Brooklyn Life and Activities of Long Island Society from Brooklyn, New York • Page 7

BROOKLYN LIFE ment and the Volstead law were divinely inspired has long since been excommunicated from the extra-dry churches and the remnant left simply dote on prohibition and can never hear the flouters of those sacred commandments too often cursed and condemned to perdition. The Cause of All That's Wrong This by the way reminds us that no mention is made of the adoption of prohibition as an article of the Christian faith by said dry churches, as a cause of "the alarming falling off" of church membership in Protestant communions reported Making the Punishment Fit the Crime For declaring that the earth moved around the sun, Galileo was sentenced by a tribunal of the Inquisition to repeat the seven penetential psalms of David every week for three years. In Denver, it motorists who violate the traffic ordinances are sentenced to go to church and listen to a sermon on the traffic regulations and every minister, rabbi and priest has been requested, though not as yet compelled by law, to preach a sermon on this subject whenever a culprit is haled into the sanctuary for speeding, or failing to observe the stop and go signals Ihe idea being, it seems, to "get the Golden Rule into automobile driving." Spiritually uplifting, as an eloquent sermon last week by the lnterchurch conierence. it is all blamed on "the benumbing influence" of the World War upon "the spiritual life of Christianity." The World War if it did not make the world safe for democracy at least provided a scape goat on which to lay the. blame, for Brooklyn's Renaissance Assured The word improvement, when applied to any civic enterprise is almost invariably associated in the mind with the creation of something of beauty or utility, but curiously enough in the case of Brooklyn the greatest step that could possibly be taken toward the improvement of the borough, involves nothing more than the removal of something which never had anything to recommend it but utility, and the utility of which was never any compensation for the brazen effrontery with which it forced its ugliness upon the attention of citizens and visitors alike and the consequent injury to civic self respect.

It is no wonder that the action of the Board of Estimate last week in authorizing immediate construction of the new subway-planned for Brooklyn, thus making the removal of the Fulton Street elevated structure within five years a reasonable expectation, has been hailed with satisfaction by every one interested in the future of this great borough of the metropolis, but in view of Boro President Byrnes' change of front on the award of the bus franchise we can not help wondering if that was the price he felt compelled to pay to win this much consideration for Brooklyn from the Board of Estimate. Well, anyway, the removal of Brooklyn's venerable eyesore which this paper was the first to advocate, the Citizen's claim to the contrary notwithstanding, is now practically assured -within a comparatively short space of time and the prediction of Mr. Frederick L. Cranford that Fulton Street will eventually become "the foremost shopping, commercial and theatrical thoroughfare of the city is not too extravagant." everything that has since gone wrong. When it is no longer possible to fall back on the World War for an explanation of alarming situations there will be nothing for it we suppose but to start another World War in to which to attribute undesirable effects.

However, we think" that the World War may be held entirely responsible for the unique achievement of the Anti-Saloon League in thrusting the blessings of constitutional prohibition upon an unwilling people and itself at the same time, into innermost affairs of their government. Commendable Virtues Says Mr. Seymour Lowman the newest Dry Chief, or "Temper-' ance and sobriety are commendable virtues." And they cannot be recommended too highly to the intemperate and fanatical bigots who are responsible for the law which poor dear Mr. Lowman is expected to enforce. Do Empty Heads Grow Blonde Hair? We wonder whether the Rev.

F. V. Loos of Liberty, who after having officiated at 4,500 weddings, was quoted as saying that "blondes are Sf By a theatrical thoroughiare we take it, of course, he means a thoroughfare on or near which theatres are located and not that Fulton Street will celebrate its new freedom by indulging in theatricalism. The Five Cent Fare Hocus Pocus Twenty-five thousand Staten Island residents who make daily use of eight trolley lines operated at a loss by the. City of New York on a S-cent fare will nave to take the emergency buses on a 10-cent fare this morning, unless the Staten Island Edison Company shall decide unexpectedly to postpone action on its threat to cut off the power which supplies the lines.

The World, August 1st. What- will hanoen to the six million the dumbest Driaes rs any reianon iu Anita Loos, according to whom, gentlemen prefer blondes. If both are right it is a sad commentary on the tastes of gentlemen. Though the Rev. Mr.

Loos is from Missouri, the dispatch reporting, his epoch making remark about blondes' came from Chicaeo and stated that the Our Comparatively Visible and Distinctly Audible Super-Government blondes of Chicago were very much wrought up about it and that a number of Chicago clergymen, had taken it up in a serious way, some of them upholding the contention of Mr. Loos and others taking sides with the distraught blondes. An official of St. Chrysostom's Episcopal Church concurred heartily in the opinion of the Rev. Mr.

Loos, but added that one did not have to marry so many couples to find that blondes were the dumbest of, brides. A Methodist parson, the Rev. John H. Delacy on the other hand, displayed marked partiality for blondes and indignantly took sides with UlnAa AaAnraA tli-if "T'c nt tVip hair hut residents of New York City when, or if, the City of New York undertakes to operate the subways of the city on a five-cent fare? The city it seems has owed the Staten Island Edison Co. $175,000 for current supplied since Jan.

1st, 1926. The people of Staten Island though paying only five cents to travel any distance on their trolley lines haven't the foggiest notion of what the service is costing them even though some of them may know what the annual deficit of the city owned trolley lines is. Tax receipts of course all go into one huge pot, and tax rates and assessed valuations are based on the City's total requirements. Those who approve of operating transit lines at a loss rather than pay more than five cents for six, seven or eight cents' worth of transportation, must base their attitude on the principle that "where ignorance is bliss 'tis folly to be wise," for the chances are that they are actually paying for this service any where from the equivalent of a ten-cent to that of a twenty-cent fare, in the form of taxes rents and living costs, the cost, however, being unequally and unfairly distributed. on the traffic regulations might be, we should think that listening to a sermon on this topic every Sunday or every time a traffic violator was brought in to serve out his sentence, might become somewhat monotonous for the law abiding members of the congregation and those, if any, who have never become addicted to the motor driving habit.

Nevertheless as a punishment for violating the Volstead law we can think of nothing that would be more cruel and unusual, than sentencing the culprit to weekly attendance at one of Wayne B. Wheeler's extra-dry churches for as long a period of time as Galileo was required to repeat the seven penetential psalms of David, and condemning him to listen to an extra-dry sermon from an Anti-Saloon League parson or wowser as Mr. Mencken might say. This, of course, would be no tax upon the patience of the regular members of the congregation, but a real pleasure to them, because, while the traffic regulations have never yet been adopted by any church as articles of religion, everybody who does not believe that the Eighteenth Amend what's under it that counts," thus begging the question, which is not what but whether tkntrh Pending further investigation we must refuse to venture any opinion upon this moot question. Hereafter when we meet a dumb Dora we shall take particular pains to note the color of her hair.

There is a story going the rounds that a visitor to New York from France, after having his attention called to the Statue of Liberty, observed, "We, too, erect statue to our illustrious dead.".