From River To Tub (Defiance Crescent News 22 Sept 1924)

    If some enterprising soul were to chronicle the experience of Defiance's alligator since it was taken from the Everglades of Florida and presented to Superintendent H.T. Campion of the municipal water works, its career would read as enthrillingly as "From Rags To Riches" or any other of Horatio Alger's novels.

    The plot might be reversed but never the less the reptile's experiences have been varied, indeed. From swamp to filtration plant and then from the Maumee River to a wash tub. What a come down! But such is the case for the reptile, was re-captured, after its second runaway from the filtration plant. It now pines away in a tub at the home of James Elisworth, Jr. East High street and Julius Balske, Summit street, recovered the the animal as it was sunning itself on the banks of the Maumee river. 

    It will be returned to the city, it was said.

Hicksville Woman Back in U.S. Describes Pearl Harbor Attack (D.C.N 8-1-1942)

    A letter to Mr. and Mrs Charles Crouse of Hicksville has revealed that their daughter, Mrs Isabelle Crouse Sparks, and her eight-year old son, Allen, have returned safely to San Diego from Hawaii, where they were at time of the Pearl Harbor Attack.
    Her husband, James Sparks, an Army officer, remained in Hawaii. 
    The former Hicksville woman and her son made the trip from Hawaii by plane in 14 1/2 hours. Mrs Sparks was one of the first nine women to leave the islands.
    In writing of the flight, Mrs Sparks said the passengers huddled in the plane fearful of an air attack. But she added "nothing could be worse than our experience on Dec. 7, and the wearisome hours caused by those "horrible yellow creatures" (Her words not mine, Dave)
    "After seeing bombs shatter ships and hangars and feeling the walls shake and rumble from the concussions. I believe these next few years will be to long" Mrs Sparks wrote.
    In the bomb shelters, the letter continued, Mrs Sparks learned the horrors of bombing raids as the English have known them. 
    "We passed a bottle of milk from one child to another for them to take just a sip." And the bottle of water to merely wet your lips." It was a nightmare, horrifying and to real. I doubt if I'll ever forget it." 
    "I watch every move of the war in the Phillippines," Mrs Sparks concluded, " and pray that Uncle Sam gets help there before too late. We must stop those "yellow devils and now!" (Her words not mine, Dave.)
    Mrs Sparks included a clipping of a story of her experiences as published by a San Diego paper.
    The clipping told how exploding bombs sent pieces of shrapnel through the Sparks home, how the pictures were knocked off the wall and dishes broken and of how the house reeled from the bombs as if an earthquake.
    Mrs Sparks and her son saw the attack on the harbor by planes which swooped low, barely missing the tree tops and witnessed the destruction of the battleship Arizona.