Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 26 January 1937 — Page 11

agabond

FROM INDIANA

ERNIE PYLE

ANTE FE, N. M., Jan. 26.—One afternoon 15 years ago, when he was a very young man in Manhattan, a New York newspaper called up Sculptor Allan Clark and said it wanted to send over a reporter to prepare a Sunday magazine article on him and his

work. Sculptor Clark replied that he didn't wish that

kind of publicity, that the only notices he cared for were academic criticisms through the regular channels

of the art world. No, he wouldn't see a reporter. Today Allen Clark stands in his : studio and tells the story on himself, : and laughs and laughs. “I blush when I think of it,” he says. “I sure thought I was an artist then.” He, unlike many, has gone clear through that stage, and back to the simplicity of the great artist. » can talk with him today as easily as you talk with a cowhand. I had never heard of Allan © Clark. But people here tell me he is undoubtedly the No. 1 man in Santa Fe’s arf and literary: colony, and he stands high among Amer--ican sculptors. He isn’t exactly what you would call a member of the “art colony.” For he lives on a ranch 20 miles from town, doesn’t go in very often, doesn’t socialize with the “set.” He's neither stuckup nor eccentric—he just likes it better out away from things. He is 40 years old but looks younger. He has a heavy head of long black hair—not the arty kind, more the cowboy-needing-a-haircut kind. He laughs much of the time. He doesn’t smoke. He is an expert photographer. He has peacocks running all over the place. ; At the ranch he wears faded cowboy overalls and a checkered shirt, with a colored kerchief around his neck. x

Mr, Pyle

s ” 2 Designed Ranch House

IS ranch house would make some of the movie palaces look sick. He designed every inch of it, and he and two Mexicans built it. Took them six years. It is low, one-story, wandering adobe. It rambles over nearly half an acre, and must have 40 rooms. It has sunken bathtubs, and patios, and many wings, and fireplaces everywhere. The sculptor and Mrs. Clark (her name is Joy and

everybody in Santa Fe loves her) live there alone with -

their servants, who don't look like servants. They

have no telephone. The only way you can get them is .

to drive 20 miles. “Now if we could just get rid of the road . . .” says Clark. But once there, you're treated like a king in a castle. " Clark isn't a joiner. He belongs to only one art society—the National Institute of Arts and Letters. He says he is genuinely proud of that. Membership

is limited to 200. 8 2 n

Galli-Curci Gave Him Break

E went to the Chicago Art Institute, and paid his way through by waiting in restaurants and ushering in theaters. He started out to be a painter. But a realization of his limitations in paint shunted him into sculpturing. He finished school in 1917, did his hitch in the Navy, and then hit New York. Galli-Curci gave him his first big break in 1922. “I wish you'd put that in,” he said. “I'd like for her to see it. I was miserably poor until she gave me a start.” The great singer happened to see a mask he had made and commissioned him to do a bust of her. He spent three months at her home in the Catskills. He was on his way. He tells about a review of one of his exhibitions in the art column of a Los Angeles paper. ‘You can tell from his work,” the critic said, “just what kind of fellow he is—night clubs, champagne, women, the gay life.” Clark laughs and laughs, sitting on his ranch in a pair of faded overalls, 20 miles from town, and no telephone. :

a Mrs.Roosevelt's Day | By ELEANOR ROOSEVELT

ASHINGTON, Monday.—Today I am going to give you a quotation from a letter which has come to me. The lady is very much in earnest. She is perhaps lacking a little in knowledge of human nature, for soft words usually bring desired results more rapidly than harsh ones. However, I feel there is much in what she says and that her appeal will perhaps be more forceful than any I can make. Part of her letter to me follows: “Why don’t you make your daily column a constant appeal to individuals and organizations to do their part—instead of filling it up with inane chatter about your family affairs—which are of very little interest to anyone and only once in a blue moon of any value whatsoever? Why do you consider those things interesting to intelligent people just because you happen to be the President's wife? - Why waste your valuable time and the space in the paper with something so worthless when you could so easily write something which might have marvelous results for the betterment of the world? “It seems to me that for the time being every individual, all organizations and the Government should put aside everything else for a while and concentrate on two things—the prevention of crime and of war. Why cannot some of the money the Government spends be used to educate the children and youths who will become criminals, and put them in suitable environments so that they will become normal people? “Will you not give up some of your other activities and devote time and energy to this cause?” - There is a good deal to be said in favor of concentrating all our thoughts and our energies on certain important things, but I feel that while this can be done profitably, you must occasionally have something lighter to relieve you, for just as life cannot always Le lived on a high note, neither can what you read or write deal always with the. solemn sides of life. The wiping out of crime is so largely an economic question because much crime arises from the fact that children grow up in undesirable surroundings and have parents who have been similarly conditioned. If we can raise people's earnings, automatically living conditions will improve. But this is a question of * production, distribution and consumption.

New Books

PUBLIC LIBRARY PRESENTS—

SCHOLARLY survey of Tudor Britain, short, comprehensive, readable, is THE TUDORS, by Conyers Read (Holt). Henry VII put his house in order after the confusion of the Wars of the Roses, consolidated his dynasty, left his kingdom rich. Not glamorous, not too scrupulous, he built well for the years to follow. With Henry VIII came “Merrie England.” She knew the splendors of the Renaissance; her sky was starred with great names. Always at the helm was Henry, a great leader, establishing England as foremost on the seas, accomplishing drastic reforms at home. : Unfortunately, Henry VIII is remembered for his many marriages. But his very sound statesmanship was to carry the nation over troublous years after his death, through the short reign Jane Seymour's sickly son Edward VI and the barren rule of unhappy, frustrated Mary, Bloody Mary of the religious. persecutions, to the Golden Age of Elizabeth. The greatest and last of the Tudors was Elizabeth, whose achievement, says the author, was to give Englishmen a free field in which to realize their own purposes. This impetus was enough. The glories of this period are England’s precious heritage—and ours. 8 » ”

HO was it who had forgotten that the third step from the bottom always creaked? And what made the red velvet curtains move so mysteriously? If you want to shiver and shake like the hero in one of Grimms’ fairy tales, read the latest book by Mignon Eberhart; DANGER IN THE DARK (Doubleday, Doran). Mh : Although the scene is not laid in a hospital as most of her mystery stories have been, the dark stairway and many rooms of a rambling old country house provide numerous mystifying and baffling adventures. The characters are well drawn and the story moves at a rapid pace to a surprising climax, v

The Indianapolis

imes

Second Section

TUESDAY, JANUARY 26, 1937

Entered as Second-Class Matter Indianapolis,

at Postotfice,

PAGE 1l

Ind.

You _|

THEY DIE BY THE THOUSANDS

City With Most Traffic Manages to Curb Auto Fatalities

(Second of a Series)

ECAUSE of their sheer magnitude, traffic statistics for New York City are not properly comparable with those of any other city under the sun. But despite its vastness—more automobiles, more taxicabs, more motorists, more pedestrians—the world’s largest metropolis has succeeded in doing something important about curbing auto deaths. Since 1933, motor fatalities in New York have followed a constantly declining curve—a net reduction of 18.6—but the figure still stood in 1936 at 905 dead in a 12 month period.

Many factors have contributed to the city’s progress, but the most important is spelled out in two words—efficient policing! Under

the grim whiplash of a tragic

death toll, “New York's Finest” have proved their colorful tag line to be something more than a name. Result: 905 auto deaths in 1936 againsts1032 in 1935; 32,975 auto injuries against 35,332 in 1935. And —in 1936 there were only 27,968 motor accidents of all descriptions, compared with 39,000 in 1933—a three-year drop of better than 25 per cent. 2 " ” \ I’ was early in 1934 that Mayor La Guardia instituted an intensified police campaign against traffic accidents. Medals were offered to patrols, precincts and general divisions showing the most noteworthy records. New York's 20,000 bluecoats were told they must reduce traffic hazards at any cost. The watchword was to prevent accidents—not necessarily to make -arrests. At the end of the year, there were medals on breasts, pictures in the paper, glory for all. Courts were stepped up to a more efficient procedure; uniform penalties were adopted for first, second and third offenders. New York has been able to reduce its toll of the dead and maimed in traffic mishaps in virtually every category. Mechanical improvements have aided—more and better traffic signals, the latest scientific weapons for the acci-dent-prevention squads. Traffic experts say that replacement of streetcars (not yet city-wide) with busses that pull up to the curb unquestionably has aided in reducing the type of accident where passengers are struck entering or leaving -mass conveyances. c ” " 2 UT one urgent need remains

unanswered—the problem of

controlling the jaywalker and the otherwise careless pedestrian. In

- 1936, 153 persons were killed and

3422 injured while crossing streets against the lights; 89 more were killed and 2011 injured crossing in midblock or otherwise taking a Jjaywalk. Jaywalking is not illegal in New York. Toward the end of 1936, a new traffic code was drawn up and adopted making this pzrnicious practice punishable by a $2 fine. Mayor La Guardia vetoed jaywalking provisions - upon the

It happened in Indianapolis.

But it can happen anywhere.

ground that, the people were not yet ready for so drastic an innovation. He may also have had in mind congestion in the traffic courts. But—the matter has not been disregarded entirely. The Finest —always ready to take things in their own hands for the larger good—are stopping jaywalkers and pedestrians who disregard traffic lights. They have no legal right thus to halt a citizen in his tracks, but they do it. One part of New York's safety drive which strikes close to every parent has been eminently successful. The number of children killed in traffic was reduced from 190 in 1935 to 172 in 1936, and the total has been dropping constantly since 1933. More than 200 additional playgrounds, opened be~ cause the Park Department cooperated with police in accident reduction, are given chief credit for this achievement. ” ” s HICAGO was late in awakening fully to the need cf drastic steps in dealing with its complicated traffic problem and thus coming to grips with the problem of reducing auto deaths. It is still a straggler, with the result that its 1936 death toll increased about 5 per cent over 1935. This estimate of a 5 per cent increase in traffic fatalities last

"year comes from the Keep Chi-

cago Safe Committee, which has not yet compiled complete figures. It differs from the provisional estimate of the United States Census Bureau, which places: Chicago's 1936 death total at 704, a reduction of 8.8 per cent from the preceding year. Even if the Federal figure were correct, Chicago's record would be bad, compared, for example, with

905 dead in New York from the same type of accidents. Prime factor in Chicago’s difficult situation is the lack of a state law for the licensing of drivers. Anybody can drive a motorcar in Illinois, and the police are powerless to prevent it. The Keep Chicago Safe Committee is confident an adequate license law will pass the Legislature in 1937. It has the sponsorship of both Mayor Kelly and of Governor Horner, and is backed, besides, by an emphatic demand from an accidentconscious citizenry. 8 " o N one phase of accident prevention. Chicago's police are relentless—the elimination of drunken driving. “Driving while drunk” in the Windy City means Jjail—and nothing less. One mother of two little children was jailed for five days for taking a couple of glasses of sherry before dinner —and later driving through a red light. The courts. take a simple, emphatic position; neither sex nor position is an excuse for driving while drunk. Results have been almost spectacular. Folks who tilt a few in the Loop frequently leave their cars downtown, they don't dare drive home! On last New Year's Eve—traditional occasion for fatal smashes—not one traffic fatality occurred in Chicago. : On New Year's Eve, 1935, 13 men and women were Killed by autos. Incessant campaigns—hortatory and educational—in newspapers and by radio and other media, have helped stem the mounting tide of death and serious injury. The drive has been intensified in schools, motion picture houses, mass meetings. The whole city was organized for town hall meetings last year, the campaign terminating in a giant city-wide

TODAY'S LOCAL PERSONALITY

/ ’

72207

CHURCH =

Wiilllamom N. Wished

Trt

HE 1S AUTHOR OF NUMEROUS ARTICLES RELVING TO SURGERY # CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEE ON MEDICAL LEGISLATURE AND_PuBuie POLICY IN INDIANA STATE MED. SQCIETY. 24 YEARS AND AUTHOR OF THE LAW GOVERNING THE PRACTICE OF MEDICINE IN IND. F.A.2.8.¢

i” = > = vr. to eal ; - 222 or :

tl 77

2Z2==1I + il %%

dail 7

J 7 4 ¢

/ 7

0 EEE A) 2% R)

be b

/ z { HE IS A SURGEON ¢ MEMBER OF MISS. VALLEY MED. ASSN (PRES. 1895), IND. STATE MED. (PRes.1398, CHARMAN BUR.PUBLIEITY) UROLOGICAL SOCIETY FRANCE, PHI RHO SIGMA COLUMBIA CONTEMPORARY AND PRESB. . \ « MARRIED FRANCES €. SCOVILLE OF EVANSVILLE IND. AND HAS 2 SONS,-WiLLiam NILES,MD. AND REV. CHARLES 8. ¢ ¢ « =

FIRST

’ of

PRACTICED WITH HIS FATHER IN INDISNAPOUSS WAS SUPT INDIANAPOLIS ely HOSPITAL 1879-37 AND: SECURED ERECTION OF NEW HOSPITAL ANB AINING SCHOOL FOR NURSES IN IND. * WAS PROF IN INDIANA UNIV, SEHOOL OF MED.

AND SURGEON GENERAL IN IND. NATIONAL GLERE IBOO-93, RANK OF €OL. + ATTENDED WABASH

COLLECE (870-72 (Hon. A.M. 1890), M.D. INDIANA MED. COLLEGE 1874, MIAMI MED, SOWECE 1976 aND POST GRAD.WORK IN. NEW YORK BND HOSPITALS OF EUROPE A : 9

Sait

assembly in the Civic Opera House. Ministers have discussed traffic measures from pulpits, automobile companies have lent cars for safety demonstrations. In Chicago high schools, youngsters now are taught how to drive as a part of the curriculum. They use real automobiles after absorbing the

theory in classrooms. ” 2 zn N July 1, 1936, Chicago opened a series of safety lanes, and drivers were required by law to have their cars tested, though they themselves needed no license and were not required to pass any examination. These" lanes are credited with some improvement, though police have been criticized for too great leniency. “Traffic education” of police, indeed, is one of the prime 1937 projects of the safety committee, for Chicago has numerous police

forces under separate jurisdictions. George W. Fleming, general secretary of the safety committee, says the numerical increase in auto deaths last year is not so discouraging as it may at first appear. Actually, the first 11 months of 1936 showed a decrease, but the December toll was extraordinarily heavy. Even so, when compared with an increase of 67,000 in motor registrations for the year—and a vastly increased total gasoline consumption—the total number of deaths becomes less impressive, though still large enough to warrant the most drastic steps. On a gasoline consumption basis, there were slightly fewer than 22 deaths per 10,000,000 gallons in 1936, compared with 23 in 1935 and 27 in 1934. Some experts say this is the only really fair way to calculate traffic death rates.

Next—Philadelphia.

Radek Trial Makes Clapper Doubt Soviet Democracy

By RAYMOND CLAPPER

ASHINGTON, Jan. 26.—The Soviet Union has labored heroically to convince the world that it is introducing Western democracy with its new constitution. How far the Soviet Union still must go to approach even the beginning of democracy as we understand it is shown in the trial of Karl Radek, one of Russia's most prominent journalists, who not so long ago was regarded as an authoritative interpreter of Soviet ideas to the outside world. The - whole affair—the Government's charges and Mr. Radek’s admissions — i$ incomprehensible to the Western mind. It is equally incomprehensible that Vladimir Romm, who until recently was Izvestia’s Washington correspondent, could have knowingly been a go-between in a traitorous plot against his Government. He is under arrest and testimony was given in Moscow that through him Mr. Radek, his editor, communicated with Trotzky. Many of us here knew Mr. Romm. He seemed too devoted to his Government to have been interested in any plot against it. Furthermore, it does not seem possikle that he could have possessed the amount of stupidity required to become entangled in any intrigue with Trotzky. He was a good-will ambassador here for Soviet Russia and did much to spread understanding of his Government among Americans.

2 2 2

HIS may be Soviet justice. The affair is too fantastic to be understood here. But it doesn’t seem much like democracy—nothing about it does. The curse of dictatorship is that it does not permit differences nf opinion. If differences exist, they are driven underground to fester into plots. It is as if on the

morning after election Mr. Roose-

velt had chased Mr. Landon out of the country and sent out his Secret Service to get Mark Sullivan and Frank Kent. In a democracy criticism is not treason. It is a healthy irritant. Able to speak its mind, the opposition does not have to plot. We may disagree among ourselves as to methods, but no {faction has a monopoly on patriotism. On second thought, we almost had a little Radek case of our own after election. An editor in California wrote that President Roosevelt was the “biggest false alarm since the creation of man.” The White House failed to strike at this plot against the Government, but several 150 per cent Democrats in California hustled the editor into court. The judge who seems to have been only a 100 per cent American, let him go, dismissing the charges of criminal libel for lack of evidence.

Lin Yutang, a shrewd modern Chinese philosopher, said recently: “While the Fascists (or dictators) regard the press as a nuisance and therefore suppress it, the believers in democracy also regard the free-

dom of the press as a nuisance. and |,

thank God they have so glorious a nuisance.” Of course, our Chinese friend was generalizing. You couldn't exactly say that President Roosevelt rises every morning giving thanks for a gloriously free press. As with pre-

vious Presidents, sometimes it is toc

free to please him. Day to day they all find.the press irritating. ” = 2 ET any President, from Roosevelt back, probably would make the fight of his life to preserve a free press if the issue came to a showdown. Politicians live by publicity—preferably favorable publicity, but if not that, then any other kind. They would rather have bad publicity than none. The one thing a politician can't. stand is silence. But let one little paragraph rub a

President the wrong way and he wants to eat two hard-boiled reporters for breakfast. A reporter for the United Press once observed a patched lace curtain on a White House window and wrote a paragraph. Herbert Hoover sét the Secret Service on his trail to find out how he discovered it.

President Roosevelt frequently is irritated at newspaper speculation about his activities. He always has disliked speculation. But you'd think that ‘after the election turned out the way it did, he wouldn't care much what the newspapers said about him, and the worse the better. Mr. Coolidge had the best rule. If it was against him, he didn’t read it. Any President could save half of his time that way.

HEARD IN CONGRESS

REP. CREAL (D. Ky.)—Back in other days I have sent men to the electric chair, but I have always doubted whether the Government should have that authority. ” ” ”

REP. O'MALLEY (D. Wis,)—We ought to have enough debate to put into the Congressional Record the names: of those rascally "Americans who ate trying to make money off armed conflict. ” % 2

REP. MAVERICK (D. Tex.) who was wounded in the World War) —If we are to discuss dead men, I can talk as long as any man on the floor. ||

KNOW YOUR INDIANAPOLIS

Eight doctors and 50 nurses are engaged in medical inspection and nursing in public and parcchial schools and kindergartens.

was found dead at his bench.

. Byrne, who was our first tailor.

Our Town

By ANTON SCHERRER

OU can take it from me that Jane Reagan was the first bride in Indianapolis. Janewas a buxom lass, daughter of Wilkes Reagan, our first butcher, who sold his meat in the grove in the Circle, provided, of course, that the sun wasn’t too hot to permit him to display his wares. Mr. Reagan came to Indianapolis in the summer of 1821, and Jane had hardly got her trunk unpacked

when she spied Jeremiah Johnson. The wedding took place that same summer, which ought to give you a pretty good idea of how fast girls used to work. Before Jerry could get married, however, he had to have a license. Jerry couldn't get a license here because Indianapolis wasn’t organized for that sort of thing yet, and

‘so he went to Connersville, the

nearest marriage bureau. Jerry walked 60 miles through an unbroken and pathless forest Mr. Scherrer to get the license, and, of course, : he walked another 60 miles to bring it back to Jane. Jerry said it was worth it. It was Jerry's first wise= crack. : After that and up to the time of his death, Jerry kept Indianapolis in stitches laughing over his bon mots. When the first telegraph line was completed to Indianapolis in 1848, Jerry had a look and said: “There! They're driving lightning down the road and with a single line at that.”

= " ” Better Wisecrack

UT that wasn’t as good as the one he pulled when Isaac Lynch died. Mr. Lynch was our first shoemaker, but he almost missed being first, bee cause Cobbler James Kittleman blew into town Just 48 hours after Ike did. It kept Jimmy humping to keep up with Ike after that. One morning Ike When the news ‘reached Tom Carter's Tavern, Jerry Johnson exclaimed: “Well, I swan if old Ike ain't beat Jimmy Kittleman again.” Jerry’s sense of humor didn’t stop at anything— not even pants. The pants story came to light bee cause Jerry was one of the first patrons of Andrew Mr. Byrne, circa 1820, made a great reputation for himself with his buckskin suits, but he had. his troubles, too. u » ”

Extra Pants

Bice breeches, for instance, had their limitations. For one thing, they had a nasty way of getting soaked in the rain, and once wet, they had a disheartening way of getting as hard as sheet iron if a fellow sat in them too long. They lost their pliability in this condition and the only thing to do in the circumstances was to resoak them. Which, of course, left a fellow in an awful predicament until they were reconditioned.

. Jerry settled everything for all time by commissioning Mr. Byrne to make him. a buckskin suit with an extra pair of pants.

A Woman's View

By MRS. WALTER FERGUSON

E gather from The New Yorker that the Mare gery - Wilson Institute of Charm has 500,000 pupils, most of them New York women. Washington is second on its lists, followed by Oklahoma City, Los Angeles and Chicago. There's no doubt about it, the' American woman is going to be charming or bust the bank a&count. For Miss Wilson's school is only one of many, and $7,000,« 000 was spent last year by the ladies who fondly bee lieve that charm is a purchasable commodity. Maybe that’s what is the matter with the country —too much boughten charm oozing out all over the place. It’s getting so it leaves you with an unpleasant sticky taste, as if you'd been eating too much molasses. Now and then we even find ourselves hankering for some old-fashioned gauche manners for a change.

Not that we're against charm as it is- taught in, the charm schools. We carp because the results are restricted to very narrow. limits. Why couldn’t the charm be spread around more? It's good as far as it goes but it doesn’t go far enough. You see what we mean? At dinner parties, or club meetings, over tea tables, and after church, the charmers are in fine fettle. They know their lessons by heart. But when the lady buyer gets down to the grocery or to the manicurist’s or steps into the kitchen to talk to the maid, she seems to forget everything she’s learned. We've heard some charmers give rather fishwifely ‘tongue-lashings to their social inferiors and couldn’t help but think about the money they had wasted. One lovely creature shattered our faith in the system when she slammed her door in the face of a shabby peddler; another was rude to a department store salesman; a third has two children who are unmannerly boors. There's one more angle, too, for the schools to work on. Their pupils who drive cars could do a whole ccurse on how to be charming at the steering

Your Health

By DR. MORRIS FISHBEIN

Editor, American Medical Assn. Journal

ODERN investigations have shown that human beings can be divided into groups according to certain factors present in their blood; and that the blood of some groups may be mixed without danger, whereas that of other groups will not mix satisface torily. This was discovered after thousands of experie ments, in each of which the blood of one person was tested with that of another, revealed that persons could be grouped according to the agglutinins and agglutinogens in their blood. Agglutinin is a -substance contained in the fluid matter of blood; agglutinogen, in the red blood cells. When the agglutinogen of one blood is acted on by a

certain kind of agglutinin from another, the blood cells will clump together, or agglutinate. Obviously, it is impossible for a person to have in his own blood an agglutinin which would act on his own agglutinogen, because then his own blood would clot. :

Further studies made on blood groups have shown

- that they are inherited, and that various types of ani-

mals and various races of human beings have special arrangements of their blood groups.

A person can transfer only one of these factors to his child. If the blood group to which a child and one parent belong is known, it can be definitely said that the other parent must belong to one of certain groups and cannot possibly belong to any other group. Today, courts in many states have recognized the scientific character of these observations and evie dence has been introduced in: legal cases to show, for instance, that a certain man could not possibly be the father of a certain child. It is not yet possible, however, to show by this evidence that a certain man is definitely the father of a certain child.

It is obvious that these tests must be made only by those who are experienced and competent in this kind of work. The method is still being studied exe perimentally all over the world. ! :

r— SNreta