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Laa Vegaa,N evada REVIEW - JOURNAL September 26, 1948 From W h e r e I never go to Reno but I thank my lucky stars for the Las Vegas water supply. In the “Biggest Little City” you drink “chlorine coqktails” for sure. They’re getting to be more and more chlorine and less and less water. Maybe I have a sensitive stomach, but a few swallows of Reno’s brew and things feel like I’m on fire inside. I’m not a doctor, but I do know there’s supposed to be; a rather delicate chemical balance in your digestive system and that acid stomach is something you’re supposed to guard against. When you have an opposite condition your prescription is two drops of hydrochloric acid three times a day. Some of these water supplies contain enough chlorine (by taste) to make a cup or two of HCL in my normal day’s consumption. Baking soda neutralizes the chlorine, but who likes to take a teaspoon of that stuff with every glass of water? H20 is mv favorite drink, provided it’s cold enough, and I need nothing else. But the health people have spoiled practically every bit of drinking water in the land by doping it with something to kill the bugs that are supposed to aboupd therein. So far as I’m concerned I’ll take the bugs and the health au­thorities can have the chlorine. Perhaps I don’t have all the Sta­tistics, but I can remember a whole lot of years—yes, stretch that to a whole lot of genera­tions and even centuries, before somebody hit on the idea of bleaching the bacteria out of the drinking water, when people ap­peared to be quite healthy drink­ing water just as it came bub­bling down the hillside or out of the rivers, lakes or springs. Maybe the scientists have ex- 1 perimented. with the effect of * chlorine on the human system and found nothing was harmed. | And maybe the high-powered • | drinking water of today is per-j fectly harmless. I ..beg to dis-i agrbe however, and'take myseif ; for example. . I feel much better absorbing other beverages while in the land of the chlorine cocktails, and even the more potent mixtures of the dimly-lighted-recreation cen­ters leave me in much better shape than the drug-store tasting water and believe me, I’d much prefer just plain old H20 with a little ice, please. Of course* you can buy un­treated water in bottles, but try to get it when you’re away from home. You take what comes out of the faucet and like it or use something else to quench the thirst which, in my case, is usually terrific. Actually, I’m beginning to wonder if this pop­ular fad of deliberately poison­ing the taste of water, and per­haps your tummy along with it, hasn’t been the result of propa­ganda spread about the land by the beverage manufacturers and distributors and/or the bottled water folks. After all, if you owned a nice mountain spring of* unlimited output (or outpouring) you’d I Sit — By A. E. Cahlan like to be able to sell it for a few dimes or couple of dollars a bottle. You’d have a gold mine. And if you could persuade peo­ple the stuff they get practically free from their tap isn’t fit to drink, you’d be in, wouldn’t you? I only know that to avoid the chemical aqua I’d drink almost anything, and I suppose there are others in the same boat. And that’s one of the big reasons I’m always glad to get back to Las Vegas where S can down a big, tall glass (and I have a special supply of extra tall ones for the purpose) ' of good water which wasn’t routed through the drug store on the way into my room. One thing worries me and that is what happens when this city of ours realizes the fond dreams we have for it,, and reaches a size where our artesian wells will no longer keep us supplied. Then we go to Lake Mead. And, I suppose the health authorities will insist we put some of the chlorine from BMP to local use by dumping it into„that portion of our water supply. Don’t know how it would be economically, feasible, but there ought to be some way we could keep the - well water for drink­ing purposes and use the chlor­inated product to run coolers, water lawns and shrubs, and flush gutters and sidewalks. If we can’t, me for the bottled water business—it will be the best racket *i n* to*w n* . * I’m worried! And maybe "you better worry too! That is if you happen to enjoy Some of these “kid” radio programs and have a wife or husband you’d like to keep. For a Spokane judge has ruled that Mrs. Maxine Mav-ther is entitled to a divorce be­cause her husband “thought the height of entertainment was lis­tening to the Lone Ranger cn the radio”’ I must confess to having be­come quite interested in a lot of juvenile programs when I was forced to listen to them every afternoon for a week. We were travelling across the1 country in the family automobile at the time, and along in the late after­noon the dials were switched to Jack Armstrong, Terry and the Pirates, and the Lone Ranger. At first I hated to see the clock reach that position. But some­how I found an attraction in each and ultimately shared the en­thusiasm of the younger mem­ber of the clan who demanded the programs. No, I didn’t whoop and holler exactly/ but I admit to being arqused and entertained. It never occurred to^ me I was being juvenile to the point where a learned and sedate jurist would consider me a menace to tne peace of mind of my spouse who, for the record, was not along. Next thing you know judges w ill be ruling out the Sunday comics for adults by the same rather devious route — holding that if you prefer them to wash­ing the breakfagt dishes or mow­ing the. law n,, your wife has a perfect right to bounce you out the front door and go her own sweet way in the home you used to call yours.