Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 9 June 1943 — Page 13

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 9, 1943

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haf loosler Vagabond

By Ernie Pyle

(One of a series on a 13,000-mile flight made before Tunisia fell.)

' SOMEWHERE IN AFRICA. —As you travel west and then south away from Tunisia, your feeling of - leaving the war behind increases in direct propor- .. tion to the miles you travel.

In Algeria you still feel the war, for you are surrounded by the flow of supplies and troops and equipment moving toward the front. You feel no danger, but you have that exhilarating surge that comes of great activity around you. In Merocco the atmosphere is different. There is still great activity there, but it is so far from the front that you feel a definite wall between you and what is going on up there in Tunisia. It’s sort of like the warmup before the big game. But south of Morocco—well, you seem only to be forever practicing. Our camps throughout the rest 4 of Africa are sort of normal affairs. You have a aily job to do and it’s the same every day. Your i Job is vital, and yet there’s nothing to fight. You ". feel a sense of frustration; you've finally reached the ‘ball park, but you can’t see the diamond. All through Africa I've run onto this same feel- , ing. Morale is perfectly good and people are doing their jobs and doing them well; but everybody has Mn‘the back of his head the burning yearning to get Up north where the shootin’ is going on.

They Came to Fight

DOWN BELOW, some of the permanent bases are almost like country. clubs. There is little difference between life there and life at an American post in peacetime. Dozens of times I've heard soldiers, all the way from privates to colonels, express a feeling of shame that they were living so well. "I know how they feel, and I sympathize. Yet they thouldn’t feel ashamed. For their jobs are vital.

~

They're doing a work that must be done or else their fellowmen at the front could not survive, Everybody can’t be on the firing line. . And as for living well, I certainly see no harm in it if you're equipped to do so, and can do it without taking anything away from anybody else. It seems to me that living miserably just out of sympathy would be a ridiculous affectation. This impatience with a static camp life is just a mahifestation of the normal American necessity to bust out and do things, The other day I was talking with the commander of a camp far in the jungle, a camp. we are closing out because it is no longer needed. The camp is near a famous and bad rapids. “I guess it’s a good thing we're leaving here,” -the commander said. “Take those rapids as an example. People have lived around here for thousands of years, and nobody has ever tried to shoot the rapids. “But if we stayed here another month, some soldier would go over those rapids in a barrel. That's just the way we are. Always gotta do something. That's the best thing about us.”

Medals or a Court-Martial?

AND I KNOW of another case of farawayness from the front getting under some soldiers’ skins. This also happened at one of our deep tropical camps. Four soldiers couldn’t stand the peacefulness any longer, so they bought two dugout canoes, stocked up with provisions, hired two native boys to help, and started by river to Cairo—a little matter of 5000 miles. The soldiers were gone three days before they

were caught. The order for their capture, incident-|.

ally, was carried upriver through the jungle by native tom-toms, beating out the message from village to village, on orders of the army. The boys’ commander told me that personally he would have liked to give them medals, but rules are rules, so he had to order them court-martialed for desertion. They were let off with a month apiece, and are now transferred to another camp. They still haven't got to the fighting line, but their ex-com-mander bets they'll get there eventually.

Inside Indianapolis By Lowell Nussbaum

A FRIEND reports that while passing the intergection of 57th and Central Monday, she was amused by a bit of kindness shown by the traffic police officer : assigned to help pupils of school 84. While waiting for the pupils to arriye, the officer was politely escorting two of the neighborhood pooches across busy Central ave, holding up traffic and shepherding them across just as he would if they had been kids. When he got them across, he stooped and patted one of the dogs. . . . Out on 62d st, folks snickered as they passed the Broad Ripple rationing board, in the Roberts Ford agency. There, parked in front of the board was a horse and spring wagon. : Maybe Dobbin needed an extra % pair -of shoes. . . . The Claypool had real band music for +its flag ceremony Monday evening, instead of the usual record. The Lions band, ” “here for the state convention, played. The hotel's flag ceremony, with the flag slowly being lowered from the lobby staff to the tune of the national anthem, and with a miniature cannon salute, still impresses Visitors, especially the service men. Many of them crowd around and stand at attention. Even folks in the tavern rise “and stand at attention during the \ (Ceremony, at least those able to stand.

A Sad Mistake

PAT QUINN, 3947 Broadway, parked his ’39 model ‘Ford in front of the A. & P. at 38th and College the other day. When he headed back for the car, he saw & man pouring a gallon of gasoline into the tank of his car. When the man had finished (and not until then), Mr. Quinn pointed out to the stranger his mistake.

Sweden

i LONDON, June 9 (By Wireless). —It is amazing that after all England has suffered, the constant casualty lists, the constant visible reminders of destructions from the German air attacks, there could be any question here about giving Germany and Italy the Bl works from the air. This incredi- ] ble controversy reaches a peak just at a time when England is noting the third anniversary of her battle for her life after Dunkirk. The question was up in commons a few days ago when Richard Stokes called attention to what he said was an ever growing volume of opinion in England which considered the indiscriminate bombing of civilian centers b both morally wrong and strateeatly crazy. Over the week-end this was followed up ‘by the bishop of Litchfield, Dr. E. 8. Woods, who is he of the best-known cleigymen in England. ; In an address to his diocesan conference he deSared that to bomb Rome would be a crime against vilization and a betrayal of the very things for ‘which England is fighting. He added that any military advantage we might gain would be more than ‘offset by the moral damage to the allied cause in the @yes of the world.

‘Remember What Hitler Did’

HK SUCH DEBATE among England's shattered monu‘ents to the Nazi terror from the air seems fantastic except for the fact that England continues to have ‘free speech—the Hyde Park soapboxers still harangue crowds every Sunday—and that: England prides herself on her traditional sportsmanship, never hitting anybody when he is down. In fact, one newspaper carries a long article ex--plaining that the enemy is trying to capitalize on that - British trait to prolong the war, The British public is urged to remember that the bombing of Germany will shorten the war and thus save lives. + Just before I left Swedeh the Nazis issued a’ long official list of allied damage to ancient German

WASHINGTON, Tuesday.—Yesterday, 1. spoke in ‘my column of controlling the world around us, but,

of course, this is only a temporary control. The war RS are now ‘engaged in, must be won, but then we

must - hegle the struggle for control of the world of the future—the control of the people of the world, of a world which belongs to them all. Sometimes ‘this is rather terri‘tying to think about, because the task seems so gigantic. It means that so. many people have to be educated’ to struggle for similar objectives and, unless: we succeed in this education, our hopes for peace are built on very uncertain foundations. People must learn that force is a very destructive method of dontroL. That reason and co-operation are the only by which we can bulld a world ‘construc-

Afele of

The man looked around, saw his Ford just back of Mr. Quinn’s, He groaned. Mr. Quinn paid him for the gas. . Double billing at the Tacoma theater: “The Great Gildersleeve”—-“Over My Dead Body.” That's the: way we feel about it, too. . . . Folks out at Curtiss-Wright are proud of their record of contributions to .the Red Cross blood bank. About 150 employees are contributing blood each week, and that equals 12% per cent of the blood bank’s weekly quota of 1200 pints. . . . The 8A graduates at school 66 (Broadway at Maple rd.) changed the usual procedure at exercises the other day. They took the stage and sang the nursery songs they learned when they entered the first grade. . « The three-sided clock in front of the Burroughs Adding Machine Co. 102 S. Pennsylvania, showed three different times yesterday. The west face said 3 o'clock; the north face, 3:25 o'clock, and the east face, 4:45. The right time happened to be 1:40 p. m. Maybe the clock is stopped.

Around the Town

HAROLD A. WADDY, who runs a service station and repair shop at 52d and College, was growling the other day to all who would listen. It seems some motorist, deciding that in these times the patriotic thing to do would be to try to repair his own motor, made the attentpt, but couldn’t get it together again, The motorist, took the motor to Waddy’s in a box. It took hours to get it back together. “And it would have taken only a few minutes to fix originally,” moaned the repairman. . . . Don Christian, the food specialist with the price division of the OPA, has been inducted into the navy. .. . . Pvt. Sexson Humphreys, of The Times’ staff, has been transferred from Ft. Harrison to Ft. Custer, Mich. . , . Merle Sidener, advertising man and leader of the C.M.B. class, is recuperating at home after four weeks in Methodist hospital.

By Raymond Clapper

churches, German libraries, art museums and other cultural monuments, evidently playing on this sentimental streak in the allies. . But the British public, as well as the American, need only remember what Hitler did to Warsaw, Rot-

terdam, Coventry and Plymouth, as well as London,

after announcing that the luftwaffe would erase allied cities. Neither was Mussolini showing any chicken heart about the brutal methods of war, and if he did less damage than the Nazis it was only because he was not strong enough to do more. :

No Time to Go Easy

NOW HITLER'S newspapers are referring to the allied airmen as air gangsters, or “luftgangsters,” as the Nazi headlines spell it: Gobbels is asking the German people to put up with the .allied air terror with clenched teeth for the time being until the Reich can retaliate. I cannot imagine that the British or the American governments will listen to any sentimental ap-

" peals to go easy on the Nazis or Italy in the air war.

Yet Lord Beaverbrook’s Daily Express thought it advisable to run a hard-hitting editorial denouncing as humbugs those who say that mercy must temper justice, that vengeance belongs only to God, that the destruction of dams and the release of floods is not clean warfare, that we must -not sink to the level of the Germans. The Express warns that as the doom of Germany becomes more certain such voices may grow louder and may well have a sinister inspiration. The government shows no disposition to yield to any pleas to go easy. The American air effort is steadily increasing. The two air forces are following the prescription of round-the-clock bombing. This, plus ground and naval action, will be intensified until the total destruction of axis power is accomplished. We never heard any arguments against the all-out blitz from the axis people when they had the initiative. The fact that there could be such discussion on the allied side is. undoubtedly a credit to Anglo-Saxon instincts, but it would be a reflection on allied intelligence if it were allowed fo deter the delivery of every possible ounce of f. force on the breeding ground of this war.

By Eleanor Roosevelt

co-operation, and yet this is one of the basic considerations if we are to live together in peace. A visitor from Chile, a" social worker who has been studying here for some months, said .to me yesterday: “I always find in your country an assumption that you have things to give us and that you are going very consciously about the business of being a good neighbor and intend to share with us some of your culture and technical knowledge. But I never find any conception of the fact that we might have something to give you in return.” I feel very sure that our relations with all the countries of the world will have to be undertaken on the basis that we will give and take, and we have to be humble enough to realize that there are things we can learn from almost every group of people in the world, ° ' We received the ‘delegates to the food conference on the lawn yesterday afternoon after the president had talked to them in the east room. If was very inspiring that they held such a harmonious conference. I was disappointed that there were not more ‘taking pazt, because I think women “have

Story of the Beginning---The Future?

This is the first of a series of articles on the Indianapolis Civic theater.

By RICHARD LEWIS

The Greeks had a word

for the theater. They called it the theater. haven't changed much in

2500 years of the drama,

except, it is-said, the plays are getting worse. In antiquity, the author of a first-night flop got the cup of hemlock. Today, he gets a Hollywood contract, which is the same thing, only more lingering. We turn forward the pages of time from the dramatic unities of the ancient Greek to the dramatic disunities of the modern Saroyan, two millenia of progress or retrogression in the theater, depending on your point of view. Then we backtrack ‘a notch, the better to get where we are going, and find ourselves in the sculpture court of the John Herron institute, Indianapolis, circa 1915. An uproar is in progress, We take this devious route mainly because we are talking about the Indianapolis Civic theater and some of its works. That is to say, the American national theater, for the two are synon-

ymous.

Support Is ‘Needed

AT THIS POINT, we must digress to express the opinion that unless the Civic gets some financial support from the community as well as some volunteer actors and technicians, it ceases to have any works. So we find ourselves in the sculpture court of the Herron art emporium, watching what the students of such things call the American national folk theater taking shape. As is to be expected in such historic moments, an argument is raging. It seems that the Little Theater Society of Indiana has been organized to:promote. culture and, such, ‘and one of the first steps it has taken is to have a well-. known Hoosier artist, Randolph L. Coats, paint ‘a curtain for the sculpture court stage. Mr. Coats has painted what is known in arty. circles as a nocturne, On. this curtain there are three nymphs, undraped, cavorting about a classic Grecian landscape, The nocturnal effect is carried out in lavender,

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Battle of the Nymphs

A GOOD MANY citizens are up in arms because the nymphs have no clothes on and the topic of the

COUNTY SCHOOL HEADS CONVENE

Panel Discussion: Held on "Adjusting Education To War Effort.

The annual meeting of the Indiana County Superintendents’. association is being held today at the Hotel Lincoln, The meeting was opened with a devotional given by Gerald Alexander, superintendent of Parke county schools. Following this a panel discussion’ was held on “Adjusting Our: Schools to the War Effort.” Members. of the panel were Custer Baker, Johnson county, chairman; Don Edington, Henry county; Harvey Poling, Monroe county; Donald Crise, Pulaski county, and Harvey PF. Griffey, Marion county. At 1:30 p. m. Dr. F. Marion Smith of the Central Avenue Methodist church was to speak. Robert H. Wyatt, executive secretary of the Indiana State Teachers’ association was to talk on “Implications of Recent School Legislation.” Officers of the association are Thomas Fogarty of: Shelby county, president; Ira IL. Huntington of Jasper county, vice president; Florence ‘Reynolds of. Tipton eounty, secretary, and W. ‘O. Schanlaub of Newton county, treasurer. ®

Z00T SUITS ARE FOR WAKING HOURS ONLY

CHICAGO, June 9 (U. P.),—Zoot suits are no good for sleeping, Rutherford Johnson told Judge N. J. Bonnelli in explaining = why he pulled off his pants when he curled up on an elevated train Platform to sleep. “I was drinking,” Johnson, a Negro, explained in court, “and the stiff cuffs on these pants were, too tight for me to pull my knees up to my chin.” “Your waist is the only thing that] -

suit pulls up to your: chin,” said| DI i, 1, you guljty of dis- swer p

Times

Herbert W. Foltz pioneered the

little theater movement in In-'

dianapolis in 1914.

Mrs. Mary Flanner was a member of the original board of directors. ‘The first board decided to stage plays in the sculpture Jouur)

of the John Herron art insutute,

Miss Eldena Lauter’s activity in the Indianapolis Civic theater has never ceased.

- This is what came of the efforts: of .the Civic theater pioneers. It is the set for “Skylark,” which the little theater presented this

past. season.. The setting is original and was: designed by Donald Finlayson, the theater’s art director,

‘well envy “it

spirited discussion -that is raging is: Resolved; the nymphs should have some clothes. There is a barrage of letters-to-the-editor on the subject, But the patrons of art stand firm, Art cannot be compromised with clothes. And so the Indianapolis Civic theater came into being along with three cavorting nymphs who might have been Faith, Hope and Charity. At least, the theater has been operating on these virtues ever since. In 1914, there was a renaissance going on in the theater, which is more or less a biennial event. In Ireland, Lady Gregory and a coterie of Irish literary giants were erecting the Irish national theater and George Bernard Shaw was wondering publicly whether anything ever would come of it. 8 ” ”

Folk Theater Arrives

IN CHICAGO, a man named Maurice Browne had organized a little theater company. In Baltimore and Boston and on the West Coast, the little theater movement was under way. Americans felt the need of their own national theater. A number of people, particularly in the Midwest, turned their backs on the professional theatrical doings of Broadway. They wanted art and life and Broadway wasn’t giving it to them.

‘Roving Bishop To Girl, 12,

‘ST. LOUIS, June 9 (U. P.).— Missouri authorities investigated today the midnight marriage of 12-veag-old Genevieve Boschert to George R. Hart, former marrying justice who claims he has performed a total of 72,000 marriages.

Hart, a grandfather at 48, said the

20 at. Sedalia, Mo., on a license obtained at Booneville. Missouri statutes provide that no recorder of deeds shall issue a marriage license to a girl under 18 without. consent of her father or mother nor to a girl under 15 without a circuit or probate court order. The girl's parents, Mr. and Mrs. Phillip Boschert, were not informed of the marriage plans” before the wedding, Hart explained. Mrs.

marriage was performed last April|

A folk theater in this country was coming into being—a movement, by the way, which gave the movies and present-day stage some of its greatest stars and finest plays, How Indianapolis became a part of all this may be traced to the night of Feb. 2, 1914, when William E. Jenkins, Indiana university librarian, was making a speech on the drama before the Indianapolis Center of the Dramas, league at Herron, »

Develop Own Drama

éMR. JENKINS had witnessed the efforts of Maurice Browne's Chicago theater in a production of “The Trojan Women.” He sug-

gested for the first time publicly that Indiana should have its own theater, In those days, maybe a Hoosier didn’t need a passport to get into Illinois, but he couldn't repress the feeling that when he crossed the state line he had left the main stem of civilization and was treading in backward territory. Indiana was well heeled with artists, writers and statesmen. It was logical for the state to develop its own drama. On Feb. 16, 1915, a group of citizens met at Herron to organize a dramatic association in response to the suggestion of Mr. Jenkins whose speech is to be considered

s ”

's' Marriage

Is Investigated

Boschert, who has five younger daughters, believed “the less sald, the better.” “We've had our share of trouble,” chimed in the grandmother of the bride. “A year ago our home burned, then came the floods, and now this happens.” Neither Hart nor his young bride would at first admit that she was under 18. However, Hart, who calls himself a “roving bishop” said she might be a little under that age. Birth records at the St. Charles, (Mo.) city hall show the current Mrs. Hart was born July 25, 1930. Hart, who recently has been performing marriages as “bishop of the Union church and Missions of America, said he had become interested in the gir! and felt she needed

CLAIMS ACCIDENT IN SLAYING OF WOMAN

TULSA, Okla., June 9 (U. P.).— The defense in the manslaughter trial of Mrs. Ella B. ward asserted today that socially prominent Mrs. T. K. Simmons, wife of a millionaire oil man, was shot to death accidentally in a struggle for possession of a pistol. The defense called its first witnesses to substantiate the claim that Mrs. Simmons, a nationally known horse fancier, came to Mrs. Howard’s room in a fashionable hotel here and threatened her with the gun. Mrs. Simmons was shot to death last March 25. Shortly after the shooting Simmons signed a statement acknowledging that he had given Mrs.

‘Howard large sums, and that she

had come to Tulsa from her home at Ft. Worth, Tex. to demand more money. Simmons did not say why the money was paid.

IRWIN WILL ADDRESS FLANNER HOUSE CLUB

A. A. Irwin, assistant county agricultural agent, will speak at 8 p. m. tomorrow at a meeting of the Flanner House Garden club. ° His subject will be the control « -question-and-

an-

someone . to look after her.

OPA SQUEEZE HITS 10 KOSHER PACKERS

NEW YORK, June 9 (U, P.).— Ten independent veal and lamb packers have closed their slaugh-

terhouses recently because of the

squeeze between livestock and wholesale ceiling prices, it was revealed today. According to Anthony Lester, business agent of the local packing house workers’ union, the firms, which employed 500 persons, slaughtered about 70 per cent of the kosher veal and lamb sold here, Lester said the squeeze occurred when the OPA ordered packers to sell veal at 23 cents a pound although it cost 20 cents.a pound tc produce.

GANG ROWS FLARE ‘AGAIN AT NEWARK

NEWARK, N. J, June 9 (U. P.).— Fights between roving gangs of Negro and white high school students, which already have cost the life of one youth and serious injuries

to several others, broke out again]

last night during a blackout test. Police broke up six separate groups. one of which consisted of more: than 30 youths, armed with flclubs, baseball bats, - bricks and

>

one of the real prime movers in local history. :

Society Is Formed

CARL H. LIEBER presided at the meeting and William O. Bates was appointed secretary pro tem. Articles of association were signed by 25 citizens who left their contributions at the door on the way out. So happened along the Little Theater Society of Indiana, precursor to the Indianapolis Civic theater, which today is struggling to renew its existence for another year. The first board of directors consisted of Mrs. Mary H. Flanner, Miss Eldena Lauter, Herbert W. Foltz, Hathaway Simmons and Mr. Bates. Indianapolis citizens who had not heard of the project up until then soon found out about it when Mr. Coats’ lavender curtain appeared with its nymphs.

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Art and Morals

THIS CONTROVERSY may or may not be important. But it still continues. The question of art and morals is fundamental in the little theater and it has become a part of the heritage. of headaches of the Civic theater here. The first board of directors employed Samuel A. Eliot Jr. of

6. 0. P. PRECINCT HEADS ORGANIZE

New Association Is Formed To Fight Factionalism Within Party.

About 285 of the 366 Republican precinct committeemen of Marion county have incorporated themselves into the United Republican Precinct Committeemen’s Association, Inc. Fenton Bluestein Jr., 620 W. 29th st., one of the corporation directors,

said the purpose of the organization was to combat factionalism in the party and support the regular-

EJ

organization “in all political move-|

ments.” He said the association would not recognize the Republican Victory Committee organized recently by Cify Hall Republicans. “The only organization our association will recognize is the Republican - Central Committee of which Henry E. Ostrom is chairan,” he said. @

Harmony Plans Laid

The association ‘has established headquarters ‘at 409 Inland Bank

building. Mr. Bluestein sald the association would sponsor Republican recreational affairs to promote harmony among all party members. Robert H. Hathaway is president of the association. Other directors listed .in the articles. of incorporation are Jack Eaglefeather, Emmette Nevada, Harry Putnam and Clyde Pierce.’ | Sidney S. Miller, city corporation counsel, is head of the Republican Victory committee which has ap-

pealed for funds from city and

county . employees ostensibly to

finance a slate of candidates in the

primary election next May. HINT 7 U-BOATS SUNK

News-Chronicle said today that

Prime Minister Churchill's: an-

nouncement that the first, week of June was the most ul yet

in ‘the battle of the Atlantic indi-

The professional theater might

Cambridge, Mass., a grandson of the five-foot-bookshelf Eliot, as its first director. Incidentally, he is now professor of spoken English at Smith college. The first program opened under the purple curtain in the Herron sculpture hall Friday, Oct. 30, 1915 and the proximity of Halloween didn’t phase this hardy group of dramatic pioneers. . Four one-act plays were presented. The first was “Polyxena,” adapted from the “Hecuba” of Euripides, the ancient Greek gent, by Mr. Five- foot bookshelf’s grandson himself.

o ” »

Shall Apathy Prevail?

THE SECOND was a homey number entitled “A Killing Triangle,” by.an-Indianapolitan who didn’t identify himself to the audience any further than that. Maybe he didn’t dare. The third was Lord Dunsany'sr “play in a lonely place,” “The Glittering Gate,” and the fourth was a farce called “The Scheming Lieutenant.” That was the beginning of the Indianapolis Civic theater. The end is not yet, we hope. For this institution is¢a part of the American theatrical tradition and if it succumbs to apathy, part of this tradition is lost, too.

TOMORROW: I Drama Under the Hayloft.

East Dartened.. ; ; ! oq By Bomber 'Raid NEW YORK, June 9 (U. P).— Three American Liberators bombers, simulating attacking enemy planes, roared ‘along the: Eastern coast last night from Delaware to New York, throwing hundreds of communities into darkness in an unexpected test blackout. The bombers sped from: lower Delaware over New. Jersey to the metropolitan area of New York— a region comprising the army’s + 2d’ service command, ; Considering the area covered by the test, there” was a relatively small. number of automobile accidents and blackout violations. One death " was reported. . Mark A. Savage, an auxiliary policeman of Rye, N. Y., was. killed ‘when struck by two trucks while directing traffic. Savage was the father of nine children, one of them a lieutenant. in the air corps. At the height of the blackout, a 36-inch water main burst in downtown New York, causing one of the city's worst subway tie-ups.

FREIGHT KILLS BOY . NEW CASTLE, Ind., June 9 (U. P.) —Funeral services will: be. arranged today for 13-year-old Charles Lee Holcomb, who was killed yesterday when he stepped -in. front of a fast Pennsylvania. freight train here. = *

HOLD EVIRYTHING

LONDON, June 9 (U.P). — The |