Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 25 July 1951 — Page 15

dial

"Faro is fine for rhino.

By Ed Sovola

CAMBRIDGE, July 25—An American bargain hunter, the lady who gets blood in her eye when you mention “big sale,” would die of frustration at an English sale, At €:58 a. m. today, I was standing across the street from the Belfast Linen Warehouse dry goods store. A line, or queue as they call it here, of women, single file, stretched for two blocks on the main street and | one block on a side one. There was laughter and gay | chatter the entire length of the line. Many of the women carried tea flasks and here and there you could see someone nibbling on a thin English sandwich. y In two minutes the doors Ag would open and the Semi-Annual “){ Belfast Linen Warehouse Sale would be on. One+half of the narrow sidewalk was clear for pedestrians. A policeman stood sasually in front of the store.

\ AT 9 A. M. the door opened and 10 women entered. The door was locked again. I couldn't believe my eyes, When would the rest of the women start throwing bricks through the window? When was the mad rush going to start? I crossed the street and asked.

“Is the sale on?” Several women nodded. A couple laughed.

“When do you go in?” I asked a tiny, frail woman, “When my turn comes,” she answered. She explained she had only been in the line since 5 a. m. Some of the women ahead of her queued up at 4:30 and even earlier. A big sale is always conducted in such a manner. First come first served. Ten customers are allowed into the store. The clerks wait on the 10, send them out the back door and let 10 more in. “Isn't that the way you do it in America?” I had to take her hand and support myself.

Africana By Robert C. Ruark

GRUMMETTI CAMP, Tanganyika, July 25— The Swahili language is wonderfully descriptive of the beasts it names. Simba is perfect for lion. Tembo fits an elephant as well as his tusks become him and Chui covers leopard like his skin. But the best and most descriptive of all is M'Bogo, a terse, brutal word _ ue for a terse, brutal beast, the ££ Cape buffalo, a monstrous, vindictive animal of infinite capacity to kill you, His sight, hearing and sense of smell are acutely keen. He runs like an arrow, despite his 2500 pounds. He {is armorplated with an inch-thick skin and insulated with muscle structure that can absorb impossible punishment from the heaviest bullets. If you wound him he will you and charge you with his head up and his eyes open and his brain intent on killing you. If he is a good buff his horns, upcurling, are from 45 to 50 inches from tip to tip, an arp as daggers. He chases you untilsfie cafches you and if he catches you he tosses you, and then he comes back and tramples you until there is nothing left but blood and tatters. The only way to stop him is to kill him because he won't quit. And he takes a lot of killing. ob MY FRIEND Harry Selby, with whom I hunt, has a mad fascination for buffalo. He has been nearly killed four times, standing firm and shooting at ranges up to four feet. One wounded bull took 14 slugs up front before he died on Mr. Selby’s boots. There is a personal feud between the man and the animal, which makes the animal beloved. Harry loves the buff because he is hard to hunt and may kill Harry on any given instance unless Harry equalizes the power and violence with skill, caution and intelligence. And luck. I am fascinated by M’'Bogo, too. But with a difference. I am scared limp of him. My stomach twists when 1 sée him. I was so pitifully terrified that I figured I'd better shoot one, because a man can’t go around being terrified forever. So I shot one, and I am now more frightened of M’Bogo than before. Mine was not a record bull, being two inches short of the record requirements. but he was as big as they come, prime as to horn and body, and he’s all the buffalo I need. Forty-three inches of horn can kill you just as dead as 50.

lay .ip wait for

It Happened Last Night

By Earl Wilson

NEW YORK, July 25—After reading about Dagmar going from $75 a week to $3500 a weel, one of my readers, Hy Zuberoff, said, Remem-

ber way back when a girl's FACE was her

fortune?” DJ oe oo WHO SAYS only radio and TV comics revive old gags? 1n the movie, ‘Sunny Side of the Street,” Frankie Laine’s with two writers listening to Billy Daniels sing. “It’s warm in here.” says Laine. “Not,” says one of his companions, writers!”

“for

(It was told long ago about violinist Mischa

Elman and pianist Leopold Godowsky listening to violinist Jascha Heifetz, Elman exclaiming about the heat, and Godowsky retorting, “Not for planists!”) *> 0D - hs NOW IT can be told. Prince Igor Troubetzkoy was offered a $550,000 settlement by Barbara Futton. He held out for §750,000, and wound up with nothing. : . Yul Brynner of “The King and I” will be signed this week to make pictures after 1952 for Billy Wilder and Paramount. Ethel Merman’s new “Russell Nype” (when Russell goes to Hollywood for 12 weeks) will be young and unknown Jeff Warren, Danny Kaye'll go on a big United States one-nighter tour for Sol Hurok next spring and undoubtedly panic the country as he did England. od a DIALECTICIAN Myron €ohen was at Pauls when a matron protested to the bartender, “Your whisky here is watered something awful.” “Just a minute,” said the bartender. “You're drinking the chaser.” Max Asnas the delicatessen Diogenes, upon refusing to cash a check for a dropper-in, eracked, “His check’s better than he is. It'll come back but he won't, dS bb NANCY CRAIG told on her TV show of a friend writing a blistering letter to a railroad about poor service. Back came an apologetic letter from the president saying he was astounded and furious about the reported incident and was starting a full investigation. ; 5 Attached to the letter was a scribbled memo to a secretary saying, “Send this jerk our usual crank letter.” » o 4G JANE PICKENS says a pyromaniac, after being psychoanalyzed, made Such improvement he wouldn't consider burning down a building more than two stories high. * > BERT LAHR’'S most hilarious second in “Two Oa the Alsle” (the big new hit) comes when he's

. playing a paper-picker in the park and recalls

a co-worker, ,

's started In Sanitation,” he remembers

tenderly, ‘and went all the way through Garbage

The sketch, by Nat Hiken and William Friedbets. Wil become a Broadway classic. > JONALD RICHARDS’ wife came

home and

» : pT

Outside Indianapolis a

Big Sale In Pngland ; Is a Tame-Affair

Is that the way we,ran a big semi-final sale in the States? When the color returned to my cheeks, I began slowly to describe an American sale, The women Stared wide-eyed, unbelieving. Lo < FIRST, I SAID, the women go in training on beefsteak for a week, They sharpen their claws and brush up on judo. They block the doorways, sidewalks and streets. Sometimes they push in plate glass windows. When the doors are opened, the weak and the infirm are crushed and trampled as they faint. Doors are sprung off their hinges. Counters are overturned. Clerks hide behind packing cases and pillars. Floor walkers tie themselves to radiators

The Indianapolis

Soldier Smoke Eaters—

Atterbury Has

and strong.pipes lest they get swept out of their !

departments. “It’s inconceivable to open a door and allow snly 10 customers in when the sale starts,” I said. “Our gentle American women would rip the front of the store away if that happened.” Many covered their open mouths when I described what takes place when the ladies get innide. 1 don’t think I exaggerated. ' So I SAID 50 TO 75 women crowd around a sale counter. They shove and pull and gouge. climb over each other. Merchandise is pawed and a tug-of-war over a particular item isn’t unusual. Should they rip a dress or a sweater or a slip in half, it’s immediately thrown back on the pile and they start work on another. “That doesn’t sound civilized,” remarked one of the more shocked Englishwomen. “Civilized or not, that's the way we do it.” I talked to the second woman in line that morning. She came around to the front. The first: woman in line disappeared. Her purchase was one down comforter. She was happy. She had been in line since five minutes after four. The first lady in line arrived at 4 a. m. The woman smiled at the satisfied customer. There was no bitterness or envy in their eyes. ‘She deserves it,” whispered someone. She sure does. Fine system. Never work in ] America.

One Brutal Buffalo Is Enough for Bob

AFTER THREE unsuccessful stalks across bog and high grass and close bush against a big herd and two lone, but badly horned bulls, we picked up two bulls with the binoculars and one looked good. We walked bent double over a few thousand yards of matted marsh and stinking mud; hiding behind tussocks and trees. The buff moved away from us, suspiciously, the big boy being tolled off by the littler one. It looked as though they were about to spook. We dived behind a bush and Selby waited until some of the breath came back to me and then whispered. “It's too long a range but it's the best we'll get. Stand up and wallop him.” I stood up and there was M'Bogo at 40 to 50 yards. I looked at M'Bogo. M’Bogo looked at me. He looked at me as if I owed him money. He looked at me as if I had murdered his entire family. He looked at me as if nothing in this world could give him more joy than a war-dance on my carcass. He stretched that black snout at me and his horns were a mile wide. He was the ugliest, most fearsome sight I ever saw.

SO I shot him. The whole world exploded, because my heavy .470 unaccountably loosed off both barrels. M'Bogo went down like a stone, but I didn’t see him. I stood there goofily with an empty gun, for a thousand light years, and then IT heard another gun go off. “I hope you didn’t mind,” Selby said apologetically, “but he was heading for the bush with the speed of knots and it’s awful thick in there. So I thought I better break his back, even though we undoubtedly would have found him dead. I'm sure you got the heart, but you can’t be certain.”

M’Bogo was flat, dying, bellowing. I helped him along with a slight brain injection. He was twice as ugly and terrible dead as before, the great head, the ticks on his scabby hide, but he was a magnificent prime bull, a mountain of muscle. When we took him apart Selby had been right. My bullet had got the heart. Five hundred grains of solid bullet, propelled by seventy-five grains of cordite, with a striking power of five thousand foot pounds of energy, had cut his jugular, smashed his heart and major arteries, and wrecked his lungs, but he had gotten up and taken off as if I'd plinked him with a .22.

I looked a long time at M'Bogo. Then I looked at Selby. “No more M’Bogo,” I said. “One is more than enough for any man.”

Hold-Out Apparently + Costly to Bab’s Mate

said, “I saw the most beautiful hat in a oth Ave. shop!” “0. K.,” said Don, “Put it on and let me see how it looks.” oe oe oe

THE MIDNIGHT EARL: NBC's TV plans for closed circuits to theaters include filming next season’s Jimmy Durante shows . . . The GM Super car, Le Saber, may be on the market within 3 years... The 508th Parachute Infantry Battalion, Eisenhower's Honor Guard, has been reactivated and will go to Europe in the same position . . . Beverly Hud- ° son’s the electrifying singer at the Copa. oo oo oe JOE FRISCO returned to B'way last night (to the Latin Quarter) after being away from B'way for 20 years. He'd

Miss Hudson been in clubs on side streets but not on B'way

since he was at Loew's State about 1931. They 1-l1-loved h-h-him, especially when he said, “I had a b-brother made a l-l-lotta money, but it looked so much like the Government's money, they g-g-grabbed him.” Ed Gardner bet $100 that “Two on the Aisle” will be one of the 5 all-time moneymakers . . . Mrs, Toots Shor's suffering a bursitis attack . . . Jackie Gleason, bound for a Hollywood vacation, wired friends one of his old gags—that he was going to be given a test: by Seagram's, Four Roses and Schenley’s. President Truman's expected to run as “the Housewife's friend,” stressing anti-inflation . . . Lou Walters signed Billy Daniels for September at the Latin Quarter. sn . oe oe oo

WISH I'D SAID THAT: “To get on TV, a gal has to play a new game . ., Kiss and Television” — Eddie Condon. . dD WHO'S NEWS: CIO organizer Allen Haywood’s ill in Pittsburgh . .. Mack Sennett's custard pie stories came out of the files for TV , .. Today’s Daily Double: Diane Herbert and Cy Coleman, the pianist . ... Some of the Smart Set now drink “Welch Mist.” dB > GOOD RUMOR MAN: Joe E. Brown's off to Chicago to Don McNeill's “Breakfast Club” for 6 wks. . . . The Bachelors Club of : America (John Talbot, pres. John Jelke 3d, veep) spells it “Batchelors” on invitations to a party at Seabright Yacht Club. They need wives—to spell for them! dob EARL'S PEARLS: Barbara Ashley knows a neglected wife who defines a fishing pole as a rod with a worm on each end. SBD TODAY'S BEST COMPARISON: “The American League race is tighter than Jack Benny." Frankie Carle. : A

on. 3 Miss Ashley

ROMO. VINCENT,.4% the Copacabana, Fe ) CENT, at Copaca , refers dollars ; “Truman J " ¢ ¢« » That's

- to silver dol as

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{‘Fvery dollar

WEDNESDAY, JULY 25, 1951

Gl Fire

SAVE LIVES FIRST—The . Atterbury sodier-fireman work out with their respirator. M/Sgt. Ken-

neth Hille (standing) instructs Pfc. Louis Saliceti (left) and Pvt. William Johnson. The "patient" another Atterbury fireman, Sgt. Harvey Williams.

ready to cleave his way to the source of trouble.

DRY RUN—Keeping in shape by practice drills with a wet hose are Pfc. Saliceti and Pvt. Johnson on the nozzle. Sgt. Ist Class Paul Tosh is standing by with an axe

"AND ROUTINE

“PAGE 15

Company

[DECIDING that Camp Atterbury had outgrown its little civilian fire company, high brass at the camp have set up an all-soldier unit.

Digging up all the ex-civilian firemen available in the Army rank and file there, Col. H. G. Peterson, who's the Post Engineer and Fire Marshal whipped the soldier fire-

fighters into a combat unit.

In charge of the firemen is Sgt. 1st Class Kenneth Hille, who was a lieutenant on the Freeport, Ill, fire

department in civilian days.

r ” »

= ” ®

CHIEF OF THE FIRE station is Sgt. 1st Class Thomas Fairman, former Philadelphia, Pa., fireman.

The new soldier fire department Lad only been organ-

ized three days when they got their “baptism under fire” during the $250,000"blaze at an Edinburg veneer factory.

According to the Edinburg firemen, the Atterbury

boys made a fine showing.

Endowed with a pioneering spirit, the soldier fire

department will blaze new trails in this area by changing

the color of their trucks from red to white.

They claim

white is more easily identified than the traditional fire

engine color.

—The Atterbury fire department als ing all the fire extinguishers on the post. Sgt. Frank Hamilton, Cpl. Howard Fassett

A & o is responsible for check-

and Pfc. Emil Dretna, a Korean veteran, do just that.

‘l Went To Work Along Honky-Tonk Row’—

Gals In ‘Wickedest Town’ Play

By EDAN WRIGHT Times Special Writer

CALUMET CITY, IIL, July 25—On honky-tonk row the customer is a sucker and the gals are out to “take” him for all the dough he's got. Moreover, they figure it's justifiable.

“The people who come here are morons and fools. If they weren't they wouldn't show up here. So why not take them for they have on them?” That's the way one gal put it. Regardless of any alibiing it's a business proposition with the gals. An ambitious “B” girl can rustle up quite a bit of change for herself. She picks up $105 to $135 a week cadging drinks. And that isn't counting her salary. The “B"” girls are strip-teas-ers who circulate between acts and hostesses who hang around all the time to keep the customers happy. If one girl doesn't make the grade with a customer—another moves in, The “B” girl has a whole bag of tricks to take a guy for his wampum. But you can sum them all under one heading. Sex. Her gyp operations range from a quick shakedown in drinks to out and out thievery. The gyp routines; don’t require any heavy brain-work. The customer’s a moron—see! He'll fall for anything. n ” o IT ISN'T THE BOOB from the small town who gets hooked most often. If he's a local boy the chances are he knows his way around and the girls leave him alone. If trouble develops they don’t want it on the home

| reservation.

It is usually the big city boy

| who gobbles the hook. He can

be “a wise guy.” He can be a staid family man with peepingtom inclinations. He can even be a city slicker who is used to playing angles himself. The operations are fast and the first pitch is to find out how much money the fellow has. A girl moves in quick — if possible before he has a chance to order a drink or when he is first served. She watches his wallet—when he pays—to get ~an idea how much of a “take” he's good for. If it's a group of fellows, she calls the nearest waitress to round up some of her pals—one for each guy. That is, if her pals aren't .Johnny-on-the-spot with her. Sometimes the “peeping into the exchequer” is done more obviously. ; 2 _ I saw one hostess slip an arm

Lo,

This is the third story of seven nights in Calumet City's honky-tonk row-—known from coast to coast as the hottest, roughest and toughest in the business.

around a man's shoulders and snuggle up to him. “How much money you got on you, honey?” she cooed. He played coy. She gave him some more of the snuggle business. And she got an answer. ” n ” AGAIN—I saw her rifling a pocket. She put on a kittenish act, took his wallet and proceeded to help him pay for drinks. Some men are cagey about revealing their cash and they open their wallets on the side— out of a girl's sight. But if the fellow makes the mistake of flashing a big bill, he can be hooked for all of it. A girl moved in at one of my tables while I was getting some beer for a customer. When I served the beer the customer gave me a $20 bill and the girl ordered “a gin.” I brought the gin and gave the man his change—with two drinks out. He complained about the price and said he didn’t want to buy the drink after all. The girl waved me away and a few mirfutes later she cornered me. “Didn't anyone tell you how this thing is operated?” She began. “You should . have hung on to the $20, faken out a $2 tip for yourself and kept bringing more drinks.” “But he squawked about the first “one,” I defended myself. “That doesn't matter!” she retored. “Let him beefy Just get the money!” . Then the assistant manager said: “If you take a guy and he makes a big beef—don’t get scared. Just call me and we'll handle it.” I already knew the pitch on that. Cops—hired by the city but paid by “the street”’-—would come in. I had seen the expressions on customers’ faces when the cops arrived. The law had come to their rescue!

§. 4. .8 BUT EVERYTHING was always settled in favor of “the house.” Theie. were tricks even to handing a customer his change ~if he was with a “B" girl. ‘A

waitress told me to put the change down on the table beside the girl—instead of handing it to the customer on a tray. “That way,” she said, ‘‘the girl has a chance to pick some of it up and give you a big tip.” I was told to let one of the “older” waitresses take care of the champagne parties until I could handle them. A favorite spot for them was the back section of the show club. The girls “moved” their best prospects there because it was the darkest part of the club. and they could get cosy with them. A champagne party is one of the slickest gyps. If a man wants to spend the night with a girl—she makes a deal with him to buy a bottle of champagne. It might cost $10, $15 or $20. It depends on how much the man is “good” for. But it is always a pint bottle. The rest of the routine goes like this: The girls cue the waitress by saying she wants a check-out. The champagne appears and disappears quickly. The girl spits it out into an extra glass disguised with a frosting. Then she stalls to see if she can get another bottle out of him. The waitress helps the operation by saying the room -“upstairs” {is being prepared or

she's waiting for the key. Ac-

” » &

tually there is no room upstairs amd it's obvious from thé outside. The building is just one story high. " n »

WHEN the girl has done all

the milking she can she may excuse herself and disappear in the washroom or she may take him out the front. If she does the latter, the assistant manager stops her. “Where are you going?” he demands, putting on a show of surprise. She explains she has a date and he tells her: “You

can't leave now—you'll have to finish up your time here.”

When the man is left sitting, there's another pitch to get rid of him. The waitress tells him the girl is” going to be tied up and she'll meet him in the lobby of a certain “hotel. To keep him there she adds: “No matter how long it takes— don’t wander around.” If a man should return to squawk on either pitch the assistant manager blandly protests that he can't help what his girls do. There's -another gyp operation that is ‘pure sucker bait. It's selling tickets to a “stag show” —also “upstairs.” The show is “fictitious and the tickets are “wardrobe” checks. I watched one of the best examples of this, :

s For Suckers

AN ELDERLY MAN-—ultra respectable type—came in and said flatly he didn't want any

women. He was loaded with money so his waitress talked him into two $10 tickets for the “stag show.” The waitress stalled him all evening on the show and finally told him it was canceled until the next night.

He turned up brightly the next evening and ordered drinks liberally—waiting for his cue to bounce up to the show.

The girls went to work on him and he took a fancy to one. She carted him off to the rear where he bought drinks for a couple of hours, When he finally got around to talking about leaving ‘he was still “good for another $20” and so she stole his car keys. He came back for them-—as she expected. The girl couldn't talk him into any more drinks and a call went out for the cops —presumbly -to help him find the keys. The keys turnéd up—timed with the arrival of the cops. And if the man had any notion of complaining, the sight of the cops scared it out of him. It also scared him out &f the place-—probably for good.

Next: The Strip- Teasers and