Document text
Mail Tribune 100, Sept. 15, 1922 By Alissa Corman Sep 15, 2022 12:00 AM A A News from 100 years ago The following news items were drawn from the archives of the Mail Tribune 100 years ago Sept. 15, 1922 ROOT BEER PYTHON DISTURBS SLUMBER JOHNNY KORENIAN Shades of Volstead! What have we at the Jackson County Fair? Johnny Korenian, former clerk at the Medford Cigar Store claims that night before last, while sleeping in his soft drink booth he was visited by a tangible member of the family which usually appear about the victim during the “D. T’s.” Johnny was sleeping in his fort berth as an insurance against burglary. About two o’clock in the morning Johnny awoke with a weight on his chest. Before he was fully aroused he felt a soft, smooth, cold object, seemingly endless, slowly sliding across his throat. He reached up, grabbed the object in both hands, flung it back over his head, let out a whoop and cleared the counter of his booth by two or three feet in no time at all. When clear of the booth he drew is pistol and then looked back inside where a ten foot python, about six inches in diameter was beginning to wrap his elastic anatomy around the Root Beer barrel. He was preparing the shoot the reptile when the though came to him that it might belong to the carnival company. He called some of the carnival men who coaxed the snake to release its loving caress of the barrel and who took it back where it belonged. Johnny went home and slept the rest of the night and vowed that another snake would never tickle him under the chin and get away with it even if it should be a trick snake. LITTLE BOOZE IN EVIDENCE, LOCAL OFFICIALS ACTIVE The local authorities are making every effort to suppress the local liquor traffic in the city and nearby, and especially to abolish intoxication or near intoxication at the county fair grounds, with such success that the fair and city have both been remarkable clean from this evil so far this week. It is generally conceded that if booze and the hard drinkers of it can be kept from the fair grounds this week, it will not only mean less trouble at the fair next year, but that there will probably be no trouble there in this regard for years. A clean-up was made at the fair grounds yesterday and after a through perusal of the big crows, two young men were found intoxicated on the grounds and were arrested and locked up in this city. — Alissa Corman; [email protected]