The Key West Citizen

Country Correspondent' Comes To Town Again
Zeke Finds Big Doings In Key West Saturday
Seems like every time me and Marthy get into town there is something going on.
Take for instance last Saturday when we just had to come in to deliver some stuff to some groceries who had asked us to bring it in as soon as we could.
We knew something special was up by the way people were talking about the big parade and the way they were going in and out of the Navy base and air station.
Finally we found out that they were celebrating Armed Forces Day.
So we followed the crowd and went into the Naval Station. Just such a sight met our eyes every way we turned them that we just didn't know where to look.
Those Navy boys really go all out to keep us common folks up to date on what they are doing to keep them Reds off our beaches.
Marthy and me really had a good time and saw a lot of things we could hardly believe but there they were right in front of our eyes.
We're not going to worry any more about them Russians slipping up on us some night and slitting our gullets while we sleep. Let the Navy boys and their other military pals take care of that.
Then we got to about that big parade and just before seven o'clock we found a nice place along the sidewalk so that we could see all the things as they went by.
First off some blimps came floating lazily along overhead and a pretty sight they made, too, as the evening sun glistened on their silvery sides.
Then some funny - looking contraptions, somebody said they were whirley birds, flew over. They were worth seeing too.
Then all of a sudden there came a scream from the skies and some of them jets airplanes flashed by so fast that you could just get a glimpse at them. They'll give them Reds a tussle if they ever come bothering us.
Then, the police department came slowly by, or at least they started to go by, with their sirens screaming. But just as they got in front of Marthy and me they had to stop and wait until the unit behind them did some acting for some people who wer sitting in a sort of bleacher fixed up on a truck at the corner
They finally got through and the police moved along and we thought the preliminaries were over and the parade would come right along.
We were never more wrong in our lives. Every unit as it arrived before the bunch on the corner stopped and went through some of the same things that them ahead had done and then maybe added a little of their own to the show.
It was pretty disgusting to us common folks to have to stand on the sidewalk and wait and wait for the next part of the parade to get to us.
Then when they did get to moving, they were so tuckered out that about all they could do was drag along, mopping the sweat off of their faces.
Maybe me and Marthy are just country hicks and maybe we don't understand the city folks' way of doing things, but we couldn't help but talk about the old parades we used to see on Fourth of July and such days.
In those days the parade moved right along and you could get some idea of what it was all about.
Oh, before I forget, let me tell you that the big truck all fixed up pretty with The Key West Citizen written along the side was mighty pretty and so was another one put out by the merchants.
Old Zeb Parker, who lives on the next farm to ours, told us after we got home that maybe we just misunderstood about the name of the affair. He said it sounded to him like a floor show and that we shouldn't have been so tight that we wouldn't find out how much it cost to get a seat to see it.
But we're learning. Someday we'll be as up-to-date as your city folks.
Got to go and look after the stock now.
Your Country Correspondent,
Zeke.