The Danville Register from Danville, Virginia • Page 23

4-C The Register: Danville, Oct. 25, 1973 Although Retired Jonathan Daniels Continues Political Observing I A crane swings into position one of three 18 ton railroad cars Which will be used as covered bridges on new 18 hole golf course in Lincolnshire, III. Howard England Excavates Old Fort With Shovel, Cans By ED HOWLAM) Associated Press Writer 'HILTON HEAD ISLAND, Sc. (AP) The spring is gone from his step but the twinkle remains in his eye. He says, "I'm having a very satisfactory old age." Jonathan Daniels at age 71 no longer writes bitingly partisan editorials for The News andlOb- server at Raleigh, He is no longer a counsel to presi- dents and observes that age is a state of the joints and mus- cles as well as of the'mind.

Retired for three years and living at the plush resort of Hil- ton Head Island on the South Carolina coast, Daniels keeps busy writing bestselling nonfic- tion books, a weekly column for the Hilton Head "Island Pack- et" newspaper which he helped found, and observes the world of politics from afar. He's one of the few surviving members of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's staff (he was FDR's administrative from 1943-45), and the last of the liberal Southern newspaper editors of the old school. "I feel like an exhibit," Daniels said in a recent interview, noting that two graduate students have just finished theses on his news- paper career. Two of the trademarks his associates remember are still evident to visitors in his home: an ever-present cigarette and his sense of humor.

He recounted an incident in- volving one of his children, who had told him she wanted him to make a codicil to his will in or- der, to leave her a small item. "I've got news for you," he told her. "I've decided not to die." Daniels said the remark was later brought up at a cocktail party where a guest noted, "I wouldn't put it past'the so and so." He also tells of being in- troduced 4o his wife's relatives in South Carolina about the time he married "Miss Lucy" and then telling her, "There are only two kinds of South 1940s, is far different. "There's been tremendous change in the White House since I was there. It's amazing the change in the presidential office," he said.

Then the immediate staff of the president was six people, plus secretaries; now it's in the hundreds, he said. "In the old days the president dealt directly with his Cabinet. Now Carolinians: One kind has nev- lie's got a tremendous staff be- er worn shoes, and the other kind makes you feel like you never wore any." Daniels' father was Woodrow Wilson's secretary of the Navy aifd the yoUng Raleigh native grew to adulthood in the Wash- ington area where Josephus Daniels and his assistant, Franklin D. Roosevelt, were powerful figures. Later he earned undergraduate and mas- ter's degrees from the Univer- sity of North Carolina, attended law school at Columbia Univer- sity and began a lifetime ca- reer as a journalist.

"I'm known to your gener- ation as an editor," he said. "Actually I'm a reporter. I still think the greatest art on earth is reporting. It was his reporting of the ro- mance between FDR and Lucy Mercer between World Wars I and II that earned Daniels new national attention five years ago. His last book was "The Ran- dolphs of Virginia" early this year.

Current projects are a collec- tion of his "Island Packet" col- umns and a book taken from his White House diary during World War II. Today's Washington, in com- parison to the capital of the tween him and the Cabinet. There's an old saying: The dev- il will find work for idle hands to do," Daniels added. Still as loyal to the cratic party as ever, Daniels has no patience with Republi- can Richard Nixon. Noting this is Nixon's last term, Daniels said the President "is running not for office but for history.

He's definitely lost the race for history." Here are some other Daniels observations on current affairs: --On Watergate: "The Water- gate hearings are the biggest whodunnit in history." --On dirty tricks in cam- paigns: "When Jimmy Byrnes (the late secretary of state, U.S. senator and South Carolina governor) first ran for office- he was born a Catholic in Char- leston and converted to Protes- tantism, and there was a ter- rible prejudice in those days-- opponents took out a newspaper ad that said, 'We who were choir boys with Byrnes in the Catholic Church at Charleston urge you to vote for him," He survived that." --On presidential assistants: "The two secretaries to Wash- ington, and Jefferson were both listed as suicides. I feel no in- clination myself." --On age: "When I was at the White House I was the youngest man on the Presi- dent's immediate staff. I was 40. While I'm not an old man griping at the better to have maturity." --On reporting: "There isn't any such thing as objectivity, Personality should be injected into stories." In the days when throughout eastern North Carolina Daniels was often referred to as "joe- nathan," The News and Ob- server traditionally printed a rooster in red ink on its front page when Democrats won na- O'R A BIKE BASKET TORONTO Police de- tectives, inquiring into the theft of $850 worth of meat from a Toronto meat, market, asked neighbors if they had seen any- one loitering in the area, espe- cially with a truck, even with a medium-sized car," said one detective.

"With the price of meat today. $850 worth would probably fit into a car trunk without moving the spare tire." tional elections. Daniels recalled returning to Raleigh in 1948 after being on the campaign train of Harry Truman and asking if the roost- er were ready. "They told me Dewey was going (o win. I said get the rooster out.

"We ran the rooster late that (election) night and about 4 a.m. I got a call from. Inde- pendence. It was Truman and he said, 'Jonathan, we're Now, at Hilton Head, Daniels says he's "a token Democrat. AJ1 my friends are good Yankee lljpiblicans." 3 ROOM GROUP ALL NEW FURNITURE MMFurn.

530 Monroe St. I'm Looking For People who want extra money, who want, sparetime businesses of their own that won't upset family duties. Find out how to qualify as an AVON Representative Call 792-3111 KEY WEST, Fla. (AP) Looking at the massive stone- work of Fort Zachary Taylor, you wonder why any man in his right mind would think of try- ing to excavate such a giant project with a shovel and five- gallon "Somebody had to do it, and I'm said Howard England as he led the way along a sun- baked rampart of a jumble of bricks and giant cannons. "I've been at it five years now, and all the work has been done by hand.

Had some help a few years ago, but'people lose in-' terest after a while and drift away." Fort Zachary Taylor was one of the few Southern strongholds that stayed in federal hands during the Civil War, but it never saw a shot fired in an- ger. England said the Con- federates never tried to take Key West because they knew the fort was too strong. '-'At one time there were 299 captured Confederate blockade runners anchored under the guns of this fort," England said. "Those ships and their cargoes were a tremendous loss to the South: But one Con- federate general who lived in Key West saw the fort being built, and when Jefferson Davis proposed an attack the general answered, in the modern par- lance, 'No The fort sits on the Key West Naval Base. England was a ci- vilian' architect on the base back in 1967 when a local resi- dent asked why something wasn't being done to make Fort Taylor a national monument.

"The reaction of the base commander and most people was, 'What England said. "It was all covered over with sand and nobody even knew it was here. they asked me to take a look at it, and I came back and recommended that it be ex- cavated and made a national monument," he said. "They said, 'Good. You do He's been doing it as a hobby ever since.

The fort is a 19th Century ex- ample of unplanned obsoles- cence. Work started in 1845, but just about the time the Civil War began somebody invented the rifled cannons that packed a lot bigger whallop than the old iron cannon ball. This meant the fort's original walls weren't much use, so frantic Union engineers threw up thicker battlements, using concrete, old iron and anything else that was handy. At the end of the 19th Centu- ry, the Army decided to mod- ernize the fort again and the huge, cavernous gun rooms along the euter walls were filled up to give added protec- tion. The engineers again used whatever came to hand.

Un- fortunately for England, this in- cluded most of the seven-and- eight-ton cannon, which were buried under piles of sand or cemented into the walls. In five years of hauling filled five-gallon cans up ladders, England has managed to clear the sand off the top of the fort and excavate three gun rooms. "We have to take 6,000 cubic yards of fill out of each room," he said. "Those damaged can- nonballs are hardest to get up. They weigh 125 pounds apiece, and there's usually 40 in each room." In one of the old ammunition storage areas buried in the bowels of the fort, England has set up a display of weaponry arid artifacts.

He pointed to a pile of dingy objects in a case and said, "Some of those bones are from an old Indian mound, but a lot are from black slaves who built the fort." Picking up a small bottle, England said, "the Army had a drug problem even in those days. Soldiers who were addicts used to steal these bottles of laudanum." QUIETS OWN HOUSE TORONTO A Toronto's works department is spending $60,000 for 10 o.uieter air com- pressors used by the city to power jackharnmers and other construction equipment. The new compressors are 50 per cent more costly than less noisy ones. Sears in Stock OPEN DAILY 10-10 SAT. SOMETHING SPECIAL" 22.88 Elura to OFF Choose from our larjie selection of Livinjj Room.

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