Jasper County Democrat, Volume 21, Number 19, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 June 1918 — JACKSON TOWNSHIP, NEWTON COUNTY [ARTICLE]

JACKSON TOWNSHIP, NEWTON COUNTY

One should never laugh at the troubles of youth, for not infrequently these troubles are too real to be made the subject of jest. Only a few days ago a boy, an unusually bright little fellow, told us that he bad ‘a darn good notion to hike out and try for a job in the army,” because he had to sleep with a certain-peddler who made occasional over-night stops at the lad’s home. Did we laugh at that boy? No, indeed. Instead we fell upon his neck and wept, his experience was so like our own away back yonder, when everybody, seemingly, who had conscientious scruples against paying for a night's lodging stopped at the “old homestead.’’ And to every gol blame man, sinner and saint, washed and unwashed, we acted in the capacity of bunk mate. God, how well we remember those days! There was the German peddler, the Russian peddler, the Irish peddler, tha Slovak, the Lithunian, the Zech, Jew and Greek. All, as we recall it, received the glad hand at “our house.” During this period of our enforced association with the lazzaroni of Europe we became acquainted with every nationality of nightmare under ’the sun, and in defending our young life from the murderous attacks of the victims of said nightmares we brought the strangle hold and half Nelson to a state of perfection that left little to he desired along this line. We also contracted a sort of mixed language which successfully withstood the efforts of some of the best teachers of those days and which made us feared and respected among the boys throughout that entire community. Yes, indeed, if you are laboring under the delusion that a boy has no troubles just try to sleep with a cabbage and pork gorged Russian, with a breath like a Mormon emigrant train and a style of nightmare that halts just short of plain murder, that’s all.