Neither rain nor snow . . .
We've heard of dogs giving troubles to mailmen, but city carrier Frank Bataillon stepped on a new obstacle the other day.
He was delivering mail in the northeast part of town and took his usual shortcut through a hedge loaded with the usual mail bag.
Only this time as he stepped through the hedge he put his foot down on a Bull snake that was sunning himself.
"Y-e-e-i-i-k-e-s," Frank shouted and from what the neighbors said he did a one-legged dance to a cha-cha-cha tune while the snake coiled around his leg and held on for dear life.
You have to be a good sport at the PO and take a ribbing on boo-boos. This one has to be the greatest:
The paychecks for employes at the Nebraska City Post Office didn't make it through the mails to the big brick building. They were missent to Nebraska City Utilities.
The fire hydrants.
Congratulations to the Nebraska City Bicentennial Commission, Mrs. Bill Berger at Senior High and her students for the clever painting jobs on fire hydrants around town. They're all beauts.
We've yet to see another Bicentennial project to match the originality of the hydrant painting jobs. There was no problem getting the okay to paint the hydrants . . . Mrs. Berger's husband is chief of the Nebraska City Volunteer Fire Department.
Didya know . . .
That Otoe county has 110 WWI veterans, 870 WWII vets, 340 Korean and 390 Vietnam for a total of 1,700 . . . that Veterans Day is November 11 and that means the Last Man's club will meet at Memorial Building to check the contents of the "box" . . .
Veterans Day was returned to November 11, the anniversary of the armistice ending WWI on a 410-6 vote in the House. Forty-four states rejected the federally imposed change in Veterans Day and two states never changed in the first place . . . shows what the power of veterans can do.
South Pacific.
The musical South Pacific will be staged at Senior High November 7-8-9 with a cast of umpteen boys and girls from the school.
The directors are Mrs. Charlotte Mabie and Jim Callen, who last year gave us Lil' Abner. Gary DeBoldt will direct the bandsmen. It's got the makins' of a reallly good show.
We saw the movie many years ago and we've seen Mrs. Mabie's abilities with youngsters. She directed the same musical at Johnson-Brock school a few years ago. It was a delightful evening to see high schoolers use their lungs in music.
The music from South Pacific is something else. We still remember the beauty of the misty Pacific isles and Bloody Mary singing Bali Hai and the cute Talky-Talky song that was special communication for two young people.
There's a lot of humor in the musical and it's the type you'll enjoy. We're told that some of the language has been toned down from the stage performance. That should be a trick in itself . . . oh darn it!
The greatest sea battle of WWII, Midway, will be released soon. American warships literally destroyed the Japanese Navy in that battle.
The over two hour film contains a great deal of the actual battle. The Navy filmed it in minute detail.
The interesting part is, how do you produce a movie about a battle that took place over 30 years ago? Much of the filming was done along the coast of Texas. Water is water, but where do you get an aircraft carrier and WWII airplanes?
The Japanese Zero airplane is faked on other older aircraft, but a number of the WWII planes that are being held by collectors are being used.
It promises to be a devastating and victorious war movie for Americans.
The congressman.
Rep. John McCollister, Omaha, Second district, is on the campaign trail seeking the seat to be vacated when Sen. Roman Hruska retires.
Congressman McCollister visited in Nebraska City and continued on the trail to Syracuse, then to Johnson and Nemaha counties before a breakfast in Beatrice. At a coffee at the Friendship Room, he thanked the group for its attention. That wasn't necessary. Politicians always get a warm reception in Nebraska City.
It wasn't too many years ago that we had Sen. Eugene McCarthy and the late Sen. Robert Kennedy at the courthouse. The Kennedy campaigners drove into town and attracted an excited sign waving group.
Sen. McCarthy's two DC3 airplanes circled over the courthouse, landed at Grundman airport and then the group drove to the courthouse for his speech.
Well, judging by the list of presidential hopefuls in the coming election, we may be seeing a lot of candidates in the next months.
Improvement.
Congratulations to the many volunteers of the Improvement Councils who have earned Nebraska City, Syracuse and Nehawka as finalists in the annual community contest.
Winners will be named Friday at a banquet in Lincoln. Governor Exon will head that program.
From where I sit . . .
We hope you've been reading the three new local columns that are appearing m your News-Press. They are "Ms. One Person's Opinion by Dorene Duffey," "Two Cents Worth by Sue Quinlan" and "Under My Hat by John Quinlan." Mrs. Duffey is getting some feedback from her family. As a grandmother, the family was apparently surprised when she went for the "Ms" bit. "I hope my husband (F. L. Duffey) will let me in the house tonight after that first column," she said.
He did. And if we know "Mister" Duffey, he's probably stirring up batter in the kitchen with ideas for his wife's next column.
Sue Quinlan did a column on the public rest room. We heard from readers "what a waste of reading space." "A fine job," Mayor Rogers said. "Appreciated your interest," another said.
Sue wrote about the "Pub ic" rest room, how it got started, what it's like and something about the people who look after it.
John Quinlan (you guessed, John and Sue are One) printed some pictures he had taken some years ago when he was a reporter-photographer in Omaha. We received a few calls on that and a couple of notes.
"I told him he'd hear about it," his wife said.
You might be interested in knowing that the large majority of the people who called, wrote or mentioned it m conversations, saw no objection. Two grandmothers thought the pictures were "pretty neat." (Dunno about these grandmothers.)
We were concerned after receiving a call from a friend so we sat in the rocker in front of the TV tube thinking and watching a cartoon commercial in living color of a long-haired beauty skinny dipping as she shampooed her hair.