Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 6 May 1952 — Page 11

Page PDF (9.26 MB)

Back to issue view

Y 6, 1952

LES ISTS

hington St.

BERR

ANCE N

ad— 8.7

fied ad -D Plan

Red plaid gingham with white pique trim.

Inside Indianapolis By Ed Sovola

. IN THE 1852 Gridiron Show of The Indianapolis Press Club there is going to be a horse. Two men play “horse” and it's going to be difcult to talk about my end of the deal. When Gridiron Chairman Jepson Cadou Sr. put the finger on this member, he said, “I have the perfect part for you.” We all have a streak of the ham actor and I fell for the line. The sugar cubes in Mr. Cadou's hand should have tipped me off what kind of part it was. Especially since Times Staffer Lloyd (Wally) Walton was neighing, nuzzling the cubes and yelling to me, “Get your tail up.” Wally occupied the front end of the horse costume. Now the Press Club's Gridiron Show is the biggest ‘undertaking of the year. ning of May 15 more than 1000 persons and politicians will pile into the Murat Theater. The club cven charters an airplane to bring the big shots frorn Washington. . db SIX YEARS AGO, when the first Gridiron was put on, I played the part of Sen. William Jenner, Then for four years in a row the gentlemen had me helping prop chairman Heinie Moescn, backstage. It's no place for a ham to be. Ore fast glance at the sagging part of the horse costume and I knew that was another place I didia’t want to be in. “Trat,” I said, pointing, “is the perfect part for me?” Mr. Cadou in his best fatherly manner said, “My boy, you were the unanimous choice of the selecting committee for the part.” We. happened to be in the bar of the Press Club at the time and I saw the committee, They were sitting on stools. Any one of the guys, in my opinion, could have been selected. “How did Wally get to be the driver?” Gridiron Co-Chairman Maurice Gronendyke said Wally was an experienced front end. For 15 minutes he had auditioned and was given the part. No auditions were necessary for what was

to follow. ‘ “You won't have any lines to memorize,” said Mr. Csdou. “I want lines, lots of lines. , .

oD oD ’ MAURICE INTERRUPTED with a flashback to the 1947 show. So, a few lines were muffed. Bo does that "medn a guy Has to start from the bottora again? . “Don’t let me down,” begged Wally. A colleague was asking for help and as Mr. Cadou said, the entire show depended on my being the best . . . the entire show depended on a good performance by the “dark horse.” It's sort of dark and stuffy and hot inside that” horse costume. Wally is the only one who can see where he is going. A practice run from the bar to the pool table ended with me under the pool table. We needed signals and a little backseat driving with a little less rye. We have four walk-on parts and some prancin’

By Earl Wilson

NEW YORK, May 6—I was hunting a story of sawdust razzle-dazzle at the Ringling Circus and I found a honey—about the Good Midget and the Bad Miget. The Bad Midget drank. “The other midget wanted him to quit,” Nate Eagle said. Nate's the boss of the midgets, also equestrian director and announcer, He was quite dandified in his red coat and tall hat. “The non-drinker said whisky was making his partner grow,” Nate said. “The drinker began to brood. For that's what they fear most.” i > & @ NATE—up to his thighs in his “true Lilliputians”—explained: “They can grow out of a job. They get $200 to $500 a week. Take Murray Wood, down in Philly. Drives a Cadillac. Smokes Corona-Co-ronas. Why wouldn't they worry?” The Bad Midget saw bleak joblessness ahead. Did he quit drinking? Do they ever? The drinking midget didn’t twirl his little cane with the usual verve. He was convinced he was wing. For his cane even seemed too short. (“They DO grow,” Nate said. “Knew a girl named Finney. Started growing at 29. Got to be 5-feet-3. She's ont in California, not midgeting any -more.”) i AND THE DRINKING midget kept drinking, for he seemed to be growing every day. One night in his brooding, he killed himself, but first

he killed his partner. For he had found a knife. The Good Midget

had been shaving his cane to shock him into his

senses. «A wonderful story,” I said. “Do you Know

their names?” it i “No. But it happened maybe 30 years ago,

Nate said. ‘ 1 said goodbye to Nate's midgets. To pretty Patty Maloney, 19. To Mr. and Mrs. Dohald Williams, Mr. and Mrs. Frank Cuksey. : Se & THE STORY sgemed familiar and by much uiry I found why. i it in Collier's in about 1930, titled “Coroner's Inquest.” Pulitzer Prize Playwright Mare Connelly won an O. Henry Award for it. “It's just fiction,” Marc told me. “Joe Cook told me about shaving somebody's cane as a

practical joke. “1 thought it had tragic possibilities as a

$64 Question By James Haswell

WASHINGTON, May 6—Question: Why does Congress give spending. agencies more money than they can spend in a year? Answer: Spending agencies buy things which take 18 months, two years, sometimes as long as five years to produce and deliver. They pay on delivery. ; Federal spending agencies will carry over into the new fiscal year, July 1, some $72.8 billions they haven't yet spent. Congress gave them authority to spend this money last year, the year before, and the year before that. Defense Secretary Lovett recently told a House committee his department by July 1 will have committed itself to spend all of its carryover. The Defense Départment share of the $72.8 billion carry-over sMowita o about $60 billions. @ LAST JANUARY the Defense Department hadn't yet committed $38 billions of this “obligational authority” which Congress had given it. ‘But it has been going along letting contracts day by day and Lovett expects to earmark all bis funds by July 1. : ‘ Then he'll be ready to start earmarking the additional $52 billions in the 1953 defense approjon bill. v PIs process of paying taxpayers’ dollars goes ih three stages. First is the appropriation. Congress appropriates, say $1 billion to the Defense Department. The department gets it July 1. Right away it sets aside one-third, or $330 milHons, to meet payrolls and buy food. At the end of the year it has spent all this money, and needs another $330 millighs Tor Bext year, 2 1HE DEFENSE DEPARTMENT also starts nding another $330 millions on new equipment, ing, trucks, houses, rifles, ete. It lets con- . tracts for these things, and at the end of the year the bills have all come in and it has nothing ; gi department further starts spending a _ final $330 millions on big equipment items, air- ‘ planes, tanks, guided missiles, ships, etc, but "these things take time. In the beginning, factories must be built, machine tools manufactured, ‘ vast quantities of suppHes obtained. di By the end of the year, the department has an itself to spend millions on e § leuy in the treasury. will pay

§ ;

= =2

On the eve- .

It Happened Last Night

yo AE

. Finds Perfect Part In Role of Horse

GRIDIRON DARK HORSE—Two men "in a horse’ need more signals and back-seat driving to get anywhere..

to do in the aisles before the show. Wally thinks that if I placed my hands on his hips he can wiggle signals. Left hip jerk means left turn, right nip jerk means right turn. A circular motion of both hips means gallop and a verbal “Whoa” means stop. : . SO

SOMETHING ELSE has to be worked out for stopping. Wall velled “Whoa” when we galloped once and before the signal got back to

me I was climbing his back. That sort of thing

will never do with street shoes on.

Director Walter Hogan, who hasn't seen the horse yet, will get a chance Thursday evening at rehearsal. We'll know Thursday if we have to attend Friday night's rehearsal.

The committee on the stools seems to think ~we'll do all right. That remains to be seen and there is a question. if the committee could see clearly. In every man’s life: there is a time when it doesn’t take much to make him laugh.

I don’t care what anyone says, this part I'm playing is a new experience. By the time the 15th rolls around it may be natural.

Story About Midget Whose Cane Shrank

story. By research I discovered that midgets’ ‘late growth’ is a physiological truth. I made up the rest.” So if you ever hear this midget “true story” around the circus, that's where it came from. ob Gy

THE MIDNIGHT EARL . .. Esther Williams flew back to L.A. after deciding not to do Mike Todd’s swim show at Jones Beach this year— but said she'll do one in ’53. . . . Hope (“The Duchess of Park Ave.”) Hampton sang for guests at a party, revealing a strong voice of good quality. Wouldn't be surprised if she returned to show business. The mud’ll ly now that tobacco heir Richard Reynolds Jr has begun divorce action, with similar blasts likely against him. A friend of Reynolds says, Dick is a hard man to catch, though; as a yachtmsman, he’s practically always on a ooat.” He started action after wife Marianne rejected a settlement of around $2 million. Wirthrop Rockefeller's new interest has heen marrizd and is a mother . . . Hotelier Frank Andrews (the N’Yorker) celebrated his 60th birthday at 21.°\ The new drug to control coronary ailments 4 (to be brought out in a couple of months) probably will be knowh as the “anti-old age

drug.” So SD

EARL’'S PEARLS: Dorothy Sarnoff says why diet?—when women are entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of hippiness?

Dorothy Sarnoff > 2 . WISH I'D SAID THAT: “The only time 1 get homesick is when I'm home.” —Max Asnas. Another postal hike’s likely . . . Jed Harris bought a big boat and is being a sportsman around Miami . . . Orson Welles promises to come in and direct “Porgy” for Blevins Davis. . .. Gag writer Joe Ehrens will wed hatchick Pat Patterson. “» bo TODAY'S OLD RIDDLE: noses, 18 legs and usually lives in a cellar? The

Philadelphia Athletics.”—Ethel Smith. ¢ & b TED SHANE reports that a Scotsman gave his gal a fine new dessert he invented—a mintflavored toothpick . . . That's Earl, brother.

Why Appropriations Exceed Expenses

gets the goods. But in the meantime, it needs another $330 million to start buying more “long lead time” items, Se > 2 : THE SECOND STAGE is the actual spending stage. It consists of meeting the bills for goods and services. The third is the revenue stage, collecting the taxes Congress levies. Here's table which shows how these three stages go along separately. It is. drawn from the 1953 book of budget estimates. The figures represent billions of dollars.

“Obligational Authority? Expenditures Revenues 1951 $84.0 $44.6 $48.1 1952 93.4 70.8 62.7 1953 84.2 85.4 70.9

Congress already has Indicated it will cut the $84.2 billion figure to $80 billion or less, The $85.4 of expenditures will decline somewhat, in proportion. But still a good many billion dollars worth of bills are piling up to be met in future years.

Dishing the Dirt By Marguerite Smith

Q—We have started a garden of tea -roses. When should we start feeding them? How often? And when should we stop feeding them? Mrs, James R. Price, 1117 Goodlet Ave. A—One workable System for feeding roses is this. Use a complete chemical fertilizer (high phosphate type) just before the June and July bloom periods. Do not fertilize thereafter with gny quick acting chemical fertilizer, But in the fall (any time from September to December) circle each bush with a slow acting organic ferti-

Read Marguerita Smith's Garden Column “in The Sunday Times

lizer such as bone meal. It does not become use-

ful to plant roots fast enough to make soft (young) growth, Such wth is m easily frozen than hard or mature wood. hen you use chemical fertilizer be sure to mulch or dig lightly into the top layer of soil some soil con-

ditiouing aerial Such 54 ground cobs, peat moss, ‘manure, or ; urse,

“What has ning

2 ! tee. go %

he Ind

ianapolis Times

‘MR. X’ GOES TO MOSCOW . .. No. 2—

Envoy Would

O FAR our ambassadors to the Soviet Union have been

either men of great wealth or military figures: William Bullitt, Joseph Davies, Averell Harriman, Gen.

Bedell-Smith, Adm. Kirk.

Now, for the first time,” our spokesman in the Kremlin will be a type of American who doesn’t fit the Red's propaganda line: a career diplomat who is

also a scholar, historian and philosopher of note, _. ws If George Frost Kennan

could do as he likes he would pas&% the rest of his life reading and writing in the rarefied atmosphere of Princeton's Institute for Advanced Study, He never had an ambition for méney or power, He would be perfectly satisfied if, on leaving his world, he had but a few good books to his credit. But since the government has invested heavily in his career, he felt a moral obligation to accept the one job in which he may be able to shape history himself.

» - - WHAT IS the new ambas-

sador going to tell the Soviet leaders if he gets a chance?

He was naturally reluctant

to be interviewed on this sub-

his thinking believe he will try, above all, to get across thé idea that mankind's advance in the past 10 years has made most Leninist-Stalinist premises

about as obsolete as a 1017

motor car, His friends predict he will make an effort to debunk half a dozen favorite Soviet fallacies: ON E — America’s “ruling circles” plan an attack on Soviet Russia to “reap new war profits.” Even if such “ruling circles” existed, which is, of course, nonsense, what could they possibly gain from the almost certain destruction of

The Lone Eagle—

djestee But those farittar with"

- — - ys ——

their property in case of war?

T W O — The United States can he maneuvered into spending - so much far arms that it will go bankrupt, Soviet economists. prophesled a post-war crash in the U. 8S. which never came. When will they stop their wishful thinking? THREE—Conspiracy from within still is an effective Soviet weapon. Since the end of the war only countries under Russian military domination have turned Communist. FOUR—The satellites form a sanitary cordon around Russia that protects her from

In an age where whole divisions can be dropped by alr, this protection has becuine il« lusory. From a military standpoint, the Soviets could just as well withdraw behind their own borders. FIVE—The satellite armies

“ would fight for Stalin.

Who is deluding whom? SIX — Russia ean achieve

nations by self-imposed isolation. Only by throwing her doors wide open to all comers can she ever hope to catch up in this field with the rest of the world. 2 » n = MR. KENNAN makes no claim that such arguments— bolstered by facts and figures will bring Immediate . results, No foreigner, he feels, will ever be able to wield a direct influence on Russian thought. Any change in the outlook of the younger Red statesmen will have to come as a natural development from within, Yet he sees a chance for sow-

TUESDAY, MAY 6, 195% J

PAGE 1

Debunk Red Ideas

—<dndusteial equality. with other .. 5% 5 0d

Slee:

a > 2 ot

FATHER AND SON-—Ambassador George F. Kennan, the “Mr. X" of the State Department, is no unknown quantity to Tommy, the Ambassador's 2.year-old son.

ing at least a few ideas in their minds—germs that may bear fruit in a more or less distant future. And in view of what is at stake—''as long as there is one thousandth of a chance that a major world conflict can be avoided"-—he plans to go about this business with patience- and perseverance,

Acclaim-And Tragedy--For Lindy

FAMOUS PLANE—Thé "Spirit of St. Louis,” in which Mr. Lindbergh winged his way to

fame, now hangs in the air over visitors to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington. He

in once in a while for a look.

By WADE JONES Times Special Writer

NEW YORK, May 6—The world went wild when

Charles Augustus Lindbergh landed in Paris on May 21, 1927, the first man to fly the Atlantic non-stop.

Movie programs were interrupted to bring the news.

The staid New York Times used an exclamation point: in its headline, “Lindbergh Does®It!"” It ran six solid pages of text on the story. Mr. Lindbergh and his plane came home triumphantly on a United States cruiser at the order of President Coolidge. His ticker-tape welcome was one New Yorkers will never forget. Through |it all, Mr. Lindbergh—now Lucky Lindy and the Lone Eagle—acted with complete modesty. He turned down more than $2.5 million in movie and advertising offers. = tJ ”

FOUR YEARS LATER the

Lindbergh name had again taken-over the headlines in the

nation’s newspapers, but .this time it was a story of tragedy. His 19-month-old child, Charles Augustus Lindbergh Jr, was kidnaped, and three months later was found dead near the family’s home at Hopewell, N. J. For nearly four more years, until the kidnaper, Bruno Richard Hauptmann, was elec trocuted for the crime at Trenton, N. J., on Apr, 3, 1936, the story was top news, In 1935 the Lindberghs went to England to get away from the -terrible ordeal of the kidnaping. While he was there, Maj. Truman Smith, United

IN 1941—Charles A. Lindbergh and is wie, the former A

wo a2 og

States military attache at Berlin, invited him to Germany to take a look at the fastgrowing German air force. Field Marshal Goring, head of the Luftwaffe, was flattered by Mr. Lindbergh's presence and rolled out the plush welcome carpet. Mr. Lindbergh got a thorough look at the Luftwaffe from inside out. His and Maj. Smith's report to - Washington was a masterpiece of military intelligence and won Maj. Smith the Distinguished Service Medal. » = Nd MR. LINDBERGH then, in 1936, began checking on the air forces of other countries, always working closely, with our ambassadors in the foreign capitals and reporting direct to Washington. In 1939 he came back to this country and went on active duty as a colonel. But when war broke out in Europe, he became a civilian again. He was a leader in the America First Committee, speaking out strongly against our involvement in the European war, President Roosevelt criticized him so harshly that Col. Lindbergh thought he was being accused of treason. So he resigned his reserve commission. After Pearl Harbor he of-

at rallies of the An

rops

fered his services to the War Department, but was turned down. But Henry Ford took him on as a consultant in B-24 bomber construction, - ” . LATER IN WORLD WAR 11 Mr. Lindbergh went to the Pacific theater and flew 50 combat ‘missions as a fighter pilot, though he was then in his forties. He lived and worked like the rest of the pilots, nearly all youngsters, but he wore no insignia. - Since the war he has lived largely in retirement, emerging now and then to do some work with our Air Force units abroad. The Spirit of St. Louis is now at the Smithsonian Institution, in Washington, as much in the public eye as Mr. Lindbergh is out of it. More visitors ask questions about the plane than any other exhibit there. Once in awhile Mr. Lindbergh drops by to take a look at it. People who've spotted him there say his look is a little wistful. ;

(Last of series of two articles)

and studious blue eyes, he rather appears to be a college professor, At the same time, there is something leisurely informal. about the man. One can see he feels more comfortable ih a tweed jacket than in an ams bassador's morning coat. He likes to sit up late over a cup of coffee, his knees propped against his chest, and dissect ideas with his friends until the early hours,

~ ” » A LOVER of modern musie, he once organized a jazz band called “"Kennan's Campus Kids" in the Moscow Embassy. He “hired” AP Correspondent Ede dy Gilmore as his chief drums mer, When he was on a mise sion in Paris in 1047, French officials told me, he somehow reminded them of that lovable type of Yankee made so fame ous by Gary Cooper in the movie classic “Mr. Deeds Goes to Town.” Back home, . the diplomat usually spent week ends on his 235-acre estate near East Ber. lin, Pa, where he painted,

«- played the plano for his 2-year-

old son Christopher, or romped the fields with his two youhg daughters, 19-year-old Grace and 15-year-old Joan Elizabeth,

-- Grace now continues her studies

at Radcliffe while Joan goes to school in Switzerland. Only Chris stays with his parents in Moscow. This is the fourth time Mr, Kennan returns to his “old

love,” the Kremlin. He brings -

a unique store of experience to the job, He speaks and reads

Russian fluently and has

State Department officials are convinced that if anyone can succeed in that hard task, it is going to be George Ken-

nan, No one is quite like him in the entire U. 8. Foreign Service. In fact, he neither looks nor’ acts like a diplomat. With his high-domed forehead

studied "the texts of Lenin and Stalin in the original. His knowledge of Russian history, law, and literature is great. One of his great ambitions has always been to write one day a biography of Anton

Chekhov, NEXT: Right Maa In the

Right Job.

Paris After Dark Paris in Spring Has Broadway Look

By WARD MOREHOUSE PARIS, May 6—There are smartly dressed women at the Longchamps track now attired in suits of poppy-red and lemon-yellow and they're wearing tiny, brimless bonnets; taxicabs are still whipping dizzily around the Place

Etoile and somehow uncolling after getting into nightmarisn

tangles shats music is being Aer . Maxim's, and the

chestnut trees are in. bloom along the Champs Elysees— such is the Paris that I've come upon at the moment. But it is also a Paris that Is seemingly a combined branch of Broadway and Hollywood— there are familiar faces all over the place. Across the lobby of the Hotel George V strode Katharine Hepburn, in town for a day or two from London. In the bar, and having scotch mists, sat Ella Logan and the tall, rumpled and wild-looking John Huston, ‘celebrated film director.

Evelyn Keyes, in a white sweater and black slacks, skipped along the Avenue

George V, and there at a ringside table of the Bal Tabarin, in a shirt of flamingo-pink, was Truman Capote, looking on thoughtfully as the floor sid back and seminude girls came up from the basement on a merry-go-round. Leland Hayward, the Broadway showman of the extraordinary success record-—something like eight hits out of 10 tries— was at a star table at the Berkeley. Restaurant as I entered (having taken the word of Charles Boyer that it's one of the finest ip Paris); the blond and smiling and unchanging Max Blouet stood upon the doorstep of the Hotel George V, which he has run for more than 20 years, and it was the Pariswise expatriate, Thomas Quinn Curtiss, who took me about some of the night spots, including the “Folies-Bergere.”

The Gypsy Life

TALK WITH thése Ameri. cans abroad and put down their comment for the record. “I suppose,” said the pretty, Atlanta - born Evelyn Keyes, “that I'm now a .gypsy. I'm here making films, but I shall be going to Rome and then to England. I have some things

U.S. Envoy Makes Hit

By CLYDE FARNSWORTH Seripps-Howard Staff Writer ANKARA, Turkey, May 6— The United States’ youngest ambassador, George C. McGhee, is showing the Turks just how democratic 10 million American dollars can be. The figure is the reputed for-

tune Mr. McGhee hullt up as an oil geologist and wise in-, vestor before he was 30, The Turks are impressed, not only with this extraordinary example of the American wonderland, but also with the en-

gaging informality of its young .

envoy. #2 »

MR. McGHEE'S wealth has.

. added to the popular inpres-

sion here that the American economy is an -ever-flowing Horn of Plenty, alll Turkey hasn't tried to take

_ advantage of that impression.

elsewhere are not surplus wealth but the deep diggings of American taxpayers.. Mr, McGhee takes pains to set the record straight. The Ambassador (from Dallas, but a combination Okla-homan-Texan) entered the State Department in 1947 to co-ordinate Greek and Turkish aid. He became Assistant Secretary of State with Turkish, Middle Eastern, South Asian .and African affairs as his regional charge, and then took over the job here Jan. 5. ya 8 HE HAS cut something of a new figure in diplomatic circles. “Not cheap and undignified,” his subordinates hasten to explain, “but informal and friendly. It's making Turks.” .

school tour of Istanbul, the a

bassador dropped in at

a hit with the f "The other days, on a two-day t

in storage in California. Paris

is my home at the momen 3 I get I want to stay.”

“It was great fun doing ‘The African Queen’ with Humphrey Bogart and Katie Hepburn, sald John Huston. “They tell me the picture is making money, I'll try another one with Katie sometime. She's now staying at the Connaught in London. She's excited as hell about doing Shaw's ‘The Millionnairess’ and wants to take it to New York.” “It will take me two years to rest up from my two months in New York,” commented Thomas Quinn Curtiss, critic and essayist, who went back to Broadway to attend the February birthday party given George Jean Nathan. “I like ‘living in Paris. There's less tension, less frenzy. The theater's just as good—or better. And I see more New Yorkers here than I do in New York.” : “That ‘Wish You Were Here’ looks like a great show,” said Leland Haywa talking at luncheon at the Ritz. “It will bring back the diving tank, just like at the old Hippodrome. . .. 1 went to London to see ‘Call Me Madam’ and ‘South Pacific.’ People are buying tickets, all right. , . . I haven't bought anything in Paris except things for my wife and that leaves me about broke. May have to wire Lindsay. & Crouse for some dough.” >

Sidewalk Cafes

PARIS is summery at the moment; thousands of male Parisians are hatless, the. bi. cycle riders are but upon the boulevards, the sidewalk cafes are jauntily in operation, and, to bring in a sordid but realistic note, countless prostitutes, in all their finery, are on parade along the beautiful Champs Elysees after dark. Paris has closed its brothels, but with the result that the followers of an ancient calling are now scattered all over town.

With Turks HE ROUNDED out his visit to Istanbul with a cocktail party in honor of visiting American naval units, shaking hands with several hundred people. Just before the Istanb

hig