A Story
(A
Wonderful
Story)
Here's a wonderful story. The famous conductor, Arturo Toscanini once received a letter from a gentleman living in the mountains of Montana. "Dear Mr. Toscanini, I listen to your broadcasts every Sunday night on the radio. I am an old man and I live alone with only my flock of sheep and my violin in a cabin high above Thompson Falls. It's been a long winter. The batteries to my radio are dying and my violin is out of tune. I wonder if you would be kind enough to strike the note of A next week so that when I won't be able to hear you any longer, I can play my violin until the Spring thaw when I can get to town again."

During the following week's broadcast, Toscanini interrupted his program to say, "I'd like to address the gentleman who wrote me from Montana recently. Here sir is the note of A." That night millions of people heard the note sounded in New York City vibrate across America to a small cabin in Montana where the old shepherd, sitting by his radio, couldn't refrain from fiddling with himself long enough to reach for the violin next to him. He spent the rest of that winter humming along to the sound of salt settling in its shaker.  
 

--- Charles Wing Krafft


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