Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 10 January 1949 — Page 9

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~ B Inside Indianapolis ~~ #v #4:

>. i Aid Tr EXCUSE a on n't get you

Surpeise Must have been written all over my face, Katherine Mertz, Manual High School nurse, added, “I'm not spoofing.” “It used to work with our ‘school nurse” I

id. “Of course, in the past 12 or 15 yéars .

maybe there have been advances in boy's ailments, especially when the is on or the ice is fine for skating.” Miss Mertz took her time in making a rebuttal. Just as well, it was something of a lazy morning, there weren't many students as yet ask-. ing for medical attention and the room was so quiet it seemed a’ shame to begin even a little tiny argument. oe

. Hard to Prove or Disprote SHE PRESENTLY informed me faking a sore throat was a difficult and hazardous’ undertaking since a nurse would surely look at a throat befere writing out an excuse. : “You'd be more apt to get away with something by saying you have a pain in the side or nausea,” suggested Miss Mertz and she explained why. Just like a backache, nausea and a pain in the ‘side are hard to prove or disprove. A young fellow walked in just then and asked if he could have a couple bandages for his fingers, He was most reluctant to' talk about how he received the knuckle injuries. But he was no match fpr Miss Mertz, who has been hearing excuses ‘Manual for 18 years. 1 would be willing to het she could spot a phory excuse in five seconds of conversation. ' The boy finally admitted with a smile after getting all tangled up in his own words that he

osing a ‘orld Series

"holidays there were very few complaints.

school the day ‘before. The<boy didn't know me from ‘Adam so I. professionally checked his knuckles. Sure enough, the brilises were familiar. Miss ‘Mertz admitted it was possible for a

Johnny or Susie was on the way home. I admitted the difficulty that could arise. (There are some disadvan in having a phone.) Rec “The next time such a student would come in, you know what would happen.” I had a pretty good idea. Heck, I'm a great believer in eduoa-) tion. Can I help it that every once in & while something came up that was more important than} history or English? atl In quick succession two unhappy-looking girls came into the office. One had an earache and another said her.stomach was upset. The girl with the earache was asked to lle down and Miss Mertz gave her a hot water bottle. The other girl was given a tablet of calcium carbonate (school doctor's orders) and sent back to her English class, The hurse thinks more students have something wrong with them during English class than any other time of the day. She sald she learned that after years of working with youngsters. Every year it's the same. Once if a blue moon she'll hear an excuse that really is original. “There isn’t an awful lot of fibbing,” said Miss Mertz. “Am I right?” she asked Mary Jean Berry, former home nursing student and at the present serving as messenger in the health office.

Not Much Fibbing MARY JEAN agreed thére wasnt much fibbing and returned to her Spanish book. She laughed when 1 asked her what “Cuanta la gusta, la gusta, la gusta, la gusta, la gusta” meant. Mary Jean didn’t know and, besides, next period was her class and she still had a lot of translating to do and I know how she felt. Thats’ OK, I'll keep singing the popular song. You don't have to know what the words mean. ; Very often a pain in the stomach is a resuit of coffee and doughnuts for breakfast. Miss Mertz gives her talk on digt. Sometimes a pain in the stomach and tears are a result of a boy walking the halls with a girl and a result little Anne thinks the world is going to end and classes at Manual should cease. Miss Mertz gives her talk on life. Anne perks up, finds a new boy friend, the pain disappears and everything is wonderful again. Ah, youth. . Miss Meriz stated that this year after the She attributes that to the mild weather.

ianapol

~~ MONDAY, JANUARY 10, 1040 _

Capone

Tax Dodgers . . . No. 2

youngster to be a good enough actor to get ex- ¢ cused from school. Then she asked what good] would that be since she would call the student's] ole n 3 home or neighbor and inform the parints that : fe

ail ‘Bottles’ Capone aw Aimed At Brother |

Ralph stalled the T.men a little while by asking them to wait . till the races were. over at Hawthorne (above) Seems. he had four

President Hoover sent down

After Ralph's Trial

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Others Pay Up By ELMER L. IREY as told to WILLIAM J. SLOCUM

The ol’ health office hasn't changed much, really. -Oh, maybe a few new tricks have been sided but the students come in with the same stuff. Nothing serious. I imagine kids will hate y English and history and arithmetic as long as it's aN HE Ameiean Sole taught. Probably there would be something wrong! Herbert Clark Hoover that he!

if they didn’t. y didn’t, : {was not quite what they wanted| {in the White House he went back Ito California with a piece of bitter By Robert C. Ruark xnowieage familiar to all horse r (players and dice addicts—when . | your luck is running bad you Even the publicity handouts are taking on an can’t do anything right. { eerie quality, this year, a mad admixture of When they added the credits science and alchemy, designed to stir the lay and the debits on the Hoover rebrain out of an earthly lethargy. gime Mr. Hoover was in sore need, By reading only the first paragraphs of these of a few more credits. - ptess-agented offspring of business, you can| I have every reason to know convince yourself that everybody, including Gen-|that one credit he richly deserved | eral Electric, is stark, stumbling nuts. {was for seeing to it that that I have one here from a science monthly. It horrendous louse, Alphonse Ca-| 8 says, without preamble: “Anyhody planning to go!pone, ‘was at last put in jail. b because she wouldn't be caught dead saying t to the moon had better hing tag ED Ro i ¥ things she says if she herself were saying "em. bottle with a nipple, a magnetized table, a metal the fortress of American gang-| Lately, she adds, the malevolent influences qish with a spike in the midd'e, and metal scissors sterdom began to crumble aroun have been - concentrating on her 72-year-old snd tweezers ..." : - : [the edges. grandma, and that is carrying things too far. Didn't surprise me in the least. An iy or “Te? , “ A ytime I go et Mr. Hoover's “It's a scandal she seys, My Rams has been to the moon, you can be sure I will not stir a running bad and he has never| SE rom re end of Miami to the other, and it's stump until T am fully equipped with those ac- gotten the credit he deserves for. WS : cessories, and it ever occurred to me to question!'a good deed well done. Instead he The lady is not Joescaie a her JSjusion, One why Take a note, Miss Terwilliger: “Traveling has become ‘the victim of an of the most common plaints from the Customers ,.: sr moon, as follows . . .” . apocryphal story which paints today is wrapped around the'idea that a wicked or or machine has been invented, to stgal away the ‘What Is Wetter Water?’ soul. HERE, A N -dresser: { I get seade of Jotiard bout Hew 20) diabolis “If a man saw I SE v . reas ; “| ot rentions or TS o thought ay i ing rush with her hair in her hand, he'd think she §iven Mr. Hoover. ane Fi ure on seed ; was crazy, wouldn't he?” Of course not. I] = ‘Fhe managing editor of a big newspaper was Wun t even blink it she were carrying her head saying the same thing recently: his correspondents od hand. Doesn't everybody? .continually fancy. that their privacy has been in- . favs Genera) Pleetor, Symly and auuy . . Goodness WE, |

vaded by everything from wire-tap to infernal but if General Electric say or & tter | hine. says some water is wetter Inashine than other water, this kid don't argue. |a hotel lobby Where ‘they were|

Te i be. = ay ’ . { { Ne . |greeted by the tanned and pros-| Wants to Grow Steaks on Vine Another science magazine: * ‘Why here's Lord | 0" \ohb eitters in a manner

THIS ATMOSPHERE of gentle goofiness is Douglas” might be said any day now, 83 years N h not entirely unreasonable, It is indeed a Buck after he fell to his death from the slopes of the |Pefitting a Presidert Be ra

Rogers. age, with science confributing atomic Matterhorn in the Swiss Alps . . .)” I read no ing reception Mr. Hoover suddenly |

Say ahhhh . . . Nurse Katherine Mertz knows all the complaints of high school students.

Yack-Yacking

NEW YORK, Jan. 10—Lady down in Miami writes she’s been bewitched by the police force and the transit company. Doesn't say how they did it, but she says even though she keeps her mouth clamped shut, strangers keep blasting away in her head, and odd words come out. She says even ‘when she’s asleep, with her teeth clenched, the stranger in her head keeps talking away, until her husband's about to leave her. Says she knows she’s a victim of evil telepathy,

{more public adulation ‘than was

lin Florida immediately after he! had been elected President.

the word: “'l want that man Al

was too broké to pay his income

As a matter of idle curiosity we checked the account of James Carter on Oct. 4, 1927, It showed a balance of $25,230.15. That was the very day Ralph Capo promised to borrow $1000 to settle his income tax of $4065.75. Ralph was James Carter, we knew, but we had to prove it. The October grand jury began listening to this tale of povertye stricken Ralph Capone and his many aliases. There was reason to feel that maybe the secret {hearings would not be too secret for the mob's large ears, do Ralph was picked up on a warrant signed by Mr. Madden. Bottles was whisked immedi lately to the U. 8. Court House in Chicago, where he was questioned a special assistant United.

bad case of camera shyness. Many people in Chicago durthe Prowibition era dulged the wishful thought that Al Capone belonged in prison, So did a man in Washington—President Hoover. did ‘more than think about it. He sald: “I want Al Capone

{mo’s Restaurant, but the charges were dismissed for lack of evidence. | “The Internal Revenue Office in {Chicagd had a pleasant young agent nanied Eddie Waters. Eddie made a place for himself in that tax-collecting branch Treasury by persuading - gangsters that it was only right and decent that they pay their taxes.

h | the photographer's

getting a dime, either for his brother or for himself. In July, 1928, Capone appeared to beg that the government make ino move until after the August {race meeting at Hawthorne, Mr. {Martin finaly had discovered that [Ralph owned, or shared the own{ership of, four horses, Mr. Martin also learned that Ralph had by cleaned out his safety-deposit box! States Attorney, Dwight H. Green. Mr, Green didn't know it, but that night he was starting a personal all Capones and the ¥ eventual

It was the Treasury Department that got the order. it was Treasury's watchdog, the Special Intelligence Unit that got the job. Elmer L; Irey, then chief of the Unit, tells in his book, “The Tax Dodgers,” how it was accomplished. First, the Unit tried its methods “just for size” on | Al's brother, Ralph,

IN 1926 Eddie for the 20th time. “Bot- * he said, “you ought to get| dit straightened out. You know |you'll get in trouble sometime if) luck was You don't” | Bottles (Ralph's nom de gang) was unimpressed. } it’s so much work Titling out them 555 He things.” Eddie saw his chance, “Bottles, him a fat-headed ham who had|you just tell me what you made the Capone empire smashed only and I'H fill it out for you. Th because Scarface Al once received all you gotta do is sign.”

And when Al was incarcerated AM

the day before he first told the __|government he was broke,

— In November, 1928, the bright

qin to work and)

AnBln. iooe on ya | ne WERT to the cortelthR en office and -nodded sadly as hiserosity Capone finally offered to {lawyer sald, “My client, Mr. Ca~ “All right, Eddie. Let's see. In|phone, is broke, But he will bor(1922 and 1923 I made about row a thousand dollars if you will

‘an 1815000. That's $7500 each year.| THE APOCRYPHAL libel runs a put me down for 20 a,

along this line: Mr. Hoover Was year for the last two years.” “What shall I put down for

| your He and some friends entered yr o4 ors asked.

ie oy Yar UR Bottles admitted that all: the phony names ‘onthe bank: ace counts were his allases. He used the subterfuge, he sald, because {he was violating the state law by {operating a handbook.

nT a SEVEN indictments were hand down. Bottles was charged with failing to pay income taxes and concealing assets, They were So were the remainder, except one. That was the one. It was trotted out and tried for size on Bottles, but it was actually being tested In hopes that it could be wrapped around

{pay the rull amount owed, $4065. 75. -But he haughtily refused to| {pay about $1000 in penalties and |interest, a slight tactical error

accept that as full payment," {which was-to cost-him three years

The collector's eyebrows went up. Ralph Capone broke? explained “My guopTLY fent has sustained considerable loss as the result of the sickness gdwa His Wilms tum local author. 1 made the dough/and death of his race horses called * throughout the past year. He has also lost a great deal gambling. EDDIE WATERS trotted back|/All he has_left is a half-interest| the office and filled out the/ln two race horses, and at the

p * . before Bottles laid od

off a gambling joint The Subway” in South-

They nabbed tHe books, and the ks indicated that a gentleman named Oliver Ellis was the owner.

alarm clocks, missiles which thfnk their way to further, but if ’is ludship pops up, with a cheery... himself a forgottén man {four delinquent returns for Ralph present time he is using up prac-

target, and sundry spooky apparatus to the con- hello, I will merely say: “Good morning.” sternation of us all

Al in time. It was an old Civil War statute, originally enacted to prosecute war profiteers who “cheat, swindle or defraud” Uncle

He brought them back! tically all his income trying to get them into shape.” The collector asked that this

He did a little carefully-guarded! talking.

. . ‘as the lobby-sitters quickly! I accept the mundane mysteries, too. Says| switched their adulation to a rub- {2nd Ralph signed them and for-

He owed $4065.75. He named no names, but ad-

1 just threw away a serious story about a here: “After 30 years of on-and-off table pound-iy. character who was ambling’ t | | Chicken feed.

scientist who was going to grow steaks on a vine, ing, they've finally fixed it so a U. 8. nut will| vy | » » % Tove ne ~ ",|across the lobby in Mr. Hoover's| like watermelons. Who is to say that some spike- fit a British bolt . ..” I don't know who “they” |g ye smiling to. the admiring!

{heartsbreaking tale but put in mitted that he (Ells) malfitained writing. Ralph and his lawyerian account in a small bank under

If Ralph had not been such an| : P winced slightly, but it was done./an assumed name. It was a cinch

This was in connection with

bearded wizard isn’t tuned into the head of my is, but I'll bet there's magic mixed up in it some- |. sulace and chewing on a big, | inveterate chisler he would have!

Boo! i : |fat cigar. |... The man, of course,

{face Al, and, as the legend has it,

By Frederick C. Othman wher Mr. Hoover became Presi-

ent. he sent out orders to get! Capone. |

Miami lady, for evil reasons of his own? where,

Oddity of Bills

WASHINGTON, Jan. 10—Our Congressmen, would tépeal taxes on. railroad tickets, movie who are eager beavers everyone, haven't actually seats, ‘electric light bulbs and billiard tables. | well know, because I got them got down to the business of making laws yet, but Rep. Bugene J. Keogh, of Brooklyn, already they have introduced more than 2000 bills, seems to have burned the most midnight oil writ- through the Secretary of including one that would make “Mom's day” of- ing bills; he now has 42 to his credit. One of Treasury. ficial, them would prohibit any manufacturer of candy But I recently got the inforAnother would exempt. children’s sleds from: bars, nylon hosiery, or anything else from using mation on what really set Mr. the manufacturers’ excise tax, while a third the words “White House” on his trademark. would give free uniforms to letter carriers. One bill wquld give ex-Presidents pensions o The bills are fluttering in from the public $25000 per year. One would build a fine new printer like lettuce leaves, burying the clerks in house (rent free) for the Vice President, who an avalanche of high-grade white paper and now must do his own house-hunting. ) “1 ) pe i mostly, I fear, never will see the light of day. There are bills to make states of Alaska and Hoover, I Seves pi rane in Except here.. I have spent this day poring over Hawaii! to slap a duty on tung ofl; which tomes onda. oN gee | the fine type and I can report that there are few from China and goes into paint: to make it legal rer satin J Knox led i thipgs in this world about which at least one for citizens under some conditions to own gold gation of Chicago citizens to the legislator hasn't written a would-be law, money, and to set up branch ofiices of West Point white House to ask for federal Seven separate lawgivers, in what looks like ‘and Annapolis in southern California. |help I determined that they would | a duplication of effort, wrote bills to repeal the |get it. That's when I gave the tax on oleomargarine. Four penned documents New Push Button Idea order to put Capone in jail.” that gwould blank out the, Taft-Hartley“ Act. A REP. GLENN R. DAVIS, of Wisconsin thinks! The job of putting Alphonse couple of hundred produced bills giving war vet- Congress wastes too much of its valuable time Capone in the penitentiary preerans all kind of benefits, from free postage to twiddling its thumbs while the officials count the sented some rather obvious probbetter hospitals to bigger pensions. votes of the lawmakers. lems.. a the City of 4 : He would install machinery to do the whole In the first place, the City 0 P Covers Run-Away Children job electrically. Each Congressman would push Chicago, Cook County, and the AND REP. GEORGE A. SMATHERS, of ; putton, marked vea or nay, and the result would State of Illinois, whose citizens Miami Fla., sent up a bill, No. 1005, which would gpssqr immediatély on a score board, as at a base- had so much of their blood spilled put Uncle Samuel in the business of sending run- pail game. . by Alphonse, had shown no disaway children back to the arms of their mothers. Ladies would be protected from phony fur Position to do anything but admit Provided they ran across state lines, that is. advertising under a bill by Rep. Joseph P. O'Hara, they were shocked. They were There's a bill up to make Good Friday a legal of Minnesota.. Rep. Frank L. Chelf, of Kentucky, Paying steady tribute to.the.reholiday and the more holidays the better, says I. would give the “young American medal for °e0% restaurant mop-boy. Rep. Henderson Lanham, of Rome, Ga. would bravery” to brave young Americans. We ‘in the Treasury Depart-| make the first Sunday in June “shut-in's day.” It looks like such a busy year that Congress ment were somehow chosen for Another bill would establish a commission to may mot even get around to considering House | the Job of ikatSerting Alphonse. study the legal status of women; still another Resolution No. 193 by Rep. Thomas A. Jenkins, 1 learned, OF en Rover In sail Fs would exempt patrons of agricultural fairs from of Ironton, O., to change the name of Eastern| 8 retary a Spot owh grim paying federal admission taxes. Ave. in the District of Columbia. I hate to get in|] ain {1 A! number of Congressmen wou ips one morning.

1d cut out taxes #n argument with a Congressman, but what's a » - on their wives’ handbags and fur coats, “YOUR MEN seem to be having

Others wrong with Eastern Avé.? : The Quiz Master

| great success with one Capone,” | Mr. Mellon sald, “George E. Q. Does the United Nations have ‘an official lan- Which European city is known as the “poet's guage? City?"

i Johnson (United States Attorney 27? Test Your Skill P22 Chicago) ‘says the unit has The UN has five official Ianguages—English,

done a grand job gathering eviFrench, Russian, Spanish and Chinese:

dence on Al's brother, Ralph. He thinks maybe you can do it on Al". Ralph Capone was Al's older brother. He had started his How many earthquakes occur each year? criminal career in typical Ralph It depends on what you call an earthquake. | Capone fashion in the. early There are, on the average, about 50 major earth- 1920's by being arrested for scarquakes ‘annually. These are recorded at selsmo- ing & horse, graph stations all over the earth. Whether they . produce damage depends upon where they occur, A large proportion are under the ocean and If it were not for the selsmographs we would mever moon, know about them. ' - ‘Gregorian

(Was Mr. Hoover himself, ! ~ » » “THAT STORY about Florida

{s absolutely untrue” said Mr.

Weimar, Germany, is often referred to by this name. It was the home of Goethe, Schiller, Herder and Wieland. Franz Liszt, one of the world's greatest musicians, also lived there.

How many new moons occur each month? Usually the moon is new only once each month. | But every twp or three years two new moons fall bitual gun within the same month. Tis Is because the length toter and was picked-up-in- 1926 of » month, as calculated by the phases of the and 1927 with a weapon, but wo

Ralph , was an

the length of the months in the| freed. In 1928 the Chicago police calendar that we use differ slightly, |found a gun on Ralph in Collis : rt i : = Coy

Ralph's plea of poverty when he had over $25,000 in a bank. The best legal talent that Al's money could buy made a few pres liminary scrimmages and then offered to accept a two-year jail term for their boy. Mr, Green's

ooked “dreamily into the future and said, “Nope. Bottles goes to

The _collector recommended that that Ellis had partners (police for the thousand dollars be accepted {in full settiment, evidently on the |idea that a thousand dollars were better than none.

{paid it and neither he nor a long| was Scar. and distinguished group of hoodlums, including brother Alphonse, would have gone to. jail when they did, if at all But to the great good luck of} That he sent out such orders I|all of us, Bottles did not pay. In the Collector of N. Y,|after they had worked down Internal Revenue got tired of trythe ing taxes he admitted owing and had twarrants of distraint issued, Ralph heard about it, and his ‘Heoover-after Capone. My source lawyer fold him it meant the government could seize his propery. “I got horses worth more than four grand,” Ralph yelped. “Let's square this thing.” But Ralph had been snapping: his fingers at law and order too

CARNIVAL

“protectors”), and Agent Martin thought it might be interesting if he could find out just who were _. |these partners. A check for $3200 But Washington refused to ac- drawn on Ellis’ ass cept the offer In compromise accoufit intrigued Mr. Martin, and and the he and Agent Nels Tessem, a human comptometer, started track- |}

January, 1927, matter was referred to me. » . ~ I SENT IT to the Intelligence Unit Agent<in-Charge in Chicago, ! Arthur P. Madden.

The check was made out to Mr. Madden James Carroll, who had closed] put a crack agent, the late Archie ut his account, and the bank which shocked him visibly. the was sentenced to three years and The SKMITUl* Mr. Martin went slightest idea who Mr. Carroll 4 $10.000 fine and was led off around checking saloons, eries, gambling joints and all the other rackets he well knew Ralph gan combing over James Carroll's was connected with, was no evidence that Ralph was

By Dick Tur

. WN THE JURY found Ralph guilty,

Martin, on the job. “I don't understand

Agents Tessem and Martin be- this at all.” A lot of Ralph's friends and adThey discovered mirers understood it perfectly. To it had -started with the identical the utter amazement of the Col« = |sum that had been the balance jector of Internal Revenue, a line closed by oneisr sleazy bums arrived the next [Tames Carter, also unknown at morning and the morning after that, and for several weeks, to had been pay Uncle Sam voluntarily $1 the exact amount million in taxes, that had closed out another mys-| terious character, James Costello|and the Intelligence Unit was |proud, and, as head of the Ine telligence Unit, I was proudest.

there hank account,

It was a pleasant little victory

AND SO IT was with the ac-

And guess whose Capone In prison for three years {account had been closed out Oct.| Elmer 27, 1925, and the balance trans-| Unit went to work on brother

ferred intact to the account of AL It was a mas

Industrial Nurses Plan Buffet Dinner

Industrial nurses will hold a buffet dinner at Wednesday at the Warren Hotel, {Guests will be Mayor Feeney, harles

Irey’s Intelligence

None other than Ralph Ca-

In a little over a year more than $750,000 had passed through the account of Capone. the account had accommodated under various aliases $1,751,840.60 from 1924 to 1929. ota The bankers insisted that Capone had not been inside their Nurses ‘marble walls since the account had been closed out in 1925, “How then,” asked Tessem, reasonably, “did all that dough get into the

discuss plastic’ nose surgery, Dr. W. D, Gatch, who will discuss {public relations. Mrs, Ina Horna |day is chairman of the program

Auto Trade Group

“A fellow they called ‘Dagd’.” Meet Here - Agent Martin got. a_ picture or 10 H Fri

Antonio Arresso. |tonjo Arresso resemble ‘Dago “Indeed he does, “Antonio Arresso,” sighed Mr.

1 | + “A messenger boy brought it. i vHe had a bodyguard.”

Indianapolis Automobile Association will hold its annual dinner and business meeting after a ‘cocktail hour at 6:30 p. m. Fri= ay in the Athenaeum Club. '|'Dago’ and also as Ralph Ca- to | | pone’s personal bodyguard.” : was lying when he sald that

“I think we ought to. transfer Montgomery for the. day=rhe has ve