Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 26 December 1947 — Page 15
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Inside Indianapolis
BPEBSQSA. INC. “What are we going .to start off with?” asked Bill Smith, holding his pitch pipe ta his lips. The “Ripple Aires” were ready for an evening of song. The Ripple Aire Quartet, member of the Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barber Shop Quartet Singing in America, Inc. voted to sing something fast. Of course, the voting was done after Al Minnick, tenor, suggested “Some Day Youre Going to Be Lonely,” Hal Purdy, baritone, beat his son Chan, bass; to the first warm up “Hmmmmmm.” In two shakes of the windpipe the rumpus room of the Purdy home at 5825 Indianola Ave. was full of mellow harmony. Mrs. Purdy, seated on a large davenport, seemed to knit faster as the four songsters began to open up. Little 3-year-old Kathy Lou Purdy buried her head in a pillow as big brother Chan pointed to her when the line “Some day you're gonna long for me only” came around.
Cast in Status of Crow
PERSONALLY, I was disgusted. My status was that of a “crow.” In barber shop quartet circles a Crow is a man who sits on a fence and listens. The fact that I was sitting in an easy chair next to the fireplace didn’t help matters any. I wanted to get in there and toss a few slides and swipes. As I watched there were a few things that I didn't understand. The hip movements, footwork, bending ¥
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SING, SING, SING—Doing their bit to preserve the SPEBSQSA, Inc., are (left to right and back) Hal Purdy, Bill Smith and Chan Purdy. On the bottom and "high man" is tenor Al Minnick.
“combined efforts were on the roof-raiser side.
_ By Ed Sovola
and swaying were self-explanatory, but things such as wetting a finger and drawing it downward in the| air and drawing a finger across the throat were/ puzzling, When the first song of the practice session ended,’ Mr. Minnick explained. A wet finger meant a mistake, had been made and a finger across the throat indi-| cated a dry esophagus. “We get better as we go along.” n "sang Chan Purdy. The note must have been just right for the! next rendition. “Violets Sweet” brought a lump in my throat. I wished I had a glass of beer to cry into. But what would a crow be doing with a glass of golden liquid? With one ear cocked to “Sweet Violets” I glanced through some of the printed matter Mr, Minnick | hanaed me about the SP.EBSQSA. Inc. | It all started when a lonesome traveling oil man in Oklahoma sent out a call to men who enjoy singing close harmony. O. C. Cash, Tulsa, Okla. was one surprised guy wien 36 warblers reported. Plenty of quartet material, Mr: Cash was responsible for hanging on the foot-
he Indianapolis Times
SECOND SECTION
long title for the new society. He also gave it its A)
motto, “Keep America Singing." ‘ As the voices grew, so did the society. Today there are 40,0000 members throughout the United States, Mexico and Hawaii. Mr. Minnick couldn't tell me the exact number of crows in the organization. While the quartet, hepped up and rarin’ to go, slipped, slid and swiped (all terms are applicable to barbershop quartet singing) through “Little Liza” my spirits went up when I read in a booklet entitled “Just What Is Barbershop Harmony” that “there isn't any musical science about ‘Barbershop’; it is just pure tone adjustment by acute ear-sense, the physics
of which is lost in vibration harmonics, overtones and
timbres that defy ordinary analysis.”
A Repertoire of 75 Songs
HAH. ANYTHING that defies ordinary analysis— I can do. It was rather hard to break into song because just as soon as the men finished one they'd go right into another. Their repertoire consists of 75 songs and, as Mr. Purdy said,’ “If you count the catch-as-catch-can tunes we can go up to a 100.” The words to most of the songs were beyond me. I was waiting for something stable like “Sweet Adeline.” Waiting was easy. The Ripple Aires took on such numbers as “Goodbye. My OlI' Coney Isle," “Heart of My Heart,” “Mifter Moon.” “Down in Louisiana Where the Sugar Cane Grows” and “Yona From Arizona.” My great chance. Adeline”. finally oozed - the crow. And did we sing.
‘he {familiar strains of “Sweet he men made room for In quartet lingo our
“Singing is so much fun, let's sing another before we say goodnight.” That's the little ditty that Closes, or starts to close, a session of song. “Am I a crow?” I hummed. In four-part harmony it was good to hear, “No, no, no, gh
Yak, yak.
Time for Peace
WASHINGTON, Dec. 26—'Twas the day after Christmas and all through the capital nothing was stirring, not even a second-string bureaucrat. Thus giving me a chance to beg the pardon of all the people I've insulted this year. Stand 'em end to end and they make a lot of angry radio gents, butchers, fountain pen makers, automobile designers, and ladies. Particularly ladies. I guess I bear the unhappy distinction of having more females sore at me than old H. C. Living, himself. The new look did it. To me it looked all right. I said so and whooie. The ladies have been writing me scurrilous notes, sending me bitter telegrams, and calling in person ever since. They claim I have a hole in the head, am in the pay of the dressmakers, suffer from astigmatism, and deserve some arsenic in my oatmeal. I thought they'd get over their peeve, but they seem to be growing madder by the day. Every time skirts drop another inch, I get another deluge of mail from females who seem to think it's my fault. Ladies, I love you every one. No matter how short the skirt, or knobby the knee.
Men Not Angry—Just Hurt
OTHERS WHO HAVE suffered at the typewriter of Othman mostly are men. Theyre not angry so much as hurt. Like the butchers-of America. They exploded en masse when I did a piece about Brother Dick Rickert of Shamokin, Pa., the butcher who sells beefsteak for 29 cents a pound. His competitors said I was crazy, or a prevaricator, or both. Poor Brother Dick's been busy ever since explaining to other reporters how he manages to sell meat at prewar prices. One of my most unfortunate experiences of the year was when I bought one of those new fangled frequency modulation radios. It wouldn't work until I
‘off the production lines now and I am delighted
By Fredeiick C. Othman |
——
bought a special aerial. Every time I wanted to change stations I had to climb on the roof to tune it. Literally. |
My. report on this brought a parade of FM special- | ists to my house. Two of them carried their own super-dooper FM sets along to prove that I was cockeyed. Their apparatus wouldn't work, either. They were beaten men when they left, muttering about | peculiar atmospheric conditions on Tunlaw Rd. I have moved since, they will be glad to know, and my radio works much better in its new location. One of my essays—and I'm a little proud of this— | got action. After investing nearly $30 in an assorts ment of ball point fountain pens, which leaked, re- | fused to write at all, or ran out of ink twice weekly | at a cost of $1.50 per refill. I consigned ball point | pens in print to the mermaids, who maybe could | make ‘em work under water. |
Better Ball Point Pens
THE REACTION WAS instantaneous and mostly | bitter. The ball point people claimed I was exaggerating and a cad to boot. Only one manufacturer, | a little fellow in Los Angeles, agreed with me. No-| body but him, he said, knew how to make a ball point | pen’s it. I'm still using it.
One of the biggest firms in the world, meantime,
bought the manufacturing |
CANDY CANE MAN — How do poy get stripes on Christmas candy? Woody Woodruff of 2335 | Ave., a machinist, how. Candy making is a hobby with and here he kneads a lump of fresh-cooked candy.
shows
nim
3
ATI G HR ASING
s insides properly. He sent me a sample to prove| | ‘
rights from him. First grade ball points are rolling| :
to! report it is becoming increasingly difficult to buy | a bad one. The auto boys are a sadder case. T asked them| please to design me a square, non-streamlined motor car, that I could get into easily. They continue to sulk. Their new models are tear-droppier than ever, | their communications to*me as sulphurous as always. | I don’t believe I'm getting anywhere with ‘em.
Torch Toters
HOLLYWOOD, Dec. 26—No matter what you hear elsewhere, the Virginia Grey-Clark Gable romance is still burning. Lana Turner insists she isn't carrying a torch for Tyrone Power. Jane Wyman and Ronald Reagan attended a Hollywood party together but said they are still not reconciled. They're living apart until they decide whether there will be a divorce. : If they are not réconciled by Jan. 15, they'll have to make screen love anyway in a new Warner flicker, “John Loves Mary.” Joan Caulfield is going places in New York Wn Lew Ayres. Hollywood studio” heads are predicting that the cost of .film rentals will go up in March with a resultant boost in theater tickets. Johnny Meyer's favorite girl friend, Janet Thomas, is stepping out with Richard Ney. Johnny is humming “I Wanna Get Married” to no avail. Reno's new $4,000,000 Mapes Hotel is going all out to lure the Hollywood divorce and galloping dice trade away from Las Vegas.
Henry Morgan Like Will Rogers
NOW THAT HE'S BACK in New York, Henry Morgan is busy writing “So This Is Hollywood” for his next film for Film Plays. He just completed “So This Is New York” in Hollywood. First sneak of the picture definitely stamps Henry as a great screen personality—a Will Rogers type humorist. Tygh Herbert definitely has given up his “Woowoo” trademark, Explains Hugh: “I just wore it out.” If Bob Hope plays a bit in Bing Crosby's “A Connecticut Yankee,” it will be a payoff for Bing's bit in “The Princess and the Pirate.”
Peak Believed Reached Building Gain
in GI College Rolls C1 Soll ty Dec. 26 «wr Predicted
Dr. Raymond Walters, president of
today that a decrease in the number | of GI freshmen this year indicated]
By Erskine John]
i — — There's no business like new business, as the song | says, and there's no better story about show business than the story behind the song, “Body and Soul.” Composer Johnny Green will make about $50,000, more as a result of its comeback via the movie of | the same title. But when Johnny wrote the song 18 years ago, it was considered a dud. He first sold it for $50 to Gertrude Lawrence. She gave it back. Then he tried to interest Libby Holman. She thought it was a dud and dropped the music sheet, in the bottom of a dresser drawer. Eight months later the song became a hit in London and Libby dug it out of her dresser to make it a coast-to-coast hit in the “Third Little Show.”
Record Booking for Joe vs. Joe THE BOOKINGS for the Louls-Walcott fight films set an all-time high—8000. Maria Montez may get Dick Haymes as her ’leading man in “Queen of Hearts.”
Photos by John Spicklemire,
RED AND WHITE — Red-colored mass and white mass
trasting strips, then re-rolled into a red and white striped mass. Candy is soft and
warm. It is cooled later by an electric fan.
Gracie Fields and Monty Woolley probably will be :
reunited in a movie after Gracie ends her engagement at the El Rancho Vegas Hotel in Las Vegas.
Paulette Goddard and her agents, MCA, will air b,
their troubles in court in January.
Mrs. Lou Gehrig, widow of the baseball star, will _
play herself in “The Babe Ruth Story.” Petrillo ban or no, Tony Marti: has cut enough records to keep his fans happy for two years. Myrna Loy nixed a long-term television contract,
offered by an Eastern agency, because of her film
commitments, Incidentally, I have great hopes for
the Loy-Cary Grant teafi in “Mr. Blandings Builds %
His Dream House.” at least once a year. Crippled Plane Lands Safety at Sydney
NEW YORK, Dec. 26 (UP)—The
for 48
WASHINGTON. ec. 26 (UP)—| (coast Guard reported today that the University of Cincinnati, said Building materials will
be more . pan-American World Airways
{plentiful and construction costs are, Clipper landed safely at Sydney,
that college attendance by veterans Not likely to rise next year, J. W.\y g yesterday with one engine
had reached its peak. |Follin, assistent
Dr. Walters, writing in the maga- | Agency administrator, said today.
zine School and Society, said a sur-|
Federal Works
out, The four-engined plane, en route
He predicted that new construec- | from the Azores to Moncton, N. B.
vey of 716 universities showed that tion would be 6 to 9 per cent above! | radioed that one engine was dead
a record number of 1,140,933 veterans were enrolled in colleges this year.
Boy Dies in Sled Crash
construction.
NEW YORK, Dec. 26 (UP)—David| Federally-financed work will fall
{this year, for a total of $13,700,000, 0 Mr. Follin forecast a “moder-| ate” increase in home building, and ‘White Christmas’ Day a 20 to 25 per cent jump in public|
|and another ‘was “rough.”
Comes to Mexican City SAN LOUIS POTOSI, Mexico, |
Engel, 13, went sledding with friends behind state and local work, he said. |Dec. 25 (UP)—It snowed here today after eating his Christmas dinner. State and local projects will go up|for the first time this century.
Sliding down the steepest hill in as much as 25 per cent for a total]
The lowest temperature, also a
Riverside Park, his sled smashed of $2,345,000,000, and federal works|20th century record here, was about
into a tree. He was killed instantly up to 20 per cent for a total of|39 degrees. $1,355,000,000, he predicted.
from a broken neck.
Snow fell steadily for’
.
I'd like to see those two together J
A HANDLE FOR 'EACH—While fr. Woodruff twists the oft candy to size, Alvin AW, Schreiber forms the handle of the cane. Al Gandy canes must have handles. ’
FRIDAY, , DE CEMBER 26,
Times Staff Photographer are rolled out in con-
$ So - . ——————
PAGE
He Puts. Stripes On Candy Canes-Sweet-Making Is His Hobby
1947
TAFFY PULL — The cooked candy mass is amber. By hanging it
“on a hook and pulling it out like taffy, Mr. Woodruff adds air to the
mass and the candy bleaches white. The more he pulls, the whiter it will get.
START OF A CANE —Mr. Woodruff draws out the striped mass to form the shaft of the candy cane. He works in the Dietz & Schreiber Candy Shop in 1050 Virginia Ave. :
READY TO EAT — The final step | 2 making adh conatibany LA Schreiber ‘of 4914 E. 10th: St. packages the canes. The cane business is boonting this season...