Current Mention

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Mar 10, 1910

— Jose Domingo de Obaldia, the president of Panama, died of heart-disease at Panama City on March 1.

— Avalanches in the mining region of northern Idaho on February 28 resulted in the death of twenty-four persons.

— There is very strong probability that the operatives of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, to the number of about 150,000 men, will soon decide to strike.

— The Maryland legislature has voted down the proposed State-wide local option bill. The Virginia State Senate has also declined to consider a bill providing that the question of State-wide prohibition be submitted to the people.

— A report from New York City states that twelve of the largest bakeries in the city, where the consumption is more than 12,000 barrels of flour weekly, have completed plans for organizing a bakers’ trust, with a capital of $6,000,000.

— A report from Juno, Alaska, dated March 3, states that twenty-three miners were killed the previous night by the explosion of a powder-magazine in the Mexican mine on Douglas Island. Eight others were seriously injured, four of whom are expected to die.

— Great Britain and France, which are carefully watching the struggle of China for internal railway development, are now advising China not to undertake work upon the proposed railway through Manchuria without consulting Russia and Japan.

— A report from Lima, Peru, dated February 16, states that preparations for war are now being made by both Peru and Ecuador. The trouble between the two countries has grown out of a boundary dispute, and foreign merchants are hoping for intervention on the part of the United States.

— Disastrous floods are reported along the Mohawk Valley in New York. Many hundreds of the residents of Herkimer have either had to leave their homes entirely or withdraw to the upper rooms of their dwellings. The property loss at this place is said to exceed $200,000. Other towns are more or less seriously damaged by floods.

— On February 21 at Pointe-a-Pitre, Guadeloupe, 20,000 sugar-cane cutters went on strike, and all agricultural work was stopped. Troops and police were unable to preserve order among the strikers. A number of the estates were completely ruined by fires started by the strikers. Troops sent to the troubled zone finally succeeded in restoring order.

— The Chinese government has finally extended its actual control over the government of Tibet. In view of the threatened occupation of the capital, Lhasa, the home of the Lamaist hierarchy, the latter fled with his immediate followers into India, closely pursued by the Chinese troops. The English government proposes to give the grand lama an asylum in India. With the extension of Chinese authority over the stronghold of Tibet, that country, so long closed to all foreign influences, and especially to the gospel, will now be opened.

— Extensive floods are reported in Ohio along the Licking and Muskingum rivers. Four thousand persons are now homeless in that State as a result of these conditions. The material damage up to the present time is estimated at more than one million dollars.

— Before Congress takes any action in rewarding Commander Peary for the discovery of the north pole, a committee is to be appointed to pass upon his records. This committee, it is understood, will be composed of men who have themselves had considerable experience in polar exploration.

— So far all attempts at arbitrating the Philadelphia street-car men’s strike have met with failure. The mayor of the city and the city council have decided not to interfere in the matter, and the labor unions of the entire city are expected to be called out in a sympathetic strike immediately.

— The latest advices from Nicaragua are to the effect that the insurgents have been losing seriously during the last few days, and have now decided to abandon open warfare, and retire to the Bluefields region, where they will conduct guerrilla warfare in the hope of bringing about intervention on the part of the United States.

— The Royal Geographical Society of London, the foremost of its kind in the world, has given to Commander Peary the largest gold medal which it has ever struck. The Royal Geographical Society of Italy has also granted a gold medal to Commander Peary for his discovery of the north pole, and a silver medal to Capt. Robert A. Bartlett, who commanded the “Roosevelt” on the Peary expedition.

— In a recent conversation between Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labor, and Attorney-General Wickersham, Mr. Gompers made the declaration that if the present American workers’ movement, which he considered constructive and conservative in character, be outlawed and crushed out of existence by unfavorable legislation and court decisions, it will be followed by another movement which he declares will not be constructive.

— In the great avalanche which carried down two passenger-trains to destruction on the Great Northern line in the Cascade Mountains on March 1, one hundred eighteen persons are known to have lost their lives, and it is believed that there are a number of others among the lost. About one hundred fifty men are digging for the bodies of the dead among the debris of snow, ice, trees, and wrecked cars. The avalanche occurred at Wellington, Wash., near the entrance of a tunnel.

— At Washington, D. C., on March 3 an organization was formed whose object is to counteract the influence of the American Federation of Labor in politics. The Knights of Labor will have an important part in this organization, and it is being backed by capitalists. A large fund is to be raised among those who have suffered at the hands of the American Federation of Labor. It is understood that congressmen who have had to contend against the federation for their political existence will lend their influence to the new organization.