Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 28 December 1951 — Page 17

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@ No. 1.

By Ed Sovola on

DO YOUR gift exchanging early. That's tip Don’t try to pull a fast one on clerks and expect to come out ahead. That's tip No. 2. ~ Just to see how department store clerks would react to ridiculous requests to exchange - merchandise, I took a pair of unmatched cuff links, e old and tarnished pair of “Screwball” cuff nks, a new pocket knife with my name en-

~ graved on it, 4 two-year-old copper hanging

flower pot and a pair of red long underwear and iried to parlay. the stuff. I had no intention of adding to the woes of the clerks, It must be tough to do all that selling before Christmas and ‘then come back to a steady stream of exchanges. I have always worked on the premise that a harmless joke adds to the spice of life. William J. Thiele will agree. LE MR. THIELE, assistant buyer at L. Strauss, currently is in charge of the exchange center én the balcony. When I unfurled the red long johns «gnd announced that I'd like to exchange them for a few pairs of shorts, Mr, Thiele broke into a wide smile, He examined the merchandise, politely informed me that the underwear wasn’t purchased at Strauss and that they had been dyed. Before I could put up an argument, Mr. Thiele joked about the winter and advised me to hang on to the underwear. Both of us knew the thing to do was to make a joke out of the situation. Mr. Thiele acted as if he was tearing his hair (with the hair he has, he has to act) and I yelled. We parted friends. ‘Mrs. Dorothy Long, men’s jewelry counter,

« WHAT'S A MATTER ?2—Exchange chief William Thiele at Strauss says no fo a gift exchanger who had _a wrong pair of long underwear at the wrong store. And they were "dyed in the cotton.”

It Happened Last Night

By Earl Wilson

NEW YORK, Dec. 28— “How do you remember faces—what's your trick?” I asked Jim Farley.

I asked him on the phone, because it had been worrying me a little. It seemed that I'd been

more forgetful than usual, I meant to ask his secretary to confide some of his system to me. But a curious thing happened when I got through to his company. “Do you want to talk to him?” the operator said. “He's in.”

“I'll talk to his secretary. bother him,” I said. “It's easier to get him than it is her,” the

I don’t want ‘to

operator said, and sure enough, in half a minute,

Jim was on the phone, saying “Hello, there,” and mentioning something from my column of that day, indicating that he’d read it, I felt fine already. 4 &

AND THEN I asked him how he'd managed

., to gain a reputation as the greatest face-remem-

berer of our time. “I have no system,” Jim insisted. “I do remember or I don't. There are times I go completely blank and can't call the fellow. “Lots of people say ‘Hello, Jim,’ and proceed on the theory that I know them, when I really don’t. I have no idea of who some of them are.” “But don’t you repeat their names over when you're introduced, or make a mental note of their looks?” “No, no, I never did that, to make notes for me.” : “What do you say to the fellow who says, Jim, I'll bet you don't know who I am?” “I say, ‘You win.’ Because that fellow ought to be shot at either sunrise or sunset. That's just vanity.”

I'd need 77 people

Americana By Robert C. Ruark

WASHINGTON, Dec. 28—There has always been the old thing about the female of the species being deadlier than the male, but it still brings you up sharply to hear a couple of delicate creatures, long misnamed the weaker sex, dropping locks and swapping recipes for direct and drastic Action, Two such tenderly nurtured ladies were talking war on the train en route here, and I am sure I would never like to go against an all-girl army. They advocated the atom, immediately, as a hurry-up to peace in Korea. They were shrilly indignant over the shilly-shally-ing in the “police action” in Korea, which seemingly has brought nothing but death and danger to their sons. and lovers, while solving nothing. “What would you do if you wounded an enemy?” one lady said, sipping at her tea. “Would you bring him in as a prisoner?” “I would not,” the second lady said. “I would shoot him again, on the off-chance he is still wiggling, or maybe stick a bayonet fn hinf. The object of war, if there is an object, and the way you win it fast is to kill more people than kill you. I don’t know how we got in this mess, but we're in it and if the women were running it you bet you they would win it fast and with no false house rules and no sentiment.” Gb. H I MENTIONED shyly that this bloodthirstiness 'did not seem entirely in keeping with the Yule spirit, nor the qualities of gentleness and tenderness for which ladies are famed in song and story, They sounded more like Bull Halsey discussing Japs than dewy flowers to be protected and shielded from unpleasantness. One of the ladies said a bad word, which was re-echoed by the other lady. “You men,” said the first lady. “Silly little boys, rushing off to your wars to fight by the book and obey all the articles and mind all the rules. There aren't any rules to winning fights, whether they are wars or private squabbles. There isn't any sense in gétting killed for ideals unless you win the thing you are so damned idealistic about. “Did you ever see two women fight? None of this stupid Marquis of Queensberry foolishness. They kick and claw and scratch and scream and pull hair and bite and throw things. They want to win it; they don’t care how they win it. I am tired of having our men killed in defense of technicalities.” \ Lo 1 WAS sort of prone to put this down to vaporous excitability, due to too much last-gasp Christmas shopping, but I notice that the same view is shared by most of the other ladies I meet these days—and especially, lately, by Sen. t Smith, the legislator from Maine. Sen. Smith has just advocated’ the “whatever military power is in our possession,”

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. *..2 Key Tips Offereil. foes . On Gift Exchange

took one look at the pocket knife and said, “It wasn't purchased here.” She looked me’ squarely in the eye and smiled.-I felt as if my hot ears were being nailed to a barn door. : * D>»

THE CUFF LINKS made her laugh. She said the “Screwball” paix had seen better days. She suggested. wearing the unmatched pair.' It's a new fad. An attempt to look, fierce made Mrs. Long laugh harder. Thank you. In the New England Food Pantry of Charles Mayer; I thought I would be able to do some real business. Mrs. Ruth Ogle had an excellent selection of copper “cookie molds, soup dishes, bean pots; stew pans, frying pans and individual molds. : I showed Mrs. Ogle the bottom of the flower pot because the inside was dirty with dried dirt and water marks. She asked if I had tried to exchange the pot at one of the dime stores. Now how did she know I bought the thing at a dime” store? IT “It seems to me the pot was purchased here,” I said. Mrs. Ogle didn't argue. She simply looked and remained pleasant. “I'll throw in the long underwear and the pocket knife for a cookie mold.” Mrs. Ogle thought the red underwear was cute. No exchanges. Jewelry Salesman Cliff Johnson took the cuff links and appeared to show great interest. He was selling service and upholding the prestige of Charles Mayer. He didn’t fool me. I didn’t foo! him, either. Aw, well. LS

I PICKED a pair of cuff links at L. 8. Ayres that I wanted in exchange for the “Screwball” pair before approaching Mrs. Martha Thompson. She knows her stock. And fast talk gets you nothing and nowhere. It was pretty clear that Tip No. 2 would be: Don’t try to pull a fast one. It was also clear that a majority of the clerks are willing to satisfy a customer within reason and good business. The long underwear threw the knit lingerie department at Wasson's into a tizzy. Clerks Mrs. Phyllis Adams, Mrs. Minnie Simpson and Mrs. Lola Schmitt ganged up on my exhibit. They went over the underwear like women usually do with sale merchandise. I hoped they would hand it back in one piece. Their verdict was unanimous, final even though it was dripping with sugar. They made such a show of examining - the red long johns they made me bit uncomfortable. Shoppers stared and a few laughed at thé red underwear and a red face. After a few minutes all I wanted was to get out.

Claire Kuhlman and Barbara Woodfill at the Wm. H. Block Co. jewelry counter, were most sympathetic and ‘full of suggestions of what I could do with the knife, cuff links and flower pot. None of the suggestions involved Block's. It’s no trick to exchange gifts for mershandise, credit or cash in any of the stores. There's only one requisite. You have to be on the level. No monkey business.

| ‘Sure, 1 Met You ( At the Garden’

I DECIDED after this talk with Jim that he didn’t need a system—he’s just got a phenomenal memory. And I haven’t. So I decided to go back to a system I was taught by somebody years ago. The idea is to take the offensive and make the other fellow feel that you do know who he is. At a party the other night an actress whom I'd recently interviewed, but whose name I could not remember, began belaboring me—but I ‘went after her. “Don’t remember you?” I said. “You've had too many drinks. Don’t you remember us having a talk over in the corner there before you had those last two?” Then I got a chance to ask somebody in a whisper who she was and addressed her tenderly by her first name, * © MY OTHER attack is to say to anybody who looks like a New Yorker, “I met you a few years ago at Madison Square Garden. - I'll bet you don’t remember it.” . Now nearly every New Yorker has been to the Garden and he’s probably met scores of people there, and there's a good chance he won’t remember the occasion-—espeéially if there wasn't one. I tried that the other night at the same party on a guy I didn't know. I was a little wortied about his ever having been to the Garden at first, as he’s a book publisher now, but finally he said, “Well, I might have met you there—as I used to be Golden Gloves champion.” And so I'd won that one. Make way for Jim Farley Wilson, the fellow with the amazing memory for faces. > o>

“A MATERNITY dress,” according to Tommy .

Dorsey, “is designed to make their heir unapparent.” , , . That's Earl, brother. 2

Mamas Ma "Be Right About War

meanifg atomic artillery and the other newest wrinkles of warfare, “if the armistice is not reached by Dec. 27 and it appears the Communists are merely delaying to build up their forces.” " In the extremely certain terms of deepest female conviction, Mrs. Smith remarks that “the American people are reaching their limit on indecisive, one-hand-tied: fighting that daily rolls up a mounting toll of casualties. The American people are growing weary and indignant at battles withdut victory and the endless killing and maiming of our boys.” She also ventured that the home folks must be wondering why we aren't using all our wonder weapons, after hearing so much about them. ® 9% 9 I EXPECT that Mrs. Smith and my two trainladies very possibly mirror the feeling of most women about war—and especially war that sake at the security of their homes and fames. Men have made a great adventure of battle— very few women have regarded it as more than 4 tragic nuisance and a threat to their basic happiness at the hearthside. But once committed to strife, there is little of foolish gallantry in their make-up—no sloppy sentimentality over the enemy's welfare. For sheer ferocity of unvarnished emotion, for intentness of purpose at all costs, there is nothing like a dame. And so far as war is concerned I am inclined to think the mamas may be right.

Dishing the Dirt By Marguerite Smith

Q—Do African violets bloom better when pot bound? I am having much better luck with my vioiets than when I last wrote you. I was using Joo Fiuch Joater, potting the roots thus making e8 droop and die.—Mrs, F. H. 4232 Central Ave. , B, Denman, A—I have perused expert advice that said violets bloom better when they are pot-bound. But I have also observed, on my own, violets that were blooming very well indeed when their roots were far from filling the pot they were planted

Read Marguerite Smith's Garden Column in The Sunday Times

in, (I know because I did what I tell readers not to do and transplanted some that were in bloom!) So I ‘suspect in this as in so many things it's wisest to work for a happy medium. That is, don’t over pot your plants or they may spend too much of their energies growing roots. On the other hand, don't expect a pot filled with" roots to bloom well unless you give fertilizer solution regularly. From observation of the most successful growers’ methods I am sure other factors are more important for success than over

-or under’ potting. Rich, loose soll, for one, is hi

most ipportant. 4

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The I

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 28, 1051 :

“

In the Next 8.4 Seconds—

Another Wreck... A

THREE KILLED—Rescuers pull victims from the twisted wreckage of a car hit by a truck near Vincennes.

BEFORE YOU can count to 10,.it will happen again. CRASH ... crunch . .. screams of agony .,.. or

deadly silence,

In the next 84 seconds there will be another traffic

accident somewhere in this high-speed country of

urs.

And in the next 14 minutes, someone else will die. Here in Indiana, state police say. that more than

1200 persons will be killed in some 120,000 accidents this

year. Propertfidamage will exceed $50 million; human

damage is unmeasurable.

Indianapolis, too, is compiling mighty black history. More persons already have been killed in city traffic than in 1950, when this city had the most lethal record in

the U. 8S.

Among the thousands of photographs entered in the annual contest sponsored by the--Indiana State Police were these four vivid reminders of what might happen

to you. :

You've heard about cars being wrapped around a tree or a pole. You can see it for yourself above. Fire, too, is an extra highway hazard. A busted

gasoline tank ... a hot exhaust pipe . .. and phlooie.

And remember those twisted, torn bodies lying on a cold slab in the morgue once were photogenic babies,

too.

State Police Photo by Trooper Albert D. Hartman (Dunes Park Post).

HAPPY NOW—But will they be future victims?

Culinary Pot Shots—

Let Up—

Put

Last of a Series By HENRY BUTLER OU want to beat the price scale in your menu-planning,

- But mayb€ you figure you can’t take the time to cook braised short-ribs (three or four hours) or make a nourishing puree soup out of leftovers (same length of time,

if you include dried peas or beans). : There are ways you can solve the time problem. One fis pressure-cookery, alluded to yesterday. We'll omit the pressure-cooker, certainly for anything like puree soups. With puree inside, the cooker becomes a new secret weapon for smearing the walls and ceiling of your kitchen, so I'm told. You can cook tomorrow's dinner tonight, That's not complicated, on a good TV night. One of those three or four-hour stewing, braising or pot-roast-ing jobs is easy enough to do while you're watching video, reading, playing bridge or just plain chatting. With a little experience, you develop a sense of something cooking. It's on your mind, and you take a gander at the goose in the oven now and then, just to be sure nothing's scorchng.

. » » ~ A STILL BETTER way to solve the problem {is to take your time about serving dinner. There's no reason except sheer habit why you have to eat early ‘when you have guests in. If they're not plagued with ulcer patients’ keen, sharp hunger, and if they're not allergic ir 2

bit of liquid refreshment, with pretzels as life-preservers, you can make dinner a climax of the evening’s sociability.

With dinner set vaguely for anywhere from 9 to 10 p. m., in which case it eliminates the necessity of midnight snacks, the cook can do his or her best.

Even for prime ribs, a prime requisite is peace 6f mind (in addition to the ribs, of course). A cook inclined to be nervous must remember that haste makes waste and you can’t achieve a goulash In the flick of an eyelash. Let the nervous cook calm jitters by humming some ditty appropriate to the kitchen, such as “Who Put the Lederhosen in Mrs. Murphy's Hasenpfeffer?” s ~ » IF THE COOK is especially nervous, with guests chomping ice cubes and neighing heartily ir the living room, let him (or her) try a bit of soothing stimulant him (or her) self, Not the dangerous spiritus frumenti, which may banish

culinary wisdom or discretion

altogether. Rather a mere taste of claret or sherry or, for that matter, a trifling schooner of sweet wine on the rocks. Even beer may help. Cull-

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PAGE 17

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State Police Photo by Trooper Forrest E. Waggoner (Jasper Post).

“

State Police Photo by Trooper (forge L. Marquardt (Dunes Park Post),

HOT BEER—A head-on crash of two beer trucks started a blaze near Michigan City.

at Police Photo by Technician Harold E. Chambers (Seymour Post).

DRUNKEN DRIVER—His bleary eyes couldn't see the bridge.

“Stir pot and watch Berle."

nary ideas of Sterling worth have been known to blossom worry. A meal, even for guests,

* pn

r Anyway, the point is not to

doesn’t always have to be a

The Pressure To Work

cook's tour de force. So long as you avoid the hazards of overcooking and scorching, you're doing OK. You will even be doing most of your guests a service by departing from the conventional sort of menu. You know, the kind of thipg that ends with upside-down pineapple cake. (That's all to the good, in view of the present high price of that botanical rarity, the upside-down’ pineapple). Keep your menu simple. 2 ” ” A MEAT DISH, well cooked and seasoned; some form of potato or noodle or macaroni deal and a green or salad-—— that's it. With a little planning in advance, you can prepare the most unlikely menu even though you're working all day before your guests are due. Luckily, the cheaper items all can be prepared in advance. So you're that much ahead of hosts who think they must serve steak or chicken, One final word: Plan not only your party meal, but also meals

you'll make of leftovers, assum-

ing guests don’t raid your ices box at midnight. (I've seen a hostess in tears when that happened and upset her menu schedule for a whole week).

Your real economy is in

That's where ) 2