Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 14 December 1942 — Page 11

INDAY, DEC. 14, 1942

Hoosier Vagabond

WITH THE AMERICAN FORCES IN ALGERIA; + {by wireless) —When Ralph Gower was a, little fellow ! Ariane, a deaf man lived across the street.

“could read lips, and Ralph learned the

from him, A quarter ‘of a century has passed, and today Sergt. Ralph Gower sits on the edge of a folding cot in a tent way out in the field in Africa.

It is ‘a hospital tent, and wounded soldiers in red bathrobes loll. around in it. . Ralph Gower can talk to them, and he can understand what they say. For he is newly deaf, ‘from the explosion of an enemy shell.

When I went to see him he " had been deaf only a few days, “but his lip reading was already perfect. It had all come back to him across those 25 years. Sergt. Gower escaped without serious wounds other than the loss of his hearing. They say there 15 a 50-50 chance of his recovering. Ralph Gower is 37. He was bora in Truman, Ark., but his home address is now Route 3, Box 832, Sacramento, Cal. He is a machine-gun sergeant. x Gower came to Africa aboard one of a group of combat boats that got into trouble'trying to take an harbor. Those who lived to tell the tale were ‘miraculously lucky. : Dd you want to hear what it felt like?” Ralph I sat down on the edge of the next cot. dc. What did it feel like?”

Arkansas Wit Keeps Others Gay

“IT FELT JUST LIKE going into hell and back out again,” he said. ‘The boys around the tent all laughed loudly. That Startled me, for I couldn't see anything to laugh at. But gradually I caught it. db seems that Sergt. Gower’s deadpan Arkansas

“Sure I

Inside Indianapolis By Lowell Nussbaum

WHILE: MAKING an overnight business trip to Detroit, a certain Indianapolis executive had a nightmare. He dreamed someone was about to steal his trousers from his berth. He awoke with a start—and found his trousers and wallet right where he left them. A few weeks later, he was en route to Washington and described the nightmare to three fellow passengers—Howard Meeker, Ralph Fenstermaker and Jim Robb. They all laughed. Nexé morning, when our executive awoke near Charlottesville, Va. and started to dress, he found his trousers were missing from the hanger. - He had panicky visions of how he would look calling that day on the WMC, the WPB and other boards in Washington, draped in a green Pullman curtain. He rang for the porter who found his trousers on the floor in the . aisle. The wallet was missing. He yelled for the Pullman cor.ductor—and then discovered his purse back of his pillow, its contents intact. And to this day, the guy doesn’t know if he removed the wallet from the buttoned hip pocket in his sleep, or if maybe his friends played a practical joke on him. We aren't paying any prizes for the solution of this one.

Use Your Own Pencil -

A BREWER'S representative who is annoyed by all the hell raising over use of empty one-gallon tin . cans to make beer bottle caps thinks we ought to explain some things. For every 100 empty tin cans made into bottle caps, he said, the government collects something like $80 in beer tax. The way he it is: Each tin can produces 38 caps. That's 3800 caps out of 100 cans, or 3800 bottles (12 ounces) of beer. The tax, he adds, is $7 a barrel. And you can, take it from there. We're fresh out of pencils and scratch pads. . A lot of Indianapolis folks will be heading toward Peru on Christmas day. The naval reserve aviation base - up there, we hear, is

Washi gt WASHINGTON, Dec. 14—We are new at using government controls, and therefore are apt to handle them, as a green driver does, with a grip that 1s too tight and too rigid, whereas a more relaxed grip _ would be more effective. I recall having to fill out a number of forms during a brief visit to England in the summer of 1941. No one ever was abrupt or unpleasant. At the police station the officer attached the waiver of the curfew regulations without my asking for it, or even knowing I should ask for it. He saw that I was a newspaper correspondent and he said he supposed I would need to be going and coming from "my hotel at all hours, so he shemped in the exemption. . At another place, where I was given my indentity fear and ration book, the young lady apologized “for having to describe me on the forms as an alien. She said the word sounded Sinister and didn’t seem : appropriate. except in connection with enemies. Life is extremely severe in wartime England, but they do manage to soften it a bit by co-operation. People know that they must do many things they would resent in peacetime. The government assumes that people will co-operate. So there is far less of that raw strain than we are having here.

Hardship Needs No Hard Words

LIFE IS BOUND fo be more Spartan here after Christmas. Rationing will be extended. More articles will disappear from the shelves. Job control is be- | Casualty lists will grow longer. Heating won't be adequate in many homes, It doesn’t help for Leon Henderson to say, as he did in Boston the other day, that if it is a choice

between people getting pneumonia and supplying the

My Day

. NEW YORK, Sunday—I was very happy ‘in Boston on Friday to have an opportunity to talk to the girls at Radcliffe college in the afternoon. It Iwas 1 interesting to go from there to Bowdoin college on Saturday morning. In a panel discussion at the fraternity house, one of the boys at Bowdoin asked mé whether I found it any different talking to young men and women at the present time, and whether I had any preference. I had never thought about it before, but I do not find that I like one any better than the other. I am afraid I am just incurably fond of pei with young

ages at the Star store Friday (by mistake, she hopes)

* monia.

wit keeps the whale. texitful howling day and ‘night. He never says anything obviously clever. He just says things’ with an odd twist. smile. His expression never changes. Six dozen wounded boys gathered on nearby cots to listen. Ralph told me the story gravely, but he was {frequently interrupted by shattering laughter from his convalescing audience. It was friendly and admiring laughter. “We were all down in one of the compartments of the boat,” he said. “That French ship came right up against us, and one ‘of their shells came through the side. The damn thing exploded right in my face.” Some of the wounded soldiers in the tent had been through the same lethal nightmare he was describing, but they laughed at that crack just as though Bob Hope and said it.

Couldn't Even Get Enough Smoke!

“WHEN 1 CAME to everything was quiet. 1 thought the battle was over. The ship was full of ammonia and smoké. You couldn’t hardly breathe. I liked to choked to death. My heart was shooting pains out in all directions. (Laughter). I couldn't get enough air in my lungs. I couldn't even get enough smoke, for that was all I was getting anyhow. (More laughter.) “I finally started climbing a ladder. When I stuck my head out on deck I couldn’t hear anything, but the air was full of tracer bullets. Then I realized there were dead men lying on the deck. I passed out. That fresh air was too much for me.” (Laughter.) Thus the story went. Censorship doesn’t permit repeating the full details. We shook hands. “Are you married?” I asked. “Am I married?” he said. mean to say I'm sensible.” The wounded boys all roared. : Sometimes you leave a battle hospital feeling horrible inside, but I stepped out of that tent, under millions of African stars, feeling good about Americans who can go “into hell and back out again” and still laugh about it.

“No, I'm single. I

planning to give a big Christmas dihner for the families of the base personnel, both officers and enlisted men. And there'll be a party for children under 12, afterward. About 20 per cent of the enlisted personnel of the base is from Indianapolis, we're told.

Lee Emmelman Ill

ONE OF OUR readers phoned to inquire why there’s no letter “Q” on the telephone dial. Just as a means of adding to our readers’ useless information, we checked with Vedder Gard of the phone company. He, in turn, checked with the plant engineers and came back with the theory it looks too much like the O and would prove confusing. There were several other theories, one of which is that it is least likely to be chosen in naming an exchange. . . . Lee Emmelman, the well-known Republican and sporting goods shop proprietor (Em-Roe) is ill at his home with a stomach ailment. . . . Maurice G. (Red) Robinson, who retired as secretary of state Dec. 1, has returned to the practice of law at Anderson. . «+ « Mrs. James Brewster, R. R. 20, box 234, wishes the person who picked up her Christmas shopping pack-

would return them to her. Some of the packages were for her two sons, one of whom is in Riley hospital with a skull fracture, the other at home with

& broken arm. Mr. Tom and Mr. Jerry

THE ADVERTISING club is planning its annual Tom and Jerries session at the Indianapolis Athletic club the day before Christmas. . . . Capt. George Cunningham, the former manager of the Claypool, who was stricken ill while in training at the air corps base at Miami, ‘is in Billings General hospital at Ft. Harrison. . . . Don Bloodgood, who runs the city sanitation plant, has worked out a graph showing just how much income tax anyone from a single persoa to a married man with three children will pay next year. You can fell just at a glance. It’s worked out as only an engineer would work it out.

By Raymond Clapper

troops in North Africa, then people can catch pneu-

Of course fuel for tanks and planes in North Africa comes first. Nobody will argue that. But public officials don’t have to add hard words to hardship. And how can a government handle this delicate business of job control and other controls that touch families so closely if it isn’t a little mellow and doesn’t keep a sense of humor. I think the hunch of a publisher was right when he came away disturbed over the conversation he had with one of Leon Henderson's civilian-supply assistants. The OPA official was arguing with the publisher that newspapers should reduce their illustrations.

The Gang Just Won't Take It

“WHAT NEED IS THERE in wartime to run pictures of bathing beautiesd ad Hollywood movie stars?” the OPA official asked, : The publisher fund a bit and then said thau a lot of people liked see a picture of a pretty girl in the newspaper, and added, “Don’t you?” To which the price official replied with offended dignity, “I'll have you to know that I'm a happily married man.” Well, when you set out to tell men they can’t quit their job, or they will have to let their house go cold, and they are not going to get as much butter or cheese, and no increase in wages—you just don't want to break the news through dumb clucks like the happily married ‘price official. The gang just) won’t take it from him. I think that’s what the trouble is, and not, as some of the Republicans want to think, a sudden revival of popular affection for the stuffed shirts of a decade] ago. There probably is more respect for the administration’s objectives than for its methods. Eugene Wilson, president of United Aircraft, sald recently that “the demand for the power to compel is confession of incompetence to lead.”

By Eleanor Roosevelt

I have come to consider them not only as my children as they grew up, but as my friends, There is an element’ of seriousness in any meeting with young people now, whether they are boys or girls. The boys are going out to fight, so that we may all live in a world where freedom exists and where we have an opportunity to build: our civilization along the lines we think good. The girls may not be so conscious of it as yet, but, nevertheless, they are going to do the same thing. It is urgent that the boys should know just what kind of a world they are fighting to preserve and build, and it is even more urgent that the) boys and girls together should discuss and come to agreements on the basic tinge involved. I have made five speeches in the last three days, two for Russian war relief, and the rest more or Joss ‘lisdup With Wiigh | sav Great Britain. I

Ww in 30 Slag that, Souiam. BE pu wb

By Ernie Pyle |

He never cracks a

Vll—Sand, Empty

Thousands of Italian pith helmets whitened by the sun blob the country. Occasionally there’s a coat, half buried in the sand, or a blanket, and an astonishing number of shoes, not in pairs, but solitary, curling shoes, filled with sand and perhaps a scorpion or two. Thousands of shoes. As I passsed through this forlorn country, shivers darted up and down my spine. There were too many ghosts scattered about. For three years I had covered the news from Rome in 1938. I had sipped chianti with some of the men who wore pith helmets and sand-filled shoes. When they were pre-war warriors I had watched their faces while Mussolini called them eight million bayonets. I had stood under the balcony at Piazza Venezia on June 10, 1940, at 6 o'clock in the evening with my wife and heard II Duce send those men, our friends, off to their fate.

Amid silence and sand skating across the surface on wind puffs, the drifting dunes have covered over the rusting tanks and guns which once paraded so jauntily down Via del 'Impero. ” » »

People Support British

ON THE GROUND in front of me is the coat of an Italian officer. And I think of the tearfaced woman in Rome whose son was reported missing in Libya.

MALTA SPURRED BY DESERT WAR

Much Bombed Islanders Feel Allied Gains Bolster

Their Position.

By GEORGE PALMER United Press Staff Correspondent ABOARD A BRITISH WARSHIP RETURNING FROM MALTA, Nov. 24 (Delayed).—The allied offensives in North Africa have boosted the morale of the population of British Malta, the Mediterranean island famed as the most bombed spot in the world. The populace of the tiny island, which lies between Sicily and Tunisia, feels that the invasion of North Africa and the drive of the British eighth army across Libya, has belstered the military position of their area. The harbor of Valletta, a noisy place in peace time, is like a city of the dead. Studded with the hulks of wrecked ships, it presents a weird sight. Only the occasional, blasts of tug whistles and the screeching of winches punctuate the eerie silence. In pre-war days, the harbor was a joyful spot for British sailors who became used to what they called the “noise of Malta,” a composite of happy voices, barking dogs and ringing bells. Malta was traditionally associated with two things—bells and goats. All that is gone. There are almost no sounds during the night, and at daybreak the people emerge from caves which have been their shelters since the axis began its concentrated attacks on the island two. years ago. The populace,

Cecil Brown

though showing

pear confident and happy. Among the wrecks in the harbor, I saw the American tanker Ohio, which succeeded in reaching the island despite severe damage from U-boat and torpedo attacks. She made the harbor by hand-steering and was floundering badly.

JAPS SAY HUGE NEW WARSHIPS IN SERVICE

LONDON, Dec. 14 (U, P.).—Japan has placed in commission “several” new battleships of 42,500 tons each, 1armed with 16-inch guns, the Exchange Telegraph said last night, quoting Radio Berlin reports from Tokyo. The Japanese also are launching a number of new cruisers, destroy{ers and aircraft carriers, it was said,

JESUITS’ GENERAL DEAD ROME, Dec. 14 (Italian Broad-

Ledochowski, father general

Shoes, Scorpions

THE DESERT IS NOT the simple sand waste it once was. Nearly everywhere there are the remnants of battle. Battered tanks, wrecked trucks, tractors, artillery, broken rifles, belts of machine-gun cartridges, slim, graceful antitank shells, chianti bottles, tires, wheels and water canteens are scattered over the sands. At one point an entire battery of Italian 105s stood lined up, barrels horizontally pointed toward the road. Some of them had a wheel or breech shattered. Ten yards behind stood five rusting tractors once used to haul them.

the strain of their great ordeal, ap-|

cast Recorded by U. P. in New| York) —The Very Rev. .

alot tne |

On the day the Italian government ordered me out of the country for “continued hostile atti-

tude” this mother said to ‘me:

“Believe me, signore, the real Italian prays for a British victory. I pray for that.” But the saddest of sights is

this: Patches in the sand, shallow, elongated mounds, a dozen crosses sticking nakedly into the sun, and a sign: “Here lie buried 12 unknown Italians.” Fatal casualties in the western desert are three times as many as the injured. Ordinarily, the ratio is three injured to one dead. In the desert, however, it is often some time before the wounded man is found in the sand, By then, sand gangrene has set in, the sun has broiled out much of his vitality, and often his water is gone, . And always casualtyclearing stations or base hospitals necessarily are 50 to 100 miles distance from the scene of action. Only those injured who. are “walk-away casualties” survive their wounds in the ' western desert. That's the reason the British soldiers say that if an enemy bullet is to touch them, let it be a definitely goodnight piece of lead. Out of the flame-hot, sandfilled Khamsin of the western desert the fighter pilot emerges like a fade-in sequence in a movie. He wobbles and teeters at

first, a towering, burly figure just

recovering from the impact of the ground heat. He is unfastening his cloth tunic, pulling off his helmet, loosening his pistol holster. ' His blond, straight hair is matted and twisted with sweat, and his forehead and the sides of his nose glisten with it.

Wandering Gypsies, Faced With Rationed Tires and Gasoline, fo'Wander No More

By VICTOR PETERSON The gypsies are off the road for the duration . . . probably for good. : Gas rationing, the rubber shortage and the draft have seen to that. . ; $8 8 SO WE WENT looking for the wanderers who have settled in Indianapolis. Strolling down Massachusetts ave. in the 500 block, we saw a " dark-haired, dark-eyed woman in typical gypsy costume sitting in

an empty store. Back of her were ,

hung some multi-colored rugs and shawls. Before a word could be said, a broad - shouldered, husky gypsy male burst through the rugs and shawls. Obviously the living quarters were back of the cloth division.

Silently the woman disappeared

as the man eyed us suspiciously but not in an unfriendly manner. Jim is his name, he doesn’t know how to spell his surname . . . it sounded like Regium. “I didn’t go to school,” he said. Jim dresses the same as any American, but the ingrained dashing appearance of the gypsy male gives him that added something. Naturally shy, cautious and extremely clever, Jim typified the mixed racial strain of the gypsy. “What do you want to know for?” met most of our questions. Convinced we merely wanted a story on the termination of their

FUNNY BUSINESS

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Everywhere there are the remnants of battle . . « here is a dead

+ Italian gunner in the wreckage.

Relief in Tents .

INSIDE THE TENT there is relief from the sand storm. A beer is set down in front of the pilot, warm beer, but wet. It’s good enough to remove sand. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. His eyes are red-rimmed, his face stubblebearded. = The two thin blue stripes on his shoulder make him a flight lieutenant. He is blond, blue-eyed, fairskinned, and if you dresséd Nor-dic-looking Flight Lieut. Archie in a Luftwaffe uniform he'd look as if he had just stepped out of Marshal Goering's office. That same thought came when I was among the German troops in Jugoslavia. Strip them of their gray-green uniforms and some of them would be typical of the boys just down from Cambridge. “Good show?” someone asked Lieut. Archie. It’s somewhat out of the ordinary for him to be down here at Sidi Barrani. This is the last landing’ field before the Ger-

wanderings, the going got easier. But we still asked too many questions that were nane of our business. “We have been ‘here eight months since,” Jim said. “After the war is over maybe we travel again, maybe no. We must think. ‘““Where can I get a job?” he asked suddenly. We were surprised, for today there is reported to be work for everyone. “A lot of our men are working. But me . . . they don’t seem to want me in defense plants. I can learn fast. Course I haven't had schooling, but I'm smart. “The war has ruined my work. I repair stoves and can’t get tools or material. Some of the tribe are coppersmiths. They are out of luck too. ” 2 a =» JIM, AS did ethers, admitted the life of a gypsy has changed in the past two years. When tires wore out and none were to be had, the family was driven to the city. But before that the selective service act nailed many a gypsy male to a permanent home. The local board plays no favorites with 24-hour notices. Gas rationing finished the process . . . 60 miles a week makes the road to adventure pale. Nothing yet has happened to keep the gypsies from hitting the road as soon as victory is achieved.

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dat Yooitilte,, “ ee ae eT oaaV? Voges “n A,

tor Coach employees, division ‘| of the A. F. oF Ls asked a blanket

man and Italian positions at Sollum. This sand-swept, desolate, top-of-the-world slice of the desert, where the wind always keeps the flying sock stretched taut, is not an airdrome. Too close for'that. It serves only as a refueling base. But he’d landed here in his Curtiss P-40, the ship the British call a Tomahawk. ” ” ”

Had Mix With Jerry

“WHY,” THE PILOT says, ‘it wasn’t too bad actually. Had a bit of a mix with Jerry. Messerschmitt 109. But I rather think there was an Eyetie pilot in it.” The flight lieutenant’s accents are Oxonian and his inclination is to be as reticent as the lions of Trafalger square. “Chased him all over the place. Used almost all my gas and almost all my ammunition. Really exasperating. He apparently objected to a spot of fighting, Dash it all,” he suddenly bursts out, “the ' follow seemed extr'ordi-

But it is happening and is going to happen. Many who already have accepted the modern way of life see

it written in the palm or cards. Today, for the first time, gypsies are going to school, . . Jim’s boy is. “He can already read and write,” he said proudly. Amd the money the men are making seems high. Gypsy life is set up on the matriarchical system . . the woman runs the show, handles the money and in most cases earned it herself. ” ” » “I CAN'T remember how old I was when I got married,” Jim said as he scratched his head. “I was pretty young. I'm 22 now and have three kids. The oldest boy is in school.” ‘Public education will probably change the early marriage, Youth likes its conquests . . . no reason to settle down too early.

# # #”

~ ACCORDING TO Jim there are 10 families in town. “About 300 in all,” he said. And we were confused until a woman added: “In our family are my husband and: I, his brother and his wife, their parents and all our children.” It adds up. In some cases there are as many as 17 people to a house. Most of the gypsies located here are of Serbian and Russian extraction.

UNION THREATENS CHICAGO EL STRIKE

CHICAGO, Dec. 14 (U. P.).—Chicago, its transit facilities already jammed: by gasoline ration curtailment of use of private automobiles, faced a major transportation problem today after 500 employees. of the “el” system had voted to strike next Saturday midnight to enforce wage demands.

Officials of the Chicago Rapid|

Transit Co., operators of the elevated train system, estimated a week ago that it carried 500,000 pas=| sengers a day. During the Christmas shopping season, “el” traffic has reached approximately 1 000,000 per- : sons a day. ‘The elevated employees, members

of the Amalgamated Association of} | \ Sipeet; Electric Railway ahd Mos].

wage increase 9 cents an hour}

with larger increases for certain} technical

groups.

narily keen to break off.” He appears to wince as he says that. He hates to accuse another pilot, even an enemy, of lack of courage. ; “Devilishly pretty morning up there. Six thousand feet and you're out of this bloody sand storm 'and’heat.” His eyes travel to the flies blackening .the table and scrambling to get inside his empty beer glass. “And no flies up there, rather.” He pronounces it “rawther-r-r” and works one eye as though a monocle should be there. tJ ” ”

Just Look Decorative

MUTUAL FRIENDS and my’ purposes as an American war correspondent, established, Flight “Loot” Archie relaxes. “We run into more Eyeties now than we used to. They don’t do much, actually. Deuced thing to say, but as a matter of fact they just float around the sky and look decorative.” At that a smile breaks over the face of the base officer, his eyes inflamed with days of sand and, wind in them, and for once the utterly bored look goes out of his Jace. A sergeant comes into the tent and tells Lieut. Archie his ship is ready. “Right-ho.” He picks up his tunic and pistol. As’ le steps out of the tent his eyes narrow to slits to face the driving sand, twisting and sweeping across the field. “Thanks ior the beer,” he calls, and fades into the mist of the sand storm. On Sunday, July 20, Capt. Fielding drove me to Bagush. "Arrangements had already been made for me to fly back to Cairo in order to do a broadcast that night. Friday, July 25: I have just received a startling cable from New York: WOULD YOU WISH SINGAPORE ASSIGNMENT. ALSO ADVISE HOW LONG WOULD TAKE REACH THERE. I immediately sent back a cable:

SINGAPORE SWELL. -

TOMORROW: Singapore dances, and a British general shows in action the big guns that spell “impregnable.”

(Copyright, 1942, by Rondon one Inc.; distribu ted) ” United Feature Syndicate, Ine.) gr

LONDON THINKS NAZIS STYMIED

Lack of Transportation, Oil Would Defeat Plan to

Cross Spain.

By VICTOR GORDON

LONDON, Dec. 14—While Na0és cow dces not overlook the possibility of a quick German drive across Spain, in seeking to anticipate Hitler’s 1943 plans, the British are disposed at the moment to question the enemy’s ability to so extend itself in the near future. As the Russians see it, the ob

jective of such a move would be to embarrass Gen. Dwight D. Eisennower’s North Africa operation because the Germans recognize that Tunisia will become a base for an allied attack on southern Europe. British opinion, on the other hand, seems to take other, most important factors into account.

Checks Oil Use

The recent German decrees or= dering the conversion of all automobiles, stationary motors and even oil-fueled ships to other fuels than petroleum derivatives seems a clear indication that the Nazis either are

|already suffering from a grave oil

shortage or anficipate one shortly. This does not suggest that they expect to control the Caucasus within, say six months. : The enemy’s locomotive situation is also known to be approaching a crisis. The first deliveries.of 8000 locomotives recently ordered cannot begin to go into service before another six months at the earliest, probably longer.

HOLD EVERYTHING