by Laurel | March 5th, 2014
11 March 1906
Alderman Kearns has again entered the arena of history to contest the honor of being “the greatest objector” so long held by a deceased statesman well known to high school pupils. According to the doorkeeper, Alderman Kearns objected 114 times at the last meeting of the board and would have made it an even 120 but that his attention was called at various times to other matters, and measures slipped by without his objecting. Yet there was some measure of reason in some of his objections; in fact the habit of occasional objecting is one of the best habits that an alderman can acquire. Alderman Kearns also made the startling statement that there were 200 horses in Holyoke that ought to be shot. As the alderman is not connected with any soap factory the statement should be duly weighed. If he means horses that are doing their full duty, perhaps his statement could be successfully challenges; for supposing all aldermen not doing their full duty by the city were to be shot likewise? Perhaps it would be well to advocate a sort of pension for horses; that those who have served as common plugs for 15 years should be allowed Saturdays and Sundays off; common farm plugs arranged specially for. It is to be wondered if the horse pension bill has not already been championed; the only reason being probably that horses cannot vote. [Note: Michael J. Kearns was born in Northampton but lived in Holyoke for 25 years where he conducted a plumbing and steamfitting establishment in South Holyoke. He was elected Alderman at large in both 1904 and 1908. Kearns died 10 July 1923, leaving his widow Frances G. Barry.]
The senior class of the high school has aroused a great deal of favorable comment by girl members of the class deciding to wear only muslin dresses at graduation. Such a thoughtful and at the same time democratic move commends itself to every person of thought and refinement in the city. There are of course in every high school pupils who are there only by self-denial and sacrifice on the part of their parents or next of kin. To such the burden of a costly graduation gown is one that is real — not imaginary: and no girl with proper pride and self-respect would care to ear a cheap gown when all the rest of her classmates were wearing costlier ones. There have been in the past without doubt many heartaches over the “keeping up with the procession.” There is enough to condemn in the false social standards of the day without adding this graduation gown folly to the list. Only as truly democratic ideals are sedulously cultivated in all the public schools can their mission be said to be rightly carried out.
Rev. and Mrs. H. H. Morrill and daughter Bessie have returned from Cambridge, where they were called by the death of Mrs. Morrill’s father, who had been superintendent of the Mt. Auburn Cemetery for many years.
Mrs. C. H. Heywood and Misses Martha and Rachel Heywood, her oldest and youngest daughters, who had been in California for a few days, sailed from San Francisco Thursday and are now on the Pacific Ocean en route to Japan, where the third daughter, Miss Gertrude Heywood, has been stationed as a missionary for the past 1½ years.
Adapted from The Springfield Republican.
