Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 12 August 1936 — Page 13
o_o
by Tn
i
HEYWOOD BROUN
ASHINGTON, Aug. 12.—Maybe it is .'. actually true that America is at the crossroads, for an extraordinary thing is happening here in the capital of the nation. For the first time within the memory of man
Washington correspondents are beginning to take an interest in economics and politics. The National Press Club has been putting on meetings at which newspaper men, just for the fun of it, come to
hear John L. Lewis, William Green, William Lemke and Gerald Smith. Earl Browder is the next one on the schedule, and that will break all precedent, since Mr. Browder will be the very first Communist to be heard by Washington reporters save when some one was served up as an assignment. Yesterday it was possible for news gatherers to hear Lewis in the line of duty and catch him at ¢ to his very best. The occasion was {| the first convention of Labor’s Non- ' Partisan League, and this may have Mr. Broun been the birth of a true labor party e in this country. To be sure, the delegates from 48 states who gathered did not undertake to put another candidate in the field for: the presidency. There was no opposition to the ndogsement ‘of Franklin D. Roosevelt. |. | Pleasant things were said about the President, but the chief motto of the meeting was that the election of Landon would be a national calamity and a stark tragedy for organized labor.
. # » ” } fs One Cause for Common Ground |
A rHoucH Lewis, Berry, Hillman and Dubinsky were the chief speakers of the day, the meeting
“did not touch at all on the problem of the Committee
for Industrial Organization. This was a political rally planned primarily to enlist labor generally| in support of Roosevelt. | - Reports from the National Press Club's seminar are that John L. Lewis made a much better impression upon the mature journalistic scholars of the Washington set than did William Green. Some. disappointment was expressed because Mr. Green spoke 80 little of the here and now and dwelt so long upon Sam Gompers, who has been dead these many years. Possibly they failed to realize that the president; of the A. F. of L. has always been a stickler for tradition. Within his meadow he is both sincere and. eloquent, but he does not like to cover much acreage. William Green has been through a tough time in the labor movement, and he would have everybody else share his experiences. New situations and new plans of strategy both puzzle and embarrass him. |
8 » 2
Always Regular and Proud of It
“Y WAS always regular,” said William Green, the last time that I heard him. “And so help me, Providence,” he continued, “I'll never go to my grave bearing upon me the stain of ever having led a dual or minority group in opposition to the A. F. of L.” | I can think of prouder hoasts than the assertion that one has never missed a bandwagon, but if Bill Green wants to be remembered as never having been tardy when it came time to jump aboard that is. own request. 1 So dig a grave for William Green and make it de. and handsome. And let four stone masons, if they can determine jurisdiction, carve upon the granite of his tomb, “He was always regular.” If there is room,
“and no conflict in the building trades, they might add
“He never led a minority group against the A. F. of L.” But if there is any want of space it might read just as accurately, “He never led.” Indeed, this blunt statement, all alone, could serve: most fittingly as the full, complete and amply sufficient epitaph for old Bill Green. free Tears have been shed and pious hopes an ar
-
that there may yet be peace in the American labor movement. But, come to think of it, whoever ca Bill Green, or any part of hi§ cohorts, a movement? The progress of the A, F. of L. under President Gre has been slower than slow motion.
My Day
BY ELEANOR ROOSEVELT EW YORK, Tuesday.—I think my family and household are the best natured I know bf anywhere, After telephoning home and saying that I would be back by 8 o'clock last evening, I had a punctured tire and it rained, all of which delayed me
so that I did not get home until 8:30. Instead of find-
ing dinner over, I found that they all waited for me and were wondering what had happened to me. Perhaps it is.a good thing to do the unexpected now and then! I had an amusing time getting my column filed yesterday afternoon. I had to write it while I was still at the state school, so Dr. Williams| loaned me 1} stenographer. When we started to drive back to Corn- - wall I realized that I must find a telegraph office. We drove into Monroe, N. Y., which looked to me like a fairly good-sized place, and on a corner we inquired about the location of a telegraph office. e were directed up Main-st to the telephone building. When we reached it I got out and found the front door locked. For once I was too easily discouraged. | It never occurred to me to look for any other door, so I wasted everybody's time by journeying to the railway station, which took us back through the town and down two different streets before we found the right entrance. All this only to be told to go Xs the original building and that the office was never closed. This time I went deciding to climb through an open window if necessary—anything to find the office! I did find the side door open and a very surprised looking lady inside. When I demanded the iesagh office she rather hesitatingly showed me down a passage and through. another door. There I found one Joue woman and when I handed her the column she asked: ' : > “Would you tell me a little mpre about it? We have just opened this office.” ¢ i So, as best I could, I explained what press ra collect meant, and very insistently said that a deadline meant a certain hour at which you had to get ‘your material in, and that it must be sent off at once. 1 saw her sit down preparatory to sending it off and left saying a little prayer that all might go well. | (Copyright, 1936, by United Feature Syndicate, Inc.) |
i }
New Books
THE PUBLIC LIBRARY PRESENTS— this open season for platforms, it is interestin inks and hopes for his RM FOR AMERICA (McGraw; $1) by Ralph R. Flanders. :
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 12, 1986
RES Fd Bl FY
Entered as Seeond-Class Matter At Postoffics, Indianapolis, Ind.
ig
* 8 Bi
Kidnaper Showed Girl Local
(Chapter Three)
BY JEAN BREESE As Told to Fred Russell, Nashville Banner Staff Writer
AS the two men lef{ their parked car and walked toward the house of Tom’s parents, I didn’t wait for Mr. Robinson but ran to the back door, out to the side street
and on toward Tom’s car.
1 was sure these men were agents. As I ran down the street, the car backed up and followed me. When it drew nearer, I feared that at any moment I might be shot down - by mistake in the belief that I was Tom masquerading in
women’s clothes.
To play safe, I stoppé®™under a street light just as the car came even with me. As it cruised slowly by; I removed my hat and looked directly up into the light, so my face would. be in full view. I did not even glance at the occupants of the car, but am sure they gave me close scrutiny. When the car passed, I dashed for“Tom’s automobile.
It was in the same place I lef
and Tom at the wheel.
tit, with the motor running
“Get going!” I whispered as I leaped in, too breathless
to say any more. :
We hesided out of Nashville the same way we entered.
i
I told Tom everything that had happened. He was terribly disappointed about not seeing his father. . I told him the date set for the trial, June 17. We were tired, wet, hungry and generally miserable that night, driving until neither of us could stay awake any longer. We stopped
abaut 4 o’clock in the morning at a tourist camp a few miles from Bristol, falling on the bed there without
even removing our clothes. The next morning we were up
"and on our way by 9 and had
breakfast in Bristol. Noticing that the ladies had .on their Easier bonnets, we realized for the first time that this was . Easter Sunday. We drove to Roanoke and stayed at the Patrick Henry Hotel for two days resting, then went to Newark, stopping at the Douglas
Hotel for a few ddys before rent-
ing an apartment on 43d-av, Long Island City, N. Y.
8. ‘as #
E soon realized:that we had made a mistake by moving into this neighborhood. There I contracted a severe cold from the exposure in the rain in Nashville. For both reasons, we decided to take a trip with our destination uncertain. . a We drove to Chicago. There I read of a double murder in Long Island in the very. apartment building in which we ‘had lived. We continued to Davenport, Oma-
|. ha, North Platte, then down to
Denver, Colorado Springs, Trinidad, Santa Fe, Albuquerque, Dem-~ ing, Globe, Miami, Phoenix, Yuma, El Centro and San Diego. We were
simply tourists. We visited Agua
Caliente for a day, too. We happened to be staying at a tourist camp between San Diego and Los Angeles when the Weyerhaeuser case broke in Tacoma. Newspapers were full of it, with stories and pictures of all the fugitives at large. It was best for Tom to stay in close. We remained at this camp for a few days before going to: the Constance Hotel in Pasadena. : Incidentally, from May, 1935, until his apprehension in May, 1936, Tom. wore a moustache. At no time did he masquerade around Pasadena or anywhere else dressed as a woman. He is six feet, one
- and one-half inches tall, weighs
over'170 pounds, wears a size 111% shoe, is decidedly masculine, has
a heavy beard and has biack hair |
on the back of his hands. To think of him dressed as a woman is positively absurd. After waiting in Pasadena for the Weyerhaeuser case to die down,
| oughly likable,
we started back to New York.
This wes early in June, 1935, and Tom wanted to be in the East during the trial of his father and wife. Taking the southern route fo Fort Worth, we came through Oklahoma City, St. Louis, Indianapolis and Pittsburgh. At Indianapolis | Tom went a few blocks out of the way to show me the apartment where he: stayed. However, we made it a‘ point not to have|to stop in .Indianapolis for gas or anything.
/ ! ” # ” N Pifisburgh I left Tom at the William Penn Hotel and went on to New York by train. ‘I had tried to find an apartment for ‘us to live. More than that, it was to
“be a place for Tom to hide out
during the ensuing weeks. The trial was docketed at Louisville for June 17 and his phofograph would surely appear in the newspapers. I rented an apartment in Jamaica. - By prearranged pian, I met Tom in Cavanaugh’s. Res- .
taurant. on 23d-st a day or two
later. Then we went to the apartment. - : ; After: being in our new. home for about a week, we learned from the newspapers of_ the. pos ment of the trial of and wife until October. This irritated Tom very much. He wanted
3
the trial over and wanted fo see .
his wife and father exonerated. He raved for days about the injustice of-it all. We had nothing planned now, so decided to go to the beach for the summer. We leased a cottage at Rye, some 30 miles from New York, and stayed there during July, August and part of September. We swam, played tennis and enjoyed a simple vacation life. We had our first chance ‘for real relaxation. Tom enjoyed that summer. I prepared most of our meals and he was a cook’s delight. I liked to cook and he liked to eat. He gained about 15 pounds. At this time I had known Tom'’s identity for about six months. Bit by bit, I constructed a.gen= eral idea of his character and mentality. He amazed me with his brilliancy on one hand and utter stupidity on the other. Most of the time he was thorat other times he was despicable, capable of the
LET'S EXPLORE YOUR MIND
ostponehis father. |
definite
Thomas H. Robinson Sr.
meanest of thoughts for no apparent reason. Fin al #8. 8 : LEARNED from personal experience that Tom had a cruel side to his nature. He had never learned how to love anything. ‘By questioning him over a period of time, I found that since early youth he. had suffered disillusionment and disappointment. At the age ‘of 15, he was pronounced ‘ tubercular and confined to a hospital for a year. At first he lied to me about this, then I found that the reason for his lie was that his tubercular history made him feel inferior. Sie 0 Due to this illness, he lost a
year in high school. : He failed to |
make this up after chan to private schools in an ort to. do so. ‘His only chance to enter Vanderbilt University: was as a special student. This added to his inferiority complex, - : Too, he tried to hide from me the fact that he had been adjudged insane. I never discussed it with him, realizing the delicacy of the subject. i His ambition was to study law. He kept a scrap book on the careers of some of the ‘country’s great lawyers. However, before he completed his course, he married and abandoned his plans. He was known as a braggart. In my opinion, that was his way of concealing his sense of inferiority. I tried to help him overcome it and ultimately had some success. The summer at Rye taught me many things about Tom. ; Late in September we went
back to New York and rented a
house in Jamaica, where Tom stayed closed in during the’ trial of his father and wife.’ The trial started on Oct. 7. : During that week, Tom was a wreck. When
/ he read any piece of testimony in
the newspapers that seemed detrimental to his wife or! father, it would throw him into a rage. " The night the jury was out, I. happened ‘to go upstairs.. Tom
ee =
Robinson's son Jimnile, 6, who thinks his faffies
was standing before|a mirrot. He was: talking to 1f and .pleading his father’s case. Hd was oblivious. of the fact that I was in the room. I spoke to him and did my best to console him. : capil HIS was Saturday night. I was tired and Tom was men=tally and physicially exhausted. I persuaded him to go to sleep. The next morning we were up early, huddled over the radio, trying to’ ‘get some ne broadcast that would state the verdict at Louisville. : 1 We didn't find out until about 4 o'clock in the afternoon. The -jury had reported at 11:55 a. m. At the news of the acquittal of both his father and wife, Tom was elated. The suspense was over. We had a ping pong set on the dining room. table and I rémem-
ber that for the next several min-
then in late November decided to head West again, hoping to find a ranch to our liking and: settle down. 5 ; fa Thanksgiving Day found us in Tulsa, Okla., after motoring from St. Louis.” ‘We continued throuzin Amarillo, Tucumcari, Santa Rosa and to Albuquerque again, where we stayed at the King’s Rest, We inspected some possible sites for: 8 ch andw~eyr search took ‘me to Silver. City, Ni M.& There a William Warner tried t “us in a tract.of land, and this indizectly led to one of the most amusing incidents of our entire 16 months together. \
(Continued Tomorrow)
(Copyright, 1936, by Nashville Banner and United Feature Syndicate, Inc:)
Coughlin and Political Allies Find
F.D.R. Common Foe, Sullivan Says
(Mr. Sullivan Writes Thrice Weekly.)
BY MARK SULLIVAN ASHINGTON, Aug. 12—On ¥Y'V Friday of this week, at Cleveland, will occur the convention of the National Union for Social Justice. This is Father Coughlin’s organization. In the presidential campaign, this organization does not stand alone. If is geared into some kind of informal co-operation with three other movements. The other three/are the Townsend organization, the old Huey Long I i A Ww. now apparently led by th Rev. Gerald L. K. Smith, and finally
the Union Party, which is a formally |
Rev. Smith and Mr. ‘Lemke—they attack both the old parties. But read carefully any speech of any one of these three, and you find three-fourths of it in denunciation of President Roosevelt. This allocation of space and intensity does not necessarily reflect any favor for Gov. Landon ‘and the Republicans. It is merely that Mr. ‘Roosevelt is in the White House and therefore is a more shining mark. Also, Father Coughlin, the. Rev. ‘Smith and Mr. Lemke all supp ‘Mr. Roosevelt in his camp: for ‘the Presidency in 1832, All three
fnterést |
feel that Mr. Roosevelt has disappointed them-—the word they use is not “disappointed” but “betrayed.” It is going to be Mr. Roosevel{
that these leaders will most bitterly |
attack. ‘And it is from Mr. Roosevelt that they will take most of the votes they get for their new party. > » = = 3 . R. yet another reason this four-in-one movement will concentrate its attacks on Mr. Roosevelt and regard Gov. Landon as only a minor enemy. The four organizations’ and their leaders can be
called radical in only a limited |
sense. They have proposals about money and finance which are ut-
terly unorthodox. For that any one |
can ‘call hem radical. But as respects organization of society they are not radical at all. They are what in religion would be called
i EE 34
| GRIN AND BEAR IT
NEW YORK, Aug. 12.—Soon Mr. Roc velt will sling his shaving-tackle the satchel and take to the road again, c ing on the trade. This suggests a thou which may not have occurred to Chs Mike and the second-string needle-work: down at the Democratic National’ Committee. haps they are having too much fun needling clumsy unfortunates who are turning out for Republican National Committee the most pathetic series of fakes, surly apologies and whither-are-we-drift-.. | ing editorials that ever sabotaged a candidate for public office. The idea is simply that Mr. Big | has a remarkably: fine train-window {i acquaintance with the geography |i and appearance of the United {i States and a fair tourist's under- i standing of ‘Europe. He has cov-
| ered more ground than any Presi-
dent since William H. Taft and has a better eye-and-ear knowledge of the people and prejudices of the i. oe world than any one since old Mr. Pegler ed. Be : 3 . Mr. ‘Roosevelt's travel is mentioned as addin something to his other qualifications, whatever yt
-may think of them. He Knows how St. Louis loc
from the bridge where the train comes in, he has seen the state Capitol, the prison and the zoo Little Rock, and he could call off by heart most of the station-stops between Eastport and Key West on
‘the Eastern seaboard. In short, Mr. Roosevelt &
been around the country which he undertakes govern and the foreign countries with which a F dent must do business. f
# » Ed
Knows His Country
N this he has an advantage over Mr. Landon and most members of the Senate and House. Unlike most of his predecessors in the job, he doesn't have to conjure a mental picture of the map and think
-of a pink state or a green one when some one mens
tions Idaho. He will have been there at one time or another on his travels and mention of Idaho wil} remind him of a luke-warm egg sandwich at a rails road lunch counter and start a train of thoughts Mention France to him and his mind doesn’t ins stinctively say “oo-la-la” but, more probably, “count the change.”
It is an interesting oddity & government in this country that most people concerned in the job, from
. President down to the youngest freshman in the ' House, generally know almost ngthin ;. United States. Presidents there have been who gol : their first glimpse of the Western states from the
g - about
tailboard of the private car during their cam
' and who had never been east of Fire Island. Know:
ing the country, Mr. Roosevelt probably realizes tha he can go just so far and no further in abolishing state lines: and consolidating the nation into an. divided world. He knows where the interests ane
1 superstitions of one region clash with those of anoth far away. He is like the national sales manager
a gigantic chain store system, who goes out over ground in person and studies the headaches of a enterprise. 2 8 =
Landon—Landlocked Kansan ‘3 “HIS kind of knowledge Mr. Lande can not to match at. present, for he is a lan g san of distinetly local type and if it comes$o An can history, Mr. Big probably can out-answer & there, for he always got good marks. : Mr. Roosevelt is like the proprietor of a jumb country store who knows by ear where the pliers a soap trays, brown sugar, birthday cards, hooks ant eyes, nuts, bolts and washers are kept.’ He can lay his hands right on them. He knows the vary temperaments of the customers and their troubles a faults and €uite a lot about the rival stores in block and the state of their business. 3 It is unusual to find a President who knows the
store. Most of them figure that there will be plenty
of time to learn after they are in.
BY DREW PEARSON AND ROBERT S. ALLEN ASHINGTON, Aug. 12.—John Roosevelt, youn est member of the Roosevelt tribe, is a cu boy, but there is nothing he hates more than to called just that. sl : : The chief bane of John’s life is that his moth and sister, especially the former, can’t seem to fo that he no longer wears rompers. - Both John. Pranklin D. Jr. take conside; delight in op some of their family’s poli views, and considering the fact that they have only a father but a mother with very definite ideas everything, from to feminine reform, can’t exactly blame them. John is not without a sense of humor in