Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 19 December 1949 — Page 15
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By Ed Sovola
WHEN YOU'RE whipped, admit it. All right. Santa Claus made me cry, “Uncle.” With soot dripping off my two day's growth of whiskers, I have to admit Ol' Nick is a pretty smart operator. If we weren't such old friends my capitulation might not he so easy. I might have saved the admission until (he last paragraph and
asked the printer to use the smallest type he could
find. ie Seg © We all know that the bearded one comes down the chimney. But how? How dues he manage to squeeze his bulk, a bag of gifts and his white beard down a chimney? \ng speaking of chimneys, did you ever stop and think how many there are in Indianapolis? Some chimneys, by the way, are so small a pipe cleaner would brush the sides. The guy is simply amazing.
Smarter Than Houdini
FOR YEARS I've wondered about the feat. There were times when the inclination was strong to say nuts to the whole business. Then after his visit, zounds—how does he do it? Taking time from many pressing matters (I could name a couple just any old time), I donned my work clothes (white coveralls) and began investigating. ) In my own establishment where the layout is most familiar, it was discovered that St. Nick would have to be a mite better than Houdini to get around. Ever try to crawl in or up a fireplace that had no flue? Tough. On the roof of the four-story apartment building which is called home in my weaker moments,
Halooooo . . . Santa's little helper discovered the boss is the only one capable of going down a chimney,
I peeked into a chimney that would make a raven! white in comparison. On a clear day and with the aid of a Navy searchlight, a man with 20-20 sl could see a three-carat diamond at arm's .length. | I say that because a Coca-Cola bottle was seen at! half an arm's length. |
A housebrick with a red ribbon tied around iti:
was dropped, Subsequently examination of the! boiler revealed a glowing hunk of red in the middle’ of blinding coals. Although. the ribbon was gone one must assume the landlord is not in the habit of heating the premises with housebricks. Nick | isn't taking that route down unless his red suit! is. made of ashestos. That's for sure, | On to the more conventional, bub. What about! the little white cottage with the green shutters one sees so often in whiskey advertisements at this time each year? If the mystery {s to be cracked wide open, it will be accomplished there. Bachelor quarters with fake fireplaces were stricken off the | list. As a matter of fact, I'm not even going to} hang up a sock Christmas Eve. I'll just leave the transom ajar, Out north, in the vicinity of 58th St. and Key stone Ave, an ideal home for resarch was found. The chimney was square ind large enough for al midget to get stuck in. Heat tT above!
the opening. Soot clung to the sid&§S The slightest | touch loosened great quantities. was entirely] possible to get one's feet into the opening. Face, no. Too hot. | Across the street, entry was gained into a] modern bungalow. The fireplace was a creation. | A veritable dream. Made a bachelor clap his hands | and yearn for a nursery he could call his own. | Sobbing as discreetly as possible under the circum- | stances, I proceeded to throw myself across the | andirons after making certain there hadn't been a! fire in the thing for the past three months. ! The damper yielded easily to the touch of a crowbar. Santa might have been able to force one shoe through the opening. Overhead, through an opening the size of a cigar box, I could see blue sky. No stars. No reindeer. Plenty of soot. More 4han enough to make a bum out of a trespasser.
On Dancer; On Prancer; On Ed Bb
ONCE MORE on the roof, it was clear to ofie who has schooled himself in the art of observation that there were two openings. Santa could take his choice. One led to the oil heater in the basement and the other to a fireplace with a stub-
«born damper.
Plainly marking the proper opening and hanging the crowbar where it couldn't be missed, I cracked the whip over my reindeer and hurtled |
through space. We landed in a merry heap on ai
clump of {dry forsythia bushes laughing as though | compound fractures were a daily occurrence. It was my hope to give a detailed account of Santa's remarkable secret. I got stuck. Santa's a! good man, believe me, kiddies.
4
Big ‘Sweet | Potato’ By Harman w. Nichols
WASHINGTON, Dec: 19-Charles Lindsay ean play aBY tune you.can think of on the biggest
sweet potato” in the world. : Charley is 59, but doesn't look it. He has made f bass oearina, otherwise known as a “sweet potato” which weighs 11 pounds and looks more like a Navy blimp. . Our man is a former Navy man, a former saxarhone player and a daddler in the invention business. This ocarina is his latest. He got the idea when he organized an ocarina band ‘aboard ship in World War I. He noted that in solo the “sweet potato” was all right. But that when you got three or four of ‘em together somebody was usually out of tune.
Finds All Are Off of Key
CHARLEY INVESTIGATED and learned that ali of them were off-key. So he retired to his workshop. He first experimented with clay. He made a lot of little “sweet potatoes.” They sounded pretty good. But they were sopranos. “The guitar and fiddle nlayers told me that they practically had to bust their “E" strings to keep in tune with me,” he said, “to get high enough.” . “80 I worked on from there. I made a baritone ocarina out of clay. It weighed 12 pounds and I could hardly handle it.” The capping climax is this bass job. It's made out of wood. Took about 500 hours of work to
Alas for Art |
WASHINGTON, Dec. 19—Secretary of Treasury John Snyder at last has won the ‘good fight. The nekkid ladies have been replaced by maps, framed in walnut. The Treasury press room has gone decent. I think I'll resign in protest from the Fiscal Correspondents’ Association. The boys have gone panty-waist. Succumbed to pressures from above and, I fear, from within. When I covered the Treasury many a long year ago, the press room water cooler was full of gin. There was a rat's nest in the adding machine. A blackjack game ran from nine.until six on the big table and occasional puffs of black smoke through the door alarmed the lady clerks in the ancient corridors.
Mr. Morgenthau Stayed Out
THE SMOKE came from the bonfire of carbon paper lit (cautiously from behind) beneath the chair of every prominent visitor. The fiscal correspondents then played no favorites. When Henry Morgenthau Jr., paid his first visit to the press room, he received the usual hot seat. He never returned. So it was that during his tenure the curators of the press room art gallery added to their collection unhampered by censorship. Their tastes ran almost entirely to undraped ladies in artistic poses. Only fault they found with the photos of the ladies, which soon covered all four walls from ceiling to floor, was their faces. These the art experts cunningly covered with the profiles of prominent people. This resulted eventually in perhaps the most libelous art gallery in America. Women never looked in on the Treasury press room mote than once. Things came to such a pass
t-from a chair. The patent iz pending and the old sailor has!
make it. Charley puts it on a stand and blows into,
the National Society of Inventors behind him this! 4
time. . i Mr. Lindsay, who is on the retired list in the Navy, is working with an outfit known as the |
“Rock Creek Promenaders.” The boys play for |
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square dances in the Washington area—and you'd! §
be surprised how many there are here. Congress- |
men and Senators attend. L
Three Regulars in Band
IN THE BAND are three regulars. Old Charley on his bass ocarina, which he blows up a little with an electric amplifier. A fiddler, and a guitar. These three are the only paid employees of the band, but frequently a man will bring along another fiddle, or a banjo, or maybe another ‘sweet potato.” The bass ocarina, which is blown into like any other “sweet potato,” was conceived to fill a need, as Charley puts it. When you have to excite folks up to the pitch of kicking up a leg for a square dance, he says, you have to have the boom of the bass. Bull fiddle players seldom amplify their tone by using the speaker system. But Charley has a better argument for his bass
~ocarina. You can carry the thing around in a
canvas bag. It's only 28 inches long ‘and 10 inches in diameter. Actually, C. Linsay'is a pretty seriou¥ musician. He likes harmony. . “I'm a barber shop man nfyself,” he says.
By Frederick C. Othman
that the charwomen refused to sweep it out. This did not’ bother the denizens of the most raucous press room since the play, “The Front Page.” When Secretary Snyder took over the Treasury and made his first tour of inspection, he was shocked. The following week-end, when the artistic ones were in bed, Mr. Snyder's henchmen tore down all the pictures and painted the walls in baby blue. As a sop to artistic sensibilities, they installed a set of fine leather easy chairs. They also replaced the water cooler with an electric job, which couldn't be reftlled with fluids any stronger. Like spiders rebuilding their web, the brokenhearted artists slowly replaced their gallery with more ladies. This took time and the results never quite matched the original. Then gradually the art lovers filtered out of the press room to other posts. And while I had my back turned yesterday, the association voted to agree with a young feliow who said his mother wanted jo see where he! worked. He said he was ashamed to show her. By overwhelming vote. the hoard of directors authorized him to go to the National Geographic Society to scrounge some maps.
A Good View of the World
THESE ARE whoppers. They showx»ihe wérld and all its subdivisions, including Siberia and Montgomery County, Md. Mr. Snyder's Treasury! Department ‘was delighted to have them framed, gratis, and the press room today is about as depressing as any other office in Washington. The correspondents therein spend their time working. And, of course, studying their mapa, All I hope is that the Secretary of Treasury is satisfied. I'd boycott him, myself, if he were in any other business than manufacturing money.
Dear Santa Claus—
Can You Help N. Y. Boy Find His Daddy?
Father of Family Left Home Almost Year Ago; Mother's Leg Has Been Amputated
NEW YORK, Dec. 19 (UFP)—Dear Santa Claus:
is our'daddy . . . anyway make! him have a nice Christmas.” Santa, here's the rest of the)
Here's a letter from six-year-old Darold Lee Getman, of 10th, he left his Hornell home for Hornell, N. Y., a fellow who's got a request for Christmas that may Elmira, N. Y., where he worked)
top your list.
He mailed it 40 Unjted Press and asked that it be passed on to/trict sales supervisor. He didn't
you, Darold writes: “.. .. My brother and I live ~
|for the Hoover Company as dis.
\return. Folks around Hornell—|
{they all thought a lot of Mr, Get-|
at 10 Sheldon St. and we hope|/Whole world. Anyhow, yeu were man—said they couldn't under-| you won't forget us this year. The to our house once and you and|stand it.
present we want most is our
Daddy and Mommy and my little | Everybody began to look tor
daddy to come home for Christ- brother Gerry Dean—he's onlyithe boy's father, but nothing was
: ear two—we had our picture taken heard of him until about & week cir omg . ey AY together, you'll find. the picture after he disappeared. Then he with this letter case you forget turned up in Burbank, Cal. He see What my daddy looks like, Didn't Come Back “Of course, we would like some didn't go back to get it. if you can bring them, I would like a two gun holster sét have been pretty tough on Mrs. and cowboy boots too. My brother | Getman. would like a cowboy suit and ill and had to have a leg ampumaybe a teddy cause he is so little tated. And just recently, she lost |
Maybe he is even sick. “We thought you might him, cause you travel all over the world. If you do, Santa, will you tell him, ‘please come home for 'OYS Christmas?’
“Mommy Awful Sick” “My mommy has been awful
{had taken his car to a garage there to have it repaired, but he
Since he's been gone, things
She. bacome seriously
sick and had to havée-her leg cut'and likes to take a toy to bed her home.
off so we need our daddy. You with him.
will know him when you see him “I hope you
cause he is the best daddy in the things, but the presemt we want| Do you think ypu could help?
| The local authorities have done | can get these all they could to find her husband. |
8 J
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Board Studies Means of Squeezing
he
arking Commission Seeks ut Of Downtown Traffic
Rooftop parking . , . is demonstrated in this model of the Lincoln Hotel section.
. ” sf =
13,000 Cars Into 20-Block Area
By DAVID WATSON
WHAT CAN INDIANAPOLIS do with the more than 13000 | cars that datlyjam its 20-square-block critical downtown area? That's the problem in the lap of the five-man Off Street |
Parking Commission now doing spade work preliminary to public hearings on the question. Meetings with business men also are
planned. Private enterprise will get the first chance to solve the parking headache, says Luther Shirley, chairman of the commission. “We -don't want to put the city into any more business than necessary,” he said. But the law under which the
commission was created empowers the group to acquire sites and provide facilities
should private agencies fail to solve the problem.
Revenue bonds can be sold to /
finance the projects. » ~ ~
DURING THE PRESENT Christmas shopping period, cars in the downtown area far outnumber the parking spaces. Private parking lot operators daily are turning away motorists for lack of space, Curb spaces are blocks in every direction from the downtown area. On many streets the spaces hetween sidewalks and streets are heavily loaded with cars. Parked vehicles often block the sidewalks. A 1947 survey of the State Highway Commission estimated 11,464 vehicles on downtown streets at the 2 p. m. peak period. The area boundaries were New York, Georgia and Delaware Sts, and Capitol Ave, “+ The survey showed only 5380 available parking spaces-- both on the street and in private lots —in the area. License bureau officials estimate traffic has jumped about
dope on Darold’s Daddy. On Jan. THE
filled for |
10 per cent annually since the survey was made. ” ” ” LEGISLATION authorizing appointment of the commission grew from efforts of the Citizens Advisory Committee appointed by Mayer Feeney.
The problem also had been | studied by the City Plan Com- |
mission and the Urban Land Institute.
First efforts of the parking |
commission will be to acquire temporary parking facilities within the mile square, to give interim relief while major plans are made. During the City Plan Commission hearings, centeféd on acquisition of the Traction = Terminal properties
for public parking use, Propos-
als included erection of a threestory building, with ramps for driveways. The completed structure, as proposed, would be similar to projects successfully operated in other. cities, including 8t. Louis, Columbus, O., and Houston, Tex. . Other possible sites mentioned were Tomlinson Hall, which would be altéred to function as a parking garage; World War Memorial grounds, and Univer-
sity Park, for underground parking. » ”. ~ BUSINESS MEN have con-
tendéd, however, that construction costs would prohibit profit-
#
STORY OF THE SAVIOUR
MONDAY, DECEMBER 19, 1049
parking |
discussion |
was announced today,
—
New downtown
would block off the disganal’avenues
f 3
plan
o
able operation of underground |
ee — , aT Ingrid and Rossellini Affair A their attempt to give | ngri an OSS ’ n r immediate temporary relief,
® % : somplasionere said they wold Likened to Star S 1939 Role taining the Court house parking | ‘Stromboli’ Parallels Port in ‘Intermezzo’ ot for public use. A rT As : hdd Moderate downtown park- i ~ Almost Kiss for Kiss, Friends Say
{ k ing plans with models are on By VIRGINIA MacPHERSON,- Press Staff HOLLYWOOD, Dec. 19—When Ingrid. Bergman publicly an.
display in the Wm. H. Block
Co. ruditorium. They are sub- |nounced her passion for Roberto Rossellini, she was re-living the mitted by the Civic Design role that brought her to America and made hér a star. , Committee of the Indiana So- | “L' affaire Stromboli,” Miss Bergman's friends said today, | clety of Architects. parallels almost kiss for kiss her part in “Intermezzo” 10 years ago, [A map of the mile square In the picture, she was a planist who fell in love with a shows traffic. flow blocked at fellow artist, Leslie Howard. I Kentucky, Indiana, Massachu-——fn—“Intermezzo” the romance COMPARY - him—not only onthe setts ‘and Virginia Ave. ‘en- [flourished in the leading man's piano. | trances to Washington and home. [ In real life Mr. Rossellini went | Ohio Sts. to reduce congestion. Last year the same thing hap- back to Italy and Ingrid followed
# = = [pened in real life when Mr. Ros- soon after. Some of the best AT EACH of the four loca- geljinf moved in with Dr, and Mrs. scenes on “Stromboli,” according tions a shopping center I8 Peter Lindstrom in their modified to reports that trickled out from
shown with rooftop parking French farmhouse while he nego- the lonely lttle island, were spaces available. = At each tiated with her to star in “Strom- played when the cameras weren't
point where traffic is blocked, poly” |evert grinding. Falls for Director i the picture, the enamoured
new buildings would be erected To, ah en, Tui | The romance tn “Intermerso” Yn il droped er own sma ings would provide for parking. (D®8an with the girs adulation for career to be with her lover. In Chairman Shirley, who. fs the older man's genius. So it was real life, Miss Bergman's making president of Shirley Brothers, With Ingrid, who fell for Mr an even greater sacrifice. She Inc. will head the commission <[0ssellini the director before she has announced she never again until members hold an election ©Ver mét Roberto the lover. . (will make a movie. All she wants, Jan. 2 Miss Bergman, so ths story She says, is to live a life of pri 4 goes, usec to sit in a darkened Vacy as Robertos wife. ¢ theater enthralled by his movies,| There thé parallel ends, =
Qther members are Edward Pierre, architect,’ who is vice She even wrote him if he ever| a
| president; Timothy Sexton, real-
tor and insurance man, treas- needed a Bwede, bm available.” Postage Stamp-Weight urer; Bruce Savage, president an en er fan letter wit Le Dev loped of Bruce Savage Real Estate Ove Iou. ns e
Co., secretary, and Albert De- Part of Mr. Rossellini’'s genius
luse, former City Council member who is secretary-treasurer of the Lew Hill Grain Co., and president of the Indianapolis Board of Trade.
veloped a new unbreakable plastic Hollywood and signed Miss Berg- “ man to & contraet, contact lens that weighs “little
more thah a postage stamp,” he Leaves on Tour told a seminar of the Northern - - ee In “Intermezzo,” the object of Illinois College of Optometry. MISS FRANCO TO WED her affections already had a wife. Dr. Wiliam Feinbloom said the MADRID, Spain, Dec. 19 (UP) S80, in the earlier stages of the new ‘lens centers itself automati--Carmehcita Franco Polo, 23, Bergman-Rosseliini romance, did cally, eliminating 90 per cent of daughter of Generalissimo Fran- Roberto. He has since become le- the guesswork encountered in the reisco Franco, and Cristobal Bor- gally single. fitting of the ordinary type lens, diu, 26, the Marquis of Villavetde,! In the picture, Howard em- It also permits a trained fifter will be married late in April, it barked on a concert tour and of contact lengs to fit patients Miss Bergman went along to ac- more skillfully, he said. crm ———————————— re
rd
- By William E. Gilroy, D.D.
TLL]
Tangle