The Key West Citizen Newspaper, September 17, 1952, Page 8

®age8 THE KEY WEST CITIZEN Wednesday, September 17, 1952 BARNEY GOOGLE AND SNUFFY SMITH HEEHQo00 4 HONEY POT! IT BE ME !! YORE: OU’ RIDDLE- DE-WIDDLES !! WHAT'S MY me LEETLE FAMBLY BEEN DOIN! “TODAY ? WELL- AT LAST! I'vE GOT EVERYTHING PACKED AGAIN- I HOPE MAGGIE DON'T CHANGE HER MIND ANY MORE- THE GRIPS ARE WEARIN' OUT- FROM PACKIN' AN’ %_. UNPACKIN' ‘em! /) I_ MUST GIT A PAPER BAG AN' PUT MY THINGS IN IT- ALL TH’ LUGGAGE 1S JAMMED TIGHT / DON'T TEASE HER.’- MAD AT MEN‘~ HER Hi BEEZEY./— 'M TAKING JUSTY RIDERS COMING OVER THE RIDGE --- LIKE GREASY LIGHTNING! TW THROW TO TH PLATE, AN’ HERE WHO SAID MAGGIE-ME DARLIN'— WHAT SHOULD I TAKE ALONG ? WILL I NEED ME DRESS SUIT? Boy! AN! IT SURE I5_A VACATION FOR ME- AN’ HOW ¥M GOIN! TO ENJOY VACATION- AND I'M TAKING IT! By Tom Sims and B. Zaboly NES, GUT IM NOT CONVINCED! 17 - WoW, YOU LOO;K SHARP/= PRETTY DRESS You GOT WHAT'D You EXPECT ME TO BE BLAST DOWN CISCO, AND THE REST'LL BE EASY! SSE 4S) é Ror ‘WESTPORT Chapter Seven ‘HE two men facing each other in the dim storeroom had no time for candles; there was death in their eyes and in their curving fingers. death in the grim game of tag they were playing there in the semi-carkness. Regan was advancing, his burned and biistered hands held out before him like two gross, misshenpen clubs, his teody crouc! like that of some relent- less j emimal that prepares to spring as It overtakes its "y. Dupré faced him with his against the wall, his white shirt pasting in the pale light from window, his legs still un- steady from the liquor he had consumed. sprang, throw- ag e Regan was moving forward again, and this time, as Dupré tried to slip aside, Regan’s heavy left boot swung forward in a savage arc, perfectly timed to smash into the front of Dupré’s ment intensified the impact, cracking the round, heavy bone helpless to the, floor. _ Regan was upon him like a tiger, one hand clutching for his throai, the thumb of the other clawing at Dupré’s eyes. Franti- cally Dupré rolied aside, felt his hand ciose upon 2 broken fire- yee ker that had been thrown nto the stereroom with a catch- to strike. He struck and struck again, feeling Regan’s weight roll Away from his body just as the swept across him. gut into the hallway and the steps and railing of the Littie by little, pulling himself across the room with his elbows, he gained the narrow window at S|the other end of the room that be over, for in that position a few well-placed kicks would render him incapable of further resist- ance. But Regan was no tyro in fight- looked out upon the quiet garden at the back of the house. He pulled himself up to the window ledge, and his voice, sharpened with terror and pain, shattered the stillness of the violet dusk. ing. The raw frontier had schooled “Help! Help! For God’s sake— him well, and now his hard- muscled right arm swung like a sledge, driving the heavy club of his fist into Dupré’s groin, failing of its full deadening and crip- pling objective because there was no room to bring all his strength into play, but still inflicting pun- ishment enough to cause Dupré to loosen his grip for the fraction help! He knew he was screaming at the top of his lungs, but it seemed to him that the mellow darkness muffled the sound, draining it away into an empty and barren nothingness. He screamed again, and sud- denly saw the swift flutter of a | pale figure running up the garden of a second that was all Regarmppath toward the house. Instinc- needed to break away. People’s Forum Citizen welcomes exp views of its re: fair and cortine t 200 words, and write ef the paper osly. the writer mast accompa letters and will be published un- less requested otherwise. “GOOD BUSINESS VENTURE” | Editor, The Citizen: “Once a Conch always a Conch.” Perhaps true but not necessarily | so. If you want the facts, as some! have asked, and if we are honest, | we know that there are GOOD | Conchs and there are BAD Conchs, Some ihtruding interests would have you believe that a Conch can do no wrong. That is about as silly | and foolish as to think that a king | can do no wrong. With the march of civilization has gone the reveal- ing fact that a man is evaluated | for what he is, not what his ances tors were. The word Conch has a strong ap- peal. It gives one the sense of be- longing. No citizen of Key West is so naive as to think that just be-| cause a man is a Conch, that his motives are above reproach. It must be conceded that there are some who would sell their mercen. ary interests to a gullible public under the pretense of “belonging” Of course that is good psychology and good salesmanship. To the dis: cerning person such pressure car ries but little weight | Most any community is proud of | its history, especially if its record | if good. There are some exceptions |The rule is emphasized when you j visit New England and learn that most of them have relatives who came over on the Mayflower. Will Rogers heard it so much that he countered with, “So what, my an. cestors were on the reception com mittee.” The typical New England- er likes to impress you with the idea that all New Englanders were good people. They say very little about the witch hangings at nor do they give you the number jin the prisons whose ancestors | came over on the Mayflower | One might drop down to Virginia | where the natives scornfully look over any stranger and let them know that they are Bluebloods Then _ too. you mig find some bluebloods of whom no one could be proud. The cist of the wide open spaces of west. Indiana is proud of her sce {of men like General Lew Wa jand James Whitcomb Riley jyou don't hear them boa | about John Dillinger, or of the dark |days when Ku Klux Klan was i: joe saddle. The fact that a man might claim to be a descendant of Mayflower clan, or that he blueblood, or that he is a Hoosier doesn't mean ar {man's inten bu clean and constructive does it mean that a Conch | because he is a Conch, car jassure the people of Key jclean. honorable or : j busimess venture. The course is whether a dog track will is a Neither | Young Couple Will Be | takes 8 per cent, they're certain of ‘tively he knew that it was Sally, kneecap just as Dupré moved, so} that the impetus of his own move-; at the joint and bringing him} ai! of other rubbish, and raised it} black waves of unconsciousness | And i wea ‘AP Newsfeatures and he called her name, beggi beseeching, imploring her to | up and see him and send him aid. She had heard his first despere ate cry and had turned to ma toward the house, but it was only when her flying f rried her out of the d ledge, ad the mottled b. like a slim the night. jump! You must jump far! You'll be sa! But there cuuid be no reckless leap into the silk The broken leg like a losc of stone. He had slready tried to lift himself to the ow ledge and found it beyond hus swengta. For a long. herrer-stricken moe j ment Sally stood rooted in her tracks, her eyes frantiea!lly the Sar window that jw no , but the fery toa Randing be: But even in that mstant of panic and terror, her mind was already in- itiating a new course of action that sent her fiying into the house, | her skirts lifted and her heels beating a staceato tattoo on the gleaming parquet floors. Gasping for breath, she flung watched André fill and place there less than an hour ago. As the night descended she watched the crimson fingers of the blaze tear at the house until it was only a blackened, ravaged skeleton; a ghastly, shattered monument to all her hard-held hopes and plans. he turned and walked slowly toward the town. The Natche; would sail at midnight. It woul serve as well as any other means to carry her away from the blacks ened ruins of disaster and despair. (To be continued) a Number Of Absentee Voters In County Is Small, Pinder Says | Wed Saturday Night Mr. and Mrs. Wm. I. Knowles an- nounce the wedding of their daugh- ter, Joann to senneth Lawrence} Krantz of Frederick, Maryland, | which will take place Saturday, September 20, at 8 p. m., at the Ley Memorial Methodist Church. Frineds and relatives of the couple | are invited to attend, be a contribution to the welfare of the citizens of Key West. The “opposition says it will) bring a bad element to Key West. This we do not want to do.” So! reads an ad. Even if a dog track was a good thing for the communi- ty—just for us home folk, could even a good Conch keep out a bad} | element? This is a free country and any school boys knows that it is good element that follows a ‘dog track. It is the gambling element} and if you ‘just follow the reports} of the Kefauver Committee one can| read quite well that gambling makes liars of men and breaks up| the home, frequently ending in murder. A few of the culprits have | been caught and are now cooling their feet behind prison bars. Not even a Conch can keep out the bad element. And then if they did, their ‘business venture’ would go on the rocks in only a short time. The intruding interests seem to be taking pride in the fact, that “It was I who determined this would be a good business venture. Is this business venture to be of benefit to the people of the commu-} nity? Will it buy bread and clothes] and shelter, the necessities for the wife and children? Just ask the wife of any gambler or their chil dren. They know. It is a good business venture for the operator. He gets his 7 per cent and the state that. The suckers take the rest. If| you don't care about the welfare of the families of the communit it might be a good business ven ture—even then only for the opera-| “ tor. A man t would sell his soul for a mess o ttage is in no pos tion to talk ‘welfare’ and “recre ation” to any ser over the fellow whe because its talk Russian—using self-imposed meanings The dog track may be a go venture, but for the operators qn and from Definitely of view. No self respecting individ just trying words w its me lega REV. RALPH ROGERS | chooses, } tributed folk. More-| | Now that the official ballot for the November 4 election is printed voters can study first hand the eleven amendments to the State constitution to be voted upon. The Citizen has twice printed the full text of these important amend- ments, as a legal advertisement and as a news story. Most controversial of all is the amendment. No. 3 —the codnty home rufe bil. If passed the le- gislature could grant requests of counties for their own charters, | Each county could then operate under the form of government it instead of the present system of uniform county govern- ment. Literature against this amend- ment was distributed in the court- house last week by a Lakeland, Fla. firm. The pros and eons of the bill have been discussed by Senator Gautier, sponsor, and the state association of county com- missioners, who opposed it, in The Citizen. Of tremendous interest to Mon- roe county is Amendment 6 which provides for the election of a Sen- ator from the county to be called the 39th senatorial distriet. A ma- joriy of voers throughout the state of Florida must approve this be- fore Monroe county is authorized to have a Senator, The Board of Public Instruction is particularly interested in amend- ment No. 1. This amendment if passed would provide that part of the revenue derived from the li- censing of motor vehicles shall be used for capital outlay and debt service school purposes, and pre- scribes the method of distribution and use thereof. It would amend Article XI] of the state constite tion and provide that beginning January 1, 1953 and for 3% years thereafter, the first proceeds of revenues from motor vehicle I- cense sales to the extent necessary to comply with the amendment shall, as collected be place monthly in the County Capital Out- lay and Debt Service School Fund in the state's treasury ann to the s in the r f the nu truction ach coun t reve- ng of and axes by adding that in Moar levied.