Indianapolis Times, Volume 39, Number 126, Indianapolis, Marion County, 4 October 1927 — Page 4

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SCMPPJ-HOWAAD

The Special Session The demand of the City Manager committee for a special session of the Legislature is merely a demand for honesty. But it is not likely to succeed. Were it merely a matter of righting the wrong done to Indianapolis and Evansville in robbing them of the right to rule themselves and changing their contracts with their mayors, the Governor would probably call the session at once and throw Duvall overboard. But the Governor and everyone else understands that there are even more imperative reasons for a special session than the changing of the City Manager laws. That is important to this city. Other matters are important to the entire State. The State needs a thorough and open public inquiry into its political past which will satisfy the people and will drive from public life those who have disgraced it and brought it into disrepute at home and elsewhere. The criminal courts are taking care of such crimes as have not been outlawed. But that is not enough. The people are more interested in the acts which were reprehensible if not criminal. They want to know what bargains were made with D. C. Stephenson and the Ku-Klux Klan. They want to know -what bargains were made with the Anti-Saloon League. They want to know just who owns their government and their public officials. The special session of the Legislature would be or should be interested in the “black boxes’’ of Stephenson and in the price of horses in this State. It might be interested in following the letters which Senator James Eli M atson says he wrote throughout Indiana in the hope of keeping the head of the Anti-Saloon League from being sent to jail by its Supreme Court. It might or should be interested in knowing what bargains were made by other officials than the Governor with the same secret government. The redemption of Indiana is not a partisan matter. It is an emergency. The people of this city were robbed of selfgovernment by the last session when the politbosses who are now unmasked gave orders and were .obeyed. Mayor Duvall went ,into office under an implied contract to give way at any time the people desired to change to City Manager form of control. That was the law under which he was elected. The Legislature shackled the city for two years. It changed his contract with the people. It is small comfort to repeat that when this was happening The Times alone called attention to this fraud upon the people and that the protest from the friends of the City Manager system was not unanimous or emphatic., The people of this city have a right to demand that the State which robbed them of their rights restore those rights speedily and at once. The people of the State have a right to a quick clean up of all the scandals in order that the next election will be waged upon principles and not upon personalities. They have a right to know the extent of super-government. They have a right to that summary action which can be taken only by the State Legislature. If the Governor hesitates to call that session as he has been requested to do, a march of the 55,000 men and women who voted for the City Manager to the State House in order to emphasize its earnestness would not be the least effective method of getting what belongs to the people. A New Note Anew and unfamiliar note has been struck by Virgil Vandagrifft in his resignation from the board of public works. He uses words which have been almost forgotten in connection with a public office. . He says that the public service is the first consideration and that no man under mental stress over his personal affairs can give the service which should be rendered. In striking contrast with the general attitude that a public official should hang'on to his job as long as he can keep out of jail, his attitude is at least refreshing. The Vandagrifft resignation is on a high plane. It places the welfare of the community above his own wishes or sensibilities. It must be, of course, humiliating for any man to resign under the circumstances which caused it. But he has accomplished it with a dignity and has succeeded in so separating his personal from his officail acts that he does it with dignity that commands admiration. When the public welfare is kept uppermost in the minds of all officials, there will be no necessity for special sessions or investigations or universal demands for resignations. rThe Voice of Labor The president, the secretary and the eight vice--presidents of the American Federation of Labor, composing the executive dmncil of that organization, submitted their annuajAgport to the annual convent

The Indianapolis Times (A SCRIPPS-HOWAKD NEWSPAPER) Owned end published dally (except Sunday) by The Indianapolis Times Publishing Cos., 214-220 W Maryland Street. Indianapolis, Ind. Price in Marlon County. 2 cents —lO cents a week; elsewhere, 3 cents—l 2 cents a week. BOYD GURLEY. ROY W. HOWARD. W. A. MAYBORN. Editor. President. Business Manager. PHONE—MAIN 3500. TUESDAY, OCT. f, 1927. Member ol United Press, Scrlpps-Howard Newspaper Alliance, Newspaper Enterprise Association. Newspaper Information Service and Audit Bureau ot Circulation?. “Give Light and the People Will Find Their Own Way.”— Dante.

tion yesterday in Los Angeles. The concluding paragraph follows: “We believe in the essential justice and rightness of the labor movement, and have found that it promotes the purposes of both good business and humanitarian progress. No movement can maintain wholesome, sustained progress that does not have its roots in vital human activities, guide itself by the facts of experience and And its inspiration in ideals of human welfare. Because it does conform to these tests, we feel doubly assured that the labor movement will continue to make substantial progress.” Calm, quiet, even philosophical, that statement. You can picture the men who joined in its utterance. Men of poise, dignity, restraint; well dressed, clean shaven; looking little different from any other board of directors. Yet, listen to this: “They work us eighteen hours in their slimy burrows. “They killed us by the thousands beneath their rotten tops. “They blew us skyward from the muzzles of their grassy shafts. “They paid for sweat and blood and broken bones with wormy beans end rancid fat. “'rtiey made us live in shacks unfit.for swine and dogs. “They forced us to go begging crusts of bread from brothers poor as we, displaying stumps and blinded eyes as our right to beg. “They kept us in their stinking camps behind barbed wire and stockades like prisoners of war, like convicts doing time. “And scarcely had the last clod hit our coffin when they drove our loved ones from their company shacks—to scrub and wash, to beg or steal or starve or rot. .“And then we met in the dark of night, in culverts, caves and deserted shafts to And a way from woe and want, from slavery and misery. . “Thus the union was born. “How v'e struggled, how we fought and bled for that puny union babe. Oh, the tears we wept and the blood we spilled and the lives we paid to raise that precious child! “At Braidwood, Ludlow and Panther Creek, at Mingo, Latimer and Virden mute tombs still speak of the price we paid for our union. “We. too, had our Valley Forge, where we slept on frozen ground, with shivering limbs and empty guts. We, too, left the tracks of bifeeding feet in the snow of many a camp.

“We, too, had our Fredericksburg and our Appomattox in the war to preserve the union. “We, too, had our Mons and Argonne Aghting for democracy. “Now, you ask us to desert our union—the union that made us free. You ask, and the hell we will.” That appears in the current issue of the Illinois Miner, just off the press. Not the same tone, is it? But every member of the digniAed board described above could subscribe his name to the searing sentences penned by this anonymous spokesman for the miners. Somewhere in the consciousness of each of them is a remembrance of the conditions out of which he and his people have come—conditions to which they are not going back. They have proved the rightness of their course. It is on this foundation that their present assurance rests. Chicago police captured a number of geese after they had escaped from the stockyards and drank a quantity of liquor that had fallen from a truck. Not all the geese ever get to the stockyards, howevfer. “Let’s Be Divorced” is the trade name of perfumery products sponsored by an opera star. The world certainly needs some sort of invitation like that. A married couple in an Ohio city was arrested for spooning in their automobile. It seems you get arrested these days for either arguing with your wife or loving her. A college is a place where a football hero, merely by a good strong handshake, changes a villain into a gentleman—in the movies. A prize has been offered for modern composers to Anish Schubert's UnAnished Symphony. Give the assignment to some jazz writers. They’ll Anish it. An lowa man, 98, has been balked in two recent attempts to marry girls of 60 and 58. Maybe the kid’s bashful. _ Students at a Missouri college have presented school authorities with a petition asking that an afternoon nap be made part of the course. Probably they just want it made official. There are no millionaires in South Dakota, says an item in the news. But another story explains it with the headline Prohibition Most Effective in South Dakota.

Law and Justice Bv Dexter M. Keexer

In the trial of a man for murder his wife was allowed to testify that she saw him bury some object in a hole in which the body of the murdered person was subsequently found. The man was convicted, but appealed on the ground that the conviction was invalid because the trial judge had permitted his wife’s testimony. He claimed that he had a legal right to the protection of marital conAdences which the law guards in order to promote domestic felicity, and that the trial judge had allowed his wife to violate such a conAdence.' The prosecuting attorney argued that while the law protects marital conAdences the man’s activity in burying an object in a hole did not impose any marital duty on the wife to regard it as conAdential, and that there had been nothing illegal about his wife’s testimony concerning it. HOW WOULD YOU DECIDE THIS CASE? The actual decision: The Supreme Court of Indiana decided that the trial judge had acted properly in admitting the wife’s testimony. The court said that when he buried the object it was “not intended to be a conAdential Communication to his wife,” that he had made no attempt to invite his wife’s conAdence about it and consequently she had a legal right to testify concerning his action.

THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES

M. E. TRACY SAYS: Science Has Made Us Rather Drunk With Conceit, Yet Man With All His Accomplishments, Does Not Knoiv Much About the Earth.

Religion is instinctive, if not essential, as George Bernard Shaw points out. Men appear doomed to worship something, no matter how many faiths they discard or how skeptical they may claim to have become. Old shrines crumble and obvious superstitions disappear as the horizon expands, but the vastness of the unknown remains quite as great by comparison'and men seem quite as inclined to believe that it promises the miraculous. / Trust in discoveries yet to be made, in knowledge yet to be revealed, in forces yet to be controlled, plays quite as much of a part in human activities and reactions as it ever did. Instead of destroying religion, science is merely changing its direction. Caveman Hangover Shaw says that he can conceive of salvation without a God but not without religion. Dr. A. A. Brill says that crowd psychology appeals to the cave man hangover in us all. Putting these two thoughts together it is possible to get a slant on the drift of civilization. In primittive times men worshipped the forces of nature and deAed their leaders. One beholds something similar in the modern tendency toward hero worship on the one hand and materialism on the other. Is science leading us back to the primitive? Drunk With Conceit Science has taught us how to build great cities, how to harness rivers, how to Ay and how to employ many natural forces which were formerly believed beyond control. What is more signiAcant, perhaps, science has made us rather drunk with conceit. We have gloriAed man’s achievements until a great many of us honestly believe there is nothing else so big, so beautiful or so promising in life. Atheism is supposed to bespeak j open-mindedness, not to say a superiority of intelligence. Asa matter of commonsense, it j is just another way of declaring . that man represents all the wisdom there is in existence. As another matter of common' sense, it is about as positive and cocksure as any belief ever evolved. Man Not So Great It is not to be denied that men are doing wonderful things compared to what they have done. The things remaining to be done, however, are so much more wonderful that' their progress seems small. No man has yet been able to rise nine miles above the surface of the earth, or descend 400 feet below the surface of the sea. The moon is by all odds our nearest heavenly body, yet no instrument has been devised by which we can see the moon clearer than we can see ordinary objects Ave miles away with the naked eye. The fastest machine we have been able to create travels 300 miles an hour, but if man were to devise a machine that traveled a million miles a minute he would not live long enough to reach the nearest Axed star. When you come to size it all up. man has accomplished very little to warrant the assumption that he knows a great deal about the universe. Even Earth Is Mystery The earth is an inAnitesimal particle of the universe, yet man with all his accomplishments does not know much about the earth. He has not been able to bore a hole in the earth two miles deep. He has not, indeed, been able to scale the highest hill on earth though he has tried to do so for several thousand years. Asa matter of fact, man does not know whether the land lie walks on is a crust inclosing hot soup or the disintegrated surface of a solid mass. Neither does he know what causes earthquakes and volcanoes. Can’t Produce Fair Day When it comes to anything that 'is more than ten miles dotarn or 100 miles up, man is still dealing with theories and speculations. By studying wind and ocean currents, he has been able to acquire some understanding of the weather. He cannot produce a fair day. however, or a thunder shower, much less regulate climate. Yet he often rises to remark that he knows how the universe was made and what operates it, throwing down temples, dethroning gods and blasting ancient faiths to prove the point. Man Bug of Dreams The curious part of it is that man cannot free himself from worshiping something, cannot abandon the conception of Deity without exalting his own kind. No matter how rational he may become, he is still a bug of dreams and adorations. Fall Down Steps Fatal B V Timm Special /WABASH. Ind., Oct. 4.—Ambrose Kisner, iB3, retired farmer, is cfead today as a result of a skull feracture suffered in a fall down steps at his home here..

Byron and Sullivan Do Great Work in 'Hell's Bells;* Trahan Introduces His Muchly Chained Harmonica

When an actor completely sinks his personality and even his appearance into a character, then that

individual is blessed with exceptional power in projecting character. We And this to be true in two instances in “Hells Bells,” a comedy of much cleverness. on the part of Milton Byron as Jap Stillson, and of Larry Sullivan as D. O'Donnell. Both play play very elderly men, rough ones who use • strong Asts and strong words. Byron sub-

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Idabelle t Arnold

merges life, own personality into his character. I am sure that when Byron Arst walks on the stage, I would not have recognized him unless I knew that he was playing the part. He has even erased Milton Byron both from his face and from his voice. This is indeed a great* triumph and as this other person, j Byron gets more laughs from his audience than when he plays just straight parts. His make-up is masterful and the change in his voice is even more commanding. Byron Ats very well into these old men characterizations. I recall his intelligent and earnest work in “The Music Master” of another season. From the standpoint of length this one of the longest roles that Byron has had for some time. I know that it required hours and hours of the most painstaking study to master the role of Jap Stillson. But his efforts are bearing fruit and his Jay atillson stacks up favorably with his Music Master. Larry Sullivan has dressed D. O. with painstaking care as regard to complete abandonment because the vest looks like the covered wagon as it is necessary for him to conceal at least two big revolvers under his vest at times. Sullivan facial transformation is about as wonderful as his vest Here is a slow moving part and Sul-' livan certainly gives it the necessary llow motion tftuch. This week Byron and Sullivan are fiving performances which equals he worth of the play. And “Hell’s Bells” is a good play, mighty human theater. Melodramatic at times, yes. You really have two Old Bill Lightnin’ characters in this comedy of supposed wealth. I And the support this week unusually good. Those helping are Adelaide Mejnotte, Alney Alba, Robert St. Clair. Herbert Dobbins, Bernice Marsolais, Inez Wolf, Idabelle Arnold, J. F. Marlow, William V. Hull and Harry Wright. Miss Alba and Robert St. Clair stage one of the cleverest proposal scenes I have witnessed for a long time. In,that scene Miss Alba does high comedy work. You will And “Hell’s Bells” more than satisfactory entertainment. At the Colonial all week. LYRIC HAS GOOD HEADLINE EVENT Headlining the bill at the Lyric this week is J. Francis Haney’s revue, “At the Stage Door.” It is a dancing act featuring Helen Stew-

Stage Verdict LYRIC—J. Francis Haney presents his revue “At the Stage Door,” starring Helen Stewart. “The Shrinking Violet” is good for what ails you if * you are gloomy. COLONIAL Milton Byron and Larry Sullivan do marvelous character work in “Hell’s Bells” this week. A mighty good comedy. KEITH’S —Three great acts here—Trahan and Wallace, Jack Redmond, and Count Bcrni /Vici and his Symphonic Girls. MUTUAL—“The Jazz Time Revue” has applied the burlesque touch to revue material.

Wash Day in Indiana

BY WALTER D. HICKMAN

art, who does several specialties, the best one being an imitation of ice skaters; her partner is one of the “stage door Johnnies.” Haney’s novelty is a characterization of an old Civil War veteran who still isn’t too old to dance. The members of the company are all eccentric dancers and each does a sole number, which is different from the others. Coogan and Casey offer a comedy skit, “The Shrinking Violet,” that embodies laughs taken from various shows and made into one big laugh. Coogan is “the shrinking violet” and

Casey is the doctor. Coogan’s ailment seems to be a fear of women and of the doctor especially, but she, the doctor, cures him of that. A lot of embarrassing questions, misconstrued by the patient, make the act a riot. Howard and Lind are a couple of women singers who get the old stuff across in a novel way. Banter back and forth

between them make for many laughs. > From a banquet table, beautifully set, “The Franconis,” dressed as waiter and maid, serve a delicious repast of music from the various dishes, silverware and so forth that adorn the board. The idea is one that is seldom seen on the stage, for besides being a musician, the performer has to be a marathon runner, acrobat and a few other things. It is indeed a treat. One nut is bad enough but think what happens when two get together. Fox and Maybelle break out of the same asylum and give the audience a .lot of nutty stuff before they go on their way. Several of the musical numbers are very good and show quite a bit of sanity. A good acrobat is a poor singer or dancer fcs a rule, but there has to be exceptions to all rules or the world would cease to rotate in the good old way. Anyway Louise aid Mitchell are good in all of them, especially the female member of the company. Acrobats that clown their way through an act are not so numerous but the Romas Troupe get more than one laugh from the audience after they get warmed up. They are billed from the "London music halls.” so I guess the English are not so slow after all. Comedies and news reels complete the bill. At the Lyric all this week. (By the observer.) COME GET ACQUAINTED They chain elephants to a little stick to keep ’em from making social visits not planned by the trainer, but never in my life before have I seen a chained harmonica. It remained for A1 Trahan of Trahan and Vesta Wallace to introduce the world to the chained harmonica. A1 introduces this knockout novelty after he has introduced a world of new material. A long chain and a heavy one is attached to a baby harmonica. And for why, I ask the world. A1 explains that he has swallowed three of the things and will take no chances. A1 admits that every genius has a weakness and his might be called the cigaret butt habit. A butt of the cigaret family will cause him to expose his hand and fingers to imaginary traffic at any time. This stunt in his act is a wow. I have placed Roy Cummings on a very high plane, because of his eccentric efforts along acrobatic lines. You recall that I have admitted Cummings to my own very personal Hall of Fame. And now I swing the door wide open and admit A1 Trahan and Miss Wallace. Trahan is essentially an eccentric pianist, but he beyond that characterization/ / His attempt to play the piano while Miss Wallace beedmes operatic is one qt the widest and lupniest

comedy moments I have encountered in several seasons. I admit that I had a problem after seeing the Keith show this week because there are three really great acts present. They are Count Bcrni Vici and his Symphonic Girls, Trahan and Wallace, and Jack Redmond, the gold expert. From a scenic standpoint Bernl Vicl has one of the heaviest acts I have seen. He uses as much scenery of as much splendor as one would expect to see in the "Follies.” Here is the best equipped band act I have ever seen in vaudeville. And the act is mighty heavy on talent. The girls of the orchestra are personally gifted. The dancing of Louise Mele is of such gigantic beauty and artistry. Her acrobatic and her tap dancing is of the Anest quality. The act has beeen splendidly equipped with real material. The orchestra knows its business. Splendid symphonic jazz work is revealed by Berni Vici in his act. Jack Redmond is favorably remembered from his work in “The Vanities.” He is an expert and then some. Trahan Ands time to help Redmond get the laughs. Miss Mary Marlowe is heard in songs and impressions. Murand and Girton have a fast bicycle act. The movie is “The Angel of Broadway.” At Keith’s all week. Other theaters today offer: “Old San Francisco,” at the Circle; “Smile, Brother. Smile,” at the Indiana; “Swim. Girl. Swim,” at the Apollo; “Tell It To Sweeney.” at the Ohio; Tunney-Dempsey Aght pictures, at the Isis and Rivoli. LOOKING OVER NEW . SHOW AT THE MUTUAL While the “Jazz Time Revue” is well on its way to have completed another performance there is an unexpected break. Dave Gardner, the husband, hides behind the screen waiting for the compromising moment between his wife, Kitty Madison, and her lover, Harry Evanson. Just as he Is to step out and denounce them the "author” of the skit, George Rehn, in the audience, tells them how rotten It Is and refuses to let it go on. Then follow rehearsals of it, much to the amusement of the audience. Kitty Madison has given her burlesque presentation. “The Jazz Time Revue,” a slightly different twist. The words and action of feature skits of the “big time” revues are handled in the old burlesque fashion. Featured in the show is Harry

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Mitchell

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OCT. 4, 1927

Thumb-Nail Sketches

A head of gorgeous rags, a bill for the sale of a racing horse, and photographs of a group of students in cap and gown. 1 These things lie within a small trunk which was the last earthly possession of a woman, mute evidence that in her long ago she had been a woman of and education. Who had she been? Her identity is even yet unknown. Night after night she had carried through the halls of a large office building an odorous bucket of hot suds, reddening her hands with suds and scrub brush bravely. Night after night she had bent on her knees, removing each distressing smear of dirt from the Aoors. keeping her pride and her silence wrapped around her like an impenetrable cloak. But the woman was ill; Eventually she lost the job and was conAned to her room. Neighbors in her down-at-the-heels boarding house notlAed the Catholic Community Center that she had no food, and so it was that the worker came to And her. bringing her food which she was too ill to prepare. She needed hospital care and at once, so she was taken to St. Vincent hospital. Her illness was too far advanced for her life to bs saved, but at least for the remaining weeks of her life she was sheltered, fed and protected with care that must have reminded her of those better days of her past. AH efforts to help her And her family were steadfastly refused. Os course she gave a name, but it was most evidently not hers. And so passed over the Great Divide hugging her identity to herself, leaving these few remnants of a more brilliant life. The Catholic Community Center might not have been able to aid her even for this short time had it not been for YOUR COMMUNITY FUND.

Questions and Answers

You can set an answer to any question of fact or information bv writing l to The Indianapolis Times Washington Bureau, 1322 New York Ave., Washington, D. C„ Inclosing 2 cents In stamps' for reply. Medical! legal and marital advice cannot be given nor can extended.: research be undertaken. All other quea-. tlons will receive a personal reply. Unsigned requests cannot be answered. All letters are confldentlal.—Editor. Are dogs imported from Europe quarantined? What is the duty on dogs? Dogs imported from Europe ave turned over to the inspectors of the United States Department of Agriculture at the port of entry. After examination they are not kept in quarantine unless they are to be used in handling sheep or other live stock. In that case they are quarantined for from six to ten day* ar.d are examined foe, tape worms. The duty on dogs is 15 per cfent aef valorem. What docs Philippi mean? It is from the Greek meaning “lover of horses." It was the name of a town In Asia Minor. What battleship cost the most to build? H. M. S. Hood of the British navy cost about 6,000.000 pounds and probably is the most costly battleship. The United States ship Colorado cost a little less than $30,000,~ 000. Evanson, billed as “The Little Boob.’* and boob is right. Evanson is the main comedian of the piece and his humor is dry. His dress is the only thing that charactizes him, for he works with none of the usual artiAces that are employed. He gives the impression that he ought to be twins—one person couldn’t possibly be so dumb. Ann Corio is the feature dancer of the company. Her dancing Is much above the average burlesque dancing while she also has a fair voice, Laurette Dore also leads the chorus onto the runway several times. The hard worked chorus has fair singing ability and their dancing is good. Perhaps the most peculiar thing about the chorus is that they wear clothes. I’m not insinuating that the choruses of other shows don’t, but these girls have rather an abundance of clothes. The show Is not made less Interesting for that! fact, however. The songs are rather catchy* especially those of Miss Madisons. The-e is nothing unusual about the revue, but it is good burlesque. In* eluded in the cast are June Hamilton, Frank Gardner, and Frank McKay. At the Mutual the rest of the week* (By the Observer.)