NEAFC 31st Annual Conference.pdf - New England Association of ...

NEW ENGLAND ASSOCIATION OF FIRE CHIEFS
"Then, you had better step aside." ’ ?
Good old St.: Peter then turned to a third member of the party, and he said to him:
"What do you do?"
"I’m a cab driveri"
"How long have you been doing that?"
"Oh, about three years."
"All right; the Gates are open to you; walk in."
Well, now, the two ministers, of course, were quite surprised by that, so they
turned to St. Peter and said:
"What goes on here? This isn’t what we were taught."
_ ~A-M=St. Peter said to them:
"Yes, .but that cab driver, in three years, ha,s scared more hell out of people than
you have in. fifty years[" (Laughter and Applause.)
Of course, I am honored to think that you people have come to this particular part
of our State, for eight~ c.onsecutive years, and, even before that, you had been in our
State, up in the mountain areas. You must know that New Hampshire is the most
beautiful and magnificent o.f all the states of the forty-eight, and it is second only to
the New England State from which you may come! (Applause.)
You are here tonight, in. the seacoast area. It i.s a small share of our total beauty,
and I hope that if you have not .done it before, you will have an opportunity to visit
some of the other parts of our State, of which we are very proud. We have 1500 lakes.
’We have sparkling Lake Winnepesaukee, with its 72-mile-around area. We have six
mountains, over a mile high. We have the only chair-lift in the world. We have the
only aerial tramway in this country, the famous cog railway.
Thus, we have in New Hampshire many things that give us distinction in this
great New England community of ours. We certainly do want you to make yourselves
at home while you are here, and please do come back for many more conventions.
And do you know, but sometimes, I feel that perhaps we are a little too hospitable
in our State. We had a Legion convention in Nashua, and there were a lot of boys
there, who were renewing old friendships. The way I get the story is that a couple of
boys were down at the railroad bar, whi.ch is a little establishment d,own beside the
railroad tracks. They came along in time to close up the place, and it was necdssary
for the bartender to gently invite them ~outside, and to be on their way home, which he
did, after considerable persuasion.
Finally, they got outside, and one of the boys had just enough sense of equilibrium
at that point to feel that maybe he shouldn’t go home, so he said:
"You know, if I go home, my wife isn’t going to be very happy, the way I’m
feeling, so I shouldn’t go home."
And the other boy said:
"Well, we’re having a good time in New Hampshire, so maybe you should come
up to the place that I’ve rented. Y~u come on up with me."
So they proceeded to move along towards the second man’s apartment. They got
out in the middle of the railroad tracks, anti as they were going along the tracks, they
got in between the ties, and they stumbled from tie to tie; it was a little difficult walking.
After going for five minutes, sweating and straining, as they tried to step from tie to tie,
one of the boys turned~ to the other, and said:
"This is an awfully long flight of stairs up to your apartment."
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