Just winding up the big Tri-State Gas Engine and Tractor Show at
Portland, Indiana, this week, I sauntered down Flea Market Avenue
in quest of a small V-belt pulley. Omer Swartzendruber had told me
that, if I’d get a smaller size pulley on my old Pierce
Governor, it would be much more sensitive in throttling the power
into the ‘mighty’ Joe Dear. So, coming across a new-looking
who hails from my old hometown of Union City, Indiana.
‘I’ll have a lot of fun trying this out, to see if
‘Swartzy’ is as smart as he thinks,’ thought I to
myself, tossing my prize pulley into my truck cab.
But I no sooner got back to ‘Uncle Elmer’s Iron Man-Gem
Mobile Circulation Dept. than Mildred Ary stopped out front in her
Buick.
‘Mercy, I don’t know what to do. A pulley dropped off my
power-steering, while I was coming over from Union City, and I
don’t know whether to try and drive home tonight or not. It
steers so hard, and I’m afraid it might damage the
power-steering.”
I said, ‘We’ll put in an emergency call over
Brewer’s Sound. With all these engine mechanics here on the
grounds, there should be someone who can help out with your
power-steering.’
Returning, I saw a tall, gaunt figure, bent almost doubled, his
bearded head underneath Mildred Ary’s car hood.
‘Someone has already answered your call,’ said Mildred,
a bit relieved.
It proved to be none other than lanky Larry Smith of
Williamsburg, Ind., who had that very afternoon informed me he had
collected all the serial numbers of the Maytag Gas Engines.
‘We need a pulley to fit this shaft,’ said Larry.
‘Driving without it would not harm your power-steering
mechanism, but it would be very hard to steer.’
I took out my steel tape measure and ‘eyed’ the shaft as
being about five-eights. Then I said, ‘I just purchased a
five-inch V-pulley with the same size bore.’
Going back to my truck, I retrieved the pulley and soon Larry
was putting it onto the power-steering mechanism shaft, while Cal
Barry kicked the components back into line with his cowboy
boot.
‘I’ll need a screw-driver,’ said Larry. Which I
promptly fetched, and Mildred Ary said, ‘It’s working fine
now. How wonderful, of all of you to be of such help.’
I mention this cheering little anedote, which took place just
before we left the still-crowded Tri-State Show grounds, not for
what I did in the situation. But to point out that God often
answers our prayers even before we ask them. The Bible says,
‘God knows of your needs even before you Pray. He is able to do
more than we are able to think or ask.’ Though the Lord let me
believe I was buying that pulley for the ‘Joe Dear’, He had
sent me to buy it for Mildred Ary who needed it worse.
Many of my best-answered prayers in life came when I was least
expecting. And at times I prayed very little. It was as if Someone
is watching over our lives, for our welfare, whether we know it or
not, or whether we accept it or not. Jesus said, ‘When you
pray, do not be as the hypocrites who pray with long faces in
public places with many words. But enter into his closet and pray
secretly to the Father who will reward you openly.’
During our stay at the Ohio Valley Antique Machinery Show at
Georgetown, Ohio, we had some enlightening visits with
‘Babe’ Lamb. Babe is one of the old-line steam engineers,
who knows the ‘innards’ of a steam engine better than some
know the outside trappings. For a decade he was the fellow with the
moustache (looking like Lowell Thomas) who yanked throttle on Jim
Whitby’s Susie-Q, pulling kids in the big wagon over the Whitby
show grounds. For years he has been sort of a ‘loner’,
visiting many, many steam shows throughout the nation Indiana,
Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Wisconsin, Iowa. Name them Babe
Lamb has been there and has a story to tell.
Said Babe, ‘I suppose you’ll laugh at me, but I’ve
been following and studying up on this ‘Foot Therapy
Massage’.
I replied, ‘No, I won’t laugh. Because I mentioned it
previously in my column here. And I gave a lecture on it before a
group of Health Food Associates at Eaton, Ohio, and I was amazed to
learn that three fellows there had already taken such therapy and
reaped good benefits.’
Thereupon Babe Lamb trekked back to his van and fetched a couple
of books on Foot Therapy Massage. One of the books we already had.
The other book was very informative, explaining how many human ills
can be relieved by massaging the appropriate spot on the sole of
each foot, which corresponds to the very organ or part of the upper
torso which has become congested or ailing. The charts he showed us
matched with the charts we had already studied.
Babe Lamb went on to explain how he had developed a very
worrisome flutter of the heart, and had congestion on his lungs
which had been causing much worry and distress. But after he had
studied the Foot Therapy Massage, and learning to locate the
correct places on the soles of his feet, he had massaged them
several times daily and the heart flutter and lung congestion had
gone away and not returned.
Even though you may not have the foot-therapy chart to go by,
one method is to relax one foot over your knee and begin pressing
here and there, with your thumbs, over the sole of your foot. You
will come to one or more places where the pain becomes almost
unbearable That indicates something is wrong ‘upstairs’ in
your body. And the sore spot should be gently and thoroughly
massaged for a couple of minutes until that pain goes away, despite
the irritation it gives at first. The pain will soon be relieved.
After it is relieved, go all over the sole of that foot, and see if
there are other sore spots, which also massage. This relieves
congestion and opens up nerve energy which can go a long way toward
healing many of our ailments. After one foot is thoroughly gone
over, do it with the other foot, and repeat. All parts of our body
are inter-related and inter-connected, and when one portion of our
torso aches, it sets up an alarm elsewhere within the body. Instead
of laughing at Babe Lamb’s suggestions, I was in hearty
agreement. By studying the books, we also learn that serious cases
of even prostrate trouble have been healed or cured by this simple
method of massaging the proper region of the foot, and the back
tendon that rises up from the heel.
We no longer make fun of the accomplishments of that ancient
form of healing, known as acupuncture. This Foot Therapy Massage is
also an ancient form of healing, much like acupuncture, but
accomplishing its results without the needle puncture.
My Mother used to have such painful feet. She always said,
‘Oh, if only someone knew how to massage my feet. When your
feet hurt, you hurt all over.’ She didn’t know that soon we
would be studying the very form of healing she was wishing for. But
too late to help her during her recent lifetime.
In studying these Foot Therapy Massage charts, one of which
appeared this spring in THE LADIES HOME JOURNAL, it is noteworthy
that all organs of the body have certain related spots on the
bottoms of our feet with which they are connected by networks of
nerves and blood vessels. The eyes, the ears, kidneys, lungs,
heart, colon, prostrate, sinuses, Spleen, Liver, Pancreas many can
be benefited by foot massage. We hope you can soon get one of the
books that will give you the information by which you can massage
your own feet and save much time and trouble, as well as expense,
in suffering.
To pay Babe Lamb back for giving us his information about Foot
Therapy Massage, I showed him how I had recently learned to put my
sacro-iliac back in place by grasping my left hand over my right
ankle, my right hand back of my right knee, and pulling it up
gently and firmly toward my chest. For years I had suffered greatly
from this, due to a fall at some time in my boyhood. My sacro-iliac
rotation had become chronic over my growing years. I soon would be
in a wheel chair, and could not sit, walk or ride in comfort. I
built a ‘back stretcher’ years ago which started putting my
spine and vertebras back in place. Then, years later I worked out
certain exercises to help out. But keeping it in place became a
minute by minute ordeal. I recall how both a chiropractor and
osteopath had dismissed me as hopeless from their offices, as they
could put my back in place, but it would slip out just walking out
their doors. The recent article I read in a monthly magazine showed
how the sacroiliac can be put back in place in a moment by the
method described above. But, since it has become chronic, it might
have to be done over and over, sometimes twenty times a day until
the tendons become conditioned and reeducated to hold it in place.
The article showed how one can put his sacroiliac back into place,
either standing, sitting or lying in bed. What welcome news! An
osteopathic doctor will be coming out with a book which explains
how you can treat your own aching back. Many threshermen and
engineers will certainly welcome such a volume. I will be looking
for it too. Sometimes the human body like a steam engine, needs
some back-shop working on, now and then. What say?
During the summer’s shows, it has come to our attention
several times how widows who have recently lost their husbands have
been ‘taken in’ by fast-buck wheeler-dealers who go to them
with long faces of sympathy, offering to buy what has been left of
their husband’s estate in such as steam engines, engine parts,
tools, machinery, etc. Naturally, at such a crisis, a widow is
caught up in fear and insecurity of the future, and more often than
not will succumb to this long-faced wheeler-dealer’s
‘concern over her welfare’, by selling to the first one
that comes along. Only to find out a little later that a real
friend comes along who would give her much more money. But the true
friend felt it was more discreet to wait a respectable time after
the husband’s demise which gave the fast-buck artist time to do
his dirt.
Our advice to widows would be to wait use some caution.
Don’t sell to the first guy who comes along with sob-sister
tears, telling you he is only interested in helping you out , then
offers you a small, round figure which he hopes you will accept in
order to get your unpleasant task over with. Wait until a tried and
true friend, whom you’ve known and trusted, offers a genuine
suggestion or price. There are always as many good friends, even
more we hope, than the shakedown artists who have only dollar-signs
in their tear-soaked eyes. Robbing bereaved widows is a lowdown,
sneakin’ sin.
We try to be helpful in these columns. But we can only try and
through faith and prayer, reading God’s Word, learning how to
improve our health by ‘doing it ourselves’ and waiting
until our true friends come by to help, maybe we can still get the
job done.
Many times during life, when faced with trouble or problems I
couldn’t solve, I’d turn to the Bible for the answer. I
soon learned that it was God’s rule book on how ‘us
mortals’ should live with our fellow men. True, it wouldn’t
tell me how to patch an old inner tube on the family jalopy. But it
would tell me to keep my mouth shut from using foul language while
fixing the leak. And whatever the situation in life, the Bible has
the answer as to how to face the problem.
All of us have had times in our lives when someone, or a group
of individuals have worked against us. Everything good that we
tried to do was denounced as ‘crooked’ or ‘dirty’
regardless of our good intentions. The Bible has the answer.
‘Do good unto them that persecute you. Pray for them that say
all manner of evil about you and curse you.’ Jesus said,
‘Do not fight evil with evil, but overcome evil with
good.’
How much easier it is on our own minds and hearts to think
kindly of those who try to hurt us, rather than go to bed each
night with a heavy burden of hate on our souls. This is better
advice than any psychoanalist or psycho-therapist could ever offer
us during one of life’s trails.
Being a man of low income, I have often been puzzled as to why
many of my friends would come to me for small loans. I should be
the very last guy in this world to loan money. Some would pay back.
Others would never see me again, or if they did they’d pass
down the other side of the street. Sometimes, when chance brought
us together, I’d get an old fashioned back-slap ‘cussing
out’, instead of the reimbursement they owed. This often
puzzled me. But I found the perfect answer in the Bible, which
says. ‘Loan cheerfully to him who asks, and do not ask in
return. For the heathen loan to their friends and expect payment in
return. But you are better than the heathen.’ And Jesus said,
‘If a man ask for thy garment, give him also thy
cloak.’
What wonderful answers the Bible gives to our everyday pressing
problems. How many of us have been perplexed at the prosperity of
wicked persons and organizations. But in Psalms we read these very
reassuring words, ‘Fret not thyself because of the wicked who
prosper for they shall be cut down. Behold I have seen the evil
doer spreading himself like a green bay tree and suddenly he was no
more.’
In order to meet many of life’s exacting rigors, we must put
on the full ‘armor of God’. I have found the greatest help
in this is to memorize certain passages of scripture, befitting the
problems we most often face. And, in doing so, we have the answers
on our lips and do not have to furiously hunt the scriptures when
such problems arise. For the Bible has a way of erasing problems,
simply by changing our attitudes toward others.
‘Bless them that curse you. Do good unto them that hate you
and despitefully use you.’ Which is even better medicine for
the ailing heart than the Vitamin E or Wheat Germ.