Straight From The Hart

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Straight From The Hart By Joan Rowden Hart I’m sure most of us who read the Lebanon newspaper on a daily basis are appalled at the number of drug stops, domestic abuse, and break-ins that take place in Lebanon every day.  I often wonder how our law enforcement men and women keep a straight face at the stupid statements made by the people they encounter during these incidents. We sometimes have to laugh, wondering how dumb these people think our officers are. But we become very serious when we think of so many drug and alcohol impaired drivers being out on the roads and highways at the same time we are transporting our loved ones back and forth over those same roads. And we must never forget that every one of those traffic stops, domestic disturbance calls and other 911 calls puts those officers at tremendous risk of serious injury or the loss of their own lives, even when the situation appears to be routine and mundane. Such was the case on December 9, 1991 when Deputy Sheriff Lesl...

Straight From The Hart Joan Rowden Hart As much as I enjoy using the Internet  and my computer, nothing compares to reading my daily newspaper while sitting in my recliner with my feet up and slowly sipping my morning cup of coffee. Cable TV will come later in the day with breaking  news , and commercials, and talking heads speaking at breakneck speed, but just for a while I can savor the quiet and the luxury of reading the newspaper at my own pace. I wrote the following essay thirty-some years ago as my submission to an essay contest sponsored by the National Newspaper Association and the Missouri Press Association.  The Lebanon Daily Record participated in the contest, and my submission won 2nd place.  The theme of the competition was “A Free Press, My Window To The World”. John Milton, in his “Areopagitica”, a tract addressed to the English Parliament in 1644, said:  “Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above al...

Straight From The Hart By Joan Rowden Hart In the April 18, 2012 edition of the Lebanon newspaper,  Associate Judge Steve Jackson, speaking at the local Kiwanis club, is quoted as saying:  “One branch of our government is the judiciary, but really it is based upon words and concepts and ideas and principles that are in written and spoken words.  We  live in a time right now when there has never been a bigger danger to those principles because we have students graduating every single day that can’t read or write.” Judge Jackson added that people do not know the language well enough to carry on this country.  “I think it’s very, very important that we get a handle on this. If we go much farther, that’s going to start becoming a real problem,”  Jackson said. I wanted to stand up and cheer when I read that article because it really struck a nerve  with me.  There are always exceptions, but most young people nowadays seem incapable of communicating eit...

Jess Easley’s Memories of Downtown Lebanon I’m going back into Jess Easley’s book about early Lebanon to share some of his memories with you.  Jess was born in 1891 and died in 1983, and sometime around 1980 he recorded his memories of Commercial Street from 1896 to 1900.  The tapes were transcribed by volunteers at the Laclede County Historical Society but  the last time I checked the book was out of print. The booklet is full of interesting details about life in Lebanon and its people at the close of the 19 th century, details that only someone living here in that time period would know. For example, Jess tells about a Racket store located on New Street which is the alley currently running west from Madison between the Knight Building and Wehner’s Bakery.  In Jess’ time it went all the way over to Jefferson and there was a two story frame building  facing Jefferson which housed a hotel on the corner.  The Racket store was located in o...

Recently a friend sent me a most profound photo she had seen on the Internet.  I was so moved by the picture that I posted it on my Facebook cover page where it remains today and I invite you to look at it. The picture is of a bald eagle perched on a tombstone in a military cemetery.  The picture was taken by an amateur photographer, Frank Glick, who was on his way to work one morning in the early spring of 2011. He was driving through Fort Snelling National Cemetery in Minnesota when he saw it, a huge eagle perched on a tombstone, its eyes alert, its head craned, looking for prey.  He grabbed his ever present Nikon camera, and got the perfect shot. He shared the picture with a co-worker and they decided to try to track down the family of the man whose name was on that tombstone.  After doing extensive research, they  were able to locate  Vivian Ruch, widow of Maurie Ruch who had served four years in the U.S. Army Air Corps in WW2 and ear...

Confessions Of A Word Person There’s nothing more diverse than people The things they cherish, that turn them on The things they collect and want to “keeple” Their treasure stashed when day is done. Some like their cars, matchbox or antique Old and battered or shiny and sleek. They polish and buff them then drive them around Taking pleasure in gear shift and motors that sound. Some delight in dishes, with patterns that match And vases and pitchers, or just one of a batch. Some collect ducks, or elephants, or pigs Some look for paintings to enhance their “digs”. But for me, I love words, How they sound, how they rhyme, How they roll off my tongue,   Absolutely sublime. Like abstruse and duende, oppugn, fancify, Prodigious and resile, cachinnate,and belie, Vademecum and bedizen, coterminous too Fugacious, inexorable, and then derring-do. I could go on forever for there’s no stopping place, Tapetum i...