Indianapolis Times, Volume 48, Number 48, Indianapolis, Marion County, 6 May 1936 — Page 13

ft Seems to Me HEVWOD BRUIN YORK, May 6.—Bradley A. Fiske, who was rear admiral in the Navy of the United States, is now retired and as he sits and watches the embers of a dying fire he sees within the smoke the images of wars which are gone and wars to come. And the old man finds them good. Indeed, he has taken up his pen and written a letter to the New York Herald Tribune in praise of conflict as the handmaiden of

culture. He speaks of the golden age of Pericles and ’hinks of Michelangelo and machine guns of Shakespeare and of shrapnel. “It is a fact that after a nation has gone through a successful war the energy lasts for a considerable period after the war has ceased.” Yes, there is still a public for one more book by Coningsby Dawson, another verse of “Hin-key-Dmkey Parlez Vous” and enough, surplus civilizing force to found the Ku-Klux Klan.

Heywood Broun

“When a nation is fighting for its life every mental and moral and physical energy is aroused and is'used.” u Lilies and War Flags CLERGYMEN take down the lilies and surround the altar with battle flags. They preach that the sharpshooters shall inherit the earth and that blessed are the bombers. And they point with pride as from the skies where herald angels sang of peace the hailstones of destruction now descend upon the crooked streets. A child is born, and at that same moment a man in a laboratory has invented mustard gas. And from the East the wise men come bearing rich gifts of chlorine, lyddite and murder. A boy crucified upon the broken wire cries out,. “Holy Mother, take me from my agony,” and Bradley A. Fiske, rear admiral, United States Navy (retired) writes, “And neither can it be denied that war has an exceedingly stimulating influence.” But what is it that the admiral means when he speaks of “stimulation”? “The great majority of human beings are not very highly gifted mentally,” he says; “most of them want to do exactly as they please and resist any kind of discipline, and, therefore, can not act together.” Seemingly, civilization has not advanced sufficiently to take from the dullards their vicious desire for joy and peace. These backward folk want days crowded with happiness and contentment and not that period of negation known a~ the zero hour. Dumbly, they resist becoming members of those great co-operative groups known as “killed” and “casualties.” But though Rear Admiral Bradley A. Fiske (retired) has seen much of these meaching men who would choose love and life and reject hate and death, he is by no manner of means bitter or cynical. He sees a brighter day just around the salient. He speaks in admiration of Mussolini and of Hitler. nun Defenders of Culture IN spite of the fact that Admiral Fiske sees Hitler and Mussolini as the leaders in the movement for the preservation of culture he generously accords a. place in the family of great nations to several laggards. Thus we find him saying, “At the present time, for instance, the only nations that can really be called great nations, the only nations that are able to keep up any advance in culture are the United States, Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Japan." They said the Premier's body lay all night under a blanket of snow after the assassins had gone, bvjffc • later it proved that a relative had sacrificed himself to save the Japanese leader from the hands of the culturists, They lie lonely and sometimes sob at night in Italy because their men are far away civilizing Ethiopia. In Germany the fires dance at night as the books are burned, and in the concentration camps the prisoners who are lashed do not moan loudly. Lads in Edinburgh jeer at Allehby when he£ talks of peace, at home Hearst’s in his heaven. And Bradley A. Fiske can retire to pleasant dreams of drum fire. Culture marches on. (Copyright, 19361

Oklakoma, Land of Oil and Politics BY RAYMOND CLAPPER OKLAHOMA CITY, May 6.—Rough notes lor a progress report on Oklahoma: What a Governor! E. W. Marland, 100 per cent New Dealer, boasts he is in debt $5,000,000. Has mansion at Ponca City but his creditors can’t take it. It's a homestead, therefore exempt . . . Nearly MO candidates running for office, three of them named Will Rogers . . .? Former FERA administrator about to go on trial charged with throwing deals for $316,000 in horses and mules to a favorite firm which liked him well enough to pay off a personal note . . . . State Supreme Court under fire for farming out the writing of opinions to lawyers. In the 1935 term, the court approved 638 of these sub-let opinions, rejected 82. One justice complains that the court was elected to write its own opinions. # u a EVERYBODY happy. New oil boom. Rich strike in Oklahoma City’s best residential section. Derrick builders, carpenters, drillers, banging pipes, chugging engines, all racing 24 hours a day in the best back yards in town. Big well going down across driveway from Governor's mansion. One well to be slanted under Capitol building. • Driveway along grounds lined with high steel derricks, pipers; storage ♦anks, lumber, drilling machinery, unpainted work shanties. It means millions of dollars to Oklahoma City, when the black,'gummy oil begins flowing all over the place. Let housewives complain. What’s soot on the curtains, oil on the flowers and noise all night, to money in the bank? Gov. Marland showed ’em. The city council said they could only drill in residential blocks and not on the Statehouse grounds and the mansion lawn. Marland called out the National Guard and drillers moved in on the state grounds. You can’t halt progress in Oklahoma! B B B SENATORIAL campaign, as seen by Oklahoma newspaper men in their gridiron dinner: '■Quick Change Gore.” Old Dealer in Washington, New Dealer in Oklahoma—’’lf that's the way the people felt, I could be for Roosevelt.” Rep. Josh Lee —“I'm against war. I’m against sin., I'm against lettmg the Republicans in.” Oov. Marland. two more years to serve, but ready to drop everything and go to the Senate. ’*■ Gomer Smith, Townsendite. He has a magnificent home. His enemies took photographs and retouched them, putting awnings on the windows. Smith exposed the fakery, but said the awnings looked so good that he was going to adopt the idea. Now he has the awnings up. A candidate, former Gov. Alfalfa Bill Murray, fuming at the New Deal down in Broken Bow, Okla., says he will support any deoent Republican against Roosevelt. He didn't used to think there were any. a b b ECONOMIC report: In wealth, seventh from the top. In education, • fourth from the bottom. Millions flowing from 50,000 oil wells. Seven out of 10 farmers landless, the other three mortgaged. Wealth sucked greedily out from under the ground. Wind stripping rich soil from the surface. Farmers taxed 10 per cent. Oil taxed 5 per cent. They get rid of a 1-cent temporary gasoline tax. Next day, the price of gasoline goes up 2 cents. B B HISTORY: Oklahoma never had a native Governor or Senator. In Oklahoma Governors are elected and then impeached. Only two were convicted and ousted, So It doesn’t mea^acything...

LIVING IN A HOUSE ON WHEELS

Depression Has Led Many to Road, Their Stories Disclose

Th* Time* today presents the third in it aeries of articles on the amazing popularity of the house trailer for automobiles. BY GEORGE H. DENNY CENSUS of the thousands of persons now living in house trailers might bare some facts relative to the state of the nation. It is fair to assume that’ a great percentage of these wanderers are victims of political or economic ciri cumstances. Since there has been no such j census we must rely on estimates to compute the number and on questioning a few to determine the motives of the mass. Numerical estimates of the trailerites range from 250.000 to more than 1,000,000. Certainly the throngs have tripled or quadrupled in less than two years. Ask any trailer camp manager. For months I have been living in a house trailer, parking with these persons in their camps, prying into their houses and affairs. I found about half were simply on vacations ranging from two weeks to a year; living in trailers because they saw it was the cheapest and most comfortable way to the best fishing and swimming. n tt n BUT we can't disregard these pleasure seekers as prospects for permanent trailer life. Having sampled freedom and independence they are apt to return to this life at the first sign of trouble at home. For instance, the couple from northern Indiana. “This is just a vacation for me,” he said. “The doctor recommended a rest for a month or two and I rented this trailer from a friend. “It’s a glorious, life,” he continued. “I realize now what I’ve missed. I hope to sell out in the next year or two, before taxes ruin me, and hit the road for good.” It developed he. , was a real estate operator and owner; mostly small rental properties. “The property taxes are bad enough but the state gross income tax is the last straw,” he said. “I never kicked on an income tax on profits but now they are levying on red ink.” tt tt- tt THE man from Wisconsin with the home-made trailer was of the same mind, He was a,con tractor. L. < “I was or the wrong st&e of the political fence so I missed out on the Federal work and that’s all the work we had in my county,” he said. “Then I saw trouble ahead with the government spending so much money. I was lucky to find a buyer.” Os course I h. ve no way to check the accuracy of these or following statements. The depression started many trailerites on their roving lives. In dozens of cases the stories are nearly identical. u u THE former owner of a general store in a Dakota town lost money in the drought and the dust storms. He paid creditors from savings and boarded the store windows. He traded his insurance equities for an annuity that will keep him and his wife nicely in a trailer. “Let the store rot,” he laughed. Four years of depression broke the health and spirit of a Maine manufacturer. Six months in a sanitarium, worrying about business, did hin no good. His wife stopped the worry by selling the factory to,a competitor. Friends who were trailer fans persuaded them to try the life! ; After a year he is brown and healthy. He is not yet 50, but does he yearn for the grind? He does not. He. is moderately wealthy,

THIS CURIOUS WORLD

VARY ENORMOUSLY r’ IN COMPOSITION./ # THE GIANT STAR, BETEU3EUSE, HAS A DENSITY LESS THAN ONE ONE-THOUSANDTH THAT y CiF WATER. WHILE SOME STARS ARE SO * COMPRESSED THAT THEY WEIGH A TON , TO TUELCUB/C /A/O/. 1816. K | UNITED STATES AS ' "the: vear without A SUMMER'/ WAS . • / /' / *-. without spring and autumn, AS WELL./ WINTER PREVAILED THROUGHOUT THE VEAR. | by msa acavtcejwc |L

On June 17, 1816, a severe snowstorm raged in northeastern United States. Many persons were frozen to death, and roads made impassable by the unseasonable storm. Another heavy snowstorm occurred on Aug. 30. Snow and ice to be found in every mpatb oi the year.

The Indianapolis Times

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has a fine trailer and plans to fish a lot in the next 10 or 20 years. n n 'T'HESE are not unusual cases. Five years, even three years ago, most trailerites were drifters, transient laborers, persons of small and doubtful means. You probably were justified in keeping a careful eye on the chickens and the melon patch when a trailer family parked in the grove across the road. It may take a few years for the caravaneers to live down this gypsy reputation. But it would be unfair to judge the rank and file today by the sins of a few of the hungry, hcmeless lot that lived catch-as-catch-can in early trailer days. The new house trailers have comforts not found in many American homes. They are more, soundly constructed -than the shacks and lenementsrthat house millions. Only the oldest models are without electric lights and running water. tt tt it THE figures are not at hand, but I know that a scandalous percentage of housewives in this progressive nation must draw water from a well and sew by lamplight. - . . But to interview some more dwellers at the Clearwater (Fla.) camp. There was an old couple living on a railroad pension. There was a family of. four, mother, father, grandfather and small grandson. The old man’s Civil War pension seemed to feed them well. Adjusted service certificate cash bought the trailer. They are going to California with the bonus. Grandfather's rheumatism was much better in the sun and fresh air and he should get his monthly check for many years. When that income ceases father expects to have a World War pension. There was a Montana family of six. Father’s health demanded more sunshine and they went on a year’s trip, looking for a permanent residence. But they like trailer life, so they may stretch the tour indefinitely.;

By William Ferguson

WEDNESDAY, MAY 6, 1936

1. Florida sunset . . . from a trailer window. 2. More fishing . . . and better luck! 3. The pelicans take a sunning at Sarasota.

THERE was a salesman, samples neatly arranged in the trailer. He drove right up to the customer’s door and displayed his entire line. You can’t beat eye appeal, he said. Next, a traveling entertainer and lecturer, a Ph. D. with a dozen letters after his name. He had a lecture scheduled at the large'resort hotel up the bay. I caught him puzzling over income tax forms. There were two Kansas families from the same village. The two children of one family were in school at Clearwater. The other outfit had to return home and was worrying about flooded roads. No one seemed to know much about the next couple. Their expensive car bore New Jersey plates and their trailer gleamed with mahogany and silver. She sat under a., gayly-striped awning and knitted when, the dishes were washed, and he went out on the fishing boats or dangled a line from the causeway bridge when the wind rolled the waves too high in - the Gulf. r . NEXT door were two college graduates seeing the world before looking for work. In fact, one of them had landed a job in Tama for the fall. Here was a quaint couple; two

Washington Merry-Go-Round - BY DREW PEARSON and ROBERT S. ALLEN

WASHINGTON, May 6.—To those on the inside, the Senate investigation into airplane accidents in general and the Senator Cutting crash in particular, ended in a shimmering whitewash for pretty much all concerned. Whenever Senator Copeland: saw an unsavory situation about to break before his committee, he sidestepped with alacrity astounding for his age. He glossed over the rows between the air lines and the Bureau of Air Commerce. He shut his eyes to internal politics running rife within the bureau. Most important of all, he steered clear of implications of wire-pull-ing by members of the Roosevelt family, and by Amelia Earhart, close friend of Mrs. Roosevelt. Shortly after the Roosevelt Administration came into office, Croyl Hunter, president of Northwest Airways, Inc., endeavored to get a government appropriation for air aids, lights, etc., along the route traveled by his planes from St. Paul to Seattle. Equipping the 1504 miles of this route would cost about $1,200,000. a a u ELLIOTT ROOSEVELT was a friend of Hunter’s, and some evidence came before the Committee that Elliott was associated with him. One letter apologized for the mention of Elliott's name as a director of Northwest Airways and explained that it was meant to be Robert Donner, at that time Elliott’s brother-in-law (through his first wife, Elizabeth Donner Roosevelt.) Hunter also wrote letters to Anna Roosevelt Dali, addressed “Dear Anna” and expressing the hope that she impress on her father the importance of aviation. There was no evidence that either Anna or Elliott did use their influence, although Senator Copeland never permitted an opportunity to find out one way or the other. Amelia Earhart began to figure in the picture on March 20, 1933, when a letter was written to Mr. Hunter by Col. Lewis H. Brittin, vice president of Northwest Airways and its representative in Washington. Brittin later served 10 days for contempt of the Senate during Senator Black’s air mail investigation. BUB WRITING to Hunter, president of Northwest Airways, Brittin said: Amelia Earhart had lunch last week a$ the White House and I mm it is quite possible a meet-

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elderly ladies, one at-least 70; the other about 50. Bo|h widows, I believe, living on insurance investments of thoughtful hvsbands. They left.a year ago with only a tent but acquired the trailer in a month or two. The next couple had been here two years, summer; and winter. They appeared to, be stranded. Their trailer was on jacks and their car tires flat. Now and then he got an odd job, but it was generally believed they lived mostly on the fish he caught from the bridge.

ing can be arranged where we would have an opportunity to lay our problems (presumably equipping the Northwest route) directly before the new Administration, and, if we can, lay out a proposal that will be looked upon with favor. Apparently Eugene Vidal is slated for the Department of Commerce job although it has not yet been officially confirmed.” Eugene Vidal, now director of the Bureau of Air Commerce, was general manager of the Ludington Line between New York and Washington in the early days of airmail, and made Amelia Earhart his vice president. On April 17, Col. Brittin again wrote to Hunter: “I’m just in receipt of a letter from George Putnam (husband of Amelia Earhart) saying that they are spending the night of 20th at the White House, and will be in Washington on the 21st.”

GRIN AND BEAR IT

“What! You ain't ever been to Niagara Falls? Why dearie, you practically ain't married, then

At another camp were two college professors, .spending feabbatical v years in the open. Ope was a zoologist. He collected strange, ‘ mushy sea beasts from the tide flats. These are typical cases. They might be your neighbors at home. It’s hard to tell by their clothes or manners whether they have plenty of money or just enough to live. Money makes little difference here.. The road and the sunshine and fresh air and good fishing are all free.

AGAIN on June 20, George Palmer Putnam wrote to Hunter apparently taking credit for the appointment of Eugene Vidal as Director of the Air Bureau and indicating that his wife could help Northwest Airways further. He said: “Sunday we wanted to talk to you on the phone because we had right interesting news from Washington, i am venturing this note to ask if there is any chance of your being East soon. There are things we would a little bit rather not write about. "Failing conservation, perhaps A. E. or I can have a chat with you on the phone. As perhaps you know, Eugene Vidal has landed in Washington. There’s been quite an internal mixup. Out of it a very satisfactory situation has emerged. He becomes director of air regulations, which, as you know, is the branch covering licensing new lines, new ships and all that sort of thing.” (Copyright. 1936, by United Feature Syndicate, Inc.)

by Lichfy

Second Section

Entered m Berond-Cls Matter at Pcstofftce. IndlanavoHs. Ind.

I Cover /ke World WMufe SIMMS (Batting for Westbrook PeglerJ gERLIN, May 6.—Titanic, apparently irresistible forces—economic- political and international—are racing: like triple trains of powder towards an explosion in Nazi Germany. Daily her masters are performing: veritable financial wizardries robbing Peter to pay Paul, then dragooning Paul in some manner to even things with Peter.

Only by these miracles of hand-to-mouth existence are they able to stave off disaster in the seemingly most threatened sector, namely that of economics. Yet were that part of the line to give way, the internal and international repercussions would unquestionably be grave. Nevertheless the signs are multiplying fast that Dr. Hjalmar Schacht. Minister of National Economy, president of the Reichsbank, and his new boss, Gen. Hermann Goering. can not possible expect to hold the fort indefinitely.

Germany’s stupendous work-creating projects of 1933 and 1934, costing billions of marks which had to be borrowed on short-term loans, have now given way to even bigger and costlier rearmament schemes. a a a The Answer Must Be “Yes” UNLIKE ordinary unemployment projects—in themselves difficult enough to drop unless the workers are absorbed into regular business and industry—Germany's new national defense plans can not be allowed to lapse, or even be postponed, no matter what happens. Or so the Nazis reason. So at the very moment when the Reich is beginning to feel the pinch of the past three years of heavy financial drain, and feel it terribly, imperative new demands from the national economy are made by Herr Hitler and he will not take “no” for an answer. Where the money is to come from nobody knows. Germany has no foreign credit. There is talk of British (and therefore political) loan of 10 or 12 million pounds, but that is problematical. Even should it materialize, a banker here privately admitted, it would be like pouring a single bucket of water on a prairie fire. What is required is billions, not millions. Germany has no gold reserve—a mere $33,000,000, four-tenths of one per cent of the gold reserve of the United States. And that must be husbanded to guard against actual hunger. Were there a single major crop failure—say the potato or grain crop—the whole of Germany’s gold reserve would be wiped out. Without credit and without foreign exchange, Germany has to pay cash down for all she imports unless she can arrange to swap commodities for commodities. And her credit at home is beginning to tighten. Already she is resorting virtually to forced loans. As already stated, billions on top of billions of shortterm paper has been put out until banks and other financial institutions are literally stuffed with it. It is not a case of not wanting any more, but often of not being able to take any more. The end, therefore, would seem not far distant. Today the masses are ignorant of Germany’s perilous economic position. What the people see is a country superficially better off than it has been sine® the war. Jobs are more plentiful. Barring the pitiable plight of the Jews and other minorities, time® seem vastly better. Herr Hitler unquestionably rate® higher with his followers today than at any time in his career. To them he appears as a huge shining success. u a tt They Don't See Behind the Scenes WHAT the masses do not see, however, is that the boom is a purely government-financed affair; that the country is living mostly on its capital; that its raw materials are dwindling and new stocks can not be imported; that the money realized from the sale of goods is going into armies, navies, air forces, tanks, big guns, strategic highways, fortifications, little or none of which is productive. The stark, terrifying likelihood, therefore, is that one bright morning the population may wake up and find their jobs gone, their savings accounts frozen, their life insurance policies unrealizable save in steel and cement fortifications and poison gas, and that the day of reckoning is at hand. No German regime will lightly face such a contingency, least of all a regime like Hitler s. Yet from this dilemma there seems at this moment only one possible avenue of escape, namely the military one. Eastern Europe always has had a fascination for more so than now.

Liberal Viewpoint —BY HARRY ELMER BARNES

THE munition makers, especially in the United States, have of late been subjected to very severe criticism in important books, the reports of Senatorial investigating committees and the like. I have no desire or intention of white-washing munition makers. But the case against them will be all the stronger if we bring to light everything which can be said in their behalf and admit the important episodes in which they have not been primarily to blame. Avery important instance has been brought to light by Miss Rose M. Stein in her book, “M-Day.” The du Pont Cos. of Wilmington, Del., had been one of the largest producers of military power during the World War, turning out on an average 1,300,000 pounds of smokeless powder a day. The war came to an end. So the sales director of the firm, Maj. K. K. V. Casey, had a conference with Gen. C. C. Williams, Chief of Ordnance of the United States Army, in June, 1919. Maj. Casey pointed out to Gen. Williams that there was every reason why the government should now manufacture its own powder. But Gen. Williams, speaking for the government, was opposed to this proposition. As Miss Stein puts it: “Gen. Williams, according to Maj. Casey, was emphatically opposed to the suggestion. It was unthinkable. Military powder and the du Ponts were inseparable.’’ So the du Pont Cos. w-as persuaded by the govern* ment against own better judgment, to remain as the principal producer of military powder in the United States.

Times Books

WHEN the African King Jugurtha ran afoul of the might of ancient Rome, some 21 centuries ago, and found that he was able to buy himself out of jams as fast as he got into them, he remarked cynically: “The world is for sale, if any one can find a buyer.” You are apt to dust off that remark and use it afresh after you finish reading Emmanuel H. Lavine’s new book, “Cheese It—the Cops!” For Mr. Lavine, veteran New York police reporter, has set down here such a sorry record of knavery and venality in American police departments as to make one wonder if there are any honest men left in the republic. Mr. Lavines book is exceedingly refreshing for all its discouraging revelations, because it handlea without gloves the whole problem of law enforcement. It ought to be a text in every course of civic* in the land. Published by Vanguard, it sells for $2.30. (Brings Catton.)

Wm. Philip Simms