Georges Township High School - Georgian Yearbook (Uniontown, PA)

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WHEELING STOGIES ---:-ooo-:--- In Wheeling, West Virginia, they make a cheap cigar, called the stogy. Similar offenders are made in Pittsburgh, Pa., one variety of which is known as the Toby. These long, thin bunches of tobacco are hastily put together, native leaf and leavings being used in the making. They are alleged by experts to be not more than half as bad as they look-and smell. The name stogy came about in this way : Before the days of canals and railroads all freight had to be sent from the coast cities to what was then called the West in big, canvas-topped wagons known-from the place of their manufacture-as Conestogas. The teamsters were willing to take a part of their pay in tobacco, out of which they fashioned a rough likeness to a cigar that became known as a Conestoga. That name was too long, so they called it a stoga, and this got itself twisted into stogie by the tavern idlers to whom the carters gave the rolls of leaf. The tale of the Pittsburgh toby sounds less likely, but its origin has become a town tradition, so here it is, for what it is Worth. When'that city was a village, and a good, blue Presbyterian one, a certain burgess suffered wide renown as a swearer. Every time he was taken to task for his temper and profanity he would quite the passage from his favorite Tristam Shandy' in which Uncle Toby said a bad word, which a guardian spirit took straight to heaven-a wrong place to take such words, for though the recording angel entered it on the great book, he dropped a tear that blotted it out forever. As the burgess grew old his memory became uncertain, and it troubled him not a little to be compelled to get his book from the shelf when he wanted to repeat a paragraph that had been so familiar as his own name. Deep was his sorrow when some unconscionable reformer ran off with Tristam Shandyj' leaving the old man to gasp and glare and stammer when he tried to frame his usual excuse. They did say that a church elder took the book, in order that the burgess should have no support in his sin. This elder-at least, an elder-began an earnest effort for the burgess' re- form, and he was at it one day, preaching ,arguing, gesticulationg, while his victim sat on his porch, hunched in his chair, his eyes roving sadly and his fingers working in the vain attempt to recall his defensive quotation, 92'

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HEXENSHDEDL -T :-ooo-:-- Pennsylvania no longer has its witches, but it has its Hexenshdedl, or witch-village, that was founded in the nineteenth century. It was famous in the twenties for the three witches, or hexes, who practiced spells and divinations there, and were regarded by the neighbors with awe. One of these old women, who was accustomed to spend her time in wan- dering over South Mountain, had a dead cheek. The Devil had touched it. In those times a witch also had this power of numbing and killing flesh by touching it. The two other beldams, withered and forbidding, often met this woman on the mountain, each bent upon her cane, her sharp nose and perky chin appearing beneath a hood. What they did and what they said no Christian might know, but the three moving dots on the mountain-top that were seen against the moon were known to be the witches, and every good Dutchman, when he saw them, read his Bible with all the speed he knew. While these meetings lasted all sorts of mischiefs were abroadg win- dows rattled, the trees whispered, there were scuttlings and clickings of clawed feet on dark stairs and in cellars and garrets, corn was also stolen from cribs and scattered about, hay was lifted from mows and lugged off to the barns of less thrifty people, tires went out, ovens refused to bake, cats bawled as if their hearts were breaking, bells were struck, and occa- sionally some person suffered a downright injury, as in the case of the girl who disliked work and was Uspelledi' for twenty-one months, so that she could not leave her bed and chair. Her father became a-weary of these doings and made his peace with the witch who had cast the spell, by carry- ing water for her. When he had done this the crone made signs in the air, cackled a laugh, and showed her three teeth. She's well, she squeaked. And when the father went home the daughter was on her feet singing hymns with the rest of the family. One housewife could not bake her bread, the oven misbehaved so. She sent word to the witches that if her bread did not bake next day she would rouse the village and drive the hags for twenty miles. A blood-curdling yell was heard outside of her house that night, as if a devil were being forced from his congenial fires into the December chill. Nothing was seen through the windows, no hoof-marks were found in the snow, but the bread was baked next day. Some of the more timid kept on the safe side by making presents to the witches, especially of flour and vegetables. For all the Devil's aid, these poor old women lived in greater straits than any of their neighbors. In the Old World a 'soul was never sold except in pay- ment for riches, splendor, power, fame, love, pleasure, youth, long life, but in America hardly a witch made any material gain through her barter with the Hend. She usually dwelt in squalor. and her pcwers were prin- cipally exercised in prodding pins into hysterical subjects, frlghtenlng children, curdling milk, causing pigs to walk on their hind legs, and aliect- ing hens with pip. Poor creatures I -AMER? CAN MYTHS AND LEGENDS. 91 A

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when Tom Jenkins, a well-known teamster, came lumbering along in his Conestoga, He knew the burgess, and, taking a sudden pity on him, halted his horses, jumped off from his wagon and stumped up the steps to have a word with him, but also to save him from the avalanche of adjuration. Giving no heed to the hints and signs, he offered one of his stogies to the burgess -the first the old man had ever seen. Flint and steel were pulled out, a light was struck, and the two began to smoke, while the elder grew in deeper earnest and shouted louder and louder in warning and expostulation. The stogie seemed to have medicinal qualities, for soon the burgess began to find his tongue in the old way, and he loosed a torrent of profane objur- gation that made his tormentor stand aghast. Then he quoted : And the ministering angel-the angel, damme !-flew up to heaven-to heaven, you blink, blank son-o-a-sea-cook-with the oath-and blushed as he gave it in. He shouted this, his memory coming back to him. But the record- ing angel, as he wrote it down, dropped a tear upon the word, and blotted it out, forever. F'ever, sir ! he roared, as the elder hurried down the steps, holding his hands to his ears and raising his eyes in despair. Then, turning to the teamster, the burgess said, looking significantly at the roll of tobacco he held in his fingers : Tom, you've brought back my Uncle Toby. And the name of toby fastened upon the cigar that day. -AMERICAN MYTHS AND LEGENDS. EEE? 93