pocket handkerchief, It Is the
simplest little affair possible. The
Finds Men Prefer
Their Co-Eds Dumb
Evanston, 111. — Co-eds of
Northwestern university were ac
cused of making low scholastic
grades to attract the men.
Prof. John J. B. Morgan, of
the psychology department, said
girl students "proceed on the
theory that men like them
dumb.”
He suggested that men submit
the co-eds to Intelligence tests
before dating them.
"If they were required by
prospective escorts to establish
high Intelligence quotients be
fore dates, the university’s schol
astic record would soar like n
rocket,” Professor Morgan added.
Largett Prime Number
Chicago.—Dr. Samuel I. Krleger
wore out six pencils, used 72 sheets
of legal size note paper and fraz
zled his nerves quite badly but he
was able to announce that 231,584,
178,474, <132,390,847,141,970,017.375,
815,700,539,909,331,281,128,978,915,
820,259,279,871 Is the largest known
prime number.
A prime number Is any figure di
visible only by Itself or 1.
alphabet that proves to be the
oldest known.”
He termed the find “an epoch
making discovery In the field of
Semitic antiquities and the most
Important find since the Babylon
ian cuneiforms have come to light.”
The tablets, he said, were In
scribed during or before the Fif
teenth century, II. C., and offer a
previously unkuown link between
techniques of cuneiform and the
principles of alphabetic script. The
Itas Shamra tablets, he said, al
though written In cuneiform charac
ters, employ only 30 signs, using
them as alphabetic letetrs, whereas
other systems known consisted of
hundreds of signs representing syl
lnhles of Ideogram..
The new Semitic dialects of Itas
•Shamru promise to throw light on
tie evolution of the letters com
mon to ancient and modern alpha
bets, revealing how the various let
came to have their Individual
shape, and how they came to he ar
ranged In their traditional order.
As a result of the discovery, he
said, Itlldlcnl literature and antiqui
ties will he better understood.
Neither the language nor script
was understood when the tablets
first were found by an archeologi
cal expedition of the French Acad
emy of Inscriptions and Belles-Let
tres, he said. The decipherment
was by French nnd German schol
ars, “opening a door to the under
standing of Semitic lore and civ
ilization which scholars only a few
years ago did not know existed.”
surprise conies when you put It on,
for there are more ways of wear
ing the hnt than the five squares of
which It Is made.
Recently n whole bridal party np
penred wearing these hnts. The
bridesmaid. In a silver and pale
blue lace frock, wore a matching
hat of the lace. The maid of
honor’s dress and hat were in deep
blue nnd silver lace. The bride's
mother. In black nnd silver lace,
wore fhe very black lace hnt from
which these sketches were made.
The fun of It Is that one can
take a half dozen such hats on a
week-end nnd hnve a matching or
contrasting one for every occasion.
A novice can make one In no time
at all. As for the cost, three hats
can be made from one yard of lnce.
Gold in Chicken*! Craw
Sitka, Alaska.—Millions of dol
lars’ worth of gokl has been shipped
from Alnska to Seattle. Some of it
apparently is going back. As Mrs.
Josephine Brojack dressed a chick
en shlpi>ed from Seattle, she found
in Its craw a gold nugget worth
$2.50.
Uses “Rainbow” to Speed Seed Germination
Dr. Lewis 11. Flint of the Department of Agriculture is pictured in the “rainbow room" of his laboratory
where colored lights bring "dead" lettuce seeds back to life. Seeds which fall to grow under ordinary condi
tions will germinate In 24 hours If soaked for an hour or so and then exposed for a few seconds to sunlight
or the proper kind of artificial light. Ills discovery will save millions of dollars to growers throughout the
country.
SEEN-" HEARD
wound the
National Capital
g—■—By CARTER FIELDS-—SS
Washington.—Cotton is admitted
! ly one of the most serious problems
In the whole New Deal set-up. High
officials will admit it confiden
tially, though their public utter
ances are very different, indeed.
The whole question, of course, is
whether the United States can go
I on exporting enough cotton to keep
■ the cotton acreage now being farmed
busy, and yet maintain the world
price of American cotton at high
enough levels to make raising the
cotton profitable.
Enthusiasts about the AAA pro
gram talk vociferously about the
natural advantages of America with
regurd to cotton. They refuse to
see any cloud on the horizon. They
Insist that there is no other local
ity In the world where cotton as
good as that raised in America can
be produced except at costs exceed
ing American costs.
As a general proposition, this is
correct. Most countries that can
produce cotton at lower costs than
the United States have a product
which compares most unfavorably
with that grown In America. The
few places that can produce equally
good cotton have very high costs.
B»it—the whole world Is looking
for a cheaper substitute for high
grnde cotton, and generally, where
such a quest persists long enough,
the goal is found. The Germans
have been experimenting with wood
pulp. They do not claim to have
gotten very far. At present they
are In about the stage of American
production of rubber from golden
rod. It can be done successfully,
but there is no particular point In
doing it. The costs actually ex
ceed the cost of good imported rub
ber.
The search for a substitute Is
by no means over. Incidentally, the
Germans have had fair success
In the last few months, producing
a substitute for rubber from rye
flour. They buy the rye flour from
Poland.
As long as America produced
cotton without restrictions, there
was not much point to looking for
a substitute, because any given year
there might be a big cotton crop, and
price would fall off, and anyone
financially interested in the substi
tute would take a terrible beating
that year.
Keep Price Up
Now, however, the definite aim
of AAA Is to keep the price of cot
ton up all the time, regardless of
weather and other crop conditions,
by the simple expedient of restrict
ing acreage and governing the carry
over each year. Which sets up a
real prize for the discovery of a
good substitute.
So actually the cotton program
is In the same position as a com
pany making a patent article, which
it is selling at a nice profit. Al
ways there is the fear that some
Inventor will come along with some
thing either Just ns good or better,
which will destroy the market for
the patent article.
A second and entirely different
problem concerns the people who
earned their living by working in
cotton fields up to the time of AAA
restrictions, but now have no work.
At the moment the federal govern
ment is taking care of them on
relief. They are part of the 20,
000,000 now estimated to be sup
ported thus. They are also, of
course, part of the explanation of
the fact that the number of people
on relief Is not diminishing, despite
the fact that business is getting
better.
While the same problem applies
to other crops than cotton, the sit
uation with respect to the others is
not nearly so serious. Cotton is
the big export crop, and always has
been. Moreover, there has not beeu
much change in that situation as
the country grew bigger in pop
ulation. Exports of wheat and
other farm products have slowly
declined as the population of the
cities in America consumed larger
and larger percentages of the total
crop. But cotton maintained about
the same ratio as between domestic
consumption and export right up
to the time when AAA restrictions
began to operate. About 60 per
cent of the total crop was exported.
Which explains some of the gray
hairs in the Department of Agri
culture.
Tax Increases Seen
Not only are there to be no tax
reductions by congress, even on lev
ies which there is very good reason
for removing or lowering, but tax
Increases are almost certain before
adjournment.
This will not appear early in the
session, as the administration is
counting on a lot of maneuvering
about taxes in its fight to hold down
the soldier bonus disbursements.
But before the final taps of the
gavels of the Vice President In the
senate and of the speaker in the
house new taxes will have been lev
ied, or old ones boosted. Because
the treasury needs the money, and
needs it badly.
There has been a vigorous check
ing over of old Income tax returns,
ns many citizens have discovered,
some to their sorrow. But the to
tal amount of money realized by
the treasury In this endeavor has
been disappointing. Official figures
are not available, but there Is no
doubt as to the accuracy of this
statement For strangely enough,
much as most people would love
to dodge and evade Income taxes,
when It comes to writing down
the figures on the return blanks
they have a wave of honesty, or
fear, whichever you prefer to be
lieve.
So with the prospect of larger
appropriations than ever, there
must be new taxes, while the fight
for lower tobacco and liquor taxes
has been lost before the convening
of congress—lost In Secretary Mor
genthau’s office.
The trouble is that even figuring
on an extraordinary budget, In ad
dition to the regular budget of nor
mal governmental expenditures, will
not Justify the administration In
not raising taxes. For while It Is
an easy bookkeeping method to say
that this or that item, say of pub
lic works or relief, Is extraordinary,
nnd therefore should be financed
by the sale of bonds Instead of by
taxes, there are other complica
tions.
In the rule laid down by Presi
dent Roosevelt, when he sent his
first budget message. Interest and
sinking fund must be counted In
the regular budget, though the sum
on which they are calculated may
be regarded as belonging in the
extraordinary budget.
Total Is Mounting
Although there has been consider
able saving In Interest charges, due
to the low rnte of Interest the gov
ernment has had to pay, the total
is mounting, and it will be recalled
that up to now the budgets of this
administration have elminated sink
ing funds. This was done on the
theory that during an emergency
there was no point in saving up to
pay off debt.
But it is obvious now that the
appropriations for public works, to
prime the pump of business recov
ery, and of relief to keep people
from starving and freezing, are not
going to decrease in the coming
session. In all human probability
they must be increased. And while
they are still regardec. as emergen
cy appropriations, and therefore
to be financed by bonds instead of
taxes, there is a growing belief
that the relief appropriations are
never going to shrink to any figure
which was thought normal a few
years back—even two years back.
For it is now clear that relief is
to he with the federal government
always, the effort to make the local
political units, states, counties and
cities, take over their own problems
to the contrary notwithstanding.
And It is plain to the experts
who have been working on budget
figures under Morgenthau’s direc
tion that the present flow of re
ceipts from taxes is not sufficient
to carry what cannot much longer
be regarded as an emergency load,
but which must soon be classified
as a normal load.
In addition, there is fast ap
proaching a time when sinking fund
requirements can no longer be de
ferred. It has been hoped that a
sufficient revival of business would
result in boosting tax receipts to a
sufficient extent to take care of
this. But hardly to take care of
the increased normal load.
About Public Lands
The old public lands question has
been completely reversed apparent
ly since the dawn of the New Deal.
In former administrations senators
from the western states com
plained bitterly and often about the
fact that the federal government
owned vast tracts of their land,
which as a result were undeveloped,
produced no taxes, and therefore
added to the burden of the state
government.
Now It is a southern 6tate
which protests—not against the fed
eral government land now held, but
against the acquisition of govern
ment land, which will thereupon
pass out of the taxing base of the
state.
In a recent telegram to Forestry
News Digest, Governor Talmadge
of Georgia says:
“The federal government, accord
ing to reports, Is optioning large
areas of land In Georgia for pur
chase, the areas reaching into hun
dreds of thousands of acres. If
any of the agencies of the state are
consulted about much of this fed
eral land acquisition program, it
is not known to me. From such
information ns drifts In, it seems
that options are being taken on
submarginal lands, largely forest
land and abandoned farms that are
now in condition to use only for
growing trees. If this land goes
to federal government ownership It
is removed from state taxation, re
moved without the state being con
sulted.
“I certainly do not want land
owners of Georgia to have to com
pete with the federal government
in growing timber or in producing
naval stores, with the federal gov
ernment using tax-free and subsi
dized lands and not obliged to
make a profit. Georgia has long
been getting a lot of wealth from
its forests and it looks as if a lot
more is coming from our woods.
Georgians, and not the federal gov
ernment, should get it. It seems
to me that the federal government
should at least co-ordinate its land
purchase activities with some con
sideration for the rights of the
state.”
Oopyricht.—WNU 8«rflc«.
Ontonc} Java
Copra Is Food, Currency and Chief Article of Trade.
Prepared by National Geographic Society,
Washington, D C.—WNU Service.
() THE natives of Ontong
Java, a group of isles lying In
the island-besprinkled sea off
the northwest coast of New Guinea,
coconuts are synonymous with
money, for copra (dried coconut
meats) serves as currency. Five
pieces of tobucco represent one
hundred copra; a bolt of calico, a
number of thousand copra accord
ing to Its quality, and so on.
The growing coconuts on the
pnlms are spoken of ns “green,"
although they may be either green
or yellow In color. At this stage
they are full of the delicious sweet
milk, thirst-quenching as 'amonade,
and the tlesh they contain Is very
thin.
When the nuts are ripe, the flesh
Is of maximum thickness, and they
fall to the ground. Then they are
gathered and the thick husks are
removed, the nuts emerging ns they
are sold in European and American
shops. They are split in halves, the
milk being now more or less sour,
and are placed open end downward
on the drying frame, a stand sup
ported on legs about four feet high.
Mats are put over the nuts, and
a tire lighted beneath the frame is
allowed to burn for about twelve
hours. The dried flesh then is read
ily removed from the shell with
the aid of a porpoise bone or sharp
ened stick. This operation over,
the dried flesh, or copra, as it is
called, is taken to the trading sta
tion in baskets and exchanged for
goods. When a ship calls, the copra
is put into bags and weighed and
then carried by natives into flat
bottomed punts, which are towed
off to the ship by a motor launch.
The copra goes to Tulagi, on
Florida island of the Solomon
group, where it Is trans-shipped to
Sydney. The oil extracted from
copra is used in making soaps,
candles, and butter substitutes;
the pulp becomes cattle feed.
The other and far less Important
item of exchange at Ontong Java is
trochus shell. Tills shell, like the
copra, is shipped. It usually finds
its way to Japan or Belgium, where
it is cut and polished into “pearl"
buttons. The cone-shaped, reddish
shell (sometimes the red shows out
side If the button has been imper
fectly cut) is washed up into shal
low water of the reefs where it is
collected by the natives.
Trepang and Ivory Nuts.
The lagoon abounds with beche
demer. the trepang or sea slug, a
food delicacy of the East. It is col
lected by Japanese, who come out
from Tulagi In special luggers.
From dinghies they look out for the
slugs below. When a suitable spec
imen is sighted, the diver goes over
the side, sinks about a fathom, then
transfixes his prey with the end of
a sort of weighted harpoon, which
he might be said to let fall upon it.
The slugs are cleaned, boiled,
and dried. A full cargo for a lug
g»r, about five tons, usually takes
tPree months to collect. Although,
of course, the price varies, it is
normally $4,000 to $">,000.
Ivory nuts, the products of a
graceful palm, are used chiefly for
making buttons, knife handles and
similar articles. The nuts are
crushed and the objects molded
from the paste made from them.
A native home on the islands is
rectangular. It has a framework of
poles, tied in position with rope
made from the liber of the coconut
husk. No nails are used. The
oeaked roof is thatched with pan
danus-palm leaf, the leaves bent
iver and made fast to a stick about
four or five feet long. These sticks,
tied to the roof pedes so that they
overlap, make a virtually rain
proof roof.
The walls of the house are inane
of mats of plaited coconut leaf tied
to the upright sticks. The floor is
also covered with these mats, Na
tives use these mats as beds. Oth
er mats are used for blankets, and
pieces of wo,id ns pillows.
Clean, Charming Natives.
The natives are a clean, friend
ly, and altogether charming people.
Fond of swimming, they always
bathe at least once a day. They
are well-built and handsome, many
reaching 5 feet 0 Inches in height
and some (1 feet or more. Their
complexion, of a light coffee color,
is similar to that of the Hawalians.
Boys from about fourteen years
of age to twenty wear their hair
cut fairly close. From then until
V
they are married men with small
families, they allow It to grow long.
They resume hair-cutting at the be
ginning of middle age and continue
the practice until they are old. For
mature men, custom favors a rather
close crop over most of the head,
with a bushy tuft left at each side.
There are, however, many excep
tions to this rule.
Girls wear their hair in the two
tufts until they become mothers,
and from then on keep their heads
fairly closely shaved—a style dis
couraging to lice. The hair is usu
ally black, though at the ends it
may bleach to a reddish brown, and
it may be straight, wavy, or, in a
few cases, distinctly woolly.
Hands and feet of both men and
women are frequently small and
often delicately shaped, but the in
step is rarely high and some na
tives are almost flat-footed. How
ever, the legs are straight and
beautiful, and many of the men
have a grace and beauty that might
be the envy of an ancient Greek.
Virtually every woman wears as
a skirt a fathom of canvas, kept in
place by a belt of woven pandanns
leaf or plaited human hair. Tho
upper part of the body is left bare.
For a man’s attire a strip of calico
passing around the waist and be
tween the legs and tied back and
front suffices. Children of both
sexes go naked till they are about
eleven or twelve.
Elaborate Tattooing.
Both men and women are tat
tooed. The decoration Is begun in
early childhood and with the fore
head and nose. The forehead pat
tern resembles an open book. At
the age of twelve or so, when the
girls first wear skirts permanently,
they receive suits of tattooing from
waist to knee that look from a dis
tance like close-fitting, figured
black bloomers. Only on close in
spection can the actual pattern be
discerned.
The pattern is made up of fish
and geometrical designs. As the
girl grows older, fish are added
around the hips and on the stom
ach. Later still when she becomes
pregnant for the first time, the tat
tooing Is finished by the covering
of the breasts, chest, back, arms,
and even the cheeks and chin lines
of the face with fish design.
The men have far less tattoo than
the women. Except on the fore
head and nose, they have none un
til they are about twenty years of
age. Then two broad bands are
added, extending from the shoulder
around the back to the thighs and
in front terminating in two arrows
on the chest. The arm Is tattooed
either with fish or a geometrical de
sign. A row of dots just below the
eye gives exactly the effect that a
woman seeks when she darkens her
lids; it makes the eyes stand out
and appear to be much larger than
they are. When a man is the father
of a family, he may have a few fish
added on his back and hips and
thighs; but many forego this right
Coconut Palm Most UsefuL
It would be impossible to flnfii
any other single tree which serves
such a variety of ends as the coco
nut palm, especially os Leuaniua
island. It gives food and drink—
the latter particularly important on
smaller islands where there are
no water holes. Visitors have gone
for ten days with nothing to drink
but coconut milk. Also, it furnishes,
besides the copra of commerce, a
strongly alcoholic toddy and a
sticky sirup resembling treacle.
The husks and shells provide
fuel, and the dried spathe is excel
lent tinder. The shells serve as
plates, spoons and water bottles.
The wats for walls and for beds are
made from the leaves; the dried
leaves, tied into bundles, give light
as torches and flares. The spines
of the leaves are made int© brooms,
and the central stalk provides a
weak timber which is put to a num
ber of uses. The outer skin of this
stalk is useful where a strong,
tough rope is required, as in lash
ing the gunwale of the canoe to the
dugout log.
The rope made from the husk
fiber serves all general purposes
from house ties to fish line. A
conrse covering at the base of the
leaf, which at a first glance looks
like a roughly woven fabric, is
made into Strainers and sieves. The
actual trunk of the palm, although
not very durable, is made into
spears and walking sticks, or cut
Into logs for sitting platforms.
