Iowa Old Press

Mt. Pleasant Daily News
Mt. Pleasant, Henry Co. Iowa
Thursday, May 19, 1927

“The Bystanders Notes”, by C. S. Rogers, Publisher
The new and modern front, which is now being put in at the Grau building on
North main street by Contractor Bergdahl and his crew is going to be a
splendid improvement for that business block.  The new front will be for
display with a six foot recessed entrance, much copper and plate glass and
buff blased brick.  There is much speculation as to the first tenant in this
well located, spacious room.  We set out as our prediction that the room
will be occupied by a branch store of the Benner Tea company, a well known
chain grocery store.  See how far we miss it.
~~~~~
Mrs. Lulu Penn Ingersol of Broadway has been called to Detroit, Mich., by
the serious illness of her daughter, Mrs. Ullena Ingersol Beal, who is so
well known among our people.
~~~~~
Mt. Pleasant, and most of Henry county, experienced one of the heaviest
rainfalls for some years when, Wednesday afternoon, two inches of rain fell
in a very short time.  It was almost a cloud burst.  Gutters and down spouts
were unable to carry off the water, leaks developed in roofs heretofore
water proof, rain was driven in through windows and under doors, gutters
were flooded and small lakes formed in low places all over town.
Incidentally the roads which were just getting in good travel condition were
broken up again.  A heavy black, vicious cloud of threatening proportions
passed around to the south which looked like a hard wind as well as rain,
but locally the town got enough to break off a few limbs and scatter leaves
all over creation.
~~~~~
Speaking of the roads.  It looks now as if Henry county was to be a pocket
of mud roads with paving all about us, a kind of an extended mud hole in the
midst of an otherwise excellent thoroughfare.  By early autumn paving will
touch us on the east and on the west with a Henry county gap of eighteen
miles.  Washington county, our up and a coming neighbor to the north, will
vote for hard roads at once, while Lee county to the south will soon have
paving to the county line.  And Henry county apparently proposes to calmly
and consistently plug around in the mud.
~~~~~
The capable and generally dependable “K” line, a branch of the great
Burlington system, which flies the tangent from the main line at this place
and lands at Keokuk fifty miles away, failed to return to its roost
Wednesday afternoon, but remained here over night, departing on its return
just twenty-four hours late.  The storm of the day before caused the
mischief.  Salem and the country south seemed to have been in the center of
the drenching, which was given southeastern Iowa and so terrific was the
downpour that the road bed was awashed from under the tracks to such an
extent that it was not safe to go over the gaps until a construction train
had dumped in many cars of cinders and ballast.  The worst washout was at
the Hartley farms south of Salem.
~~~~~
After watching the construction of the Memorial Library on the South Campus,
we can harbor no vain regrets over the failure to substitute Bedford stone
for brick in the walls of the structure.  Indeed we think that the admirable
composition of stone and buff pressed brick is most satisfying.  There is
ample stone in the trim and the general front of the building, especially
when the stone pillars are added.
~~~~~
Unless attended to soon, Henry county is going to a large expense to repair
damages being done by a defective roof on the court house.  Water has
already seriously damaged the decorations of the ceiling and walls of the
court room while the discolorations on the exteriors of the building clearly
testifies to the rapid deterioration which is going on up under the roof.
The matter must be looked after soon, or the beauty of that stately edifice
will be sadly defaced by stain and crumbling.
~~~~~
Mrs. C. H. Cook is spending the week at Rockford, Ill., attending the
graduating exercises of Rockford Seminary and from which institution her
daughter, Miss Miriam, graduates this year.
~~~~~
Invitations have been received to the wedding of Miss Marian Reeves Weir,
daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Chas. F. Weir, at the home of the bride’s parents
in Englewood, a suburb of Chicago, and where Dr. Weir has been practicing
his profession most successfully since entering it.  The wedding will take
place June 8th and the fortunate young man is Mr. Thomas De Witt Gibbons.
Dr. Weir is the elder son of our own H. C. Weir and graduated from Wesleyan
with the class of 1891.
~~~~~
Mayor Van Allen and his police are discouraging petting parties in town.
People who drive into secluded places in the Grove, or the fringes of town,
douse their lights and park there for an inordinate length of time are
pretty certain to be visited by the vigilant police who will without
introduction, flood the car with light and demand why the delay in moving
on.  A very definite ordinance has been passed by the council, forbidding
parking with lights out.  Each night officer now has the use of a car and
each officer has been ordered to make frequent but irregular trips down
through the grove, about the college campus and less frequented streets of
the city.  Cars which are found standing without lights are to be deemed as
suspicious.  The police are under orders to investigate every car thus found
and inform the occupants that they are violating the city laws and must move
on.
~~~~~
All officers are now required to go armed and Mayor Van Allen will not only
see that the laws be enforced but that the public give all officers
respectful consideration in their work.  Any one assaulting an officer
either verbally or with violence will be given the limit of the law.  In
other words the police are to have the fullest backing of the
administration.
~~~~~
As officers hardly ever use the same cars in making their rounds of the
town, it is very difficult to identify the occupants of cars running over
the highways so that consternation has seized upon some of the chronic
petters.  They have no way of knowing whether the car coming their way is to
drift quietly by or suddenly stop along side for an investigation.
~~~~~
Not only is petting to be somewhat discouraged, but houses where
irregularities of any character are suspected will be the subject of police
supervision and if after due warning these irregularities are persisted in
raids will follow.  Not only will bootlegging be suppressed as far as
possible but the constant and flagrant violation of the cigarette law will
be watched with especial interest.  Many stormy interviews have been held in
the Mayor’s office while he has fairly warned offenders of various laws that
the violations must cease or the law will be allowed to take its course.
Mayor Van Allen proposes to make the town as clean as it is possible to do.
~~~~~
Unless something interferes work on moving the printing machinery of the
News from its present location on East Monroe street to its new home on West
Monroe will begin Monday morning.  The work will be slow and will take most
of two weeks probably.  The larger presses will be taken down and set up by
skilled machinists from the factories, assisted by local labor.  If plans
work out the News will not miss an issue of the paper.  The News gets a good
deal of satisfaction from the very kindly comments concerning the new plant.
When completed it will be one of the most modern and efficient printing
plants in the middle west and a business institution in which the entire
county can take justifiable pride.  The new home and equipment has cost the
owners many thousands of dollars but faith in Mt. Pleasant and Henry county
has justified the venture.  We are placing our money freely on Mt. Pleasant.
We believe it’s a good bet.

Submitted by P.R.W, June 2006