Vagabond Editorials

(Continued from Page 6) ens ansfhsi-"things are better." And that day will be just the day after a day when we will be truthfully saying-t'11tints are worse." The day before business is actually know4 to be better, no man will be able to point to any particular reason or' causc and say-"tomorrow will show improvement." One day we will be as we are today. The next day-without rhyme or reason-things will be admittedly and provably on the upgrade. That much is true. Take comfort from it, and don't break your neck or strain your optics seeking for signs. Maybe that glorious day will be tomorrow. Who knows-maybe it is TODAY? rN rB rli

When you speak of "men with eras in their purpose, men with epochs in their brains," you'll have to mention King Gillette, who died the other day. Since the beginning of time men who tried to expose their features to the light of the day, did so by tortuous ways and methods. Mr. Gillette looked at the old fashioned razor, realized that in creating a modern substitute for that ancient and fearful weapon there was a chance to build a commeriial empire, and he stuck to the task until he found the safety razor idea. As a benefactor to humanity he ranks high.

Look about you, Mr. Man-Who-Would-Become-Rich ! Seize upon something of everyday use that, like the old fashioned razor, is a million years behind the times, create a modern replacement for it at modest prices-and the world is yours.

News dispatches state'that the higher paid movie folks in Hollywood have had to take a deep cut in their salaries. Now ain't that just too bad? Vot do you tink dem bik ekseckutives iss going to do ven dey iss forced to sell dere pushcart peddler brains for only a bitiful four or five tousand dollars a veek? Vat do you tink? And consider the sad plight of those dizzy blondes who hopped over a ribbon counter from eighteen a week to several thousand! Ainlt this depression just awful? What do you suppose Mr. American Wage Earner thinks, trying to feed his folks on his double-cut wages, when he reads of the salaries the movies pay to numerous bounders and blondes whose intellectual capacities only lend added horror to the name of moron?

Mdch criticism has been heaped upon the big railroads of late by the published high salaries of their executives. But the movies pay a lot of their employes salaries that make the highest salary of any railroad executive look like a tip.If costs in movie production could be placed on a plan comparable to costs in well run business institutions the public could see the best pictures made, for not over fifteen cents-and leave plenty of profit for the producer. Imagine paying a snippy little dame fifteen thousand dollars a week ! She couldn't earn that much in a year if she worked twenty-four hours a day !

**rl.

A life and death struggle is raging between the consurner magazines and the radio. Both live on advertising-or cease to exist. In times of plenty, both might prosp'er. But in times like these the pickings are poor, and the competition is bitter, and to the finish. They are fighting at close quarters-head-locked. There will be no quarter. And there are no Marquis of Queensbury rules. Striking below the belt is O. K. if you can land; and the strangle hold goes if you can grab it. **i.

Just as a sample of the "no quarter" scramble between the two, it is announced that the word "radio" and anything about radio is taboo in the news columns of all members of the New Orleans Newspaper Publishers Association. They not only decline to further publish radio programs or activities as news, but they bar the word itself. The newspapers, of course, take the stand that the radio, which sells advertising and lives by advertising, is their competitor, and when they run the radio news and programs in their free news columnp they contribute to their own destruction by advertising their most dangerous competitors-free. So there !

Every lumberman everywhere will want to join in the discussion that has been raging in Texas for the past two weeks since 'Wm. Cameron & Company made the mills a proposition- If Wm. Cameron & Company has done nothing else it has given the industry something interest- ing to think and talk about, with plenty of arguments pro and con. Here's what. wm. cameron & ""-;"; ir*" ,ut"il tine yard concern at Waco, Texas, which operates close on to one hundred retail lumber yards, and is the biggest lumber and building material buyer in Texas by far, likewise it is an old, respected, and highly progressive concern, headed by a group of splendid citizens and business men. Two weeks ago they sent out an inguiry for lumber. It was the biggest inquiry in two years in Texas. They offered to buy this lumber-and probably a lot more-on one basis and one only. That the sellers guarantee them against any decline in the price for six months. And then the chorus rose.

The head of wm. ""*".; I "o-n"n, says that the mills keep urging him to buy lumber and help them keep operating their mills; that for three years they have been buying sparingly because every time they go into the market and buy, they find the market declining immediately afterwards, making their purchases bad ones. They should have waited. This has been so continual that thev

-like innumerable others-have become afraid to buy lumber. Result, their huge string of yards running with almost no stocks. They are, and have been, ready to assort their stock wherever they can do so without taking a huge loss by reason of further declines.

So they say to tt e -ill], ';J *.", lumber, but we are not willing to try and help the situation at possible great loss to ourselves. We have money in the bank to pay for all the lumber we can store. If you will protect us from the great loss that would follow a decling in the market after we had bodght all this lum,ber we need, we will buy. It is up to you. We can keep on with the low stocks we have, indqfinitely. Or we can buy hundreds of cars of lum,ber. But the mill that sells us must guarantee that if they reduce any of the prices charged us, within six months, they must refund us the difference between their reduced prices and the prices charged us, on the amount of lumber sold us."

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Is it creating endless talk and discussion? Almost a tidal wave of both. What do YOU think of it?