Radio Script #135
Little Talks On Common Things
February 10, 1952
Now that Congress is aga i n In sess Ion, we are al I i nte rested to know what legislation it wi II pass. Unlike the program that precedes this one on the air, over this station, we are not given to predictions of things to come. We can only tell you what leading members of Congress themselves say about legislation ahead. Senator George and Representative Doughton, the leading authorities on taxation within the Congress, both state emphatically that taxes will not be raised again in 1952, and we may look for no further change in social security and we I fare laws. On foreign policy that veteran senator, Tom Connally, chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, says foreign econanic aid wi II end in 1951, just as originally planned, but that military aid will probably continue. He says there wi I I be no Ambassador to the Vat I can, that the Senate w I II never ap.,.prove It. The Japanese Peace Treaty will be ratified, but the St. Lawrence Seaway Is a dead issue.
On mill tary affai rs Senator Russe II, chaf rman of the Armed Services Com .. mfttee, hopes “there wi II be early enactment of Universal Military Training, but no Senator or Representative is bold enough to predict its passage. Propone·ntst:,,of UMT know that they have a fight on their hands. There are a lot of people in the United States who do not want to see us tied to a permanent ml litarlzation of youth, and those peop Ie have strong support in the Congress. As for labor, not even the bitterest enemies of the Taft-Hart ley Act four years ago now expect its repea I. They admit that I t has worked rather we 1/ and needs minor amendments, rather than repeal. As for oommunism within the ranks of labor, Representative Barden, chairman of the House Cormlittee, says:
“I think CIO and AFL have done a good job of cleaning house, and they found that indeed some house cleaning was needed. Unfortunately there are still a few un ions In wh i ch the colTmun i sts hoi d power. II
What about government controls? Representative Spence, chairman of the House Commi ttee on Bank i ng and Currency, fee I s sure that we do not now have suffidient control to fight inflation and sti II carryon defense production at a high level. That, as we have more than once pointed out on this program, is the crux of the problem. How can Increased defense production and decreased clvi I ian production do otherwise than bring higher and hi gher prices as long as the workers have more and more money to spend for fewer goods? Let us repeat again what we have tried to emphasize before: No partial control solves that kind of problem. You can’t solve it by freezing prices and profits, and letting wages alone. You can’t accomplish much by control of processing and trade without contro I ling raw mate ria Is at the i r source. I f we have a s i tuat i on that demands all-out control, let’s have It. If we have no such situation, take off all controls and let free enterprise do·<the job.
A few weeks ago we tol d you about Dr. Ambrose Howard of Sidney — his wi II and the inventory of his estate. Tonight we want to tell you about a letter wri tten by Dr. Howard’s younger son, Erasmus D. H~ard, in 1834. Li ke many other Maine youths, young Howard had gone far from Maine to seek his fortune. On Apri I 23, 1834 he wrote to his father from New Orleans, where he had been settled for several weeks. This is the way the letter begins: “Dear Father:
received your letter in due time after its date and was happy to learn that you were all enjoying a measurable degree of health and prosperity. I hope you wi II pardon me for not giving your letter a much earl ier answer. The delay has proceeded from two causes — first, the necessity of devoting all my tIme not required for relaxation and rest to my business; and secondly, my intention, when I wrote you last, of giving you a general description with some outline sketches of the ci ty. But strange as I t may seem, I have not yeT been ab Ie to obtain enough Information to accomplish that purpose. I must Therefore defer the matter for the present, but I shall not lose sight of it, if I have a convenient opportunity before I leave the city.”
Why young Howard had gone to New Orleans is not entirely clear, but apparently he was seeking hi s fortune in that southern port, for he goes on to tell his father:
“I began at once to search for emp loyment. It has been a di fficult and laborious task. The immense numbers that had preceded me here from all parts of the Un f ted States, brought hither by the I dea that the cl ty had been rendered nearly empty by the sickness of the last two seasons, had filled every vacant place in every branch of business. The papers are filled with advertisements of young men seeking employment. Scores — yes, hundreds — have been leaving this city for the North in the New York packets.
“I spent five or six weeks in fruitless search of business, three of those weeks amid incessant rain. Wading in mud half way to the tops of boots, I explored the city and the adjacent country, for 15 miles up and down the river on both sides, but to no avail. All were full, many having already more help than they needed. My only encouragement came from the other side of The river, nearly opposite to the upper part of the city, by a wealthy Frenchman, who had been building a double steam sawmi II which he expected to get into operation by early summer. He would then need a clerk and bookkeeper and thought no doubt he cou I d then emp loy me at about $50 a month.”
Young Howard could not wait until summer before getting to work. Although he was getting precious little food, his stomach was fed up on New Orleans itself. He vents his wrath on the old city In these words to his father: “Had it not been for my obligation to complete Lovejoy’s business here, as committed to me before I left home, I should long ago have left this sink of the western world, this region of interminable swamps, fearful inundations, incessant ra 1 n or scorch i ng sun, perpetua I mud or smothering dust — a mora I Sodan, the puogatory of the ebony race from a II the other states — the Immense storehouse, repository and vortex of all the superfluous wealth and fatness of half the world — the city of refuge for this lone creation — the Babel of a thousand tongues, the Pandandrum of as nany different colors — but sti II the resi … dence of some good, amiable, kind, and religious people.”
Then young Howard tells his father how he had made plans to go up to the sources of the Mississippi as an employee of the American Fur eo””any. He already had visions of what he calls “scal ing the R:>cky Mountains in search of the buffalo and other game of the Far West”. But what Howard calls a “Provi ..dence -that watches over the strangers in a strange land” Intervened. At last he found a job in New Orleans. Before leaving Maine he had learned the carpenter’s -trade, and in those days every carpenter worth his salt was a’-cabinet maker. Howard was no exception. He found a room for which he had to pay what was then an exhorbitant rental of ten dollars a month, and determined to set up In business as a cabinet maker and joiner. He got his chest of tools and a few other possessions trucked up from the ship, where they had lain since his arriva I. Then he obtained sufficient lumber to construct a work bench and began work on the most essential articles of furniture for his own needs — bedstead, chai r and tab Ie. Then he te II s hi s father about hi s first work for pay in New Orleans:
“The first job I performed was working the molding 00 the mislon (sic) channels of the ship Ceylon, which I wrought entirely by hand, as I could find no sui-table molding tools In this city. I had scarcely finished that job when the sh i p was run into by another vesse I, wh i ch carried away her starboard mt d- ship works. That gave me another job of three or four days.
“After fi nishing on board the Ceylon and arranging my shop and household, app lied to my I and I ady for further patronage. She is a French lady, an 01 d rna I d of about 45 years — and a much better woman than anyone wou I d expect to find renting quarters in New Orleans. She gave me encouragement, and a few days later gave me a job repairing another house that belonged to her. That job gave me emp loyment for near Iy a month. Then she recommended me to other members of her fami Iy who in turn recommended me to their friends. Thus, through the kindness of Mi ss 5T. Vertorby, I have prospered.”
Other men from Maine were down there in New Orleans, and young Howard made the close acquaintance of John Cottle of Windsor, Maine, a lad of 19, who had graduated from Ch I na Academy, served an apprent i cesh I pin Bangor, and had come down to New Orleans, as he said, “to make five or six hundred dollars and return home in the spring with enough money to set up in business for himself near his father’s p I ace in Wi ndsor.” Li sten to what Howard wrote about young Cott Ie and his hopes of fortune: “Poor disappointed youth of self-sufficiency and vanity. After six weeks of wading through the mud — spending nearly all his funds and meeting with a continual series of disappointing expectations — he was tempted through despair to try his fortune with his last money on the roulette.
The result was what common sense might suppose, Finding him destitute, I invited him TO live with me. He was with me about five weeks before he obta i ned any bus i ness, and he rendered me some ass is tance on the heavi es t work on my job. Finally he obtained employment in a baking establishment at $25 per month. Then the bakery burned, but he fortunate I y got another job where he is now recei vi ng $30 a mnth.” After Cott Ie got settled on hIs job, Howard took in another Mal ne youth, Nathan Sims of Union, who, I Ike Cottle, had graduated from China Academy, and had then determi ned to go to sea. So he sh ipped on the bark Tamerand of Thom- aston for New Orleans and thence to Europe. But on the voyage from Maine to New Orleans, Sims learned~ as Howard puts it, that “his constitution was not at all adapted to a sea-faring life.” So he obtained the captain’s leave to stay In New Orleans rather than sail across the Atlantic. Howard describes Sims as “a young man of good sense about 23 years old, having a good English education with principles and habits of the old Puritan stamp.”
Young Howard was concerned about some of the financial affairs he had left unsett I ed InS i dney • He gave his fathe r the fo II ow i n9 Ins truct ions: “The ha rness and saddle were company property with bi II of sale to Elisha Hayward. The crosscut saw belonged to Sawyer and myself in common. The Smith Co. papers delivered to Mr. Ames, who Is treasurer. Please inform me In your next letter whether you have settled with Newell and Henry Lovejoy. Ask Sawtelle and Bailey if S’alwyer has taken up rrrt note. lowe Char les Ham I I n a sma II trl fIe, or he owes me, I do not know wh i ch • I a I so owe Asa Red i ngton five sh i I I I ngs that I ough t to have pa i d • P I ease attend to these ob I i gat Ions on my beh a I f. It You have heard me say on several occasions that these old letters were mal led without postage stamps and no envelopes were used. The letter itself was ingeniously folded and the address written on the outside. This letter of E. D. Howard’s is long — writte n on pages one, two and three of a foolscap size sheet, with the fourth page left blank to make the outside folding and carry the address of the letter. Now comes a practice with which I had never been fam; I iar in such old-time letters. Having finished the third page, Howard goes back to page one and continues the letter between the already written lines of that page. I assure you that practi ce does not make the letter any eas ler to read 118 years later, but I finally managed to decipher It, as I have been te I I I ng you.
Now why didn’t Howard simply use another half sheet of foolscap, fold It inside the four page sheet, and thus save his father the trouble of making out that inter-lined script? Interestingly enough I found what is probably the answer in that 1813 edition of the Farmers Almanac, loaned me by Mr. Lewis Whipple. In that old almanac are published the rates of postage. Thl$ is the way they read:
“For every letter of single sheet, delivered by land, 40 mi les, 8 cents; 90 mIles, 10 cents; 150 miles, 12i cents; 300 mi les, 17 cents; 500 mi les, 20 cents; more than 500 miles, 25 cents. Every double letter, of two sheets, Is to pay double the said rates, every triple letter, triple the rates. Every ship letter, originally received at an office for delivery, 6 cents per sheet.’T There you have It. Letters” for which the receiver, not the sender, always had to pay postage, were charged for, not by weight, but by the number of sheets. So, mindful of his father’s pocket book, young HC»Iard economically used just one sheet of paper, managing to get five pages of writing on three pages, by going back and writing between the lines of pages one and two. A young man with that kind of Yankee thrift deserved to prosper in New Orleans.
Year: 1952