Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 171, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 July 1918 — Page 3

SPRINTING IS QUITE POPULAR PASTIME AMONG ALLIED SOLDIERS BEHIND LINES

That the soldier is always keen for Recreation, whether on the battlefield or in training camps, is shown in this picture of a field of athletes ready for the start in a 1,400-meter run which is being held behind the firing lines In France. For the time being the runners have discarded their uniforms and rifles and equipped themselves with the best possible athletic material on hand in order that they may show their best speed.. Trench work and camp training have hardened the men, and although many of them had not competed in a race for many years, all succeeded in completing the long distance. ' .

JIM THORPE AGAIN AFTER REGULAR JOB

* Jim Thorpe is a great believer in that old adage, “if you don’t succeed first time, try, try again.” The famous Indian athlete who gained great renown in track athletics and football, is not cutting such a fancy figure In baseball, but he is a bear on perseverance. For the sixth consecutive year Jim is after a regular berth on McGraw’s Giants. Thorpe’s chief trouble since he broke into the major leagues has been his inability to hit curve ball pitching, although last year he was quite effective with the stick against southpaw twirling.

ONE-ARMED STAR IS SLUGGER

Center-Fielder of Hamline University Team Makes Perfect Batting Average—Fast on Bases. jMhve hits In fives times up is the Hope of evcy ball player, and few twohanded hitters come through with the perfect score during a season, but William (“Ottb”) Schfranskl, oqe-arm-ed center fielder of the Hamline university team, has already accomplished the 1,000 batting average feat this year. Schfranskl was born with one arm. His left arm did not grow below the elbow. When a youngster he started playing ball with the other boys and soon became a “regular.” This spring when Coach Baird of Hamline called for players Schfranskl reported, and when the first scheduled game was played he had won a regular portion in center field. A strong throwing arm offsets whatever delay may be occasioned by Schfranski’s style of taking the ball. He wears a glove, and after catching the ball tosses it Into the air while slipping off the glove under his’left arm. Catching the toss, the ball Is sent away propelled by a powerful throwing arm. He takes hard-hit balls as easily as the high ones. At the plate Schfranskl chokes the bat slightly more than the average player, balancing It with his stub arm when he begins his swing, which Is completed with his right arm. He uses a slight crouch and pulls his drives Into left field. He Is fast on the bases. Schfranskl Is twenty-one years old and a senior. He was born at Clayton, Minn.

JAKE PITLER LEAVES PIRATES

Substitute Infielder Leaves Pittsburgh Team to Take Up “War Work" In Factory. ,■ Jake Pitler, substitute infielder of the* Pittsburgh club, is the latest major league ball player to quit the diamond for “war work.” He has taken a position in a Pittsburgh factory and will play ball on the ball team maintained by the factory of which Enos Kirkpatrick is manager.

CUBS SPEND MUCH MONEY

President Weeghman and his partners have spent a world of money to promote the Cubs in Chicago. They paid $500,000 for the franchise in 1916, also $30,000 for players that failed to mhke good. Since last fall the Cub’s owners have spent $50,000 for Alexander and Killifer, sl2, t 000 for Tyler, SIO,OOO for Hollocher and SIO,OOO for Barber. Up to this season the Cubs lost big money in operating expenses, so that when the pennant race began in April it was roughly estimated that the Chicago magnates were at least $700,000 in»the hole. The Cubs, however, are drawing profitable gate receipts at home and abroad this year, and if they remain on top the club’s indebtedness will be considerably reduced.

BASEBALL STORIES

Coach Kid Gleason, It is said, still refuses to join the White Sox. * ♦ * August Moran has been appointed on the umpires’ staff of the National league. * * * O’Farrell will have to do the bulk of the receiving for the Cubs when Bill Klllefer joins the army. * * * Flagstead, the star slugger of the Southern association, has been ordered to report to the Tigers, who own him. • » * With Dick Rudolph in his old-time form the Braves may be expected to raise considerable smoke before the season ends. * • « Ernie Walker of the Mobiles in the Southern league has b<»en landed by Louisville In place of Duke Reilly, who goes to Toronto. \ *** ■ - - Leo Dressen, disgusted with his fail ure to make good on first for the Detroit Tigers, has quit the game and entered a munitions factory. * * * Elmer Myers seems to havd lost some of the speed for,which he was famous when he first made his appearance in the American league. ♦ * * Two players who have found it difficult to get started In stick work this season are Nemo Liebold of the White Sox and Tim Hendryx of the Browns. * • « Fred Merkle has come back in great form as a hitter. The erstwhile first sacker of the Giants has been hitting the ball close to the .350 mark for the Cubs. • * * George Ross, a left-handed pitcher, and Sicklings, a shortstop; have been purchased by the New York Giants from the San Antonio club in the Texas league. r • • Miller Huggins Is partial to ball players who “crab.” This is to be expected, for in the old days when Hug. was in harness he was renowned as a player of this type. £ £ £ ' x While the experts are pondering over who to select for Ty Cobb’s successor they had better take a look at Cobb himself. He is starting on his wild career again. * * * Ruth has played every posltiod possible for a left-hander to play, excepting right’ field. He has played the other outfield positions, first base and has done some pitching. —— —— * • • The St Louis Americans have about given up hope of having Pitcher Nick Cullop in their team this year. As far as they can find out Nick isn’t in the service, or anything, but when the club refused to meet his salary demands in the spring he disappeared and hasn’t been heard of since.

THE EVENING REPUBLICAN. RENSSELAER. IND.

FORMER BALL PLAYER IS WOUNDED AT FRONT

Lieut. D. Sturgis of Uniontown, Pa., well-known athlete and a former member of the Philadelphia American league baseball club, was wounded severely in action June 7, according to a telegram received by bis father, Attorney W. J. Sturgis. Lieutenant Sturgis, who played with the Philadelphia club in 1913, and part of 1914, anfi >who was well known in Bucknell sport circles, was commissioned during the first officers’ training school at Niagara, and was sent to France shortly thereafter.

PINCH HITTING NOT NECESSARY ON TEAM

Sixteen Men Are Plenty for Any Team, Says Brooklyn Owner. t.. McCormick, Hyatt and Lellvelt Are Only Ones That Ever Made Good, Says Napoleon Lajoie of Indianapolis Club. Najoleon Lajoie, now manager of the Indianapolis club, and one of the greatest hitters the game has known, a man, who had a big league batting average of around .350 for 20 years, declares the policy of some to carry players to act merely as pinch hitters is not one of wisdom. “You can count the men who have . filled such a role and mad. good on the fingers of one hand,” slid Larry. “Moose McCormick was on« If I remember right, Pittsburgh ha 1 a player named Hyatt who broke ii to a box score only when he hit for someone else. They tell me Hyatt was quite a success along that line for a year or so. When we had Jack Lelivelt with us in 1913 he came through nicely with many a safe hit. “But the man who sits on the bench day after day and only occasionally gets a chance to go to bat and try to hit in a regular.game has not much of an opportunity to deliver. The odds are all 'against him. Of course, you may say he gets his batting practice every day the same as the other batters. True enough, but that does not count like hitting practice in real games. Few pitchers use much stuff in batting practice. “I have had some experience in the pinch-hitting business myself. .Remember when Ed Klepfer broke a finger on one of my hands and the thumb on the other hand? Remember how Joe Birmingham called on me several times to hit before I was ready to get back in the game regularly? I’ll admit I delivered until the pitchers insisted on handing me bases on balls, but I had not been out of the game long enough to lofee my batting eye. But if I were to sit on a bench and be nothing more than a pinch hitter, perhaps I would not be any more successful than many others w T ho have tried to deliver and failed. But I woifld not say I would fall down until I had tried.”

LES MANN IS GREATLY IMPROVED BALL PLAYER

Les Mann is a greatly improved ball player. He has always shone brilliantly in fielding, but this season his batting has taken a decided jump; His base running also shows an Improvement. One of the features of his playing, In addition hitting and fielding, has been his aggressiveness. In that he leads the Cubs. He showed it recently by the clash he had with Heinie Zimmerman at third base. He saw an opportunity to score another run for the Cubs by driving the ball out of Heinie Zimmerman’s hand. In this he did not succeed, but it demonstrated that the spirit to win was always foremost in his mind. He probably was inspired to more aggressiveness by the training he received ar Camp Logan in the winter, where he bad charge of the Y. M. C. A. athletics.

Caton Is Smallest Player.

“Kid” Caton, the Pirates’ shortstop, is the smallest player in the major leagues. He is making good. He was secured from Birmingham.

Indians Release Peters.

I Catcher John Peters has been released by the Cleveland Indians.

Bagging Their First Hun Planes

Home-Trained American Boys Tell How They Shot Down Enemy Fliers From the Sky 7 tbpT HAPPENED while we were ■ bowling along a smooth I French road that split innu- ■ merable red-tiled villages in lia lves on its way to the American front, writes Her- ' man Whitaker in the Detroit News. A week before I had jour- MM IT neyed around our flying instruction stations in south France, where our lads were to be seen in training from their first ridiculous “hops” witli wing-clipped “pengulns” to the daredevil stunts on the » acrobatic field. There I had watched

perform a n c e s that would have raised the hair of Lincoln Beachey or any other of the stunt flyers of five years ago. For in the ordinary course of their flying our lads are taught the “vreille,” or tail spin; the “r e versement,” a half loop and fait jsldeways; to “camel, turning over and over sideways like a rolling cask; the “vertical cirage,” a 90-degree bank, said to be a most disagreeable first experience ; to bank and side slip the distance required to elude a pursuer; a difficult operation which the beginner usually ends in a

“barrel.” While dropping from a boy pull valmost the whole bag of tricks. In fact he put'his plane through every possible twist and gyration — and many impossible—in an actual fall. Visits U. S. Squadron. With this knowledge stored away I was now on my way to visit an American squadrilla in actual service at the front. As we approached the last town between us and the trenches I finished telling the, lieutenant from general headquarters about a submarine I had seen captured while enilsing with our destroyer flotilla in English waters. He agreed that it was as fine a bit of luck as ever fell to a correspondent. “But lightning never strikes twice in the same place,” he added. “You used up all the luck that is coming to you in this war. You won’t get in on anything like that again.” He was, however, mistaken. Nature’s laws are said to be without exceptions, but he had no more than said it before the lightning violated all precedents and struck again—through the raised hand and arm of an American military policeman on the edge of the town. “Pinched!” our sergeant chauffeur exclaimed when the hand went up. He was not altogether jpking. Military law is not unlike that of the Medes And Persians which altereth not. Because of some mixup in their passes three correspondents had -been “pinched” by the military police and brought back to M. G. H. Q. the week before in a state of uncertainty as to whether or no they would be shot at sunrise. The sergeant added as the car rolled on to a slow stop: “You can get by the French military police with any old thing—beer check, laundry bill, chewing gum coupon, anything that’s written in English and looks official, but when them'lron-jaws of mirs hold up a hand it means you.” Je See Boche The “iron jaw,” however, was relaxed in a pleasant smile. Saluting, its owner informed us: “If you drive round by the public square you will see two Boche planes our boys have just shot down. It’s worth yoUr while, for these are the first planes brought down by home-trained American aviators flying our own flag.” “First Submarine —first plane!” the lieutenant commented as we drove on. “You must be the luckiest man in the whole world!” It happened to be Sunday, and in the square we found dozens of women,

Risked Life for Leader

When the steamer Rochester was sinking, the men of the armed guard abandoned the ship in the various boats assigned to them. The explosion of the torpedo had damaged one of the ship’s boats and a redistribution of the men among the remaining boats became, necessary. W. F. Eisenhardt, a member of the United States naval armed guard, had ; een stationed at the bow-painter of one of these boats.

LIEUT. ALAN WINSLOW (LEFT) AND LIEUT. DOUGLAS CAMPBELL, FIRST AMERICAN AVIATORS TO BRING DOWN ENEMY PLANES

GERMAN AIRPLANE BROUGHT DOWN IN FLAMES

children and pretty French girls, all in their 2p-to-meetlng best, elbowing through a mixed crowd of Pollus, Tommies and Sammies to get a good view of the wrecks. Of the two Albatrosses one had burned in mid-air and lay a charred wreck on the ground. The other could easily be fitted for flying again. Both their pilots had survived, though one was badly burned. Their conquerors, we were told, could be found at the flying field outside the town, and a very few minutes thereafter it opened before our speeding car; a dead flat plain bounded on one side by long low barracks; on the other by camouflaged hangars. In front of one, surrounded by a mixed mob of mechanics and flyers, stood the victorious planes. In the crowd we found two of our crack fliers who had recently been transferred to us from the Lafayettes. One had just received the newly created American ord?r for distinguished conduct. The other has no less than 16 official “crashes” to his credit and twice as many that are unrecorded. All Like “Maiden Aunts.” Usually the presence of this one man would be sufficient to set any hangar abuzz with excitement. But today he and his fellow stars were “suping” in a scene which in its general features strongly resembled that created in an average American household by the first visit of the stork. The same atmosphere of quiet joy. suppressed excitement, prevailed. In their pleased interest, indeed, the two stars might have acceptably filled the role of maiden aunts at a christening. They were bashful about their age as girls—for the opposite reason. They would fain have been older. When pressed for the truth Douglas Campbell, a young Californian, admitted one and twenty. Alan Winslow, who hails from Chicago, went him one better. Babies! Just out of their Infancy! Think of it! But then —this aerial war has been conducted from the first by babes. Of course you want to know more about them. Alan Winslow, then, trained with the French; therefore must yield to young Campbell, who was born and raised at the Lick observatory on the top of Mount Hamilton in central California —with its wooded gorges, deep ravines, cosmic outlook over foothills and plains, surely an ideal eyrie for a young eagle. He had taken his ground training at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and was completely American trained.

He was told to let this go and get into the boat. This he refused to do, thinking the commander of the armed guard was still on board. He remained on board long enough to satisfy himself by search that his superior was not aboard. Eisenhardt was tfle last man to leave the Rochester. He was one of the occupants of the open boat that landed five days liter on the Irish coast. He has been commended by the secretary of the navy. Eisenhardt is twenty-one years old. He comes from New Orleans.

Your fighter is never a talker, and of all fighte s the air men go the limit in slowness of speech. Even alter Winslow, the hoary elder of two and twenty, was finally prodded to talk, he left so much to the Imagination that It Is necessary to fill In between his wide lines. Hear Planes Coming. He and Campbell had got out early for the first official flight and were playing cards in a tent near their hangar while the mechanics tuned up their machines. The morning was clear, sunlight streaming between soft clouds high over the flying field. From the sand bag targets, where a machine gun was being lined up and synchronized with the motor, came staccato bursts of firing. Everything was going on as usual, when in response to a telephone call from some far observation post, a bugle shrilled out the “Alerte!” “I was already :p. my flying togs" Winslow’ explained, ao got ,nto the air at once. Campbell followed about a minute later. The Boche planes had just come into view, flying quite low, not higher than 1,000 feet. Their pilots said afterward that they were lost and mistook our station for their own, otherwise they would never have ventured intp such a hornets nest. “To me it seemed impossible. I felt sure it must be some of our fellows coming in from another station. But the ‘Alerte!’ kept me ready. They were flying higher than we and the Instant I sighted the German cross I let fly a burst from my gun. Shot in Second Burst “The BoChe answered, but already I had bapkefi steeply on a half loop that carried me above him; then describing a ‘vreille;’ that is, a tail spin. I came squarely behind and shot him down with my second burst. “By that time Campbell was chasing his man like a hawk after a running chicken across the sky, and I lit out after them. How that Boche did go! But he was too slow. Just as I caught up Campbell sent him down in flames.” He summed up this remarkable contest in. the following schedule: “The ‘Alerte!’ sounded at 8:45. Eight-fifty, closed with the Boche. Eight fifty-one, shot down my man. Eight fifty-two, Campbell got his. Eight fifty-three, back on the ground.” Eight minutes by the clock! Good work! We went Into their rooms to view the trophies, guns, cartridge belts, clocks and so forth that were laid out on their cots, and while we were looking them over (Campbell added the last humane touch to the story. In sky warfare alone, It's raid, have the Germans displayed any chivalry, a thing that is quite understandable. The uttermost bravery called for in those desperate duels up there in the wide and lonely vault of heaven is always associated with chlvalric spirit. The knightly tradition still obtains and this lad’s utterance proved that our boys can be depended upon to uphold it. “My fellow was wearing an iron cross. I wanted it badly, but the poor devil was suffering enough from his burns. I hadn’t the heart to take it from him.” Fine feeling! There is. no such thing as defeat for men animated by such spirit backed up by th? thorough, intensive training given at our fields. - By a quick combination of acrobatics he had learned during instruction Winslow had got his man. And as I thought of the quick-witted lads that are now getting the same training not by the tens and twenties but by hundreds and thousands, I mentally echoed a favorite exclamation of the British Tommy: “Poor old Fritz!”

Educational Influences.

“Do you find that your farmhands are benefited by a course of reading?” “Yes,” replied Farmer CorntosseL “They’ve gotten about all there is from the scientific works on agriculture. —When I want ’ein to bustie fcr crops now, I make ’em read the war news.”

In These Days of Many Laws.

“There ought to be a law against It” “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I’ll bet there in"