Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 6 August 1940 — Page 9

TUESDAY, AUGUST 6,

940

The Indianapolis

SECOND SECTION

Hoosier Vagabond

(Fifth of a Series) AN AIRPLANE ENGINE factory is a place where they take big chunks of metal! and through a million little processes work them down into tiny parts that mare up the vitals of a motor. Hardly anything originates in the factory itself. Everything is made, in rough form, somewhere else. 1 There is no foundry at the Allison piant. The big steel companies cast the heavy pieces, such as crankshafts and cylinders. The aluminum companies cast the lighter things, such as crankcases. These rough pieces, looking like old rusty iron, come to the factory in freight trains. And then Allison starts its infinite grinding and boring and shaping. Half of the Allison plant is devoted to this gigantic task of working thousands of big pieces down into little pieces. The other half is devoted to Inspecting them, and fitting them together. Only in a small stretch at the far end of the plant do you come to an actual assembly “line.” Assembling an airplane engine is different from putting an auto together. It takes more care, more skill, and more time. The stakes are higher. So the line moves slowly, and in fact it isn't a continuously moving line at all. It moves in individual units, and makes long stops. = ” =

The Big Moment

Each unit is a big steel cradle on wheels. A crankcase and crankshaft are bolted onto this cradle. They stay there until the cradle, after many stops, has reached the far end of the line and absorbed all the numerous other parts that make an engine. There are scores of these assembly cradles in the Allison plant. They move down in two rows. When the engine comes off the far end it is ready to fun—but it isn't through yet. By overiiead chain and pulley it is transterred to a small dolly, rolied back to the test stands in the rear, and by another chain and pullev swung over to the test-stand mounting. A crew of men hooks it up with permanent gas, air and electric mountings. The great moment is at hand. We stood watching them hook up a new engine in one of the test rooms. The various parts of that engine-~had been weeks in the making. Thousands of men, miilions of dollars, worlds of knowledge and

Our Town

Hs R. NATION'S present state of abstraction is accounted for by a letter he received last week. Mr. Nation is the Acting Chief of the Archives Division over at the State Library. Something like 3000 people look him up every year to learn more about themselves and their ancestors. He knows more about the skeletons in your closet than anybody else in Indianapolis. It might be a serious matter were it not for the fact that Mr. Nation is a tight-lipped gentleman. To help him out, Mr. Nation has access to 14,000 bound volumes of bona fide records, to say nothing of 1800 good sized drawers jam-packed with loose leaves of the same kind of material. He usually finds what he goes after. If he doesn’t, you might as well give up. Half of the questions put to Mr. Nation have something to do with the Civil War. Believe it or not, there are still occasional calls from widows who want the necessary data to establish pension claims. Most of Mr. Nation's callers, however, want to join patriotic orders in which case they have to have the right kind of ancestors. Then, too, there -aré-the survivors of soldiers who want to establish their rights to Government headstones. In case you never knew it, the Government pays something like a hundred dollars for the burial of honorably discharged soldiers.

Getting to the Point

Wher the hunting and fishing seasons open, Mr, Nation hardly gets time to eat. That's because soldiers with the right kind of records don’t have to pav anything ‘for hunting and fishing licenses. And on top of everything else, Mr. Nation has his mail to tend to. It pours in from all over the country. Which brings me to the point of today’s piece. On Aug. 19, 1939, Mr. Nation received a letter from Mrs.

Amortization

Amortization is a big word. But it is a key to the preparedness program. Here in simple terms, the tax problem which is engrossing industry and the Government is explained.

WASHINGTON, Aug. ¢ 6.—In normal times, a company puts up a new factory it comes to an agreement with the Federal Government that the building has a certain span of useful life. Thereafter, at 1ncome-tax time each year, the company is permitted in computing gross income to charge off a certain percentage of the cost of the new factory. For example, if the factory cost $1,000,000, and it is agreed that it has 50 years of useful life, then each year for 50 years the industrial taxpayer is able to deduct from gross income 1-50 of $1,000,000, or $20,000. That is what the tax people call the depreciation allowance. It applies not only to buildings, but to tools and equipment. But now the Government is calling upon industry to equip itself with vast facilities to manufacture air planes, engines, tanks and all the other paraphernalia of national defense. #@ = Jp

Needed

when

New Factories

This means that many industries will have to build new factories, and equip them with special tools. Things purchased by industry to perform the jobs the Government wants done for national defense will, in many instances, be useless when this emergency ends. They will depreciate in a hurry. Therefore, Congress is working on a law for the

By Ernie Pyle|

experience and care and patience, had gone into that engine. It was as perfect a mechanical thing as man couid create. Now it was ready. And as we stood there looking, one of those twisted thoughts that are always cork-screwing through my | head came leaping in. What, I thought, if after all this time producing this magnificent piece of mechanism, the darn thing | wouldn't start? But it does start.

room, looking through a window and watching their instruments and checking down thousands of reactions of that one engine. Each test stand is a huge room, more than two stories high. Its walls are immensely thick, and 1t is heavily soundproofed. Opposite the oropeller, the walls are reinforced with steel beams and extra thickness, just in case the prop should come off.

The Final Test

When you look through the window at that violently roaring engine inside, its maniacal power puts

a chill into you, and you can feel the import of its FL

heavy throbbing clear down to your stomach.

If you go down into the basement room adjoining 0

the engine, you cannot hear the loudest shout right |. in your ear. no paper, wrote words on the palm of his hand In lieu of conversation. This first seven-hour test is called the “green run.”

When it is over. and the engine cools, it is hauled ;

back into the factory and taken completely apart.

Inspector Volmer, having a pencil but|

Big Little Town’

Always. Then for seven sours 8 it runs, and five men sit at a desk outside the test:

Once more, every tiny piece goes through ithe most a

microscopic tests. Any part that shows the slightest strain is replaced. And the engine is built up again, for three more hours of running before it is ready for shipment. This final tearing down and assembling is where Allison and the Army use their strictest caution against sabotage. All this work is done in a separate room. That room is continually locked. Nobody can enter except the men working there. Even the general manager couldn't get in without a lot of red tape. We stood and looked through the heavy wire that forms the inside wall of it, but we didn’t go in. Every workman in that room is known down to the most intimate detail of his life, past and present. For sabotage in these last few hours might not show up for weeks—and then fatally.

TOMORROW—Conclusion.

By Anton Scherrer

Emila G. Thompson of Sayre, Okla., asking for the Civil War record of one Amos Littlejohn, a one-time resident of Indiana. Mr. Nation sent what he found and didn’t think any more about it, The other day, Mr. Nation got a four-page reply from Mrs. Emila G. Thompson. Enclosed was a photograph of a 72-year-old man. “This,” begins the letter, “is a picture of William Thompson, the son of the man (Amos Littlejohn) whose ‘identity I sought. It anyone lays claim to his fortune I want it contested (underscored), no matter who the claimant is. Stop the proceedings, and I, his wife, will certify to every word. Write me as I am his secretary and the only one on whom he can rely. I will take oath any time that I have proof in my possession that will prove the identity of ‘William Thompson,’ his adopted name, on record at Dyersburg, Tenn.

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Well, Who Wouldn't Be

“William Thompson who was bound to E. C. Taylor and lost from his people these many years has been defrauded of everything. Help me to now put this man in possession of his father’s holdings in Indiana, Kentucky, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Arkansas and Missouri.

“This man is the little baby boy whom Malenie (Melly) Hamilton Wilks Willkie left when she died. John Wilks Willkie Ashley Wilks Hamilton was his father (he was Amos W. Littlejohn of record). Windle Willkie is this man’s half brother. “If there is anything else that I can do to make this plainer I shall be glad to do so. I am everlastingly grateful to you for the part you have played in the identification. It is finished. “Please acknowledge receipt of this picture and this statement. Preserve it with the record of Amos W. Littlejohn. I thank you and remain truly “Mrs. Emila G. Thompson.” When I asked to see Mr. Nation's acknowledgment of the letter, he said he hadn't got around to it yet. He was still too bewildered, he said.

By Marshall McNeill

Industry is demanding, and the Government is prepared to give, the right to amortize such capital expenditures for national-defense purposes over a five-year period. If, for example, an industry spent $1,000,000 on a new factory in which it was to manufacture airplane engines, it would amortize this expenditure at the rate of 20 per cent each year. Thus it could deduct from its gross income, for tax purposes, $200,000 a year. . But while the principle of special amortization for defense industries is simple and admittedly fair, there are attendant problems that Congress has not vet settled, and in the settlement of which more than a little controversy probably will arise. = n 5

What Busimess Asks

Businessmen, as represented by the U. S. Chamber of Commerce, are asking: 1. Will the special amortization apply to both regular taxes and excess-profits taxes? 2. Should not the taxpayer be permitted to elect a period longer than five years to amortize his capital

Willkie’'s home-coming. Day crowds won't stub their toes,

By LOWELL B. NUSSBAUM

Times Staff Writer ELwoob, Ind., Aug. 6.— When Wen Willkie comes back home a week from Saturday to be notified he’s the Republican Presidential nominee, he won't recognize the old home town. Instead of the quiet little Elwood of his childhood days—or even of his most recent visit this year—he’ll find a town that reminds him of New York's Broadway the day Lindbergh returned from Paris. Or maybe it will remind him more of half a dozen state fairs, a score of circus parades, several

Speedway races, an old-fashioned

Fourth of July and a couple of Republican national conventions, all stirred into one. That's the picture they paint for you on a visit to Willkie Day headquarters. Homer Capehart, Mayor George Bonham and their committees confidently expect a crowd of “at le.st 350,000 and maybe a lot more,” on Aug. 17, and they're working night and day to get ready. It would be a big job even for a city the size of Indianapolis, but for little Elwood, with its 11,000 inhabitants, it's a monumental task. n ” 2 HE only way to get a picture of what Elwood is up against is to imagine, if you can, a horde of 11 or 12 million people suddenly swarming into Indianapolis by train, plane, bus and auto, and all heading for one spot. Merely feeding such a crowd is no easy matter. But Mr. Capehart, backed by the experience of his famous Cornfield Conference, thinks he has that well in hand. First, he has arranged for several hundred food and soft drink concession stands, some at the park and others on the pavement in five blocks of downtown streets. A standard price has been set— 10 cents for soft drinks, including coffee; ordinary sandwiches, pie, etc., with ice cream cones at 5 and 10 cents. Even the people putting up concessions on their front lawns have agreed to charge these prices. u EJ = ND then, for the last week or so, Mr. Capehart has been walking into Elwood’s regular restaurants and taverns, casting an experienced eye over the place, and then telling the manager:

a

Callaway Park at Elwood is getting a mighty face lifting these days In preparing for Favorite Son Workmen are shown leveling the ground after blasting out a stump so the Willkie

Ten-year-old Suzanne Buennagel, Indianapolis, gives a passerby, Jack Booher, a souvenir sales talk at a stand in front of the Willkie

birthplace.

Times Photos.

When Candidate Willkie arrives in Elwood, he'll find this gentle hint from the Townsendites awaiting

him,

It’s only one of many signs about town.

of a display reminding visitors of the town's chief claim to fame.

There's hardly a business establishment without some sort

3 CHEAT DEATH IN RAIL CRASH

investments, if the facilities would have some usefulness after that period? 3. Should not the amortization allowance be exclusive of any other allowable deduction provided in existing tax laws? “Businessmen generally,” says the Chamber “do not look upon national-defense or war-preparedness contracts, particularly those which require heavy investments for facilities, as sources of exceptional profit, or as representing very desirable business. “Their prior experience is thatthe probabilities of ultimate loss are so great that, if it were a matter of preference, they would rather not undertake such business.” But, war millionaires have been made in America

Car With Father and Two Sons Hits Engine; One Boy Slightly Hurt.

Three Indianapolis persons — Thomas Ayres and his two sons, Arthur, 8, and Daniel, 13—were alive and well today, although the odds last night were heavily against it. Their car ran into the side of a moving switch engine at the 9th St.

“Get all these booths and chairs

and tables out of here before the big day, or the crowd’ll take them out for you. “Get rid of these steam tables and put in sandwich counters. Streamline the place so the crowd can move in through the front door and on out the back door without anything to slow ‘em up.” And the managers are following his advice. It's a pretty good idea, especially for the town's dozen or so taverns. There won't be any beer sold in tents or anywhere except in the few regularly licensed spots, and they're expecting a landoffice business.

” ” s

NOTHER knotty problem that's not solved completely yet is providing sleeping accommodations for the thousands coming a day or two early. Elwood’s single hotel was flooded with reservations a month ago. Practically every home. in Elwood has arranged to “sleep” a half dozen or so guests. The stores are about sold out of folding cots. The committee has taken charge. of hotels in surrounding towns for the day, and has arranged

sleeping quarters in homes in such nearby towns as Alexandria and Frankton, and even in a lot of farm homes. The standard price for rooms is to be $2 a person in modern houses, $1 in non-modern houses, and 30 cents for breakfast

s ” 5

RAFFIC is another headache. They've got the auto problem solved pretty well, on paper, at least. All auto trafiic is to be rerouted around the city and directly into the 300-acre parking grounds adjoining little Callaway Park where the main ceremony is to be held. They'll have 130 or more state police handling traffic on roads leading to the town, with 300 or 400 borrowed pelicemen from other cities helping in town and at the park. Ft. Wayne and Gary are sending 50 each, Indianapolis is expected to send maybe a hundred, and even Cincinnati will be represented. The several thousand busses expected to make the trip either will go directly to the parking grounds and stay there, or enter the town, unload their passengers and then.

return to nearby towns for fresh loads. Handling the hundred or more special trains coming from all directions is one problem not sclved yet. The town has only two single-track railroads—the Pennsyivania and the Nickel Plate. There'll be specials coming from both directions on each line, and with practically no switching facilities, the problem is driving railroad officials crazy.

” " ”

HE Pennsy plans to unload northbound trains at its regular station and is building a special platform north of town to unload southbound trains. But how to get the unloaded trains out of the way to make room for the dozens of others is what's bothering them. The Big Four, which has a number of special trains chartered and doesn't have any tracks through Elwood, is in worse shape. Big Four passengers probably will have to be unloaded at Alexandria and then taken the nine miles to Elwood by busses—if the railroad can find any unchartered busses. For fire protection, Mayor Bon-

Souvenirs have become big business.

ham has arranged to borrow apparatus and firemen from Ander= son, Tipton and Kokomo, stationing the trucks in outlying sections of town. 2 ” ” LI, autos except those of the press, committee members and special guests will be barred from the town, and the streets will be turned over to foot traffic. Most of the delegations are planning to take bands with them and march to Callaway Park. Altogether, more than 100 bands are expected. IY ought to be terrific, The Cincinnati delegation, headed by Mr. Willkie's conven=tion opponent, Senator Robert A. Taft, has announced its parade will be preceded by three real, live elephants. Every lamppost in the downtown section, and en route to the park, will be decorated with a huge picture of Mr. Willkie and a battery of American flags. Four streets leading to the park are to be regular courts of flags. At the park, dozens of workmen are busy removing playground equipment, small trees and shrubs and anything that might get in the way of the throng. Even stumps are being blasted out, and lowhanging or rotten limbs being removed. ” un ” HE committee has contracted for loud speakers all over the park and downtown district so everyone can hear Mr. Willkie's speech of acceptance. The loud speakers also will be handy for die recting the crowds and notifying delegations when their trains or bus caravans are leaving after the ceremony. In keeping with the gargantuan proportions of the entire celebration, there'll be a tinted photo of Mr. Willpkie, 14 feet high, on the platform, and an American flag 27 by 47 feet across the front of the old high school where he is to give a brief talk for old friends and relatives. The high school steps ceremony will start at 2:30 p. m.,, and the ceremony at the park, a half mile away, at 3 p. m. There are a thousand and one other details being arranged by the committee, such as first-aid stations, telephones in strategic spots, where to get 35,000 folding chairs for special guests, and the cleaning of the debris for a month afterward. But they're not worrying. By the time Aug. 17 rolls around, everything will be in tip top shape for the biggest small town celebration in history. As far as they're concerned at Elwood, there won't be any use to hold an election after the celebration. In fact, arrangements already have been started by committee members for special trains from Elwood to Washington next Jan, 20 for the Willkie inauguration.”

Mayor of Montreal Interned For Opposing Conscription

Dominion Acts After He Urges Public To Resist Draft.

MONTREAL, Aug.

ternment camp early today,

| © Quickly |

6, (UP)— Camillien Houde, Mayor of Montreal and leader of a large segment of |

French Canadians, entered an in-| to re-

vey

HAMMOND ENDS ‘GERMAN HOUR’

WHIP Cancels Program That FCC, FBI and Navy Were Reported Probing.

CHICAGO, Aug. 6 (U. P.).—The Hammond - Calumet Broadcasting Corp., today cancelled a “German Hour” broadcast sponsored by the German-American National Alliance, Inc., over radio station WHIP, Hammond, Ind., because it was ‘“un-

TEST YOU R KNOWLEDGE

—The Tailwaggers’ Association is a group devoted to the welfare of whom or what? 2—Is Port wine fortified? 3—Have U. S. destroyers ever been named for civilians? 4—What is the national anthem of Great Britain? 5—Who wrote “All This and Heaven Too”? 6—What does the motto of West Virginia, “Montani Sempter Lie beri,” mean? T—Which President of the United States was prominent in Amerie« can relief work in Belgium dure

main probably for the duration of the war. He had publicly advised his followers to resist national con-

scription. He was arrested by Royal Canadian mounted police on order of the Dominion Government laste night. Montreal, in Quebec Province and the center of the French Canadians, is Canada’s largest city. Its population is 800,000. Last Friday evening Mayor Houde announced that he would not support national conscription and advised the public not td support it. The following morning a Montreal newspaper demanded his arrest. On Saturday he was denounced in Parliament. Yesterday Minister of = Justice Ernest Lapointe conferred with police authorities. The internment order said he was to be detained “in such a place and under such conditions as the Minister of Justice from time to time may determine.” Internments ordinarily are for the duration of the war, but Mayor Houde is a Canadian citizen and should he recant, he might get out sooner. As a citizen, he has the right of appeal. Houde, 50 years old, a dynamic, squat little man who speaks English with a French accent, has been called a Fascist by his enemies. He has been Mayor of Montreal seven times, achieving his election victories through his popular appeal

ing the World War? 8—Which sort of tree grows from an acorn?

Answers

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Big Four crossing. Mr. Ayres and Arthur were uninjured but frightened and Daniel received a small cut on the chin. They live at 856 E. St. Clair St. Fourteen-year-old Lloyd Shure, 2719 N. Capitol Ave. was reported in fair condition at City Hospital with injuries received when he fell off his bicycle in the 1000 block of Congress Ave. A two-car crash in W. Washington St., 5000 block, last night resulted in injury to Alice Hicks, 33, nf 2816 Adams St., when she was thrown through the windshield of the car in which she was riding. She was taken to a private doctor. Nine other persons in the accident were uninjured.

U. A. W. GROUP CALLS FOR UNITY OF LABOR

ST. LOUIS, Aug. 6 ( P.).—The United Automobile Workers of America (C. I. 0.), in convention here, last night adopted a resolution urging a convention of the C. 1. O, A. F. of L. and railroad brotherhoods aimed at uniting the labor movement because the present split “threatens labor's progress and growth.” The convention elects officers today. R. J. Thomas, president, and George Addes, secretary, are expectedc to be re-elected.

“amortization” of plants and equipment which are immediately necessary for defense. The word amortization, as used around Washington these days, means accelerated depreciation.

My Day

HYDE PARK, Monday—I am very glad to find myself in agreement with Gen. Hugh Johnson whom I like personally very much, though I do not frequently have an opportunity to agree with his ideas. He has been writing in favor of the selective draft and in his column says something which I vr believe is true: 1 “It is simply a question of whether or not we are going to get adequate defense against overseas attack and get it quick enough to keep war away from these shores. We won't get it if we don’t get selective service and get it promptly.” With this I agree, but I should like to add something more which I believe every Senator and Congressman as well as : every public servant in the country, no matter whether he is Republican or Democrat, ‘should be watching with the greatest care. We know that in the past some people have profited financially from war. It is one thing to draft young men to give their services to their country and another to draft such capital as may be lying idle for investment in ways which may be deemed necessary for defense and which may mean little or no return to the investor. The obvious answer is that most capital is in the

acceptable to many leading Americans.” The broadcast, a daily feature conducted principally in German, reportedly had been under investigation by the Federal Communications Commission, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U. S. Naval Intelligence to determine whether it contained subversive material. The program announcer recently had repeatedly urged all listeners to attend the keep-out-of-war rally Sunday which was addressed by Col. Charles A. Lindbergh. Notice of the cancellation, effective Saturday, was made in a letter from Dr. George F. Courrier, president of the broadcasting company, to Paul A. F. Warnholz, managing director of the alliance. The alliance has been the largest and most active German language organization in the Chicago area since the German-American Bund became doimant “This action is taken because the ‘German Hour’ as now presented is of such controversial nature as to make it unacceptable to many leading Americans,” Dr Courriex said. “Any broadcast which engenders social conflicts or kindles hatreds cannot be construed as serving the public interest.” Station WHIP is operated as a. independent. : '

in the past; and if the President and Congress have their way, none will be made this time, although they are agreed that industries which help the defense program shall not suffer thereby.

By Eleanor Roosevelt

&

1—Dogs. 2—Yes., 3—Yes. 4—"God Save the King.” 5—Rachael Field. 6—"“Mountaineers always freeman,” T—Herbert Hoover. 8—O0ak.

ASK THE TIMES

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BAI Pri bd hg hf pes ss

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nature of a trusteeship. Those who have it to invest feel a responsibility to the people (you and me whom they represent in banks and companies) for the way in which they invest it. It is apparent that some people cannot afford to spare anything from small incomes. But the best minds in the country should be occupied at the present time with determining how it can be made equally certain that capital, wherever possible, is drafted for the use of the country in just the way that lives are drafted. I am no economist. I am not a public servant. I am a mother and a citizen in a democracy, however, and I think it should be clearly put before us exactly how this is being done today. In Congress and in administrative circles this is a responsibility which the people are going to want to be sure is being considered and adequately safeguarded. I had a grand ride this morning, but was grieved to find that the last storm blew down some of the most beautiful trees on a neighboring place. Somehow when a great tree comes crashing to the ground and lies there with its leaves withering, I feel as though some great and good force had finally been vanquished. Some people are coming to lunch with me and a number are coming to see me this afternoon. My husband has kept this day entirely free because tomorrow he has a number of official engagements.

Mavor Camillien Houde . . . thinks it over in internment camp after Mounties get their man.

rather than control of a political machine. A devotee of the wisecrack, he has mannerisms and poses dear to the hearts of his FrenchCanadian constituents.

TIGHE RITES THURSDAY PITTSBURGH, Aug. 6 (U. P).— Michael F. Tighe, 82, veteran steel labor leader and former president of the Amalgamatéd Association of Iron, Steel and Tin Workers who died at a Pittsburgh hospital yester< day, will be buried Thursday at Wheeling, W. Va. his boyhood home. Funeral services will be held here tomororw. Mr, Tighe died of a paralytic stroke.”

HOOSIER DIES IN CRASH PLYMOUTH, Ind, Aug. 6 (U. P). -—Chgrles McCollough, 60, promi-

nent Marshall County farmer, was killed instantly yesterday in an automobile collision at an intersect. n five miles eat of here. George Emenaker, 55, of Plymouth, driver of the other car, was in Marshall County Hospital where his injuries were said to be serious.»