Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 18 May 1943 — Page 9

TUESDAY, MAY 18. 1943

- Hoosier Vagabond

IN TUNISIA (By Wireless). —\When about to go into battle, some men are very introspective and thoughtful. Others carry on as though everything were normal. I remember one night when chow had come up just after dusk and a dozen or so of us were opening tin cans to the tune of constant shellfire. Somebody started singing a parody of some song. Others joined in, and for five minutes there in the night they sang funny songs. A silly feature of that episode is that now I can’t remember what we sang. Another time we were sitting in the darkness on a rocky ledge waiting to start a night march that would culminate in an attack in which some of the men were to die before dawn. As we sat there, the officers who were to lead the attack got into a long discussion comparing the London and New York subways. The sum total of the discussion was that the London subways were better than ours. After that the conversation drifted off onto the merits and demerits of the Long Island raiiroad. The only “warlike” thing about the discussion was that somebody expressed a hearty desire to be riding on the Long Island railroad that very minute.

“ith Hollywood FE ffects

WAR SOMETIMES gets almost like Hollywood. We had a fantastic example one day. A company of our troops worked far ahead of us and got pinned down on the back side of a hill. This tack slope was almost a cliff. It was practically straight up and down. Our men were trapped there, just hiding behind rocks and on little ledges. The Germans had worked their way up onto a long slope in front of them, and around each end behind them. The first Hollywood effect was that although they were completely surrounded by the enemy we still had telephone communication with them. So their company commander asked us to start shooting mortars over onto the Germans on the face of the hill We set up a battery of mortars and let iy a practice round at the Germans a mile or so away. As the

Inside Indianapolis By Lowell Nussbaum

| Trained soldiers, newiy forged weapons, stacks of ammunition and food are useless until they are moved and moved again to points where Charles Lucey, the description of industry at war, reveals in a new series, of which this article is the second, how the railroads are rolling the nation

CAPT. MYRON E. GREENE, the Indianapolis dentist, thought he was seeing things when, somewhere in northern Africa, he was served cream with a Polk Milk Co. label. The label. complete with Polk's regular cow's head trade-mark, was on a can of condensed cream. Capt. Greene removed the label and sent it to his father, Edward E. Greene, 425 N. Emerson ave., suggesting that he send it on to Duane Dungan of Polk's. The bulk of the cream condensed and canned by Polk's goes to the armed forces. Blaine Miller, president of the Excelsior laundry, was telling his friends the other day about his difficulties with the city garbage collection department. Missing his garbage can lid after the collectors had passed. he indignantly phoned the city department and complained. They sent out another lid. It was too small, so.another was sent out. This one fit. And then Mr. Miller discovered his own lid a few doors down the street where the wind had blown it. He's still blushing.

It's Papa Fremont Now

FREMONT POWER. the old tomato editor. sent Inside an announcement of the arrival of Michael Alvin Power. The youngster was born May 9 at the Putnam county hospital in Greencastle. Papa Power now is a pharmacist’s mate in the maritime service. , . . Little Easley Blackwood, the 10-year-old mathematical wizard, produced one of those calendars that has every dav in the year numbered—from 1 fo 365—and solemnly informed his mother that he had found the number of every Thursday was divisible by seven. After she had tried a few sample Thursdays, he admitted it “had to be that way” since Jan. 1 fell on Friday this year. Victory gardening has its headaches. Two North side couples who have a joint garden—a big one—put in their

Sweden

STOCKKHOLM, May 18 (By Wireless). —Deterioration in Germany is bound to accelerate from now on. For instance, Germany's chief source of phosphates has been North Africa—the Sfax area. No other adequate supply is available, which means a drastic loss of farm productivity in another season. The German food supply therefore is bound to become worse. At the end of this month the Germans are to cut their meat ration. While the new ration will be more than the Swedish meat ration, the difference is that here fish, poultry and milk are unrationed and fairly plentiful, whereas Germany has no such alternatives. Swedish industrialists have many acquaintances in Germany. and report that all of them are now convinced Germany will lose the war, The Nazis are losing in popularity rapidly, but that does not necessarily mean a quick upset of their regime. For instance, one German industrialist, In conversation with a Swedish businessman, puts it this way. He says he knows the war is lost and that the Nazis ’ ‘must go, but he does not feel that he can turn against his own country. In other words, it is difficult to separate patriotism from a desire to get rid of the Nazis and end the war. So it is more probable that momentum will carry Germany on until she is cracked by force.

Industrialists Know Perils

SWEDISH BUSINESSMEN used to go to Germany to transact business. Now the Germans seize every opportunity to come here to discuss business—in order to get out of Germany and get extra food and other

My Day

WASHINGTON, Monday.—The papers report today that a Japanese dispatch accuses our forces in landing at Attu, of using poison gas. This is probably to be used as an excuse, should they decide themselves to resort to the use of poison gas. Such tactics have been known before, and we may be quite sure that our troops would not use this kind of weapon unless they did so in retaliation. We will never be the first offenders. That, I think, we can all take for granted. Yesterday afternoon I saw our daughter off on her journey back to Seattle with her youngest child. Her husband has gone and she will now return to her home and her two older children. who will welcome her with open arms, They

mortars roared our battery commander said over the phone, “Thev're on the way, Mac.” Then we'd wait about 30 seconts and Mac's voice would come back: “They went clear over our. heads. Bring her down a little.” Thus with him directing us to right and left, up and down, we kept shooting until our mortar shells were landing smack on the Germans. Of course thats the way all artillery is directed. But usually there is an observer on some other hill a mile or so away, watching through binoculars. In this case our observer was bevond our own falling shells and sc close he'd duck down behind his cliff every time they came over. Even veterans where we were had to laugh at the thing. And just as in Hollywood it had a happy ending. Our shells ran off the Germans and our men were rescued.

You Don’t Dare Feel Too Deeply

ONE AFTERNOON Capt. Russell Wight and I were lying in the sun against a bank alongside a dirt road, waiting for some tanks to come past so he could show them where to attack. While we lay theie, machinegun bullets sang over our heads. Capt. Wight is the kind of person I feel at home with. The enlisted men love him more than any officer I ever heard them speak about. He lives at Cambridge. Mass, and he was an executive of a big soap company. His business experinence with personnel would fit him for some safer work, but he wound up in the fightingest job in the army—as an infantry company commander. He has no kicks. He is already living on borrowed time, for three times 88-mm. shells have landed within 10 feet of him and freakishly left him untouched. Finally the tanks came by and the leader got out and talked for a few minutes before going into battle. The young tank commander's boss drove up in a jeep and gave him some instructions. He told him, it gets too hot, button up and pray for darkness.” The young tank commander laughed and said that's

“If |

‘By Ernie Pyle

Giant Diesel

what he would do. A half hour later he was dead. Capt. Wight and I sat on our hillside and saw it happen. That is the way it goes. After a while you don't feel too deeply about it. You don’t dare to.

order for two bushels of seed potatoes several weeks ahead. When the potatoes arrived, arrangements were made to plant them the next evening.

When the male gardeners got home the wife of one

proudly led them in and showed them how she had helped. She had spent the dav peeling the two bushels of potatoes. That spoiled them for seed.

Around the Town

CHARLES SHERLOCK, veteran doorman at the Indianapolis Athletic club's side entrance, reports that a taxicab driver became highly indignant over a dime tip given him by a passenger the other day, complained that the dime had a hole in it, The passenger looked at’ it; found a bit of dirt on it, wiped the dirt off and gave it back to the now satisfied cabbie. . Audley Dunham saw a cab parked in front of Wasson’s on Monument circle and approached with the intention of engaging it. “No,” growled the cabbie. “I just pulled in here and I don’t want a passenger now. I want to rest.” With which he laid his head on the back of the seat and rested. .. . One of our agents reports seeing the following sign on a drugstore window at 38th and Illinois: “Lunch at Warrick's—Pioneer Dog Food.”

Looping the Loop

ONE AGENT in charge of keeping an eye on Monument circle reports seeing a bedraggled little old mongrel dog dogtrotting around the circle in the rain about noon Saturday. The dog made at least cight complete loops of the circle with its nose to the ground. Our agent thought maybe it was looking for a young master and didn't know when to turn off the circle. . . . During the Harvard club banquet Saturday night, Governor Saltonstall of Massachu-

setts. the speaker, laid his watch on the table in front]

of him during his talk. Howard Travis, the toast-

master, looked at the governor's watch,

Eastern war time.

By Raymond Clapper

things unobtainable in Germany. There may zlso be,

a desire not to have outsiders in Germany to see the] damage and trouble that are developing. Allied bombings are bound to have a cumulative effect on industry during the summer and fall. Evi-| dently German industrialists are entirely aware of the | dangerous situation, more slowly to the general public. Even ‘there, however, signs appear. Student executions at Munich are one sign. Also, it is impossible to conceal the situation from the people when some 200,000 bombed-out persons are sent to Norway, as is believed to be the case.

Swedish sources are confident that Franco's sec- |

ond peace feeler was inspired from Berlin. Here they. take it as a further indication of the desperation of Germany's situation.

Bitter Over Nazi Brutality

EVEN IN LAPLAND, 9% miles from the Arctic circle, connections who are bitter over the brutality of the! Germans in Norway.

out Germans is now forcing Norwegians out of their homes. Although German propaganda clings to the line that neither side can win and that therefore it is

senseless to go on with the war, that makes no iil

pression here in Sweden.

I have been up into the mining section in the north.

T talked with the Norwegian wife of one North Sweden | industrialist whose relatives’ town and summer homes ' had been seized by the Nazis. Countless such cases! are talked around among Swedes everywhere. It is significant that Germany used Franco. not anyone in Sweden, as a mouthpiece for peace feelers.

By Eleanor Roosevelt

us need to be busy these days. We can not help thinking about those we love who are far away, often in dangerous surroundings. Therefore, the busier we are, the less we have to worry, and the more we dwell on our happy memories, the better it will be for us all. I had an early meeting this morning with Mr. Bruno and Miss Gay Shepperson, from community

then at his! own and immediately wound his own watch and set! it forward an hour. thinking it had stopped. It hadn't! occurred to him that the governor's watch was on!

but the realization is coming |

you find everywhere people with Norwegian | The Germans by their own con- |

duct have made the best propaganda for the allies in Sweden. The use of Norway as a refuge for bombed- |

and

Locomotive

Hauls 3000 Tons of War ‘Materials Over Rockies

One of the biggest ingredients they are needed.

to victory.

at the throttle of the most built, for the haul over the Jim Jackson, Santa Fe foad foreman of engineers and a steam-locomotive man 27 years before Diesels came along; sang out his “High-ball-1-1-1" across the cab. With two shrill whistle blasts he answered the fireman. Slowly the throttle eased back. Thousands of horsepower throbbed in steel casings. With a barely perceptible start, 7.000,000 pounds of war cargo was rolling. The moon was brilliantly full. Save for overalled men moving quietly in yards and roundhouse, Winslow was asleep. The big train picked its way through a labyrinth of switches like an elephant walking a tightrope, and slowly pulled out toward Flagstaff. To the men in the engine cab, there was nothing dramatic about itt The man at the throttle lighted a cigar: his fireman looked back over the crawling train. Here was stuff that in a few days would be feeding into Pacific coast airplane plants and shipyards, and a little later headed out across the ocean to American men waiting for the weapons of war. But nobody talked of that now,

Pass In the Night

For the first few miles it was crawl and race, crawl and race— dragging 15 miles over a hump, then making 40 or 50 on a straightaway. No. 116 hadn't got down to tough pulling yet. The tough stuff was all ahead. Eight miles out and the lights of the first opposing train showed, still miles from where we were. In a couple of minutes the engines were racing toward each other— on the same track, it seemed. The searchlight came straight at us, | a giant tracer bullet in the night. The engineer's face was set, and { none in the cab spoke. Just as.it seemed sure to meet us, it roared past on another track. a thought it was going to hit

of success in war is transportation.

who wrote “Smashing the Axis”

By CHARLES T. LUCEY

Times Special Writer WINSLOW, Ariz.,, May 18.—It was 10 minutes short of midnight when the arc of the brakeman’s lantern, a curving pinpoint of light more than a half-mile back, gave the highball signal to big, red-faced J. F.

Jackson, powerful freight Diesel ever Rockies.

Ss,” I said. “That would be a hell of a way to run a railroad,” the fireman answered.

Up to 50 again, then back to 20. rolling now at 35. The door in the back of the cab opened and a terrific din of 64 stamping cylinders broke through. The Diesel maintainer, 1943 counterpart of the coal-passing fireman of other years, stepped foiward. “She's not pulling right,” the man at the throttle said to him. “She ought to be doing 45 or 50 now.” The big locomotive had had only three hours’ rest before starting: she had come East pulling a fruit train and had to be rolled right out again. That's the way it is with the railroads these days. =

= ”

116 ‘Takes A-Hold"

The maintainer unscrewed a cover plate from the locomotive centrol box and went to' work. He tried one thing, then another, talking to the engineer as he worked. After a while he replaced the cover and went back to his rearing engines. ‘ The track was slower and the pull harder. The engineer's hands went to .the transition lever to give her more power. “There, she took a-hold time,” he said. Twenty-seven miles out, No. 116 rumbled across a trestle high over Canyon Diablo, its jagged walls showing clear to the bottom in the moonlight. There was a small telegraph station here, the first since Winslow where the crew might get new train orders. But the light was green and we roiled on without a stop. The engineers’ chief climbed down from his seat and H. H. Webb, the regular engineer, took over. Here were men who knew their business—knew how fo take a steep downgrade with millions of pounds pushing hard on the loco-

that

Engineer George Webb keeps a steady hand on the throttle as a 5400-horsepower Diesel-electrie locomotive goes up the grade at Cajon Pass, Cal.

motive and still keep ‘this iron giant in leash. The trainmen themselves, who don't talk much about it, say it takes cool nerve and a lot of knowledge to get these trains over the mountains.

n s

Plenty of Air

“You've got to know your business and have plenty of guts to carry the job through,” they say. “We use more air (compressed air for setting brakes) here in one run than you'd use on a level run in a month. Most good mountain engineers are made in the mounfains—not many come in rom outside.” The Diesel rounded a norseshion curve and the fireman leaned out to look over his half-mile of train as he couldn't on a straightaway. Here were freight cars from railroads all over America—the Central of Georgia, Seaboard, Chicago &. Northwestern, = Pennsylvania, Baltimore & Ohio, New York Central, Southern Pacific, the Denver, Rio Grande & Western, Great Northern, the New Haven, Western Pacific, Missouri Pacific, Wabash, the Frisco, Chicago & Eastern Illinois—all riding the Santa Fe tracks. No: brakes sticking, no journal boxes afire. “All black,” he called out—train talk for o. k. ” Hit Torpedoes Fifty miles along now and nine miles south of Flagstaff. Far to the right the twin San Francisco peaks, 12,000 feet high in snowy grandeur, showed silver in the moonlight. No. 116 was climbing now in the big-pine ccuntry. We'd see plenty of deer and antelope here in the davtime, the engineer said. Slowed at 13 miles an hour now, pulling hard. You could almost feel - that long train fighting to drag the’ big Diesel back, It was 2:12 a. m. Far away in the mountains a light ‘bent ‘round a curve. The Santa Fe Chief, crack streamliner Letween Los Angeles and Chicago, ripped past us. We hit torpedoes on the track and the noise split the night like

Ld

To.

an explosive shell. That meant restricted speed. Down the mountain into Flagstaff, bell clanging sharply, red lights against us. A telegraph operator was out with his loop to pass a message. The fireman's arm went out and brought it into the cab. “Speed limit all trains 10 miles an hour MP (mile post) 348': to eight poles west MP 348'; westward track,” it said. ‘Trouble up there, with repairs not completed. ”

. Cross the Divide

Now out of the resfrictéd zone and climbing again. - Up, up, up-= 13 miles an hour, with the shriek of grinding flanges on rails as huadreds of tons rounded curves set on the edge of precipices. Automatic oilers spray lubricant on the track to keep flange wear , down. It had been balmy at Winslow, but it was cold on the motintain now, At 2:52 a. m. 2 large, white sign caught the moonlight. It read: “Arizona Divide--7335 feet.” Men who build railroads look for mountain passes, not mountains. Yet here was a big Diesel freight, 7,000,000 vounds of precious war goods, nearly a mile and a half in the air. Here was the highest point on all the miles of the long Santa Fe freight route. The big fellow had done it again. But no one in the cab said a word. The train hit a new downgrade. Jim Jackson was at the controls now, setting the air brakes and releasing them, over and over, working steel levers like an organist in a cathedral. Forty years and more of running a train from the head-end poured into those fingertips. Compressed air hissed through the cab to best the throb of laboring engines. The dynamic brake—a reversing of electric motors—-is on too, but it alone wouldn't hold the giant in check. ”

Start Climb Anew Then a straight stretch, and up again to the summit at Supai, Ariz, start of a tortuous, winding

NAME DR. NEWCOMB DEFENSE UNIT HEAD

Dr. John R. Newcomb, 4402 Washington bivd, has been appointed! chief of staff in charge of organization of the medical profession and ‘hospitals for civilian emergency defense in the city and county. The appointment, made by Dr. *Donald R. Adams, chief emergency medical officer for the county, was

{announced today by William E,

Munk, county defense director. Dr. Newcomb will recruit and organize physicians and surgeons and members of hospital staffs for emergency service in the event of an air raid or other wartime disasters. Members in district 9, 12, 13, 14,

war services, on the subject of the West coast plans for the care of children whose parents are at work. Then I had a press conference and a very brief) chat with a woman from Kentucky, At 12:30, I reached the Y. W. C. A. to attend the luncheon forum of the Washington youth serving agencies. It proved to be a very interesting forum and brought up many questions and suggestions as to what might be done to preparz young people in small towns and rural areas of our country, before they

go to work in any of the bie centers of war in-|

dustry.

15, 16, 17, 18, 19 and 20 emergency medical council will meet with Dr. {Adams at 7:30 p. m., May 27, in the Immanuel Evangelical and Reformed church, Prospect and New | Jersey sts. The purpose it to effect a smoother operating organization.

SPONSOR MUSIC FESTIVAL A music festival and fair will be

French With U.

S. Equipment

Are Like Kids With New Toys

+ CASABLANCA, May 11 (Delayed) (U. P.).—The French troops waiting to fight their way back to the homeland look over their new American equipment like kids with new toys. ‘They feel they're at last on their way. “It's hard to keep the men away from those trucks and tanks and half-tracks,” one officer said. “They want to use it continuously to speed up their training.” The slick new stuff is a long way from the antiquated vehicles and almost useless weapons they had to fight with for three months in central Tunisia—old-time 75 guns, charcoal - burning trucks, twowheeled carts and requisitioned pleasure cars. American officers are instructing the French and native Moroccan troops in the operation and maintenance of the equipment and teach‘ing them tactics at training centers [near here. Today they were on simple ma|neuvers on sandy fields near the low hills that rise up to the Atlas mountains. The French officers could

|repair all their new tools before | they've earned the chance to shoot

new guns, Several sections of these

troops are being trained as armored forces.

PLAN STATED MEETING

Corinthian chapter, O, E. S., will have a stated meeting and initiation at 8 p. m. tomorrow. Betty Ervin is worthy matron and Elmer A. Jones, worthy patron.

Your Blood Is Needed

May quota for Red Cross Blood Plasma Center — 5800 donors. Donors so far this month— 1836. Monday's quota—200. Monday's donors--103.

You can help meet the quota by calling LI-1441 for an appointment or going to the center, second floor, Chamber

PILOT IS GROUNDED FOR DRUNKEN FLYING

mountain down which we must thread our way for 19 miles. Now we stop to set retainers to make brake applications more severe, Three brakemen leave the caboosa to climb to the top of the traineach taking one-third--to watch for red-hot wheels or brakeshoes, Up in the cab Engineer Webb brings out some hot coffee, and we drink from a tin cup. For 48 minutes the train crawls at 10-12 miles an hour while aire plane beacons blink out through the night on faraway peaks. Then we stop dead again to let traine men inspect the long cargo chain for overheated braking or running parts. We move on once more, through tunnels, around curves. Ash Fork, in the valley, 19 miles down, in just under two hours from the top. Less than 10 miles an hour-—down hill. Big Jim Jackson lighted a new cigar, » »

Drop 3000 Feet

At 6 a. m, dawn was breaking as the big Diesel train, curving on mountain horseshoes that put the caboose exactly opposite the ene gine, snaked down toward Selige man, Ariz, like a giant, gray cobra. It was easy running now. We had dropped 3000 feet and No. 118 had done her work, At 6:50 she pulled into the Seligman yards, just seven hours for a 146-mile mountain run. Big Jim Jackson, Engineer Webb, Conductor Lowery, Traine master Bagenstos and the others climbed down to get a few hows’ sleep before starting out again. The Diesel didn’t stop two mine utes. A new crew climbed aboard, the throttle came back again and the big train headed out for the Mohave desert and the Pacific. It's the job the railroads do in a thousand places all over the country every night while you . sleep, carrying the tools of war to the ships that wait to take them to American fighting men beyond the oceans.

——————

Next: Texas Railroads Meet a

Test.

NO MORE COLD FEET FOR MEN IN SERVICE

WASHINGTON, May 18 (U, P.),

|~-Men in the armed forces, won't

OKLAHOMA CITY, May 18 (U.|

P.) —The flying license of a 42-°

tyear-old ground schoel instructor at |

Cimarron field near here was re-! voked yesterday by the civil aeronautics administration after hig arrest on charges of flying while drunk.

The emergency suspension was,

ordered by Alfred 'K. Young, CAA inspector, Young revealed he also was filing charges with the civil aeronautics board of failure to obtain a clearance for night flight, flying a plane without lights, carry ing a passenger in a ship equipped with dual controls and piloting a plane while drunk. The inspector said the civil aeronautics board has authority to ground the instructor for an indefinite period and also to assess a fine. Highway patrolmen arrested the instructor and his passenger near Chickasha Saturday night after their plane had run out of gasoline and made a crash landing on a farm while en route to Calumet, Okla., from Borger, Tex.

The patrolmen said the men were|

| get cold for lack of blankets if the

government can help it. The war production board today authorized manufacturers to make 90-inch blankets for the army and navy, six inches longer than hy : present limit,

HOLD EVERYTHING

have been very lonely these past few weeks, Seeing one’s husband off to the wars is not easy for anyone, but our daughte: has added responsibilities in her job and this is a good thing, since all of

Then they took up specifically what might sponsored by Indiana's old-age pen-| be done here in Washington for those who find sion program groups at 7:30 p. m. | hardly keep up with their enthusithemselves in government work in this overcrowded tomorrow at the I. ©. O. F. hall, | astic men, city. {Hamilton ave. and E. Washington st. They must learn how to drive ‘and’

5

intoxicated and ‘that they found

of Commerce building, N. six quarts of liquor in the wrecked|

Meridian st. )