Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 5 March 1950 — Page 21
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~ By VICTOR PETERSON ~ O® as a fuel today has ripped open the stone-like
defense of coal.
It is pouring into domestic and
; industrial furnaces in a major breakthrough. Lo <As a coal and oil state, Indiana has a vital stake in
the issue.
‘The battle has waged “or "Heatly a quarter century
-with oil on the attack. Until 1947 ‘strategy brought only infiltrating movements; oil seeping through the seams of the Black Colossus at a gain of but 1 to 2 per cent 8 year. A coal shortage existed in '47 as did a desire by the public for a lazy method of keeping the home fires burning. War and reconversion had put the frost to the desire, keeping it from blooming earlier. ° In '47 the Great Wall of Coal ‘began to crumble. Distributors
“of fuel oil experienced a five-
year trade jump in thé ’47-'48 heating season. The industry was not prepared for the business gusher and a shortage resulted. A minor counter-attack by coal died because of the battle within {ts’own ranks. Last year brought Ywhat operators term the 110 Black Days, 110 days when no coal dust blackened the face of miners. Either they were on strike or marking a mine holiday. Now two months of '50 have passed. Only a trickle of coal drips into empty bins over the state and nation. Almost en masse miners and operators pave faced up, neither willing to give an inch in their raging civil War until yesterday, Mean-
to 18]
rdine
pring ray
y oconed 4 4 Ider, back... ring, ~ orite
6.95.
RED
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while, another enemy, threatening survival, hammers relentlessly. f " s y THE CHIPS are in the poker pot and oil and coal, industry leaders read it like necromancers peering into a crystal ball. Continued = unsettled condi-
bring extinction in 10 years.
“It is very possible,” a local coal operator said. “We are battling for survival, If pres-
ent circunistances continue, the American people with native ‘ingenuity will "find substitutes for our product.” “The handwriting is on the wall,” an Indianapolis oilman said. “This is the end unless - differences can be settled, Coal could go out entirely or become a very small business. We don’t think, however, the industry will allow it to happen. They have too much at stake.” And so the bittersweet could grow up around- the shafts, the
_tipples crumble from. neglect,
valuable strip mine machinery rust in gaping holes still glit-
‘tering with black diamonds. The nation’s 400,000 miners, -
some 8800 from Indiana, would become surplus labor. Already
the coal industry itself esti>
mates a labor surplus of about 100,000 through loss of business. Those not surplus lost a
third of their earnings last .
year, They have drawn nothing this year; this in an industry
which boasts the highest av-
erage wage level in the nation. ) 8 .. | SOME 20 PER CENT of Hoosier miners were paid more than $5000 in 1948, coal operators say. Only a handful in Indiana, the -nation’s most highly mechanized mining state, received the minimum
- wage ‘of: $14.05 a day. This went to the water boys, car
riders and the few manual laborers on the surface. One state mining firm paid 30 per cent of its miners more ‘than $5000 in "48; 20 per cent receiving more than $5600. Today Hoosier miners, and those over the nation, are living on
tons inthe coal industry could —credit-piting up in stores and
rapidly counts. Coal operators ‘admit they “lost forever some 50 million
shrinking ‘bank ac-
ada Ilias
< Reais - big 4 1
«
tT eS - SUNDAY MARCH5190 ~~
strife Gives Edge To
Bituminous Men Fear for Survival As They See Competitors’ Inroads
Typifying the surge in use of oil . . . a night view of the Rock Island Refining Corporation ablaze with light while the city sleeps.
tons of business last year, about 11 per cent of production. Some place it 10 million tons higher. "On the average of tons mined ‘per man per-day, this would
leading coal operator said. “We
are losing business every day.
We -have lost it with every
“strike. We slipped steadily the before the war, re-
‘be 10 years work for one man for 8,333,333 gained much during the con-
days. Indiana mines and miners have been dealt a severe blow, too, but not equal to the punch taker nationally because 94 per cent of Hoosier coal is mined mechanically. A Hoosier miner in the strip will do 20 tons a day, not the average of six.
“GIVE the union power to control the working time of the
machinés and we will suffer even at a greater percentage,” a
ae YT TE —— IN THE PAST 30 days Indianapolis ' industry has been converting rapidly to ofl. All _ Installations must be registered
flict, and now are skidding disastrously.” And this is what the state's 8800 active union miners and coal operators watch today in the battle of fuels, Here is the picture pinpointed in the heart of Hoosierland within & 90mile radius.
with the city smoke control
board. Laundries, dairies, cleaners, ice cream manufacturers, metal manu~facturers, power companies are making the switch, some types
drug concerns,
almost in toto.
Since the first of ‘the year more than 400 oil domestic installations or conversions have been made in Marion County to Last year, in the city, 1089 oil furnaces were installed Coal inA total of 85
25 coal.
and 580 converted, stallations—645. -ott-fired boilers also went in.
The Citizens Gas & Coke Utility, with but three weeks normal supply of coal, .is padding out by: Toanutaciuning gas
-egion Is Reds’ ‘Most Relentless Foe
ott Out of Movie Stars
By RICHARD E. COMBS
a Stave Senate Foct Finding Commition on Un Aimersean Activision
Now oa pect by snus ]
FIGHT
THE AMERICAN LEGION ARAD NE
fis
HOW YOU CAN COMMUNISM:
By James, O Heil NATIONAL COMMANDER THE AMEICAN ion REPRINTED FROM THE AUGUST 1948 BOITION i | *
J COMM EDUCATION
The thivd of 107i
in this country
RED FRONTS I
COMMUNIST - INFILTRATION
In TRE
UNITED STATES
1s ny 5,
UNISM
“AND
oy and irs mfluenct
on the Communit consprra
1be organized alon Russian Soviets. Soviet government wi Soviet governments
”
HOW J reFAers wd, *
Soviet government will The An the son lines of the « + * The American ill join with the other in a world Soviet
EE RY
100
STS” With
Joe THE Coygpppree
MENT
It fs Later Than You Think!
ee this treasonable, revolutionary heme unfold all around you in every ay lite. . . . according to plan
WHAT MIKES THEM = ~COMMIES ? » ze i ©
COMMU
of a series
Comniting oy —— Wat
YE unre 87 ‘gHOULD KNO Yisu/y I ' i
UNIS LABOR
and its influence
o Communist conspiracy h
from oil in the greatest volume in recent years. The utility reports the public
knocking constantly on the door for gas home heating. Federal
approval of introduction-—-of natural gas from Texas will accommodate some 2500 additional houses.
They believe . surveys made
elsewhere in the nation would be applicable to Indianapolis. Through this they estimate gas home heating is desirgd by 15-
000 to 20,000 more customers.
THE INDIANAPOLiS Power & Light Co., the city’s greatest copl burner; today ‘has three boilers converted to ‘vil. This
saves 1000 tons of husbanded
coal a day but consumes some
175,000-gallons-of oil.
Presently the utility is spend- -
ing $100,000 for erection of four huge oil storage-tanks at the recently completed - White River plant. This is the first time oil has been used extensively by IPALCO. In 1946 it was tried experimentally for two days.
Distributors of oil to Romes
and industry --there are some to transports and then to homes “207 in Indianapolis ars rushed and industries
over '46 The
—naces thrive in a normally offs
~—tn—history— forthe sate of oil
"rise,
"u
Strikes Step Up Conversion Plans
year notched a 10 per cent rise A is _experiexcing another five-year, boom In a year's time, - - s - TEN YEARS ago coal cuse
tomers had a 10 to 1 advantage... ..
over oil users. Today it has . been narrowed to 4 to 1 and the ditferefice is shrinking rapidly. Retailers of oil fure
season period.
Wher sales. should be ruts... ning one a day per firm, they mount. at four to five. Many concerns are unable to get burners in pace with sales. And “this doesn’t include the thoue sands of space heaters in use. A spokesman for probably the largest space heating res tailer in the state said. “Last vear was the greatest
space heaters. We have noted & gradual increase over the ysars, but the spurt is in full force. Oi is outselling coal 5 to 1.” While Indiana mines stand idle except for feverish activity in non-union gopher holes, the flares of ofl refinerics burn bright 24 hours a day. = = = = E THE ROCK-ISLAND- Refine ing Corp.. only refinery in cens tral Indiana, throbs at peak capacity and soon will add huge new storage space. Servs icing dealers principally in a 90-mile radius from Indianapolis, it is one of the major dis< tributors in the area. Every day brings new des mands. Production has been stepped up. Domestic fuel oil sales sky-rocketed 40 per cent last year over 48, another-40 per cent this year over the same months for '49. Industrial fuel oil has shown a 20 per cent
Today about half of the firm's 450,000-gallon-a-day pro= duction of petroleum producis is fuel oil, . Virtually as fas as it is manufactured it flows
Some 150 million gallons are being consumed a year in the city and bordering. sections.
“Last year showed g 5 to 6 per
cent increase over ’'48. This
Pianist Had to Fight For Parental Approval;
Damrosch Was ‘Impressed’ With Her Playing
By HENRY BUTLER PATRICIA BENKMAN, pianist who will make her Indianthe Murat has smal
apolis debut Apr 18 in
Lregard for the hack-
neyed old comparisons between men and women musicians. Miss Benkman thinks there need not and should not be important differences between men's piano- playing and women's plano-
playing. “I've heard some men play lightly and some women play heavily. The.only way to judge any piano performance is to listen objectively to the artist, man or woman, and. disregard the old theories,” she says. Miss Benkinan, in private life the wife of Ozan Marsh, chair-
man of the Jordan piano de-
partment, comes from a busily musical family in San Francis:
“co. ‘Her father, Herbert Benk-
man, 48 solo flutist with the “SF” Symphony. Her mother is an able amateur pianist, Two uncles are professional musicians; and both her sisters, one a flutist, the other a singer, follow the family pattern. “We even have an airedale that sings.” Miss Benkman told
——methe—other—day—"She—starts—
Toverlook your State Capital in your fight TZINST subversives. You can tick them ‘there
legislators and all too ofén win out
5. News § World Report
1
Een rir A —————— pp —————————
ki THR TO WIRY
IIIa r 1
land COMMUNISHL
“In three decades of fi ghting communism, the American Legion has produced a mountain of paperwork ¢ onthe subject. The list Ps pamphlets, OWE news-
RADIO
papers, magazines, books and photostatic copies of documents,
Centralia ‘Massacre’ Spurred Group. to 31-Year Battle
Union: — WI TLLIAM ‘Z FosTir
(First in a Series)
By CARL HENN For 31 years the American Legion has fought communism. For 20 of those 31 years the Legion has fought almost alone, with little support or! sympathy for its anti-Red campaign. Not until the United States was involved in a cold war did the American public. fully realize the dominating ambitions. of Soviet Russia. Not until after World War II"did general -of opposition 1 to,
communism materialize. Yet the Legion's opposition to communism has been solid and unyielding since its bloody in-
spiration in Centralia, Wash.
on Nov. 11, 1919. On that day, Post Com‘marnder Warren O. Grimm and three subordinates were shot and killed as they marched with their comrades in an Armistice Day parade. Sixteen - other TepiGinaires were wounded. The shots were fired from. ambush by organizers and members of International” Workers of the World, a radical labor group. All but one were fried and jailed. That ‘One was lynched. : ; ._» TO. BROTHER Legionnaires ‘gathered in Minneapolis- for “their first national convention,
the four deaths seemed nothing
less. than murder, committed by an anarchistic “group. . ~ On Nov, 12 the - deiigatos :
solved fo ‘create a National Americanism Commission to
combat anti-American tenden-
cies and to work for education in the nature and principles of our government. - The Legion further reésolved that Congress deport alien en-
emies of the U. 8. A. and pass,
laws to “effectually punish Americans who have become so lost to ' common decency and patriotism - that they are actually assisting aliens to bring * about.disorder and revolution in our country.” ~~ That resolution was affirmed
again and again through the
years that followed. National
commanders and Americanism’.
directors called for anti-Red action from Congress, from Presidents, roma Sitizens, :
WHEN recognition of (Soviet - Russia by the United States
“wis popassd 1h 1922 [Suncesstully “Spposed..
Chairman, Communist Party, U. Ss a
be es a © Ae Ma atten nt
In 1933 recognition of Russia
by the United States again was proposed. Again the Legion, led
by then national commander
Louis Johnson, opposed recogni$ion. But this tirfte the Legion st ig The same Louis Johnson, a8 Secretary of Defense, now is charged with keeping the weapons and fighting manpower of the United States honed to razor sharpness against his foe of 16 years ago—Russia.
= - » THE MOST effective Com-mie-fighter ever to do battle under the Legion banner was
Homer Chaillaux, National
Americanism Commission chairman from 1934 until 1945. It was Homer Chaillaux who dug into the background of apparently harmless, idealistic groups and revealed them to be Communist-front organizations. - ‘He -did it in 1935 and 1936, when front groups were almost unheard of.
It was Homer Chaillaux who _ _Inspired a. Legion national eon-
vention in 1937 to resolve that Congress “investigate and make public its findings on organizations in the United States which
* are militantly serving ‘Germany,
Italy, Russia, Spain or any other alien power or system.” -
resolution, backed by -
powerful Legion pressure groups, eis in the ‘creation
‘Dies Committee, atid for Martin J Dies, its
IN ITS first 10 years, the -
Dies Committee heard 998 witnesses, took-19,651 pages of testimony and issued 43 reports.
It named Communists and
Communist-front groups and axposed them to national attention. The German-American Bund was uncovered and Fritz Kuhn was indicted. Pelley and the Silver Shirts were pinched off. ‘ : For this and other actions the committee received a torrent of abuse and villification from its targets. Many honest liberals, even conservatives and in-betweeners, believed the Dies Committee fad invaded the sacred area of personal liberties guaranteed Americans.
. = » AFTER World War II the committee, dormant for a time, was revived as the House Un-
American Activities Committee.
Again the same cries rose, especially when the committee indicted ~ Hollywood witnesses for contempt after they refused
to say whether they were Com- .
.munists or were not. Yet thé committee exposed Gerhardt Eisler as the "No. 1 Communist “in America. Its . action Jad to conviction of 11
ors. kicked the Hd off the Hiss-Chambers scandal,.
after leh. Alger. Hiss was
convicted of Peyy. 4
nunists *in New York’
and they know it. That is why they gang up on
When nd Tae Over a Country oT
SH
Br i
-
JU DITH COPLON and V aléntin. Gubitchev probably would not be on trial in New York if there had been no such committee.
To all the ‘arrows aimed at the Dies Committee the Legion bared its own breast. When the annual battle for appropriations arose, it was (and still is) the Legion which feught the good fight. In other words, the American Legion would be doing exactly the: job the committee is doing, had it the authority and the funds. ; Is this effective, or even wise? Is the Legion's loud, at times shrill, battle cry ever motivated by economic, instead -of patriotic, motives? Is the Redhunt a witch-hunt? Seldom is there a clear-cut answer to these questions. It
would take a Solomon to designate the dividing line between’
radicalism and liheralism, and few Legionnaires are Solomons, « : Bat that does not diminish the vigor of the assault. As Richard - Seelye Jones says in
his “History of ‘the American
Legion: “In its frontal attack on unAmericanism the Legion has scored many - ‘hits and many
‘misses.- But for 31 years it has always. been _in there, (aWing:
Ing." .._ (ToBe Continued)
singing the minute you begin making the motions of an orchestra conductor. She's a very extroverted airedale.” a a = " : “ALL THIS musical activity undoubtedly had some “influence on Miss Penkman' 8 choice of a, career, From as early as she can remember, she wanted to learn the ‘piano. “1 don't believe 1 —ever—had—any chtidhood—ambi=
tion to, drive -a.fire- engine or Join a circus,” she. said. Papa Benkman knowing the — difficulties of “a musician's life,
"took a dim view of Patricia's
determination. He even patiently disregarded her repeated pounding on ‘the family. upright —- gentle hint that she wanted lessons. Finally, at the mature age of 5, she put: her foot. firmly.down..on: the pedal and won her point,” He ‘agreed
to start teaching her. After some months of beginning study, she insisted, again despite paternal advice, on entéring a city-wide competition,
—big-prize of which was -a grand
plano. “tI wanted so much. to win that, because our piano at home wasn't very good,” she told me
SHE WORKED her way up -
through the semifinals to the nerve-wracking finals where she and the other finalists had to play -before a Municipal
Auditorium full of -15.000-listen~ -
ers. Little Patricia's “Minute Waltz” and- “Farewell to the Piano” didn’t quite make the grade. But a morning paper carried a heart-throb picture of her uncontrollably weeping “over her failire. That picture meited even her father, who-thereupon sent her
to study with Lev Shorr, the -
San Francisco Symphony's pianist. She studied and did lots of public playing in grammar and high school. In 1939, she played for Marcel Maas, director of the Brussels Royal Conservatory, during one of. his then annual
lege —a-Cali—
fornia counterpart of Bryn
Mawr. {Indianapolis Bryn incidentally,
“Mawr alumnae, are sponsoring the. Apr. 18 re-
_eital). ‘Maas offered her a twoyear scholarship in Brussels—
an offer that filled her family with consternation. She was too
young to go_to Europe, they
felt. ou uo ~
THE WAR decided things in their favor, but Miss Benkman
. were able to settle together in
Then progress began.
_ four to eight or more hours of
—joyed on San Francisco Bay.
-adopted in Carmel. “Ozan
Meanwhile, coal-burning in< dustries curtail production or close. Home owners ration the last black chunks, bank thé fires until they die, then shiver,
Patricia Benkman Debut Book 4
did get to study with Maas in Washington. There she latefh had an audition with Egon Petri and won a scholarshi for study with him at Corne University. At Cornell she met Mr. Marsh, also a star Pe pupil at the time,
Study in New York with sie mon Barere, marriage and ag interval in which she took over her husband's teaching duties -at St. . Lawrence University while Mr. Marsh was in the service, occupied the years une :
a New York studio apartment; which Patricia, gleefully anny upon a decorator’s advice painted with “fire-engine-enamel.” 7 = A neighbor in the W. 55th St. building was Anis Fuleiham, composer-pianist now on the IU music faculty. Miss Benke man's Apr. 18 program will ine clude an Indianapolis premiers of Mr. Fuleihan’'s “Five Tribe utes,” a suite for piano honors ing Debussy, Vaughn Williams; Prokofieff, Ravel and de Falap
2 MISS BENKMAN'S first New York appearance was in a 1047 benefit concert in Hunter Col= lege auditorium, where she and Lauritz Melchior shared the limelight and the accompanys Ing orchestra. At the end of her playing of Liszt's Fantasy on Beethoven's “Ruins of Athe ens" (one of the few New York performances that work ‘hay '. had), she noticed a man in the
front . row jumping’ up and—shouting “Bra
VO #ach time ske took a bow. Melchior told hep it was Walter Damrosch. She was similarly lucky. mn her 1948 San Francisco recital, not long aftér her New York Town Hall debut. Pierre Mone teux heard the San Francisco recital and engaged her for the four concerts she played with the San Francisco Symphony last January, As a refuit of those ‘concerts, she's been ‘signed up for a ‘New York aps pearance next October with the Paganini Quartet and a Lew. isohn Stadium program with Mr. Monteux and the New York. Philharmonic in the 1951 sums mer season. Miss Benkman and her huss band, who now live in a tiny’ three-room cottage out in Cars mel, where their six-foot grand: fills a nine-by-seven room, do their - practicing independently; Both'subscribe to the idea that “two pianists can’ be married without becoming a two-plane team,” as she phrases it. > While Mr. Marsh is teaching and practicing in his Jordan studio, she does anywhere from
daily practice at home. It's not just drudgery. It's also recreas tion, she says, and more fas<" einating than almost an but the sailboating she has ens
The Marshes Rave a nondes.. : script dog, “Spooky,” they:
her a ‘Mongolian,’ but I she's built along the lines of a Socker Jhaniel, th though she's & ; bit bird-doggy in the beam