Indianapolis Times, Volume 44, Number 206, Indianapolis, Marion County, 6 January 1933 — Page 13

Second Section

itteoK | Nook

Guy de Pourtales

Having written the lives of Liszt and Chopin, it is not surprising that Guy de Pourtales, farrmus French author, turns to another great musician. This time, the author is interested in Riogard Wagner. His biography of Wagner has recently been published by Harper & Brothers. tt tt tt BY WALTER D. HICKMAN YEARS before I made my first trip to New York I had the nutty idea that I wouldn’t see the kindly, cruel human and interesting New York. In other words, I wanted to get out of the beaten track and not just lake a tour of the city. I was lucky because my pilots on my many trips to New York were such friends as newspaper men, actors, press agents and even song writers and piano players. And I know I have seen quite a slice of New York life as recorded by Helen Worden in “The Real New York,” just published by the BobbsMerrill Company and sells for $2.50. If you have never been to the big city, get hold of this book, because the author is a newspaper woman and very wise as to the goings-on, both day and night. It is the most human “guide book” og New York I have ever read. Quite wisely, she starts out with your stomach. I hope I am not trying to be too familiar, but she lists places to cat where food is served that “Cleopatra would call home-com-ing.” If you want to slop coffee with the big names on the stage as well as those that appear on the front page of the dailies, then take Miss Worden’s tips and you will see the mighty dine and sip. And she lists the prices for two. She tells you where you can get the best frog legs in New York and the two places where you can buy green cheese and she even tips you how to prepare it. My >ips are watering as I write this. Where to cab—the different places, including the “speaks” where good food is cooked while on (not meaning you, of course) drains an old-fashioned and the like. The food is cheap in price, but the refreshments? Oh, what a headache. The trip that she takes you on in the Bowery is the most human of all. And she will not let you miss Kennedy’s restaurant and the OneMile House, one of the largest flophouses in the Bowery. This book gives you the real Chinatown of New York. And it is not so mysterious as the subject matter suggests. And in the same chapter the author tells you where you may buy red wine and plaster saints. Quite a combination. Whether you go to New York or l.ot, read “The Real New York,” because it Is great literary theater. a a a Best sellers in non-fiction over the country includes: “Farewell, Miss Julie Logan.” by James M. Barrie; “Flowering Wilderness.” by John Galsworthy; “Mutiny on the Bounty,” by Hall and Nordhoff; “Invitation to the Waltz,” by Rosamond Lehmann, and “Bachelor's Bounty,” by Grace Richardson. The J. B. Lippincott Company informs me that their spring publications in fiction will include "Encore the Lone Wolf,” by Louis Joseph Vance. In this story, the famous Duclos pearls and the Duclos fortune are the prizes for which the Lone Wolf and his son and daugh-ter-in-law engage with the denizens of the New York underworld in a series of thrilling encounters. ana Mv mail the last few days contained a letter that made me want to shout. You recll how I loved the best children's book of the last ten years—“Funday,” by 110 Orleans. Well, the author has written me a letter, and he is going to make me “a belated Santa Claus.” Here is the letter, which is one of the finest 1 have received: “There has come to my desk a copy of the very delightful review of my book ‘Funday’ which appeared in your column of Dec. 2, 1932. “While many reviewers, to my great amazement, indulged themselves in superlatives with regard to my very humble effort, I was particularly touched by the extent of your enthusiasm in your suggestion that if you had money, ‘meaning gobs of it,’ you would set up funds for a wider distribution of my book. “I haven't ‘gobs of it’ either, but I can send to you a dozen copies of •Funday’ with my compliments if you know of twelve youngsters who would find some delight in its pages. Do you care to be a somewhat belated Santa Claus? Let me know, and I will see that tl*o books are shipped out to you. “With all good wishes for a jear brimful of Fundays and with deep appreciation for your kindly words of commendation. I am “Sincerely yours, "ILO ORLEANS.” And I have WTitten the author, and I am wild to be Santa Claus even in January.

Full T,*a*pci Wire Service of the United Press Association

INTEREST EATS BIG SHARE OF SCHOOLFUNDS $102,460 Paid on Library Bond Issue, With None of Principal Retired. ‘PAY AS YOU GO’ URGED A. B. Good, Business Director, Gives Figures to Show Argument Is Right. BY LOWELL NUSSBAUM Back in 1911, the citizenry of Indianapolis' deemed it advisable to build a new' public library, and the school board obliged by purchasing a site at Meridian and St. Clair streets, paying for it by issuing $125,000 in bonds. Today, the school city still owns the site, on which a handsome structure has been built, but it also owes the entire $125,000 bond issue, despite the fact $102,460 in interest has been paid. The bonds will not mature until 1946. This incident, together with many similar ones, shown in a report compiled today by a. B. Good, schools’ business director, provides a strong argument for backers of the “pay-as-you-go” plan. Since 1872, when the first Indianapolis school bonds were sold, the school city has issued a total of $15,674,300 in bonds. It still owes $10,644,000 of that total. Cost Is Enormous Bond totaling only $5,030,300 have been paid off in that 60-year period, but the staggering sum of $7,053,688 has been required thus far for the privilege of keeping up with the building needs of a growing school population, and passing the bills on to posterity. The practice of issuing bonds w'as started by the school city in 1872, when SIOO,OOO bonds were sold. At that time the board was informed by its attorney, school records reveal, that the law permitted it to assume an indebtedness no greater than that sum, and required that the bonds be retired within five years. To meet this retirement provision, the board refunded the issue four times, until the bonding power was enlarged in the ‘nineties. After that, issuance of bonds to meet cost of constructing school buildings and acquiring sites became a regular practice, but no extensive issues were sold until 1919, when the board issued $1,300,000 for a unit at Tech, for repairs and real estate. Amount Keeps Increasing In 1920 issues sold totaled $4,236,000, while in 1921 an even greater amount of bonds, $4,736,000 were issued. Nearly $12,000,000 of the total amount of bonds issued in the sixty year period was sold in the last thirteen years. Thirty years ago, in 1903, an issue of $200,000 was sold. Os this amount, $72,000 still is outstanding and will not be retired until 1934 and 1935. Interest thus far has totaled $183,365. These are the oldest bonds still outstanding. The following year the board floated an issue of $150,000, on which $140,962 interest has been paid and $112,000 of the bonds still are outstanding. Although the main library site was acquired in 1911 bonds for the library building w'ere not authorized until 1915, when a $500,000 issue was sold, the entire issue to mature in 1955.• Only One Bond Retired Only one SI,OOO bond has been retired, leaving $499,000 outstanding, and the school city paying out $21,000 interest annually on the issue. Thus far, interest on the library building has totaled $361,228. Thus the library site and building bonds totaled $625,000, of which only SI,OOO has been paid, and on which interest already has amounted to $501,290. and which at their maturity, will total $1,055,290. which is $430,000 more than the bonds. Many other amazing facts are show'n by Good's summary of the schools’ bonded debt. In 1894. the school city sold a $60,000 issue, which has been paid off, but which cost $62,100 in interest. An issue of $1,645,000 for building the Teen shop and pow’er house and Schools 22 and 26 was sold in 1920. These bonds will not mature until 1940, but the board has bought up and retired $202,000. Interest on this issue has cost $947,952 thus far. and by 1940 will have cost $1,496,202. Interest Equals Principal Considering the fact that the bonds were sold at a discount df nearly $200,000. the interest in twenty years will equal the principal. The present school board. Good pointed out, has retired more bonds than it has issued. Since Jan. 1, 1930, when the present board came into power, bonds totaling only $700,000 have been issued, while other bonds totaling $1,247,000 have been retired, a net reduction in the bonded debt of $547,000. NEW STUTZ DISPLAYED AT SHOW Large Crowd of Notables Looks on at New York Exhibit. Before the largest crowd of financial and social notables seen in New York's automobile row in years, new models of the Stutz Motor Car Company of Indianapolis formally were presented to the public Thursday by Charles M. Schwab, financier and stockholder of the company. The presentation was made in a setting displaying fifteen of the new Stutz models, including the utility Pak-Age-Car, following a tea in charge of an official of Good Housekeeping Institute.

The Indianapolis Times

Sweet Land of Volstead — No. 4 EXTRA! FIRST DRY LAW PINCH!

Brooklyn Saloonkeeper Nabbed Soon After Lid Fell

Forrest Davis presents today the fourth of six articles on the amarine twelveyear Volstead era and the factors leadine un to it—a subject of increased interest with the present clash of the lame duck session of congress. BY FORREST DAVIS Times Staff Writer iCopvright. 1933. bv New York WorldTelegram Corporation) A FEW minutes past the midnight, on Jan. 17, 1920, a policeman—whether conscientiously or from mere malice, does not appear on the record—arrested Mike Minden in his saloon, at Howard avenue and Monroe street, Brooklyn, for selling a glass of brandy.. Minden, spoken of in the press of the day as a “well-known dramseller,” thus became the first prisoner in the great war; a conflict of mass will against authority, which would perplex the land for twelve years and longer. Fifteen minutes before the policeman collared Minden, it had been no crime to pass a hooker of brandy across the bar. Now, through the metaphysics of certain ponderous phrases engrossed on congressional records at Washington and numerous state capitals, the act had become an offense against that revered instument, the Constitution of the United States. The almost comical disparity between Minden’s petty trafficking and the august eminence of the fundamental charter of the people's liberties appeared not to strike observers in 1920. So, with the arrest of an obscure rum-seller in Brooklyn, the issue actually was joined. Would the American people, spirited and touchy about their rights in earlier times, observe an ordinance which so drastically altered ages-old habits and customs? Could the use of alcoholic beverages—as natural to many races and to countless individuals as swallowing tea or coffee, eating, or talking—be eradicated from the land, from New York City, by a fiat hysterically arrived at? a a a 'T'HE dry crusaders in January, 1920, expressed a naive faith in the ability of the law arbitrarily to amend manners, rob bowsers of their thirst and stamp out ancient mental attitudes. It has been suggested that the childlike reliance of American reformers on the statutes stems from their evangelical upbringing. Mr. Daniels, and the prelatical wing led by Bishop Cannon, believed almost pathetically that rum would vanish as by magic. But, instead of a dry republic, the abracadabra of the eighteenth amendment and Mr. Volstead’s definitive straightjacket, brought us in the incredible 1920’5, the Speakeasy Age; hip flasks, Rum Row, all but universal cocktails, an army of bootleggers incessantly corrupting enforcement officers, “disrespect for law,” and in the end the most ferocious clash of propaganda witnessed since the slavery issue merged into the Civil war. Moreover, the attempt to correct a nation’s habits as a severe parent does a child’s, revived the cult of drunkenness which had been waning steadily. The drinking of spirits had decreased steadily from 1850 to 1913, by, roughly, 40 percent per capita. Beer consumption had advanced during that period from 4.08 gallons per capita to 22.80 gallons. The use of wines had doubled. In the eaiiy years of this century, the country seemed progressively co be sobering up. The Yankee, in his earlier stages, a spirits drinker similarly to his north European forbears, had turned to milder brews. But prohibition reversed the process. Gin, hitherto regarded with contempt by the stalwart, who relished honest bourbon and rye; treated with disdain by the fastidious; held by many to be no beverage at all, but merely a degraded tipple—gin promptly became the national drink. The reason is obvious. Sound, imported liquors were expensive; beer too bulky for profitable trainsport. Alcohol, distilled in the thousands of illicit laboratories that sprang up everywhere, easily could be turned into a passable gin by the city house-

Open Congress Drive to Save Nation’s Schools BY MAX STERN Times Staff Writer WASHINGTON, Jan. 6.—The call of educators to save schools from the blight of economy drives and depleted tax funds has been heard on Capitol hill, and first-aid measures are being prepared for immediate consideration by congress. Senator Walter F. George (Dem., Ga.), has introduced a measure to .make available to states, counties and school districts loans from the Reconstruction Finance Corporation to keep the schools open and the teachers on the salary rolls. Early hearings have been asked for the measure, now before the banking committee.

“The nation is confronted with the collapse of its public school systems,” said Senator George today. "That free education should pass from this country for even a short time is unthinkable in any community. “The official figures of the United States bureau of education show that in a number of states all or nearly all of the rural schools of some counties either already have closed, or will close within the new year. “In other localities, the official, government reports show, city i schools and some of the county; schools will be kept open only upon a tuition basis. Nor is this condition limited to any one portion of j the nation. “In Arkansas, an alarmingly large

INDIANAPOLIS, FRIDAY, JANUARY 6, 1933

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Drawing from New York Evening World of Jan. 16, 1920, mourning the fact that, with the coming of the Volstead era, the pocket flask, hangover, corkscrew, etc., would be no more. Above, Deputy Police Commissioner John A. Leach (right) watches agents pour liquor in sewer following a raid in June, 1921.

holder. He had only to add “drops” and glycerine. a a a ASIDE from the mechanics of drinking in “dry America,” what of the sociological effect? The first three years witnessed a slow unfolding of the stubborn resistance which was, in 1932, to find convincing political expression. Citizens boasted in the early 1920’s of a reliable bootlegger. For several years it was considered smart to know your bootlegger socially. The youth of the land, in whose name the protective shield of Volsteadism had been raised, discovered the zestful, if punitive, delights of getting pickled, boiled, fried, etc. It was in this time, likewise, that the captioius conduct of the youngsters when likkered-up most attracted the horrror of the odler generation. The gals of debutante age shed their corsets at dances; and old gentlemen in clubs and elderly ladies around the auction bridge tables wet their lips as they repeated the titillant gossip. Boys, it was said, were not welcome escorts unless the manfully bore capacious flasks of gin. Brave fathers and mothers took to sup-

Leslie’s Claim of Huge State Surplus Ridiculed

Democratic legislative leaders today rallied to attack an assertion by Governor Harry G. Leslie, retiring Republican, that he is releasing reins of the state with a healthy balance of $17,762,277.65 in the treasury. Leslie made the statement in his message at the opening session of the general assembly Thursday. Democrats grew suspicious when they learned that he had not procured the figure through the office of Floyd E. Williamson, state auditor.

number of public schools will be open this year on a tuition basis. “In Alabama, the state superintendent reported that probably onehalf of the rural schools of the state would have to close permanently before New Year's day. “In North Dakota, many schools can be k?pt open only in case the teachers are willing to ‘board around ’ Salaries can not be paid. "Michigan has been forced to redue • its maximum millage to 15 mills a cut that the state superintendent says will necessitate the closing of many schools. “In Chicago, the teachers have gone without pay for so long that they have become the objects of national pity. From my own state has come a cry for help that I feel I must heed. My people beg for help to save their free schools.”

plying late teen-age daughters with flasks from their own tested stores in order, as they fondly thought, to preserve the darlings from poisoned potables. Gradually, the donkey-like refusal of the people to do without their liquor showed itself, alarming by 1923, even the most fatuous of the Anti-Saloon League’s optimists. a u a THE wets, as we have seen, were caught flatfooted by na-tion-wide prohibition. Nor did they rally for many a year. It was the fashion in the first third of the 1920s to accept the conviction of the drys that “prohibition is here to stay” as gospel. Few hoped that the eighteenth amendment could be dislodged, at least in their lifetimes. Drinking, therefore, took on an added quality. It was not only amusing to indulge moderately in forbidden fruit; it was more than a gallant social gesture, adding new excitements to living; it grew to be a sort of political duty. If the sincere wet couldn’t expect to set aside the law, he could, gustily and with a clear conscience, thumb his nose at it and and at the hatefully restrictive philosophy it embodied. And presently the Anti-Saloon ’ League zealots were striking back

Williamson, who, with Lawrence F. Orr. chief of the state board of accounts, has predicted a $3.000000 general fund deficit at the close of the fiscal year Sept, 30, pointed out that the Governor's figure bore little or no relation to the general fund, which represents the actual state of financial affairs, he asserts. The general fund receives all revenue, largest part of which is paid under special statutory regulations. What remains must carry the cost of the government from day to day, and unless new revenues are found this will be insufficient, he said. Leslie merely took the bank balances from the treasurer’s office. “It is like giving the figure for your bank balance and not mentioning that more than that amount of checks are outstanding,” Williamson explained. Senator Anderson Ketchum ( Dem.. Greensburg), president pro tern, of the senate, asserted that if the state was in such fine shape as Leslie claimed, there would be no need of the present session of the legislature. “Instead, we are facing financial ruin and the gravest social problems in history,” Ketchum declared. Figures in the auditor’s office disclose that only $3,610,470 was in the general fund for all purposes of state government on Jan. 1. This is how Leslie’s total is made up, as of Jan. 1: State highway funds, $5,541,321; gasoline tax, $4,374,157; rotary fund for penal institutions. $282,544; school revenues, $1,821,684; teachers’ retirement fund, $537 014; Purdue trust fund. $340,000; common school, $5,374; motor police, $51,701; World war memorial, $113,143; Clark memorial. $49,026; fire marshal, $12,513; library building. $453,157: forestry, $37,131; unclaimed estates, $136,608; architects’ fund, $2,341; swamp lands, $22,288; Dunes state park, $11,471; educational improvement fund, $296,599; agriculture board, $40,540; permanent endowment interest. $lBlB5, and sinking fund to protect bank deposits of state in lieu of bonds, $5,564.

at the “good citizens” who so shockingly ignored the law. Dr. Charles W. Eliot, at Harvard, as early as May 24, 1920, detected an informal conspiracy on the part of “these so-called best people” to nullify the law. But the sincere wets, buying liquor “just off the boats,” dining by choice in Italian table d’hotes where one openly could enjoy the civilized pleasure of wine with food took their stand with Dr. Arthur Twining Hadley, presi-dent-emeritus of Yale, rather than with Dr. Eliot. Dr. Hadley viewed nullification of the dry laws with no dread, but rather as a “safety valve which helps a self-governing community avoid the alternative between tyranny and revolution.” tt a a THE first three years of the experiment “noble in motive” were not, however, primarily years of agitation. The dry, well pleased with their triumph, rested on the oars. The wets, unorganized politically, finding shelter in neither major party, pretty thoroughly were persuaded that they had no political recourse. Nor had the underworld yet grown unbelievably prosperous on the new liquor traffic’s profits. The Capones, Dwyers, Maddens et al had not yet emerged as troublesome phenomena. These were the rather bewildering years when brewers sought to cultivate a public taste for “cereal beverages”; when saloonkeepers hoped to keep running as sandwich shop proprietors; when candy makers widely advertised sweets as a substitute for whisky; when presumably reformed sots were advised to eat an apple whenever that dreadful thirst stole upon them. The middle period of the Volsteadian age brought tentative efforts at modification and repeal—and the grim organization of the illicit liquor trade into a social menace. That phase will be taken up in the next article.

Jewish Congregation Will Observe 20th Anniversary

Three Rabbis Will Take Part in Ezes Achim Celebration. The twentieth birthday anniversary jubilee of the Ezes Achim Hebrew congregation, Norwood and South Meridian streets, will be held at 6:30 p. m. Sunday. Three rabbis, Morris M. Feuerlicht, Milton Steinberg, and Abraham Lazar, in addition to the congregation’s rabbi, Israel Horwitz, will speak at the anniversary. State Senator Jacob Weiss, Indianapolis attorney, will be another speaker. Cantors J. Berman and Sam Levin will chant. Other entertainment includes songs by Leonora Wolf and Esther Liskin, and Solly Maurer; violin selections by Louis Casey and a piano recital by Ruth Smulyan. Sam Kaplan is president of the Congregation. Aaron Cohen is chairman of the anniversary program committees. The women’s committee in charge of arrangements for the anniversary composes Mrs. Samuel Schampain, president of the ladies’ auxiliary; Mrs. A. Brody, Mrs. Fred Schuman, Mrs. Abe Tubin, Mrs. Sam Zukerman and Mrs. Aaron Cohen. The men’s committee is com-

Second Section

Entered as Second-Class Matter at Postoffice. Indianapolis

MUSCLE SHOALS VICTORY NOW APPEARS NEAR FOR NORRIS AFTER LONG FIGHT Roosevelt’s Regime Likely to Transform Old White Elephant Into Work Beast, with Steady Job Serving Public. RUHR IN AMERICA IS VISIONED Battle Against Powerful Corporations Appears Near Climax, With Victory for Doughty Nebraska Senator. By Scripps-Hotcard Newspaper Alliance WASHINGTON, Jan. 6. The fight of a kindly old man against two administrations, and the dogged hosts of rich and powerful corporations is about to culminate in victory as part of the Rooseveltian new ileal. For the first time in more than twelve years, it now appears certain that the old white elephant, Muscle Shoals, may be transformed into a good, gray, work-a-day beast that will labor in the valley of the Tennessee and, perhaps, develop another Ruhr in America.

30-HOUR WORK WEEKBAGKED Federation of Labor Chief Cites Surprising Figures on Night Shifts. B’J Bcripps-H award Newspaper Alliance WASHINGTON, Jan. 6.—Surprising figures to show that some industries still are working long hours and engaged in night shift operations were presented to a senate subcommittee Thursday by Presi* dent William Green of the American Federation of Labor, in expressing whole-hearted support for the bill by Ssenator Black (Dem., Ala.) to establish the thirty-hour week in industry. Green asserted vehemently that the shorter work week is the only answer to unemployment and the problem of stabilizing industry. The mechanization of industry, he declared, has inured almost wholly to the benefit of the employer and to the detriment of labor. With 11,800,000 persons out of work today, according to the latest tabulation, he asserted, little more than half of them could be absorbed back into employment under the present system, even were the peak prosperity of 1929 restored overnight. Department of labor statistics for 1932, he said, show that in the cotton goods trade, the fifty-five-hour week predominated. Out of 154 firms, he pointed out, 68 per cent worked the fifty-five-hour week and 66 per cent were on night shifts. In woolen goods, the average full-time work week was more than fifty hours, and in hosiery, the full-time standard was a work week of a fraction more than 51 Vi hours. STRAUSS__WILL SPEAK Sermon Will Be Given at Meeting of Hebrew Congregation. Sermon on an unannounced subject will be given by Leonard A. Strauss, president of the Jewish Community Center Association, at

regular service tonight of the Indianapolis Heb r e w Congreg a t i o n , Tenth and Delaware be conducted by the local Mase chapter of Hai Resh fraternity, national Jewish fraternity. The service will be held in conjunction with national Hai Resh night, with every chapter in the national participat-

4Ta

ing in observance. Following explanation of the event by Richard Efroymson, president of the local chapter, Richard K. Munter, former national president, will assume charge.

posed of Aaron Cohen, Max Smulyan, Sam Kaplan, Peter Lawrence, Sam Eshowsky, H. E. Garfinkle, Aoe Tubin, Dave Rosenberg, Fred Schuman and David Borinstein. The congregation has a memoership of 125 and is clear of indebtedness. DRUGGED WOMANJif RUSHED TO HOSPITAL Condition Is Serious; Believed Under influence of Sleeping Potion. Believed to have taken an overdose of sleeping powders, a woman registered in a downtown hotel under the name of Mrs. Blaine Dorley of Cleveland, was removed to city hospital early Thursday night. Physicians regard her condition as serious. She was unable to talk at the hospital and police were unable to learn the cause of her condition. Housekeeper at the hotel found the woman unconscious. Baggage in the room bore the initials ' B. B. T.” and all clothing bore Indianapolis labels. Police Dog Good Fisherman By United Press ASTORIA, Ore., Jan. 6.—. Jerry, a police dog, makes life miserable for salmon. Several times a day the dog darts into Big Creek, catches a squirming salmon, which he carries to shore.

A hundred years ago the Muscle Shoals rapids in the Tennessee river, where it dips into Alabama, constituted a legislative problem in Washington. Under Woodrow Wilson there was built across these rapids a huge dam; and in it were installed power generators to manufacture war nitrates. Muscle Shoals actually was never given a steady job, and since war days it has stood there, the dynamos practically idle, while a nearby town was illuminated with kerosene lamps. Drive Started by Norris Meantime, the generation of hy-dro-electric power became one of the leading industries in the country; but the charges made for this electric energy manufactured from rushing water were criticised widely and questioned. The financial pyramids built upon these charges grew until there came a federal investigation. This made more important the question of whether or not the charges demanded f consumers for electric energy were equitable. Years ago Senator George W. Norris, the Republican progrc ive from Nebraska, proposed to use Muscle Shoals as a handy yardstick, already in the government's hands. Senator Norris included in his bill the provision that the government should experiment in the nitrate plants at the Shoals to determine if more and better and cheaper fertilizer could be made.

Died in Coolidge’s Pocket Congress agreed with Norris, and it passed his bill. But President Coolidge tucked it away in his pocket, and there it died. But “Uncle George,” undismayed by defeats and advancing age, kept up his fight with dogged determination. In the seventy-first congress he reintroduced his bill, and the senate passed it. But the house, then under Republican control, passed another bill which provided that the government should give up its power and nitrate properties to some private corporation, through a lease for fifty years. Senator Norris won in the conference, after making a few concessions. Vetoed by Hoover Thus, the bill which went to the White House in 1930 provided for these things: 1. Government operation of the government's own power properties at Muscle Shoals. 2. The lease of the nitrate plants, with the stipulation that they be used to manufacture a specified amount of fertilizer. 3. The construction by the government of Cove creek dam in East Tennessee, not only as a reservoir to help control floods in the Mississippi, of which the Tennessee river is a tributary,, but also to increase two-fold the power capacity of Muscle Shoals below. 4. The construction by the government of transmission lines so nearby cities and towns and other political subdivisions might benefit by receiving the cheap surplus power from Muscle Shoals. President Hoover vetoed the bill. Roosevelt to Inspect Project Last session, the house passed another Muscle Shoals bill that pleased no one. The state agriculture committee reported out the Norris bill again, but the senate did not act. In the present session, no action is scheduled on Muscle Shoals, but within a few days President-Elect Roosevelt, in company with southern senators, will inspect Muscle Shoals, preparatory to taking up this legislation in the next congress. Senator Norris was invited to accompany the party to Alabama, and he expects to go. The new effort to put Muscle Shoals to work will come at a time when the prospective sale of electricity within transmission distance of the plant will be less than was expected, because of hard times. Cheap Power Is Seen However, engineers believe that a sufficiently large number of customers for cheap power will soon be available. In that connection, Senator Norris contemplates that farmers or others who want to buy the power will be able to organize, as drainage or levee district farmers are now organized, to build power lines to their homes from the big transmission lines. The Reconstruction Finance Corporation may be asked to help by financing these power districts.

Strauss