Current Mention

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Aug 26, 1902

— An explosion in the Delaware pulp mills at Wilmington, Del., August 20, killed nine men and seriously injured four. Five more of the employees are missing.

— The Moros of Mindanao, in the Philippines, seem disposed to resist American rule, and General Chaffee is expected to push a vigorous campaign against them.

— The town of Babahoya, in Los Rios province, Ecuador, was destroyed by fire, August 19. Much merchandise from Guayaquil, in transit, was burned. The town is seventy miles from Guayaquil, and has a population of about 2,000.

— Fierce volcanic eruptions are reported from Japan. The small island of Torishima was completely overwhelmed by an eruption occurring between the 13th and 15th of the present month, and all the inhabitants, about 150 in number, were undoubtedly killed.

— Another suicide in high society life is announced in a dispatch from Newport, R. I., R. R. Remington being the individual's name. Under the heading “Suicide Day at Belvidere,” a press dispatch reports the attempt of three persons to commit suicide at Belvidere, Ill., one attempt being successful. Thus the appalling record of suicides goes on.

— Near Kokomo, Ind., on a recent Sunday, a dispute arose among farmers and farm hands who were thrashing grain, as to whether the work should be continued on Sunday. The outcome was that a general fight was begun, and the faction who objected to thrashing grain on the “Sabbath” administered a severe thrashing to their companions, serious injuries being sustained by several of the participants.

— Speaking of the prediction which was rumored in Atlantic City, N. J., that that place was to be destroyed by a tidal wave on August 18, a dispatch from Atlantic City under that date says: “So far as the tidal wave was concerned, the sea never looked more placid than to-day, and it was a day of surpassing beauty. To-night there is not a man, woman, nor child who will admit that he or she ever dreamed that the tidal wave would come, but, just the same, there were hundreds of departures Saturday, Sunday, and to-day of persons who feared that something might happen. Many excursions set for to-day had been postponed, and the hotel men have been angry for a month at the way in which the strange scare hurt business. A semi-panic struck the colored help at the hotels yesterday, and the managers were flooded with requests for brief vacations. Proprietors had to rule with an iron hand to prevent wholesale desertions. Services were held in some of the colored churches, and many men and women remained up all night to be ready in case the wave made an early appearance. All along the board walk this morning, fakirs were doing a rushing business selling ‘tidal wave insurance’ in the shape of a badge.” Many people had chartered yachts in order to be afloat when the catastrophe occurred. A little intelligent faith would enable people to avoid such exhibitions of superstition.

— The rise of farm property in this country since the last census brings the total present value of such property up to $20,000,000,000.

— Fifty thousand employees of Pittsburg Mills and factories are threatened with loss of work on account of a famine in coal and coke, due to the prolonged strike of the miners.

— The negroes of Virginia, says a Richmond dispatch, are making every preparation to fight the suffrage clause of the new constitution. They have already subscribed three thousand dollars for the purpose of paying counsel to prepare a case and carry it to the Federal Supreme Court.

— The Catholic Mirror says of the new Catholic federation, that it “is now in a position to grow, and ere long it may be expected to embrace in a working partnership practically the entire membership of all societies composed of Catholic laymen in the United States and dependencies, whether these societies be national, state, or local, diocesan or parochial.”

— Railway wrecks have been reported the past week at Hammond, Ind.; Humboldt, Iowa; Neenah, Wis.; Pana, Ill.; and a trolley-car wreck between New York City and Yonkers. At Hammond and Humboldt several persons were killed, nine were seriously injured at Neenah, and fifteen victims of the trolley wreck were taken to the hospital, some of whom were not expected to live.

— In military maneuvers, as well as in actual war, it seems that the soldier is bound strictly to obey orders, no matter whether “some one had blundered” in giving the command or otherwise. Thus it happened that at some army maneuvers recently, near St. Petersburg, Russia, a cavalry squadron in obeying a sudden order to charge, galloped into a river, and fifty or more of the horsemen were drowned.