Indianapolis Times, Volume 46, Number 162, Indianapolis, Marion County, 16 November 1934 — Page 21

It Seems to Me MOD BROUN DEAR SYNDICATE MANAGER—I haven't *m**n to vou since nm 'ranM-ontlnental tour enrich in Minnesota I hope vou still care. Possibly you mill he pleased to hear that mv efforts at salesmanship still are going on The last effort to pet in touch with the trade included Wernersville. Baltimore Washington and Cleveland I took m> sample case along and 1 still have all the sample*. Bo*. it seem* the eustomers are kicking As lar a* I can find out the complaints fall under three head* The first is that the column

ha* grown too radical. What shall we do about it? Mv suggestion is that we dont do anything Af’er the last election the country seem* to be swinging to the left so fast that m another coup ® of weeks the customers are going to mistake mv stuff for that of Herbert Hoover or Henry Mencken The second holler which I encountered while out on the road wa* that I write too much about myself One client had ringed all 'he I* in a single column and he savs that he counted up to sixty-eight. And vet people sav there is no leisure

He* wood Broun

class in America Weil. boss. 1 dont thin/ we can do much about this either. Along about, mv time of life every one begin* to write. "I remember when—.' 1 a m a Jim Ia Had Habit Os course, it s a bad habi* but I m afraid it s in ih- blood stream and can t be eradicated. More than i rat some of the younger fellows encourage us gaffers. Only the other day one of the recruit reporters said to me in all seriousness. "What was old New Y'ork like. Hevwood?" I had to make him up a story about how I shot Indians on the site where the public library still stands. The third indictment is more or less a nlanket accusation There are customers <since this is confidential* who think that the column hot or told, personal oi impersonal, is just pretty terrible. When that comes up I don't know what to do except to leave th* room in a dudgeon. Have vou ever had any experience in selling pictures’ Would you consider any arrangement, under a very liberal commission, of handling earlv Brouns and letting the column racket just hang? A few sago I sold a landscape for #4O. I think I can no ten or eight in a day It might run into money for us both Incidentally. I have more bad news for vou. Just the day before yesterday I had a letter from one of the big hos.se.* .saying that he liked a column 1 wrote recently and woulrin t I come around and see him. If I know my big boss that mean* that there were ten or twelve he hated like pm son The trip to Cleveland was no dice because when I got there I found that there already is a paper which uses the column. That is they print the first paragraph, the fifth and half of the final one It reacts pretty cockeved hut sometimes the plan brings about very amusing results and I understand the cryptogram fans are crazy about it. aaa , Hr tint Revenge I DID get some revenge in Cleveland for the short columns I was out there to make a speech and the other fellow didn't show up. He was Roger Baldwin and he was going to fly. Only that day the blizzard rame Sometimes the tortoise beats the hare.' I said to myself as I lay in my berth. Even before I went 1 was scared of the date. Thev told me the*- had hired a hall holding twentyfive hundred people. Quick as a flash I replied. One of us will have to he good '* Well. boss, there was plentv of room to swing a couple of elephants in that hall when the gong rang but they did have twelve or thirteen hundred fish at 50 rents a head and outside the storm was raging. It was the sort of night you wouldn't want to turn a dog out. let alone a cash customer Rn I talked foi two houis and ten minutes which i* mv record and I den t ever mean to heat it During the last half hour I had an uneasy feeling. “Haven't I mavbc sid all this before and here in this same hall on this same night.” I woulrin t be surprised. During the last fifteen or twenty minutes I was down to a point where I was lust about to use the mule stor\ l compromised on "To Seville or back to the frog pond" and let it go at that. Incidentally, boss, if you're going to Cleveland try the lake Shore limited and go into the lounge car called In wood Club, or something like that, the porter make* the best gin rtekey you can get anywhere this side of New Orleans. Would you mind very much if I don't travel anv more for a while. It doesn't do anv good Let s just print the column on vellum for posterity Imin a frame of mind where I'm about ready to break into tears the next time anvbodv leads me to a lower. And are vou sure travel broadens a columnist? I mean spiritually, of course. All I ran remember of Cleveland is an oratorical ordeal, a hamburger sandwich. tw'o labor leaders and a red-headed girl. <Cnvnht IM4 b* The Time*'

Your Health -BY lK MORRIS FISHBEIN

I \OCTORS always nave taken carp of thp exi) trrmelv poor, m the past, and under sickness insurance svstrms that is just what they do now. It is probably what the doctors always aill ha\e onr svstem of emergency relief in this countrv during the last two treats, -cans have been worked out bv the government to pay doctors to some extent for the care they give to the povertystricken. . . B'U the monev paid is infinitesimal in comparison with the cost* of the service m time and effort, and it is definitely understood that this is an emergency measure The persons who nave been trying to promote a Mrknrss insurance system in this rountn say doctors mil m**ke more money under such a system. Possiblv thev anil. . .. . In England a here only the actual aorker and not his dependents are covered bv insurance, the average income of the uoctors aho carry on insurance aork is a little more than $2,000 a year, and -he doctor has 10 pax his expenses out of that. Such doctors are still allowed to have such private practice as they can gel. but many of them do not get much. • * * * THIS question of sickness .nsurance is being agitated mostlv by social workers As far as 1 can find out. there has been no particular desire for the system voiced ov organized labor. The industries are oetng so much troubled with taxation ano with the problems of unemployment insurance and old age pensions that thev do not srem particularly interested in putting over an> systems of sickness insurance In their aork. social workers see much poverty and sickness tn homes It seems reasonable to believe that their pity has blinded them to many significant factors involved in this situation a m m \FTER all. medical care is a doctor's problem. The vast ma.ority of doctors do not want any state system of medical care for the American people _ This does not mean that doctors are opposed to the principle ot insurance as a method of payment for hospital rare or as a method of pavment for the cost* of sickness. It does mean that the quality of medical service and the prevention of disease are the most significant ’actors tn the situation. Doctors will be opposed to any state or federal svstem of insurance for governing the rosts of medical care that null tend to lower the quality of service Questions and Answers Q —What proportion of the population of Palestine are Jews? A—The estimated population of Palestine. June 30. 1933. was 10. VS 3M of whom 180 793 were Jew*. Q—Where was Doak Carter bom? ▲—ln south Russia, of Insh-English parents.

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THE NEW DEAL AT TOP SPEED Finest Workers' Town in America Is Norris, Built for Dam Staff

Thu i$ 'he fifth af ii atari** an what Prpid*nt Raaefvrlt will a** when h* viiHt th* Tfnn*a** \iVlm. Na | siKial - plinmnf urojfft at Ihr Sew Dpl. What actual)* has beta done in etrhtetn month* of work and spending? These stories tefl ?oi. BY JOHN T. MOLTOEX Written lor NEA Service KNOXVILLE. Tenn.. Nov 16.—Visitors to the Tennessee Valley sand there have been 100.000 of them since last spring) may gaze openmouthed at the vastness and audacity of Norris Dam, but when they see the little town of Norris itself they're apt to sigh and say, “That's the kind of a place where I've always dreamed of living.” Yet this little town, nestling In the hills and woods four miles from the great dam. wasn't built as an important part of the TVA project at all. It was built to house married workers on the dam. Army engineers had plans for the usual barrack-like structures to house workers on the oam costing $1,500,000. Somebody suggested “Lets spend twice as much and build a permanent town.” So here it is. the finest workingmen s town in America, laid out like the famous English garden cities. A group of British, German and American housing experts, after a tour of the country, said of Norris, "This is the most interesting thing we have seen in the whole country.” Scarcely a year ago thp site was chosen—a 2.500-acre wooded tract. Today, except for a school nearing completion, the town is an accomplished fact. It consists of 350 nice-looking, well-built houses that cost from $2,500 to $6,300, and which the TVA is renting for from

$1450 to $45 a month. Norris was not laid out in the usual way of taking a plot of ground and cutting it up into squares, with a criss-cross of streets at right angles to each other. The TV'A town planners marked off a boundary and then immediately threw iround it a protective belt to keep rheap developments from springing up next to the town. aaa THFI site was rolling land, and the engineers built the streets according to the slopes rather than cut through the high places and filling in the low. Most of the tract was in woods, and the next job was to leave as many trees standing as possible. If a large tree stood on a house site, the site was changed. Purposely the houses were set back irregularly from the street. Before any houses were designed the TVA architects studied the type of architect tire found in the valley so that the houses at Norris would not seem out of place. The first group consisted of 152 houses of twenty-six major riessigns. enough to avoid monotony. They ranged from three to five rooms and had at least one large screened-in porch. Because of the mild climate, a porch can be used like a room eight months of the year. These houses were of wood and brick. Steel casement windows ran to within an inch or two of the top to eliminate the usual dead air space near the ceiling. Interior walls were finished with wide-board wainscoting up to the level of the window sills and veneer wall board above. Ceilings also were of wall board. No moulding was used, to make cleaning easier. Kitchens'were equipped with electrical appliances; walls were heavily insulated; handsplit shingles were used for the roofs. And all houses in this group were heated by electricity, though to add to their livability an open fireplace was built in each home. nan ’T'HESE houses were to cost A around $2,500 to $3,000. But soon after work began ouilding material prices shot up and the TVA established a wage schedule

THE NATIONAL ROUNDUP nan ttan By Ruth Finney

WASHINGTON. Nov. 16.—President Roosevelt’s social security program threatens to precipitate the legislative fight of his career. The new congressmen, most of whom campaigned under the impression that a more extensive program would be presented, will be under heavy pressure to enact old age pension legislation. An attempt to liberalize the administration unemployment insurance program is certain also.

The Presidents advisory council on economic security may be split similarly. Closed sessions, beginning today, at which their recommendations to the President are to be whipped into shape, promise to be turbulent. The President's statement on old age pensions took the advisory council by surprise. His message to congress last spring said: “I am looking for a sound means which I can recommend to provide at once security against several of the great disturbing factors in life—especially those which relate to unemployment and old age." To the council he said: "I do not know whether this is the time for any federal legislation on old age security." Sentiment in favor of the DtllConnerv old age pension bill —providing federal aid to states with old age pension laws—was strong in the last congress. The bill pased the senate once but was recalled on the plea that the President was working on a general security program Since then organizations supporting the Townsend plan and other pension measures have stirred up public feeling to a high pitch a b a TWENTY -EIGHT states now have old ace pension laws, some of them much more liberal than others. Under all of them the states supply the pension funds. President Roosevelt told the council that "full solution of this problem is possible only on insurance principles His decision to divorce unemployment insurance from relief, making it apply only to those persons who now have jobs, also will precipitate a fight. Various speakers at Wednesday's conference on economic security, including Thomas Kennedv. Lieutenant Governor-Elect of Pennsylvania, urged that the federal government contribute funds to make possible transformation of relief payments into unemployment insurance payments. Kennedy argued that such a course '•would add to the selfrespect and morale of unemployed industrial workers.” President Roosevelt's decision that unemployment insurance must be financed by contribution*,

The Indianapolis Times

several times higher than that prevailing in this section. The result was that the cost was about double the announced price, and less than half of the total number of houses needed had been built. A drastic reduction in the price of the remaining houses was ordered. For this second group anew type of house was decided on. It was built of cinder concrete blocks. There were eighty houses in this group, half of one-story -and the other two-story. Architecture was of the simplest. The interior finish, like the exterior, was—a coat of paint on the cinder blocks. They were wared for electrical equipment, but were not equipped with electric heaters; instead, a wood or coal range and a hot water tank were provided. These houses were intended mainly for workers with smaller incomes, and no chance could be taken with the uncertain cost of electric heating until it had been tried out in the other houses. This group was truly low-cost housing—they averaged about half as much as the first group—but still the architect and the TVA officials were not satisfied. The cost was low but the houses were not pretty. aaa MORE houses were needed, so a third attempt was made. The object now was to combine low cost with attractiveness. This last group called for fifty-nine one-story houses of cindpr block and wood, ten of them duplex and the remaining forty-nine Single family dwellings. A group of unemployed stonemasons asked a chance to build stone houses. Ordinarily a stone house costs twice as much as one of wood or brick. But the stonemasons pointed out that the stone could be taken from a quarry right on the TVA property and they promised that their house would cost no more than the others in the group. TVA officials took them at their word, put the TVA's own labor relations man in charge, and let them build a house. The stonemasons kept the house within the $2,500 limit set, and TVA officials were so pleased thpy let them build four more houses like the first.

not taxes, and that states should develop their own systems while leaving investment of reserve funds to the federal government, had been foreshadowed in his message to congress. However, some of his advisors disagreed sharply with him. Chairman Frank P. Graham of the advisory council said at the White House that “the necessities of the ease require federal action although . . . the states well may be charged with part of the cost of management.” He pointed out that ‘since industry in each state is forced to compete with the industries of other states, it has been and is still very difficult for the states to act independently and individually in providing social insurance.” 808 SENATOR WAGNER still favors the form of unemployment insurance contained in his last year's measure, levying a federal tax on employers not participating in compulsory state insurance plans. He may. however. introduce the administration bill when it is completed. Thomas Kennedy argued, at the conference, that interstate competitive conditions might be dislocated without a nation-wide insurance system, and that otherwise costs could not be equalized as between different sections of the country. At the same meeting Professor Pa il H Douglas of the University of Chicago pointed out that the federal government should provide means whereby eligible workers, moving from state to state, would not lose their claim tc benefits. He stressed the need of a federal reinsurance fund to help protect states which, because of their industries. are subject to cyclical hazards. One of the most troublesome questions yet to be settled concerns worker contributions. William Green, president of the American Federation of Labor, will fight for guarantees that workers shall not pay into insurance funds. He argues that industry will pass its part of the burden on to consumers, and that workers as consumers, will pay their share. In any other arrangement be sees a double burden on labor.

INDIANAPOLIS, FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 16. 1934

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Progress Is faking heavy toll of the picturesque in the New Deal development of the Tennessee valley, but it is bringing comfort that natives of the hills never dreamed of possessing. Above is sjiown a typical habitation of a family near the Norris dam site, one of many which will pass when the reservoir is flooded. Left is one of the modern stone and hand-hewn timber homes erected under the New Deal “raise the. living standard” program.

In fact, this entire third group w'as a success, financially and cst hetically. Five low -cost apartment houses, intended mainly for unmarried stenographers, clerks and the like, were also built, completing the housing needs of the town. ana ALL the houses are owmed by the TVA and none is for sale. The lowest rent is sl2 a month. A unit in a duplex house and some of the apartments rent for that. Os the single family houses, the lowest rental is found in some of the second group—sl4.so. The range in this group is up to $20.50 and the average is $17.60. The lost-cost but more attractive third group rent, for $22, while in the first group the average is $30.88 and ranges from $24 to $45. Chairman A. E. Morgan lives in one of the $45 houses, as do some of the other officials.

CITY MAN OFFERED ILLINOIS SCOUT POST Leader of Largest State Troop May Accept Position. Leßoy E. Allen. 3854 Cornelius avenue, will accept a contract as> Boy Scout executive for the Arrow j Head council, Urbana and Cham- ! paign, to succeed Don Higgins, :e----cently appointed to a post in Granite City, if he is admitted to the national training camp in New York, j work in which begins Nov. 22. Enrollment in the camp its limited. and Mr. Allen says he has not ! been advised whether he will be 1 permitted-to enter. Mr. Allen has been in Boy Scout ! work twelve years, for three years scoutmaster of Troop 72. largest J troop in Indiana, with headquarters in the Tabernacle Presbyterian church.

SIDE GLANCES

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"Well, can we go home now or do you want to tear around .the rest of the night?”

On the average, the rental amounts to about 18 per cent of the worker’s income. There is enough land in Norris so that every family can have its own vegetable garden if it w-ishes. a„ a a epHE town has oiled streets, -* sidewalks, a water system, a sewage system, community garages, a police and a fire department, a grocery store, a market, and a school. Adjoining the town is the construction camp with its community building, offering movies, lectures dances and other recreation. TVA pow'er from Muscle Shoals serves the town at regular TVA rates—from a top of 3 cents to a low of 4 mills a kilowatt hour. All houses heated by electricity will get the benefit of the low 4mill rate. The weather has not been cool long enough to ascertain w r hat

-The DAILY WASHINGTON MERRY-GO-ROUND By Drew Pearson and Robert S. Alien —

WASHINGTON, Nov. 16.—Where there's a will, there’s a way. The Bankhead Act for cotton production control provides ihat before its drastic powers can be applied to the 1935 crop, two-thirds of the growers must signify their approval. Such an expression of opinion is obtained by a referendum ballot. To set such a vote in motion the President is authorized to issue a proclamation that an emergency is likely to exist in this commodity next year, and call for a ballot.

But with the big growers and exporters bitterly agitating against continuance of production control, there is considerable doubt whether a two-thirds ma.jority can be obtained. So in order to avoid putting the President on a hot spot should the referendum fail, AAA strate-

By George Clark

heating by electricity will cost, but it has been estimated that the electric bill for all services, including heating, will be around $lO a month. % The town’s water and electric departments are taxed and the money is used in helping to pay for the school and other municipal services. The school, from the primary through the twelfth grade, is run by the TVA No tuition is charged. The future of Norris is, of course, uncertain Between now and the completion of the dam early in 1936. the TVA will try to build up co-operatives and bring small industries to Knoxville so that the houses will be occupied after the dam workers leave. 'Copyright. 1934. NEA Service Inc.i Next—The Tennessee valley’s future, if the entire New Deal program is carried to completion.

gists have evolved an ingenious maneuver. Instead of the President issuing an order before the referendum is held, he will say nothing until the results of the ballot are known. Then, if a two-thirds vote is obtained. he will come forward with a proclamation declaring that an emergency exists, decree the law operative for the 1935 crop. Now you see it, and now you don’t. a a a ‘•JIM.” said a friend to Posts' master-General N Parley several days after the election, ' now that you have all these Democrats in congress what do you expect to do with them?” 'The best we can.” ne replied. n a a JOHN COLLIER, lugubrious chief of the Indian Bureau, w ; as passing a friend in the interior department just after elections. John, said he. “how about ■rounding up all the remaining Republicans and giving them a place on one of your Indian reservations?” “It’s all right with me.” replied Collier solemnly, “but they wouldn t stock half a reservation.” a a a APIGEOp once played an important part in the original construction of the Washington monument. Abandoned during the Civil war, the shaft was left half completed at a height of 133 feet. When work was resumed in 1878, the roof had caved in, and all tackle had crumbled to dust. There was no way to reach the top again. A workman suggested that a cotton cord be tied to the leg of a pigeon, which would be set loose inside the monument and driven upwards by discharging guns below. The device was tried, and worked. When the bird emerged at the top, it perched a while, then flew out and down. It was shot and the strand recovered. By attached heavier cord, then rope, to the thread, new tackle was raised and platforms erected for the continuance of the work.

Second Section

Entered Seoon-l-I'l*** Miff.-r It Poeroffiee. lntl(n*poli*. Inrt.

fair Enough WESTBROOK PEGLER "VJEW YORK Nov 16—Abe Mickal, a Svrtan lm--1 n migrant bov and star of the Louisiana Stats university football team, has refused to accept a seat in the Louisiana state senate Mr. Mickal was elected unanimously by Huey P. Long last week but the election was held in his absence, under con-

ditions which gave him no chance to defend himself Returning to Baton Rouge with the football team, the young man declined to attend the ceremonies. Mr. Michal undoubtedly deserves some commendation for hi.* refusal but not too much. The office of state senator in Louisiana pays a nominal wage of $lO a day during the legislative sessions, plus mileage and the customary small pickings. The stated pay, mileage and pickings, however, are merely the nominal remuneration The real rewards are limited only by the individual member's own in-

genuity and thr discipline of Senator Long. As state senator. Mr. Mickal. the football player, would have been able to support himself in luxury through the remainder of his college career, lodge all his unemployed relatives and friends on the state pay roll, subject to the customary kick-back to himself, as their sponsor, and introduce anv number of wolf bills threatening punitive taxes against various Louisiana industries. The wolf-bill phase of a state legislator's work in Louisiana is an important source of private revenue as these bills generally bring the lobbyists representing the affected industries around to see the member at his hotel or boarding house or even in the legislative chambers. nan They'd Sever Do That T?OLLOWING the visit of the lobbyist, assuming A 1 that the visit has been successful and that the member is an honorable man. the wolf hill is forgotten. Moreover, the etiquette of the legislature is such that no respectable member of the body would think of introducing a second wolf bill against the industry in question after the lobbyist has made a successful appeal to the statesmanship of one member. Priority rules and. in cases where two members introduce similar bills at once, they high spade one another for priority. Or they may listen to reason on a fifty-fifty basis. Obviously this was no mere $lO-a-day, play-or-pay appointment which Abe Mickal declined. He is described as a brilliant student and thus equipped he would have been able to establish himself in a very substantial way while still a college bov. However, for the seductive advantages which were held out to Mr. Mickal by Senator Long there are serious penalties to be considered. Worst of all. is the stigma which attaches to membership in the Louisiana legislature. Your correspondent heard of one statesman in Baton Rouge who had migrated from Alabama. w r here his father was a respectable town drunkard and his mother an honored inmate of the county poorhouse. Being recognized one day by a boyhood friend from his old home town he begged him not to tell his parents that he was a member of the Louisiana state legislature. "I would break their poor old hearts,” he said. "They think I am in prison for life.” Mr. Mickal has had the advantage of propinquity during his college experience and doubtless knows what membership in the legislature means. He has had many opportunities to observe the character of the members and, if he is the honest youth that he seems to be, then the office which Senator Long tried to thrust upon him when his back was turned will have seemed to him less an honor than a disgrace. aaa Self-Respect—No Less STILL, in Mickal's rise, it took a sturdy sort of self-respect to decline the opportunity because propinquity has had an unfortunate effect on the student body of the state university, considered as a whole. The young men and women go to Baton Rouge as high-principled as any average group of students and. in thrir young innocence look to their legislature as an aggregation of the best citizenship. As the seasons pass and they rub elbows with -their state government thp.v have no means of comparison bv which to inform themselves that brawling, drunkenness, ignorance, undisguised graft and tyranny are incompatible with the ideal. They get prytical lessons watching their own state government at close quarters and many of them emerge from college so well grounded in the vices which pass for public service in Louisiana that it is a natural step down from the campus to the statehouse. The rest return to their homes taught what to expect from iheir government and thereafter give their votes to the lowest members of their community as being naturally qualified for the jobs. It seems a great mistake to plant a state university and a legislature in the same town anyway. Evpn the best state legislature tan have no other effect on thp students than to impair their morals except to such a rare case as that, of Abe Mickal who is a foreigner anyway and obviously not yet ready to be finally Americanized • Copvrlzht. 1934 hv tTnI ri Fcanire .Svnrtlrate >nc.l

Today s Science H\ DAVII) DIETZ

AMERICA today must get ready lor the world s greatest battle against the processes of unrestrained erosion or else resign itself to becoming the world’s outstanding example of subsoil farming with all its attendant, evils of poverty, declining social and economic values and hopeless outlook. H H Bennett, director of the soil erosion service of the United States department of the interior, calls the attention of ihe nation to the situation. The unrestrained action of wind, rain and flowing water is carrying away three billion tons of soil material annually, doing damage estimated at *400.000.000 a year. “Immigrants to the American continent iound a region so rich in land, timber, grass, game, ftsh, fur and navigable streams that there early developed in this country a false concept of inexhaustible resourpes,” he says 800 WE have a tremendous area of land in this country, Mr. Bennett says, but it is not all good land In addition, he calls attention to a highly important fact. The average depth of hunns-charged surface soil over the uplands of the United States is only seven or eight .nches. Underneath this lies, for the mast part, raw clay subsoil. It took nature thousands of years to develop that thin layer of topsoil. Once it is gone it will take thousands of more years to replace it. The Union of South Africa, Italy and Japan have all seen the need of curbing soil erosion and have launched elaborate programs to do so The Italian plan contemplates an expenditure of *SOO 000 000. America, in Mr. Bennett's opinion, must follow the example of these countries. a a a THE United States, as a matter of fact, has begun to give attention to the problem The soil erosion service of the department of the interior was organized during the latter part of 1933 with an allotment of *10,000,000 from the public works administration. It was formed, according to Mr. Bennett, lor the purpose of demonstrating the practical possibilities of curbing erosion and its allied evils of increased floods and costly silting of stream channels and reservoirs, operating within the various important geographic and agricultural regions where these evils are known to constitute major problems. The general plan of procedure, as suggested by President Roosevelt, is to watersheds. Twenty-one watersheds, ranging m size from 25,000 to 200,000 acres, now are under treatment.

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