[Newspaper]
Publication: The Muncie Evening Press
Muncie, IN, United States
vol. 53, no. 266, p. 1, col. 1
Comment
By Wilber E. Sutton
WHAT CAN BE
DONE NOW? —
WITH admirable restraint, or, anyway, restraint, the Delaware County Grand Jury, just adjourned, criticizes the county jail that has been condemned up one side and down the other for many years by other grand juries, the city, county and state health boards and other organizations. The present jurors say that the county needs a new jail; that the cells are "unsanitary and unclean;" that the kitchen is in bad condition; unused cells are filled with rubbish; the plumbing is in bad shape and the fixtures are loose from the walls. Concerning what has been told about this filthy structure, this report is mild. Maybe that is because other sources have done so good, a job of reporting upon it that these grand jurors thought about all had been said that could be said.
This ancient, decrepit, dirt-ridden, rat-infested firetrap was about to be condemned by state authorities for once and all when along came the war and made it unlikely that building materials could be obtained, so it has been permitted since to stand in its own stench. And all of the time, the danger that it would catch fire and burn to death the prisoners that happened to be there. But the war is over.
The question is, what are we to do for excuses now?
JOTS AND TITTLES —
MUNCIE'S deer hunters this year don't bring home the bacon — it's the venison. But some of the rabbit hunters do, to hear the farmers tell it. . . . "There is an informative article in Collier's of December 15 on the rehabilitation of narcotics users." writes a Muncie real estate dealer to this column. If those who blame Mr. Skinner for his plight could understand, they, would be more charitable toward him and other sufferers. Let s also feel for the alcoholics and the tobacco users." Charles E. Skinner, a Muncie city councilman, recently was sentenced to a year and a day in federal court on the charge of "raising" a prescription for narcotics. . . Except on the theory that Skinner was sentenced in an effort to cure him of the habit rather than to punish him it was the common belief in Muncie that the sentence was far too severe. He had offended frequently in the same way, and it was felt something had to be done about him. Pretty severe indictment of our social system, however that it finds it necessary to imprison a sick man for a year — because he is sick . . . Why all of our hospitals? If Skinner had been a non-addict and had obtained the drug in order to sell it to those with the habit, then a year's sentence might have been light.
* * *
FRED F. REASONER, former county treasurer and mighty hunter, left word that he be called early Tuesday morning to seek the early-morning rabbit over hill and dale, and so he was awakened and told the thermometer then registered six degrees above zero. "I just happened to remember we have one frozen in the ice box." he peeped. "He's colder than any one out in the field and he can't get out of the refrigerator unless I take him out. Be foolish for me to shoot another one." . . . The Owens-Illinois Glass Company's Muncie plant, formerly that of the Hemingray Glass Company, has an enviable reputation for the long service of its employes. Two of these have been with the concern 51 years, which is more than the total years of an average life. They are Charles Hawk and William Jenkins. Several others have been there all the way from 10 to 46 years. One, Harry McDonald, died this year with a record of 71 years. Those who mourn the passing of the pioneering spirit in industry might look around the offices and shops of the Owens-Illinois and learn something to their advantage . . . Pestilential phrases and words picked up here in a single day "Psychological condition," "reactivate," "in the last analysis."
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