Note to readers: Our next publication will be November 18, as we get back to twice-a-week publication today. Thank you for your understanding.--eeb

TODAY'S ISSUE
Georgia Lions recycle cell phones for lighthouse funds
By Dan Stuart
Vice president of the Georgia Lions Lighthouse
Special to GwinnettForum.com

NOV. 15, 2005 -- Did you know that old cell phones are helping to restore people's sight in Georgia? Yes, the Georgia Lions Lighthouse Foundation is recycling used cell phones to help pay for eye surgeries such as cataracts, detached or torn retinas, and diabetic retinopathy for impoverished Georgia residents who have nowhere else to turn and no insurance. The program is supported by the more than 260 Lions Clubs across Georgia, five of which are here in Gwinnett County,

Stuart

Founded in 1949, the Lighthouse provides sight-related surgeries that are beyond the funding of local Lions Clubs. In recent years, the Lions of Georgia have seen a significant increase in the demands for their services. The Lighthouse is a 501 (C) 3 Organization, and gifts are tax deductible.

The Lighthouse was the fruition of the dreams of a blind man, Tom Bingham, in 1949. Three Lions Clubs -- Atlanta, Albany and Moultrie -- each contributed $1,000 as beginning funding.. The rapid growth of the services provided by the Lighthouse over more than 50 years represents dedicated work by many Lions.

Mr. Bingham was a member of the Atlanta Lions Club. He had lost his sight in a hunting accident at the age of 25. His loss of sight made him most aware of the importance of sight conservation. He realized that one person or one Lions Club was limited in how much they could help others. But by banding together, Georgia Lions could vastly multiply the results.

The Georgia Lions Lighthouse staff is dedicated to helping as many people as possible, but it must turn away applicants every month. Through the staff's rapport and coordination with health services providers, it is able to receive an additional $3.87 in donated services for every dollar spent.

The average surgery costs in excess of $2,000. As a new source of revenue, and thus funding for more surgeries, the Lighthouse has recently instituted a program to collect used cell phones and sell them to an electronics recycling company.

For more information about the Georgia Lions Lighthouse please see their website at galions.org/lighthouse; or call 1-800-718-7483.

For many years, Lions Clubs have collected used eyeglasses and given them to non-profit medical groups, such as Medical Assistance Program International, to be issued in third world countries. As an extension of that program, the cell phone recycling program allows the local Club to now collect cell phones along with eyeglasses and forward them to the Lighthouse.

So, if you have old cell phones lying in that kitchen drawer, please consider donating them to this very worthy cause.

If you would like to know more about this program or where you can donate your old cell phone, please contact the Georgia Lions Lighthouse or one of the following:

Lawrenceville Lions Club, Pete Stamsen, 770-995-9274
Lilburn Lions Club, Steve Hart, 678-232-6687
Loganville Lions Club, Neal Byrd, 770-466-8689
Norcross Lions Club, Ed Hashbarger, 770-995-0405
Snellville Lions Club, Norm Masters, 770-979-4544

ELLIOTT BRACK
Poet who wrote of Chattahoochee is namesake of lake
By Elliott Brack
Editor and Publisher
GwinnettForum.com

NOV. 15, 2005 -- Sidney Lanier is a name I have known at least from the first grade. Growing up in Macon, I attended Gresham Elementary School, which was the Bibb County school located closest to the house where he was born. It seems that every year, our entire student body (maybe 200 students) trudged the three blocks to the Lanier home on his birthday.

You can be assured that we were drilled repeatedly on the poems of Sidney Lanier. Though probably all of us had never seen the Chattahoochee River, we had certain heard of it through Lanier's lilting poem, "The Song of the Chattahoochee." Years later we would come to understand the poem, especially the upper stretches of that river, and even of the sister river that flows into Lake Lanier, the Chestatee.

Sidney Lanier was born to an aristocratic Southern family in 1842, in what was for him an idyllic time. His father was an attorney. Early on, the young Sidney showed an interest in music and literature, teaching himself to play the flute, guitar, violin, piano and organ. At age 14, he enrolled at Oglethorpe College, near Milledgeville, graduating at the top of his class in 1960. The next April he enlisted in the Macon Volunteers of the Confederate Army, at age 19, along with his younger brother.

His early service was near Norfolk, Va., with little action. Later he would fight in several Virginia campaigns, including Petersburg. While commanding a blockade runner, Lanier was captured and imprisoned in Maryland in 1864. Here the first signs of tuberculosis emerged. He was released in February 1865, walked home, and arrived very sick. He would have bad health the rest of his life.

In 1867, he married Mary Day of Macon, and they had four sons. He practiced law with his father, but with health problems, moved alone to Texas in 1872. While there, he wrote articles, but no poetry. He left Texas a year later, becoming first flutist in the Peabody Orchestra in Baltimore. He later lectured and at Johns Hopkins University in literature.

Lanier stamp issued in 1972. More.

Meanwhile, he was publishing poems, and developing theories of the laws of music and poetry. His best works were written in 1869 and afterwards. Some, such as "Thar's More in the Man Than Thar Is in the Land," were written in rural Georgia dialect, while others such as "The Marshes of Glynn" were more serious in nature. As his health continued to deteriorate, Lanier traveled to the mountains of North Carolina, where he died of tuberculosis in Lynn, N.C. on Sept. 7, 1881.

Today, we in this area know him best as the namesake for Lake Lanier, and for his poems about Georgia. We re-print his poem about the Chattahoochee, which gave rise to the lake being named for him.

By the way, with the lake covering much of the river, today you can also see the Chattahoochee "jumping and leaping" as Lanier saw along the river in Gwinnett, when there is low water flowing out of Lake Lanier.

Song of the Chattahoochee

Out of the hills of Habersham,
Down the valleys of Hall,
I hurry amain to reach the plain,
Run the rapid and leap the fall,
Split at the rock and together again,
Accept my bed, or narrow or wide,
And flee from folly on every side
With a lover's pain to attain the plain
Far from the hills of Habersham,
Far from the valleys of Hall.

All down the hills of Habersham,
All through the valleys of Hall,
The rushes cried Abide, abide,
The wilful waterweeds held me thrall,
The laving laurel turned my tide,
The ferns and the fondling grass said Stay,
The dewberry dipped for to work delay,
And the little reeds sighed Abide, abide,
Here in the hills of Habersham,
Here in the valleys of Hall.

High o'er the hills of Habersham,
Veiling the valleys of Hall,
The hickory told me manifold
Fair tales of shade, the poplar tall
Wrought me her shadowy self to hold,
The chestnut, the oak, the walnut, the pine,
Overleaning with flickering meaning and sign,
Said, Pass not, so cold, these manifold
Deep shades of the hills of Habersham,
These glades in the valleys of Hall.

And oft in the hills of Habersham,
And oft in the valleys of Hall,
The white quartz shone, and the smooth brook-stone
Did bar me of passage with friendly brawl,
And many a luminous jewel lone
-Crystals clear or a-cloud with mist,
Ruby, garnet, and amethyst-
Made lures with the lights of streaming stone
In the clefts of the hills of Habersham,
In the beds of the valleys of Hall.

But oh, not the hills of Habersham,
And oh, not the valleys of Hall
Avail: I am fain for to water the plain.
Downward the voices of Duty call-
Downward, to toil and be mixed with the main,
The dry fields burn, and the mills are to turn,
And a myriad flowers mortally yearn,
And the lordly main from beyond the plain
Calls o'er the hills of Habersham,
Calls through the valleys of Hall.

ABOUT OUR SPONSORS

The public spiritedness of our sponsors allows us to bring GwinnettForum.com to you at no cost to readers. Among our sponsors is Jim Cowart Companies which have been developing outstanding neighborhoods throughout Atlanta for over 45 years. Today, Jim Cowart Residential communities continue to stand for the very best in the metro Atlanta area. Homebuyers can expect to find new, award-winning, custom and spec homes located within carefully controlled architectural and landscaped communities, featuring superb amenities. Many homes are available for immediate occupancy. Most of the Jim Cowart Residential communities offer prestigious locations, near excellent shopping, fun community recreation and entertainment, and great schools. For more information, go to www.jimcowart.com.

For a list of other sponsors of this forum, go to: http://www.gwinnettforum.com/about/sponsors.htm

McLEMORE'S WORLD
11/15: Election results

Another great cartoon from Bill McLemore:

NOTABLE
GJAC on full security plan; only jurors allowed before 8 a.m.

The Gwinnett Justice and Administration Center (GJAC) is now operated using a full building security plan. Those entering the building will be subjected to security screening, which includes an x-ray examination of all purses, briefcases, and other containers and a walk through and/or hand wand screening of the person.

The front doors in the main lobby will be the primary entrance for citizens, who will not be allowed inside the building until 8 a.m. Those reporting for jury duty will be allowed inside as early as 7:30 a.m. Each juror must show proper documentation before he or she will be allowed inside the building.

Weapons are prohibited in the Gwinnett Justice and Administration Center. This includes, but is not limited to: firearms, explosives, pocketknives, pepper spray, any sharp objects, etc. Prohibited items must be returned to the owner's vehicle or disposed of in provided containers.

RECOMMENDATION
From Zack Young, Wesleyan School

"Just read The Amateur Marriage by Anne Tyler for the second time recently. It's about a couple that marries during WWII, have children, raise children, experience unusual family crises but who are never really fit to be married to each other. It's a wonderfully told longitudinal tale about the life of the family through the years up to old age. If you like Anne Tyler and the realism she creates through the quirkiness of her characters, this is one of her best."

• An invitation: What Web sites, books or restaurants have you enjoyed? Send us your best recent visit to a restaurant or most recent book you have read along with a short paragraph as to why you liked it, plus what book you plan to read next. --eeb
  
  
  

GEORGIA TIDBIT
Georgia Baptist newspaper has extensive heritage, history

The Christian Index is the official newspaper of the Georgia Baptist Convention. With a circulation of around 62,000, the paper provides news and information to Georgia Baptists. Its contents include news from Baptist and other religious wire services along with material about the Georgia Baptist Convention and affiliated agencies.

The Christian Index

Founded in 1822 in Washington, D.C., by Luther Rice, the "father of Baptist mission work," the paper claims to be the nation's oldest religious newspaper still in print. W. T. Brantley Rice utilized the paper, originally known as the Columbian Star, to raise support for early Baptist mission efforts and Columbian College (now George Washington University).

In 1831, editor W. T. Brantley changed the name of the paper to The Christian Index. In 1833, Jesse Mercer, a Baptist minister, purchased the paper and published it in Washington, Ga. In 1840, Mercer donated The Christian Index to the Georgia Baptist Convention, which moved it to Penfield later that same year. When Mercer Institute (later Mercer University) relocated to Macon in 1857, The Christian Index also moved to Macon. Because of ongoing financial difficulties, the Convention sold the paper around the time of the Civil War. At that point, the paper moved to Atlanta. It changed owners several times until the convention bought it back in 1920.

The Christian Index boasts a list of editors important both to Georgia and Southern Baptist life. In addition to Rice and Jesse Mercer, the founder of Mercer Institute, the Index 's editors have included Henry Tucker (1866, 1878-82, 1885), later president of the University of Georgia; John Hurt (1947-66), later editor of the Texas Baptist newspaper, The Baptist Standard; Jack Harwell (1966-87), later editor of the moderate Baptist newspaper Baptists Today; and R. Albert Mohler (1989-93), current president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. Others have been prominent ministers in the Georgia and the Southern Baptist Conventions.

• To access the Georgia Encyclopedia, go to http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org
  
  

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
Philosophy on money from Kansas native Damon Runyon

"The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, but that's the way to bet."

-- Author Damon Runyon (1884-1946). He also said: "Always try to rub against money, for if you rub against money long enough, some of it may rub off on you."

• Another invitation: What's your favorite saying? Share with others through GwinnettForum. Send to elliott@gwinnettforum.com.
  

MORE: Contact Gwinnett Forum at: elliott@gwinnettforum.com

© 2005, Gwinnett Forum.com. Gwinnett Forum is an online community commentary for exploring pragmatic and sensible social, political and economic approaches to improve life in Gwinnett County, Ga. USA.