One of my first jobs was a paper route for The State paper in Columbia. The State was located then on the 1200 block of Main.
My first stop was to deliver the paper to the barbershop at the Wade Hampton Hotel. Columbia had two radio stations then WIS was housed in the old Jefferson Hotel. All the picture shows were on Main Street. Every Saturday morning my cousins and I would migrate from 1320 Richard Street to the Ritz Theatre. It looked like a herd of cows on the way to the barn. Our only stop was at Kresser or Woolworth, where for a quarter you could get a sack full of candy that would feed Tom, Bobby, Buddy, Joe, Jr., Nancy, Helen and me through a Buck Jones thriller and Captain Seven of Flash Gordon conquers Greeleyville and as a bonus free ice cream. These were the days of wine and roses, today a quarter’s worth of candy wouldn’t give a ladybug a bellyache.
After 75 years of reading The State paper, I’ve filed for divorce. The paper has shrunk like a cheap dress in a thunderstorm. It’s a liberal Gamecock septic tank. I’ve returned to my roots, read the eyes, nose and big mouth of the Holy City, The Post & Courier. They give me more bang for the buck more B.S. for the Peso.
Here’s two items from a recent issue. I would like to comment on “Two men broke in a store and stole a box of condoms.” In Williamsburg County, we will steal lard out of a biscuit, a pulley bone out of a chicken, but I’ve never known someone to steal condoms. The economic avalanche has buried us all. This hasn’t affected birth control in Greeleyvile, where they use clothespins. A column in The Post and Courier by Edward M. Gilbreth, who I assume is related to the man who wrote the column, “Doing the Charleston.” In my opinion he was a diamond in full of stones, and still is. The article was based on the age-old problem. In the bathroom is it correct to let the loose end of the toilet tissue hang over the roll or does it hang behind the roll?
I conducted a survey in Greeleyville, 70 percent of those polled said the corncob should go out grade.
Now if we could only get The Post and Courier to give us sports to equal other parts of the paper, I would have no other paper before me!