Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 19 May 1937 — Page 13

agabond

FROM INDIANA ERNIE PYLE

HESE strange men in fantastic scream- . - ing cars that tear around the Indianapolis Speedway on Memorial Day—how dif: ferent are they from us common mortals who drive down the road at 50 miles an hour? Well, off the track, you couldn’t tell a race driver from anybody else. But on the track? Well, they

have to be different from us. For five hours out

there they live in a world we can hardly conceive of. I've been around among some of the drivers lately, asking them schoolboy questions’ about this other world and getting the answers. Here are some of them: Can the driver and mechanic hear each other talk during the race? Yes, but not very well They shout back and forth -a little, but not much. They talk mostly by pointing. Can they hear. that dramatic, momentous, mile-long yell of the crowd as the winner comes down the stretch on the last lap? No:| The rushing wind and the roaring motor makes too much noise, and anyway by the end of the race theyre almost deaf. Are the boys in the cars conscious of the crowd? Yes. I didn’t suppose they even knew the crowd was there, but they see quite a few things. Wilbur Shaw says he can actually see some of the crowd getting drunk as the day wears away. Does the race ever get monotonous to the drivers? Yes. Sometimes they drone alcng for a hundred miles with the cars well scattered and no change in position, and then it is like monotonous driving anywhere else.

Mr. Pyle

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Mechanic Plays Important Role:

OW much does the driver depend upon the riding mechanic? A great deal. The mechanic has to watch behind for cars trying to pass; he helps read the pit signals; he watches the outside tires,for dangerous wear. And to me one of his most interesting little duties is this: going into every turn, he looks to the left, clear across the turn, to see if there are any pile-ups on the far corner. How do the drivers feel about the danger of the race game? Their attitude toward death is the same as it is among aviators. Exactly the same. It's a simple philosophy. It's merely this—it can happen to the other fellow, but never to me. : Do drivers get scared during a race. Well, yes and no. Naturally you couldn't see a car pile up and see people killed without being:affected. But it sel-

dom slows them down. ” E-4 ”

Slowing Down Most Difficult

N the other hand, the hardest part of a race for the drivers iis when they are flagged down to 60 .or 80 miles an hour for several laps because of a wreck, or because of rain. They have been keyed® up to a terrific tenseness. Drive 400 miles at 110 miles an hour and you're in a state of nervous tightness that will carry you on through nearly anything. But have that spell broken,

: + and the fine tight wire of your senses goes slack.

Drivers almost go crazy during the “flag downs.” They yell at the race officials as they go by, pleading with them to “let us go.” “And then when they do get the green flag and everybody guns it and they go slamming around faster and faster than ever, wild over lost time, their armor of rigid tenseness all shot, their nerves frazzled—right there is the most dangerous part of your 500- mile auto race. (Next: The cars themselves.)

* Mrs.Roosevelt's Day

By ELEANOR ROOSEVELT

Wasumaron Tuesday.—Have you ever noticed how contagious enthusiasm" of any kind is? A young man came in to talk to me at tea-time yesterday afternoon about the educational program carried on in the CCC camps. His interest in the stories of the boys, their opportunities for future employment, the contacts which have been made with employers, the study of the boys themselves over a period of six months and the judgment shown in placing them in the proper environment, was so vital, that it became equally: interesting to us. I forgot I was going to swim and when I finally ushered my guests out, it was five minutes past 7. . The very same thing happened in the evening. A housing enthusiast, who has taken the trouble to go to Europe to make some interesting pictures of housing conditions there with which he contrasts some of our own conditions in this country, came to dinner and showed his pictures afterward. It was all to be very brief and cut and dried, but somehow or other his enthusiasm caught the rest of us: Everybody became interested in the subject. When the pictures were over, my husband, instead of making ‘a hasty retreat to the privacy of his study, stayed. We all sat around and talked until the gentleman really had said most of the things he had in his heart to say. People like this, who feel so intensely, are certainly the people who inspire action in others. I rode again this morning for the first time in some weeks, and was impressed with the preparations being made for the Boy Scouts’ jamboree along the river. When they arrive, the bridle path will not be a good place to ride, but by that time I imagine most of the people who ride there now will Have gone to other places where it is cooler. I have just come back from the Red Cross where I was presented with one of my own books, “A Trip to Washington “With Bobby and Betty,” in Braille. They showed me the processes by which they do their work and explained that they did such individual things as transcribing German lessons for a blind student at Howard University. This student will keep these lessons very carefully. She has already passed one oral test with the help they have been able to give her. When she is through with the entire course, the book will be sent to the Library of Congress and will be available for other blind students.

New Books

PUBLIC LIBRARY PRESENTS—

NE could scarcely ask for a more favorable comO bination of trained historian and understanding friend than we have in George M. Trevelyan, as bio‘grapher of GREY OF FALLODON (Houghton-Mif- - fin). . Prof. Trevelyan’s aim has been to take from documents, letters, notes, and Grey's own “Twenty-five Years,” enough truth to justify the foreign policy of that most harassed Foreign Secretary. Along with this vindication he has portrayed the character of the man, whose struggle between his sense of public duty and his yearning for the quiet, studious life of the nature-lover made that character even finer and stronger. The first great tragedy of Sir Edward's life was the death of his wife, Dorothy. Then—but let us quote Trevelyan—*“The memories he amassed in the first half of his life, with Dorothy among the woods and the birds or alone with his rod by the waters, were the capital on which he lived during the long years of his - widowhood, his grim struggle to guide the brute forces of Europe into the paths of peace and the blindness that mocked his final escape from office.”

# # 8

ITH his fiddle tucked under his arm, a stout stick for walking, and a lively personal interest in everything in sight, Walter Starkie takes one adventuring among the gypsies of southern Spain in PON GYPSY (Dutton). Not only a fiddler, but a scholar is Dr. Starkie, professor of Spanish at Dublin University. And the result is that, interspersed with observations on Romany life, legends that have been handed down for gen-

erations, and the “heroic combats” of the past, are

analyses of the theory of music and particularly the brilliance and zest in gypsy music. He has a way of carrying the reader along through his pages of music and dancing until the whole ugly tangle of international relations and economic problems is lost in an ~ abandonniént to the rich lights and sounds, the’ violence and generasity of gypsy life.

The Indianapolis Times

WEDNESDAY, MAY 19, 1937

The SEVEN

By David Diety

Times Science Editor

Action of Pneumonia Sari Often Seems Like Miracle, but Dread Disease Is Still One of Plagues of Modern Times.

(Sixth and Last of a Series)

ERE it comes,”

shouted a sharp-eyed member of the

crowd on the main steps of the Airport Administration Building as a police squadron car rounded the far corner of the road and raced along the concrete pavement. The car came to a stop and out jumped a uniformed officer with a small box in his arms. “This way,” called the airport director and together they ran to the rear of the building where

a high-peed, though small, cabin plane was waiting on the runway. — The officer hurriedly handed his box to the pilot who waved his hand and slammed the door of the

cabin shut.

Mechanics grasped .the propeller of

the plane and swung it around. . The motor roared as the plane leaped along the runway and took off. The men on the ground waved their hands and shouted, “Goed luck,” although they knew the pilot could not possibly hear them.

David Dietz

That plane was speeding to a little lumber camp in the far North. The little box contained a burden

more precious than gold. In it was pneumonia serum which rhe district doctor of that far community had requested by radio to fight an epidemic of pneumonia in the lumber camp.

If the plane got there in time, For oiften the action of pneumonia serum is like a miracle.

many lives.

The patient seems to be dying.

Within a few hours he shows definite signs of improvement. Before eight hours have passed, he is on

his way to recovery. 2 8 8

NFORTUNATELY pneumonia serum is difficult and i sive to prepare.

It costs about for enough serum for one pati R/

And still more unfortunately, there are a great variety of types of pneumonia and serums for only a few. Otherwise, pneumonia might not constitute the menace to imnodern life that it is. But because the situation is what it is, pneumonia is still one of the seven horsemen of death, one of the most common causes of death in the United States. Pneumonia is divided into two general kinds by medical men today. These are known as bronchopneumonia and lobar pneumonia. Broncho-pneumonia is an infection at the ends of the bronchi, the tubes which bring air into the lungs. This type of pneumonia is ‘most likely to occur as a compiication to other diseases and frequently is the iast chapter in the lives of people who have grown old and infirm. Lobar pneumonia is caused by germs whose actions cause all the air sacs or aveoli in one lobe of a lung to be filled up with an inflammatory exudate. There are 32 different types of pneumonia recognized by physicians today, each one caused by a different germ. They. are known as Type I, Type II, Type III, Type IV and so on. At present, the designation Type IV is frequently used to mean everything except the three preceding types. = = = ERUMS at present are known

for Types 1, II, V, VII and VIII. These serums are exceed-

its precious burden might save

An injection of serum is given.

ingly specific in their actions. For: example, there is no point in treating Type I with Type II serum. Recently attempts have been made to dreat Type III, for which mo serum’ exists, by means of the new antiseptic drug, prontosil. An exceedingly important part of the treatment of a case of pneumonia is skilled nursing care. There is still some discussion as to whether or not a patient can contact pneumonia, directly. While Ait is now felt that an attack of pneumonia may develop suddenly, as a rule it follows a cold or influenza. : Here then is the important piece of advice which the medical profession can give upon the subject of pneumonia: Never neglect a cold. It may be the prelude to

pneumonia. In particular, beware of the notion that you can “walk off a cold,” or get rid of it by

strenuous measure. This is virtually an invitation to pneumonia. 4

2 " ”

HE best treatment for a cold is rest in bed. is severe, and particularly if it is accompanied by fever, the fam-

ily physician should be called in.

If he suspects pneumonia, he will lose no time in making certain by having a sample of sputum analyzed under the microscope. He knows that in the fight against pneumonia, speed is half the -battle. Last year a campaign was launched by the New York State

NEXT: Charlie McCarthy, The Wooden Trouper of Radioland.

HOR

If thecold

Health Department and the medical associations of the State to educate the public to the dangers of pneumonia and the necessity of prompt treatment. Other states have adopted similar measures and it is hoped that this will lead to a reduction in the number of deaths from pneumonia. In conclusion, let me say a few words about what you can do to battle: the seven horsemen = of death. Here as always in matters cf health, your chief ally is the family physician. All authorities agree that he must always man the first-line trenches in the battle against disease. : Every family should have a physician whom they know and trust.

His knowledge over the years of °

your family give him a tremendous advantage in caring for their health. He will tell you when the services of a specialist or a surgeon are needed.

# 2

F you are one of those persons whose health is good from one end of the year to another, go to ‘see your family physician once a year anyway. Let him check up on your heart and blood pressure, and so on. This does not mean that you should start worrying about your health. Far from it. Worry itself is a disease and the prelude of various nervous disorders. Next, without worrying about your health, apply good judgment to its care. Suppose that you owned a marvelous automobile for which, unfortunately, there were no spare parts in existence. If

you smashed a. spring or wore out -

the storage battery, you could never get a new. one. Obviously, you would take good care of that car. Your body resembles that kind of an automobile. If you wear out your arteries or your liver or your kidneys, you can’t get replacements. Again, this does not mean to be unduly fearful about your health. Returning to that automobile, it would be silly to lock it up and never take it out of the garage. It was meant to be used. But you should exercise good judgment. on 3 HREE of the seven horsemen of death, it will be recalled, heart disease, kidney disease and cerebral hemorrhage, are the finales in a train of events which begin with high blood pressure. Many authorities have called them the “diseases of civilization.” Medical men believe that their incidence is augmented by the tempo of modern life. As I have said, to avoid them, learn to take it easy. Cancer can be treated successfully by X-ray, radium or surgery, or some combination of the three, if diagnosed early enough. That is why an annual visit to your family physician pays. Accidents are something beyond the control of the medical profession. They constitute one of the major causes of death in the United States because of human frailty, carelessness and shortsightedness. Every accidental death is a sacrifice to these weaknesses. Care,” forethought and

GANDHI SPINS MORE TROUBLES FOR GREAT BRITAIN BY DOING NOTHING

‘By MILTON BRONNER NEA Service Staff Correspondent

ONDON, May 19. — Skinny, ‘toothless, pencil-legged, 67-year-old Mahatma Gandhi, who looks like a brown gnome and smiles with saintly benevolence, has jumped right into the limelight in - India again and has the British masters of the vast land guessing once more. By simply tending to his spinning, with the utterance of hardly a word, he has sabotaged the “Government of India Act.” It all looked so different’ when the Mahatma, more than a year ago, retired from all activity in the Congress Party. At least apparently so. Eloquent, youthful Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru was chosen president of the party and was popular and powerful in spite of the fact that many of the party did not espouse

‘ his socialist doctrines.

HE British Parliament passed the Government of India Act, which, it was hoped, would go far to meet the demands of the Indians for a large measure of home rule. India was divided into 11 provinces, each of which should have its own legislature and a cabinet responsible to that legislature. Pandit Nehru and his party not only put up candidates for the legislatures in all the provinces but made an active campaign, Nehru himself flying to widely scattered areas. Oddly, though, while demanding votes for his candidates, he asserted that in all probability they would not take office as they did not think much of the constitution anyway. With the result, last March the Congress Party won complete victories in six of the 11 provinces and constituted the strongest group, though not a majority, in three others.

The Congress ‘Party chiefs then

held a meeting and decided in the six provinces, where they had a majority, that they would not form a government unless the British Governors of those provinces would give an assurance that they would not use their special powers in regard to constitutional activities. The Governors refused. ” ” ” . ITTLE GANDHI, quietly. spinning cotton in his country colony, munching his handful of rice, did not have to say much. Mainiy he smiled his acquiescence in the Congress Party. stand. So the British invited minority parties to form ministries in the six provinces. This has been done. But, of course, those ministries can accomplish nothing. : The Government of India and the British Cabinet at home are in a quandary. Gandhi and Nehru have them stymied.

narrow-minded attitude and gave a | more reasonable and workable inter-

1 v

Entered as Second-Class Matter Indianapolis,

at Postoffice,

“Good Luck,” they shouted as the airplane took off with .its precious load of life-saving pneumonia serum.

good judgment can reduce their toll.

Tuberculosis, while still among the horsemen of death, can be eradicated. Medical science knows enough to wipe it out. If adequate public support is given to the task it can be done. Pneumonia, as already outlined,

can he combatted in large measure by the methods mentioned.

The future, therefore, is largely *

what the people of the nation, individually and collectively,-choose to make it. The seven horsemen of death can be combatted with wisdom. The End.

Court Plan,

ASHINGTON, May 19.—The Administration may try to revive the fight but Justice Van! Devanter’s retirement will bury the Roosevelt Supreme Court enlargement plan so deep that it will never be dug out again. It was practically dead anyway— not because of the shrieks of Senator Wheeler or anybody -else—but because in this term the Supreme Court itself abandoned its former

pretation to the vague clauses of the Constitution. Doubts were resolved in favor of Congress, instead of against it. Now Justice Van Devanter’s retirement gives Mr. Roosevelt an opportunity to enlarge his margin of safety on the Court by an additional Justice. The frequent 5-to-4 division is more likely to be 6-to0-3 now, unless Justice Roberts does a backslide. Thus with a line of decisions going the New Deal's way, and with an additional margin of safety on the Court, the justification for the Administration court plan no longer exists. That is what will kill it, Not the Senate Judiciary Committee’s vote against it. That means nothing. If" conditions justified it, the Senate would override its Judiciary Committee without batting an eye. 8 nn 8 HE Supreme Court has come around. Mr. Roosevelt has got his way without having to go in for the kill. He may not think so. Some of his advisers don’t seem to know when they have made a

. go on- for five new judges.

sale and they are egging him to But if

Justice's Resignation Kills

er Says

By RAYMOND CLAPPER Times Special Writer

Mr. Roosevelt can shake himself loose from Tom Corcoran and Ben Cohen long enough to take a calm, objective look at the situation, he will call it a good spring cleanup and move on to the other important unfinished business. Justice Van Devanter’s announcement was made in an unusual way, and just an hour or so before the Senate Judiciary Committee held its much advertised meeting to vote down the court plan. If Justice Van Devanter didn't time his announcement to put Mr. Roosevelt in a hole, then he doesn’t read his newspapers. He didn't even give the President a chance to make the announcement, as courtesy would suggest. Anyway he gave a break to an old newspaper friend. John Suter, who has covered the Supreme Court for 45 years, was an old-timer around the Court when Mr. Van Devanter was still Republican national committeeman for Wyoming. When Mr. Van Devanter came to the Court in 1910, Mr. Suter was a veteran reporter, having been around there since the early Nineties. They °‘became close friends. Yesterday morning, as Mr. Suter was preparing to leave home for his office, Justice Van Devanter telephoned him to stop at his apartment on the way downtown. When Mr. Suter arrived, about 8:30 a. m., Justice Van Devanter showed him the letter he was about to send to the President announcing his retirement. He gave Mr. Suter a chance to get the news out on his wires, and then about an hour later sent the letter by messenger to the White: House.

Second Section

PAGE 13

Ind.

Our Town |

HE Little German Band was the real harbinger of spring when 1 was a boy. To be sure, we had daffodils and tulips, too, but somehow they weren't as dependable as the strolling musicians. At any rate, the

Little German Band always showed up at the beginning of the vernal equinox, which was something the flowers didn’t always do.. : I know whereof I speak, because I remember that

it was usually a windy March’ day when the first German bang arrived. It was usually “ironing day,” too. Maybe you don’t know: it, but when I was a boy we had what is known as a “planned state of so- . ciety.” Monday was “wash day”; Tuesday was “ironing day”; Wednesday was “mending day”; Thursday was supposed to be “visiting day.” but it always seemed more like “knitting day”; Friday was “cleaning day,” and Saturday was. “baking day.” Well, as I was saying, the Little German Band nearly always turned up on Tuesdays. I don’t know why. It just did. Sometimes there were three musicians and somee times four, but no matter how many men the band had, there were always four instruments—a trombone, an um-da-ca horn, a piccolo and a pair of cymbals, Sometimes the trombone player had the cymbals attached to his shoulders with a rod running down to his heels by means of which he kicked the music. Which explains, of course, why some Little German Bands could get along with fewer plajers.

# 2 2

Liked “Four-Man Band Best

REMEMBER that I liked the hand with the four men best, probably because I thought the cymbals deserved -a man and not a machine. Another reae son, though, was that the bigger band had the grandest collection of mustaches ever brought to Indianapolis. I remember the piccolo player in particular, because, besides having a magnificent mustache, he also had a scar—just the kind you'd associate with a duel. or something.

I always meant to ask about the scar, but never quite had the courage. As a matter of fact, I didn’t get around to it until the Little German Band turned up without the defaced piccolo player. Then I knew it was up to me to ask about his whereabouts. : Well, it turned out that the piccolo player had returned to Germany—for good, too.. As for the scar, sure enough it was the result of a duel. Seems that when the piccolo player was a student at a German university he got into a fight about a girl or some= thing. What's more, he killed his rival, and the only thing 15 do about it was to escape to America.

Mr. Scherrer

Ti He Was Baron in Disguise

IS father was so angry that he said he'd disine herit his son, but he didn’t, because when it came time for the father to die he said hed give anything to have his son back again. They found his son in the Little German Band, and nobody was more surprised than the trombonist and the horn player and the cymbalist, because when they heard the whole story it turned out that the piccolo player was a German baron in disguise. I always thought it kind of queer that a man lucky enough to be in the Little German Band would give it up to be a baron.

A Woman's View

By MRS. WALTER FERGUSON

HE students of a Western university are clamoring to get the lowdown on “the facts of life’— and just when we have decided there was not a chit of 10 who had not graduated with A-plus in the subject.

Perhaps we jumped too hastily to conclusions, just

as adults are apt to do about issues involving voung

people. At any rate the news comes as a great surprise, and it proves, we think, that the kids are not going to be satisfied with the pretty fables which were handed out to us in the late Victorian era. On second thought, however, perhaps the stark realism which now passes for instruction is no more enlightening than our fables were. To convey a real knowledge of the facts of life involves so much more than a mere recital of details concerning procreation and birth. Thousands of

children are informed about such details without

having the dimmest conception of their truth in relationship to themselves and life. The barnyard learning which is regarded in so many quarters as wisdom merely mystifies the child mind and often results in complete confusion and a distorted idea about what should be a beautiful certainty. Knowing all these so-called “facts,” you see, doesn’t help the girls and boys unless they also know some= thing about the emotions which lead up to such facts. In the main our efforts to be modern and sensible on the question have left us foolish and furtive. We don’t call it furtive, of course. But that’s what our attitude remains, because we so often refuse to admit there is anything more to sex than physical attrac tion.

The functions of sex, even when they are most intelligently taught, are only the abc of the alphabet of love and marriage. One learns that only through experience, and the experience of no two of us is alike. It is impossible to explain the sene sation of love to one who has never felt it, just as it is impossible to make a 16-year-old girl understand how a middle-aged woman could possibly feel undying affection for a stout, bald, oldish husband. For some of the facts of life are inexplicable, and they are far more important in many ways than the simpler ones.

Your Health

By DR. MORRIS FISHBEIN

Editor. American Medical Assn. Journal ECENTLY two specialists. in diseases of the heart made the following statement about angina pec= toris: “Persisting in golf after angina is perhaps comparable to persisting in eating candy after diabetes appears.” In eight of 190 cases of deaths from angina pece toris, the patient died while playing golf. Every golfer knows the frequent temptation to violent exercise. There is the danger of bad weather and strong wind; there is the possibility of short but stiff climbs; there is the necessary exertion in getting out of the rough or climbing out of a trap, and the hurry necessary to keep pace with more rapid golfers, In 33 out of 100 fatal .cases of angina pectoris, long journeys had been taken Just before the final disaster. A person with angina pectoris should never pub himself into a position, once he has learned that he has this condition, in which he may be suddenly submitted to an extraordinary stress. Scientific medicine ‘has developed a method of ° relief for the acute attack. There are now small glass ampules filled with a drug called amyl nitrite, which are prescribed for people with this disease. In the majority of cases, thesinhaling of this drug will bring about prompt relief. Some of the patients do wel with treatment involving the use of nitroglycerine. These drugs are pofent and should’ never be taken except upon advice of a doctor. Relief of the acute attack is not the chief matter of importance. The doctor who is responsible for the patient with angina pectoris will regulate the entire life of the patient, according to the suggestions that have already been mentioned, to minimize the number of - attacks.