Hasbrouck Heights High School - Coronian Yearbook (Hasbrouck Heights, NJ)

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l ' V ' ' a W ' ' -1----- --------H -Yv- ' 1 Lad,,' he said, may God bless-. ' He stopped suddenly, his face grew pale, and he fell back upon the ground-dead. That is the story of a True American, that is the tale of what any True American would have done. That young man knew that the officer could not live. Moreover, he was a Hun, an enemy. Yet, that lad did not hesitate. VVhy? llecause a great, invisible spirit had spoken to him-the spirit of Humanity, the spirit of,True American- ism. Five times the Government asked for Vlfar Loans, and five times the people gaveg five times the quota was ex- ceeded. NVhy? Because that same spirit, that invisible, invincible power had moved them-Americanism. Thousands of aliens have flocked to our shore, seeking what could not be found in any other country-freedom. lllany of these become citizens, patriotic Americans. great men perhaps. Leaving their native haunts, they seek America-the Beacon of Liberty, and when the call comes, they light for her, and die for her. In a message to New Americans, Vlfoodrow NVi1son said: You have taken an oath of allegiance to the United States. Of allegiance to whom? Of allegiance to no one, unless it be of God. Certainly not of allegiance to those who temporarily represent this great Government. You have taken an oath of allegiance to a great ideal, to a great body of principles, to a great hope of a human race. There is but one longing and utterance of the human heart, and that is for liberty and justice. From 1776 We have grown, from thirteen colonies to forty-eight states, held together in one Union: from three millions of people to over one hundred and ten millions of people. lfVe have fought four foreign wars, and a civil war, of the greatest proportions ever recorded on the pages of history. And yet we have united those battling sections by an indissolube tie. A foreigner slanders America, and suffers duly for it. Vvhy? Because, as Theodore Roosevelt, great American, said, As long as strength is given to us with cool heads and fearless hearts we shall war unceasingly against what is evil and for what is good, so as to bring nearer the day when justice shall be done every man, every woman and every child within the borders of the great free common- wealths to which we belong. A' America,,' as Francis Trevelyan Miller has so uniquely put it, is, like a great sleeping giant-with its head at the North Pole, and its feet at the South Pole: who arises and stands today like Atlas supporting the world on his shoul- ders. This is America-the land which in the next genera- tion is to be the dynamic force behind civilization. The world is looking towards America, the face of every nation, great or small, is turned upon this country of ours. And, in turn, America looks to its citizens, its patriots. It is they who must lead the world of tomorrow. 4- M-W .- A ,. - - ,, Y

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f f E E .LLI Ill! Ll TRUE AMERICANISM The mist rested heavily on that dismal gray morning in May. It was early, the sun had just begun to creep above the horizon, and, piercing the enveloping fog, cast its rays upon a scene, already too familiar in the hearts of many. lt was lfranee, stricken France, in 1919. The sun- beams, stealing thru that curtain of dew and damp, fell upon a man's face. He was lying on the battlefield of Mons, still, silent, his features distorted, his head bloody. As the mist lifted, the form of another man could be seen, silent, still, prostrate. lioth were wounded, near to each other, yet between them lay a gap-one was a Yank: the other a llun: one a private: the other an ofiicer. The sun was high in the heavens when the eyes of the American private opened. l-le looked about, raised himself on one elbow and clutched his throat with his fingers. For twenfv long hours he had been lying there, with a bullet in his right shoulder, another in his knee. Twenty long, dark hours-without food or drink. 'His fingers tore apart his collar-band: he was dying-dying of thirst. Oh! where were those companions of yesterday? XVhy didn't they come to help him? .lust then he heard a sigh, the sigh of a sufferer. He was not the only one who had fallen before that storm of fire. Again he heard that sigh: it came from someone on his left. lie turned his head, and there, scarcely a foot away. lay an officer, in gray. Ah! A Hun, perhaps the one who had wounded him! Making a mighty effort, he raised himself once more. XYhat was that? A Hask-the Hun was grasping a flask. Thru the mind of the khaki-clad lad passed thoughts of a drink, water, and end to his thirst. He leaned over. stretched out his hand and took the bottle from the fingers of his neighbor, and, muttering a short prayer of thanks, raised the bottle to his lips. He was about to drink, when the German awoke and cried for help. A drink, my God. a drink! he pleaded. I am dying: help me. save me. Uh! God, give me water! The Yank paused, he took the fiask from his lips. Here was a man, about to die, the blood streaming from the bullet hole in his head. He asked for help, yet he knew that he couldn't live. And there was the lad in brown: Wounded, yes, but he might live: help would reach him, he felt sure. He raised himself a third time: but how hard it was, his strength was ebbing slowly away! tirasping the flask tightly in his hand, he moved it towards the fainting one's lips. Comrade, he said, drink: this is yours. l-le drank, and when he had finished, stretched out his hand and grasped the other's tenderly. My son, he said. I am going: yet with me I will take the memory of an American friend. l'lTfI1ITTI

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It is they, imbued with the spirit of yesterday, the spirit of the men of '76, who must hold high the light and guide the other peoples down the broken stairway into the years to come. Here is where East and NYest, the palm and the pine, the pole and the equator, the crescent and the cross, must meet, and thus with their heads bowed before that spirit of l.iberty-Justice-Equality, unite, using the words of Israel Zangwill, To build the Republic of Man and the Kingdom of God. True Americanism is a power, a moving spirit, an un- seen force. It has built up this country to where it stands today, at the ladder's top, supreme, financially and com- mercially, economically, morally and spiritually. This great tower of strength was born, at least, into the realms of knowledge, in one of the darkest periods in racial history, when men were burdened by monarchistic rule, and held in the shackles of the kings of Europe. America's discovery saved the civilization of Europe. john Fiske says: lt saved the race from a cataclysm, for it came to it as good news comes to a man on the point of committing suicide. No man ever left for America in the 16th, 17th or 18th centuries with the idea that his ancestors would grow to be stronger than he, or merge into a race with men who were his enemies. His idea was the founding of the oft- repeated phrase, True Americanism, the idea of liberty and peace. VVe hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal: that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. From the Declara- tion of Independence of 1776. And on that principle America has grown: from those first two hopes, peace and liberty, have come tolerance, sympathy, confidence and freedom. Freedom-that word has become linked with the great- est Americans, its statesmen, its generals. Patrick Henry sounded that note in those immortal words: Give me liberty, or give me death. When Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves, he sent that echo of liberty, of true Americanism, into every hut. every mansion, every cabin of the South. Cn April 6, 1917, America entered the W'orld War. and within two years that voice of freedom had torn thru the realm of Germany, thru the lacquered portals of Berlin, and into the VVilhelm Strasse, into the Shonbrunn Palace. America will never stand for such principles as Prussia upheld. In size, alone, we could lay Germany down upon the State of Texas, and Texas would remain uncovered. And no smaller in size than its territory is this country of ours with its commanding spirit of True Americanism, and its ideals embodied in Old Glory. VVe do not mean the ideals of the Red flag, nor the hopes of those men who seek, by overthrowing the Federal Government, to establish a True Democracy, a govern-