Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 23 November 1937 — Page 11
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Vagabond
From Indiana— Ernie Pyle
Test Shows Ernie Why Auto Racers | Make Speed Trials on Salt Flats;
Smoke—-City's Public Enemy No.
He Can't Skid Even When He Tries.
VW ENDOVER, Utah, Nov. 23.—It has always been a puzzle to me why the salt beds of Utah should provide the world’s most perfect raceway for automobiles. All recent world speed records have been made on the Bonneville Salt Flats. Sir Malcolm Campbell, and Ab Jenkins, and now Capt. George
Eyston. So I drove on the salt myself and now I know. For a hundred miles west of Salt Lake City the country is common desert, ‘dry, brown and sage-bushy. Then gradually you come into the salt flats.
On either side, and ahead and ;
behind, for miles and miles in every direction, the flat salt stretches to the very foot of the far-lying brown hills. The feeling is that of being in the center of a vast frozen lake. And you see mirages. Far out on the bluish “ice” you see black boats, apparently floating a few feet above the surface. As you come along even with them, they become sticks of wood lying on the salt. Along either side of the oiled highway is a deep ditch. It is blue in the center and white along the edges. It appears to be clear water, running between snow-encrusted banks. You don’t know whether it's a mirage or not. You stop to have a look. You kneel down and stick your finger into the ditch. Yes, it's water, all right. Then you taste it. Wham, pop, blooie and ugh! What a taste! Here's how the salt beds came into existence: Once all western Utah was a lake. Then somehow its outlet was shut off by geological shifting, the lake became a dead lake, and it gradually turned salty. The sun evaporated the water, the lake withered, and the salt crystallized and settled and formed these
salt beds.
Salt Packs Four Feet Deep
On ‘the Bonneville flats the salt lies four feet deep. Why it packs so hard, I don’t know. Finally I came to a sign which said you could drive off the highway a little piece, then turn and parallel the road for four miles, then go back on the highway. That gives tourists an opportunity to say they have driven on the salt. So I turned off and drove toward the tented auto race camp, That drive, right on the salt, was sensational. The surface was a bluish-white—so white -that even with dark glasses you could hardly see to drive. It was hard to drive in a straight line. For there was no perspective. Nothing to judge your direction by, except the far-away race camp. The whole expanse appeared so much like ice that I couldn’t believe a car could have much traction on it. My car is very fond of skidding. So I tried it out. 1 stepped up to 60 miles an hour, turned the wheel a little, and hit the brakes, I thought we would spin at least three times—and of course it wouldn't have hurt anything if we had, for there's nothing within miles to hit. But I didn’t spin at all, or even skid. The tires just crunched, and I stopped. Then I got out to examine this salt floor. Close up, it isn’t like ice at all, It's a tightly packed composition of salt crystals. 1 drove miles and miles around over the flats, and almost got lost. I believe a man could go crazy on it from the confusion of an infinite bright bareness.
My Diary By Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt
End of Lecture Tour Lifts Cares;
Southern Dams Excite Admiration.
NOXVILLE, Tenn., Monday —Seven o'clock saw us on the road yesterday morning. The sky was blue, the sun shone and we were all feeling very cheerful. There is a satisfaction in finishing a piece of work and a lecture tour is a piece of work. But mixed with that satisfaction there is a sense of obligation which I can now shed and feel parficularly free. We stopped at the museum in Shiloh National Park and were told the story of the battle by a young lecturer. He had that kind of fluency which comes only from daily repetition of the same story. Danis are marvelous engineering feats and they fill me with awe and admiration for the men who plan and execute them. I would never have the courage to begin so monumental a work, but I am not an engineer. Of all the interesting things I saw yesterday, two things stand out in my mind. This part of the country has always seemed poor to me. The land is poor, the majority of houses are poor, the people living in them look poor. However, the TVA has done something to this countryside since I was here two years ago. The farmers are beginning to conserve their land. Field after field is terraced to prevent the topsoil from being washed away.
Phosphates Aid Farmers’ Lands
When we went over the big Muscle Shoals fertilizer plant I was told an interesting story. The Department of Agriculture in conjunction with the TVA arranged that farmers who wanted phosphate could get it in lieu of cash payments from the Government. Instead of trying to produce crops with it, they are putting something their land has lost back into it by using this fertilizer and planting a cover crop which can be used for grazing. At every one of the dams yesterday I saw pictures of this kind of conservation, A map of the area was there to illustrate flood control, navigation and the generation of power. Other pictures showed how the power would be used. Our first stop this morning was at Pickwick Dam, which is only 60 per cent complete and which I had not seen before. From then on I was seeing things for the second time, which is always much better, for you see much more, Last evening we sat around and asked questions of some of the officials connected with the work and then proceeded by train to Knoxville. We are spending the day in Norris.
New Books Today
ublic Library Presents—
“NOME to my house, Nobody minds me. Everyone knows that everybody comes to see me. If the Pope, the Tsar of Russia and Bismarck were to be seen on my doorstep arm-in-arm, nobody would infer anything.” So spoke Henry Labouchere, better known as “Labby,” to Parnell. Labby was a Victorien politician, wealthy, champion of the poor, friend of such notables as Gladstone, Whistler and Wagner, and possessor of a raustic wit which made him greatly loved and cordially bated. ie : To Hesketh Pearson a vote of thanks for presenting LABBY (Harper). Mr. Pearson writes well; with humour he fits into an era of intense respectability a man who had from childhood shown a “marked. disinclination to sobriety of thought or behaviour.” ” » ® RANCE in the 16th Century was a country torn and harassed with civil and religious wars, and ruled by young, weak kings, the sons of that formidable and crafty Italian Queen, Catherine de’ Medici. Hers were the hands which really controlled affairs in France; hers the mind which planned the tragedy of St. Bartholomew's eve. Heinrich Mann in his novel, YOUNG HENRY OF NAVARRE (Knopf), pictures Henry's early life and training under his Huguenot mother, Jeanne d’Albert and describes with great clarity his mental struggle during the long period of his captivity in Paris after his marriage to Marguerite de Valois. We see Henry's character develop through his experiences and find him making himself ready for his final victory and vindication when he becomes King of France; after the downfall of the house of Valois. The book is a splendid biographical study, in fiction form, of Catherine de’ Medici and her family of
kings and queens, as well as a story of the life of Henry of Navarre and France, = fitte ite vt 4
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1e Indianapolis
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 23, 1937
Soot Pall Blamed for Half of Pneumonia Deaths
By William Crabb
controlled.
tion for the last five years: Year
1936 .....
a few years.”
Sanitary Instruction said:
death rate.” Dr. Kegel asserted that the Chicago death rate could be reduced from 12 to
10 per 1000 persons if smoke were eliminated. = » » NEUMONIA has claimed 2500 victims here in the last five years. Smoke was either directly or indirectly responsible for more than half that number, the Health Board estimates. For 12 consecutive days last winter the sun's rays failed to penetrate the blanket of clouds and smoke that covered Indianapolis. Within a week afterward, . the number of.pneumonia deaths increased sharply. “It happens invariably,” Morgan said. He estimates that throughout
the winter months, the city is deprived of 30.per cent of its normal sunlight. » = ” E described the health effects thus: “The average Indianapolis citizen does not have normal lungs because of the smoke pall which hangs over the city during the winter. During the course of years a direct relationship can be traced between the high respiratory disease and pneumonia rates and air pollution. “Although it is difficult to estimate the direct damage done by smoke to health, unquestionably the absence of sunshine together with a polluted atmosphere is conducive to colds and other respiratory infections. “When pneumonia develops, oxygen is one of the essential elements for the body chemistry successfully to combat disease. Any foreign material in the atmosphere—soot, dust and deleterious gases—certainly would handicap the pneumonia patient in obtaining the proper amount of oxygen.
" NY person who has lived through the winter in a smoke-polluted atmosphere has dark, mottled, discolored lung tissue instead of the normal pink. The black lungs will continue through the winter. “This is due to the fact that when the dir is breathed and taken into the lungs, a deposit of minute soot particles and coal dust is laid in the air sacs and bronchi of the lungs. Quite naturally, lungs saturated with such material do not have a normal resistance to infections of any type, bronchitis, pneumonia or tuberculosis. “Notice the deterioration of buildings from soot and air pollution. If it can affect wood and stone, it is reasonable to assume it is very detrimental to health.
Dr.
He was a practicing physician at the time. he became alarmed after several autopsies showed the smoky atmosphere was corroding residents’ lungs. Today his fears have been realized. He points to the City’s record of births and deaths per thousand of popula-
BUB2 ririenienie tevin D:D BUBB «ices sr wewiwees THE BUBE ov vcrienine nerves 1541 HUBS ernie rniensy 108 cen TDD “The situation is alarming,” Dr. Morgan said. the present rate, births and deaths will be parallel in just
“Smoke is a serious health hazard. the life and well-being of every citizen of the city of Chicago. It stands in the way of the attainment of a lower
(Fourth of a Series)
TT WENTY-SEVEN years ago Dr. Herman G. Morgan, City Health Board secretary, in a published article, warned Indianapolis what to expect if its smoke menace were not
He said
Deaths 12.7 12.9 13.9 14.2 14.9
“At
Births
Dr. Arnold H. Kegel, former Chicago Health Commissioner, in an article published by the Chicago School of
It is a menace to
BAG 1 WILD INGS | NIRS
It tends to contract the lungs and form fibrous tissue which interferes with their normal expan-
sion. “The public quickly would resent any pollution of the public water supply. Yet we have grown ac-
@ customed to the pollution of the
War Scare Now Occupies All Europe's Attention
‘By Raymond Clapper
Times Special Writer ONDON, Nov. 23.—During the « last two months I have talked with a large number of informed persons in Europe. It is not a hope- | ful picture that one finds. | In no country did I find that war was expected soon, or that it was wanted. But everywhere I found that war was regarded as Jikely. Many feel it is inevitable. From Russia ‘to Engiantd you have the whole life of each nation geared to war preparation. In Germany Goering tells the people that butter only makes them fat, but iron will make Germany strong. So they go without butter. In England physical-culture classes are being organized—because the youth of England must be made fit
to meet the German and Italian youth which is being trained in Fascist physical discipline. Municipalities in England are in controversy with the Government
City Hospital officials maintal
Ent at
7 4 4 Times Photo
n a crew to keep the walls and
ceilings clean, due to the heavy soot and smoke content of Indian-
apolis, A workman is shown above, A smoke survey here recently
washing away the soot,
disclosed startling facts. George
Popp Jr. (left with jar), City Building Commissioner and former City Combustion Engineer, shows some of the equipment used, J. W. Clinehens, City Combustion Engineer, helped develop the checking system in use, Mr. Clinehens is shown with a map of the
city used in the survey.
§ How Hoosiers Voted as | Congress Opened
atmosphere during the winter months and accept it with all the hazards which ensue from the standpoint of public health.” And Indianapolis spends less than $3000 a year to combat this menace,
NEXT-—The Smoke Bill.
over the cost of gas masks and airdeferise refuges, which are required in every locality. All insurance com=panies have ceased to give protection against air-raid damage. Europe is thinking entirely In terms of the next war, grimly preparing for suicide, seeming to see no way of preventing it. As you hear people of all classes, of every country, talking in the same way, Europe at the moment seems almost like a graveyard of human hope, waiting to| swallow up the civilization which has | been built with such long toil. { Much is said in America abot | how the United States ought to step in and again make the world safe for democracy. The only trouble with that is that the next war, instead of making the world safe for democracy, is likely
only to make it safe for revolution. Little democracy survived the last war in Europe. Another one and it
land and France.
will go out like a light, even in Eng- |
By E. R. R. ASHINGTON, Nov. 23.-—Pur-suant of a Presidential call, the Congress met in special session on Monday, Nov. 15 for the avowed purpose of considering a four-point legislative program-—-crop control, wage-and-hour legislation, governmental reorganization, and regional planning—left incomplete when the regular session adjourned on Aug. 21. Notwithstanding that the special session cannot last more than six weeks (the next regular session must convene on Jan. 3), and probably will not last more than five weeks in view of the customary Christmas vacation, the first week was almost entirely devoid of accomplishment,. House and Senate committees did succeed during the week in whipping together a preliminary draft of a crop-control measure, and a petition was circulated in the House to discharge the Rules Committee from further considera~tion of the controversial Wage-and-Hour Bill, which has been buried in that committee for months. » ” n HE special session bore a striking resemblance to another special session called by President Harding in 1822 to consider a shipsubsidy bill, The 1922 special was a “lame-duck” session, and nothing was accomplished excepting that Senators and Representatives drew their full travel allowances of 20 cents per mile. In that session, too, it was a filibuster against an antilynching bill that forestalled action. Now, 15 years later, the same old issue is still serving the purpose of creating endless debate and preventing the completion of legislation. The first Senate quorum call of the present session showed 76 of the 96 members in their places as the Senate came to order on Monday. Nine subsequent quorum calls showed that 84 Senators were present on Tuesday and Wednesday, 86 on Thursday, and 85 on Friday Senator VanNuys (D. ind.) and Senator Minton (D. Ind.) were both present on the first quorum call as the Senate came to order. The last quorum call of last week showed Senator VanNuys present, and Senator Minton absent, ou n ” T the regular session beginning last Jan. 5, 85 Senators were present on opening day, and 92 was
Loolee Soitanepoun, ina.
the largest number that answered a quorum call during the session. The opening quorum call in the House showed 380 members in their
opening day of the regular session last January. By Tuesday, on the basis of a roll call on the question of adjourning, only 348 members were present in the House, and two quorum calls on Thursday showed 357 and 324 present, respectively. The first quorum call of the House found the following Democratic Indiana representatives present: Samuel B. Pettengill, James 1. Farley, Glenn Griswold, Mrs. Virginia Jenckes, Eugene B, Crowe, Finley H, Gray and Louis Ludlow. Rep. Charles A. Halleck, Republican, also was present, Reps. William T. Schulte, Arthur H. Greenwood, John William Boehne and William Henry Larrabee, all Democrats, were absent, The House adjourned almost immediately after convening on the first two days of the special session, but Republican opposition to these tactics became so heated on Tuesday that a record vote was needed to adjourn the House, Indiana representatives voting for adjournment were: Schulte, Farley, Griswold, Jenckes, Boehne, Crowe, Gray, Larrabee and Ludlow. Voting against was: Halleck. Not recorded were: Pettengill and Greenwood. ” » » FTER that incident, the leadership ceased to press for quick adjournment day-by-day, and allowed the members to ‘blow off steam.” The only record vote in the Senate during the first week was taken in the midst of the filibuster against the Antilynching Bill. Senator Pepper of Florida, shouldering his part of the filibuster, sought permission to have the Senate clerk read a lengthy address delivered in Paris last September by Majority Leader Barkley of Kentucky. The Senate voted against reading the speech, and the vote was viewed as an indirect test of sentiment toward the Antilynching Bill. Both Senators Minton and Van Nuys voted against reading of the speech. Senators who supported the Pep- | per motion were regarded as oppos{ing the Antilynching Bill, and those | who voted “nay” as supporting that
Side Glances—By Clark
gossip at the
"There, i've gone and put six fingers on this glove! | can't knit and ig Les i . ee 2 5a ¥ . 1 FPA .
A WOMAN'S VIEW
By Mrs. Walter Ferguson
REBUKE has come to this column from J. Gareth Hitchcock of Toledo, and @& ‘well-merited one it is, I think. It goes like this:
“You ask what parents can do about the salacious literature now cluttering the newsstands. I want to tell you what my Dad did.
“When my brother and I were young he read aloud to us sevefal evenings every week; stories of the Bible; poems of Eugene Field, Robert Louis Stevenson. As we grew older he provided us with a large fund of excellent reading material; the story of the Round Table; the works of Burns, Longfellow, Anderson, Poe, Mark Twain, He also baited us with rewards for reading certain books.” “He acquainted us with the delicious fruit of good reading. Naturally when we reached the age when we wished to explore on our own, the stuff you speak about was found to be frothy, unsatisfying trash. Yet you throw up your hands and say: ‘What can parents do?’” What nostalgia your pen picture evoked, Mr. Hitchcock! Long evenings at home with Dad reading aloud, great stories from great literature, mother mending and the children munching apples as they listened. Those were days when our lives were slow-geared, Men had time for thought and contemplation, time to spend with their families to teach and train their young. One thousand such fathers resurrected in any city, and there would be no need for maintaining expensive organizations or passing expen-
LEAS So Lxieh Shuraenis dun whe Lsoming g generation. 4
Jasper—By Frank
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places, against 421 present on the;
Second Section
PAGE 11
ur Town
By Anton Scherrer
Here's Secret! That Horse Wears Blanket to Keep Warm While They
Give His Plaster Insides a Drying.
DON’T want to sound too much like Dorothy Thompson today, but I'll be lucky if I don't. At best, today’s piece is lugubrious enough. It's about the horse in front of the Herron Art Institute, The last time 1 mentioned the horse in this column, it wasn’t wrapped up the way it is today, That was last September when Wwe had Indiana Summer. A lot has happened since then, For one
thing, the rainy season set in and took its toll, Our sewers spilled over, our cellars were flooded, and the horse I'm talking about filled up with water. That's because the horse is hollow, There's no telling what might have happened if Wilbur Peat and Herbert Foltz hadn't been around to handle the situation, Mr, Peat is the direétor of the museum, and Mr, Foltz, the chairman of the committee on buildings and grounds, but I doubt whether anything was said about = horse when they got their jobs=not a nephritic horse, anyway, It turns out, though, that they know as mich about sick horses as they do about anything else, At any rate, they both agreed that the frst thing to do waz to tap the water-logged horse, You'd be surprised to learn What came out, Or maybe, vou wouldn't be surprised at all, if you remember the way you wrestled with your cellar a couple of months ago. Well, Messrs. Peat and Foltz tapped the horss, It was only the beginning, however. After that they had to find a way of drying the inside of the horse. The horse wouldn't dry of its accord, because it’s made of plaster. Tt surprised me, too, because to look at the horse you'd think he's made of bronze, Well, he isn’t, He's made of plaster, and anybody who knows anything about the behavior of plaster knows that you can’t do a thing with it when it's wet,
Here's Way It Was Done
It was at this stage that Mr. Peat came through with what looks like the Pulitzer Prize of the year, Without telling a soul about {t—not even Mr. Foltz Mr. Peat looked up a Beauty Shoppe, and talked the operator into letting him have the blower they dry ladies’ hair with, Dorothy Thompson would have said that Mr. Peat wangled the operator into letting him have it, but I don’t believe he did, With his line of talk, he doesn’t have to. Theoretically, Mr. Peat's {dea worked all right. In the end, however, it proved a lot better on the outside of a woman's head, It was a grand idea, though. Even Mr. Foltz admits it, Indeed, I doubt whether Mr, Foltz would have hit on his own idea if Mr. Peat hadn't paved the way, Mr, Foltz conceived the idea of turning heat inside the horse, and that's the way matters stand today. Four heating elements working day and night have been inserted at strategic points in the horse's body, and {f evervthing goes well, it won't be long now until the inside of the horse it dry enough to receive a coat of water proofing. That's why the horse in front of the Herron Art Inctitute is wearing a blanket, Sure, it's to keep him warm,
Jane Jordan—
It's Tough Job If You Want to Trade Marriage for Career, Wives Advised.
HAVE on file several letters from mothers of small children whose husbands are making life unbearable by their escapades with other women. Some of the men are good providers; some are not. Some are kind to the children; some are not. The thing that is remarkable about all of them is that they stick to their families: they aren't deserters. But they look to other women for recreation and the results are varying degrees of misery at home, The wives, who have no money except what their husbands give them, want to know if it is better for them to leave and try to earn a living alone or to stay and eat their hearts out in anguish. 1 cannot answer this question for 1 do not know what they should do. What is best depends upon the women involved and what their capacities are. Tt 1s trie that women do escape from matrimonial prisons with babies in their arms, start at the bottom and work up into good incomes, even without previous experience or training, But it is a gigantic task and no woman should undertake it without first taking stock of herself to see if she has in her the stuff of which success can be fashioned. Pirst she must have some definite bent, talent or ability which can be developed. There must be some thing whiclt she can do better than the average. Some women start with nothing more striking than the ability to make better candy, cakes or pies than anypody else. Some have a feeling for dress, decoration, drawing or writing which can be turned into cash, The ability to sell always welcomed by merchants. And invincible self-regard is essential. Second she must have robust health, the actual physical stamina to stand up under the demand which will be made on her energies. Restless nights and finicky appetities are ruinous to the existence she must lead, Two hours sleep and a dish of fruit salad will not see her through her strenuous day. After eight hours of work she can’t go home and rest or seek diversion away from home as her husband has done, There are babies to be bathed, school children to help, clothes to mend, and worst of all, important decisions to be made,
Must Be Able to Take It
A woman with ability, personal salesmanship and physical health needs still another quality for success, She must be able to take punishment from reality, She will meet men in business who are harder to please than her husband. She will be criticized, belittled and blamed. She will make mistakes which are not condoned and blamed for mistakes she never made. Unless she's exceptionally lucky, irate execus tives will yell at her. Somewhere somebody will knock her ego flat. She must know how to handle envious and infantile people who connive behind her back, and she can’t weep about it too long or come home and cry into her pillow every night. She must have the resiliency of a rubber ball which bounces back after it hits bottom. After considering this prospect many women feel that putting up with an unfaithful husband is a picnic in comparison. Perhaps it is. All I can say is that the rewards are very great for the woman who has the courage, energy and hardihood to carve her own career. It is just that I do not dare to undere estimate the undertaking. JANE JORDAN,
Put your problems In a letter to Jane Jordan, whe will snswer your guestions in this column daily, d
Walter O'Keefe—
ENATOR BYRD (D. Va.) doesn’t like the way Soe cial Security moneys are being put to other uses, He feels the Social Security plan, as it’s working out, is nothing but a gigantic slot machine racket, His fear is that the chances are 100 to 1 against hitting the jackpot when you're 65. : Recently the New York State Assembly was cons sidering a maternity bill whereby each tts: oul} get a bonus of $75 at birth. What an ind that is, if you're planning to be born! You get when you're born and then security when you're Now all you've got to worry about are those 66 in between,
Mr, Scherrer