Yes, I can see that old Indian with his sharp features and wearing his buffalo robe on a cold bitter day leaning against a telegraph pole, with his ear very close listening to the hum of the wire overhead. A grunt and a sigh of bewilderment in his mind as he gazes along the wire stretching for miles and miles across the prairie. He calls it the talking wire. Yes, from city to city, from towns to villages all across this great land of ours.

As you, a proud collector, scan over the two, three or four hundred or more insulators you have collected, cleaned and so carefully arranged so as to show off the beauty, odd shapes and sizes, would you stop for a moment and try to imagine the part each has played in the development of the great communication system we have today.

This little fellow carries a message to loved ones that a new babe was born, mother and child doing fine. This one tells of striking it rich in the gold fields of California, the copper mines of Arizona or the flowing black gold of Texas. Others tell of sorrow and despair, of sickness and death, of war, famine, fire and flood, success and failure.

Every insulator I possess has a special meaning to me - the places I have been, the people I have met, the difficulty getting some of them. The cold, hot, windy or rainy days have caught me seeking a special one I wanted very much. Some of these beauties have stood guard and waited untouched night and day for a hundred years or more to help carry a message of happiness or sorrow to some very concerned person.

Folks, I just love insulators! The part they have played in the development of this country is part of our American history, and in a few decades scarcely any will adorn the skyline of a setting sun.

May I urge more and more people to start a hobby such as this. I promise you willI spend many pleasant days and hours in doing so, and meet many new people and friends you will enjoy very much.