With Veterans Day coming up Thursday, it seems like a good time to pass along a clipping of a poem that goes back to World War I.
It comes from Dorothy Teigen of Moorhead.
The clipping is from an unidentified newspaper and was published in 1918.
The poem reads, in part:
"Old Kaiser Bill one day was feeling kind of breezy;
ADVERTISEMENT
"Says he, 'I think I'll lick the world; I think it will be easy.'
"Then this chesty Kaiser Bill conceived another notion.
"He built a thousand submarines and thought he owned the ocean."
The poem goes on:
" 'All right,' said Uncle Sam, 'if you want war, by gum, you'll get your fill, sir.
" 'I'll call two million fighting sons and make you take your pill, sir.'
"And now his boys are coming in from Maine and Minnesota;
"From Florida and Michigan, from Texas and Dakota.
ADVERTISEMENT
"They're practicing with aeroplanes; with guns they're getting handy.
"They'll teach the Kaiser not to fool with Yankee Doodle Dandy."
As the Kaiser and other enemies of the U.S. that followed him through the years found out (and are finding out), it's sure not a good idea to fool with Yankee Doodle Dandy and "his boys (and girls)."
Keeping the clipping
The clipping Dorothy sent is in tough shape, but there's a reason for that.
Not only is it nearly 100 years old, but it's been kept in the pendulum section of a very old wall-hanging clock in Dorothy's apartment.
Dorothy's Grandpa Teigen bought the clock in 1887 for the first home he and his wife owned on a homestead in Lac que Parle County, Minn.
The clock eventually was handed down to Dorothy. She moved to Moorhead in 1949. Since then the clock has been in three apartments and now is with her in the Eventide Living Center.
ADVERTISEMENT
The brown clipping might be in better shape today, Dorothy says, "if Grandpa didn't make a habit of oiling the clock (where the clipping was kept) with kerosene and a chicken feather."
If you have an item of interest for this column, mail it to Neighbors, The Forum, Box 2020, Fargo, ND 58107; fax it to 241-5487; or e-mail blind@forumcomm.com
