Newspaper Page Text
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Washington, D. C.
MOBILE HOUSING
Harried by the national criticism
of failure to provide housing for de
fense workers, Defense Housing Co
ordinator Charles F, Palmer finally
has proposed to Roosevelt that the
government buy fleets of trailers
and rush them to the most congest
ed industrial spots as temporary liv
ing quarters.
In submitting his plan, Palmer
carefully avoided the term “trail
ers” and has cautioned his staff to
refer to them as “mobile units.” But ;
never mind the fancy terminology. |
Plain, ordinary auto trailers are
what he proposes to use.
Palmer contemplates the pur- ;
chase of thousands of these homes
on wheels, but where he is going
to get them remains to be seen. A
check of trailer manufacturers dis
closed two interesting facts:
First, available at present are not
more than 2,000 trailers, a drop in
the bucket compared to the tens of
thousands of housing units needed.
Second, the plants are working day
and night on urgent orders for the
army, and unless they suspend such
operations, can’t make trailers.
Meanwhile, with a vast army of
migrated workers jammed into
makeshift quarters, the defense
housing problem daily becomes
more alarming. Public health au
thorities are scared stiff over the
danger of epidemics.
• • •
ALIENS IN CONGRESS
Amid all the breast-thumping on
Capitol Hill about aliens, it is in
teresting to note that 20 members of
the new congress are foreign-born.
Three are veteran senators—Rob
ert F. Wagner, New York New Deal
er, author of the Labor Relations
and Social Security acts, born in
Germany; James J. Davis, Pennsyl
vania Republican, former secretary
of labor, born in Wales; and James
E. Murray, Montana Democrat,
born in Canada.
The 17 in the house came from
all parts of the world and some of
them still have strong foreign ac
cents.
B. J. Gehrmann of Wisconsin and
Leonard W. Schuetz of Illinois were
born in Germany. Karl Stefan of
Nebraska and Rudolph Tenerowicz
of Michigan were born in Austria.
Incidentally, when Stefan gives a
radio talk for the folks back home,
he says good-by in four different
languages, including German.
Two were born in Russia—Samuel
Dickstein of New York and Herman
Kopplemann of Connecticut. Rep.
Samuel Weiss of Pennsylvania was
born in Poland, and Adolph Sabath
of Illinois, the genial, popular dean
of the house, in Czechoslovakia.
There are two Canadian-born
members of the house—Charles
Eaton of New Jersey, and Albert
Rutherford of Pennsylvania. Wil
liam Barry of New York was born
in Ireland; and Frank Crowthcr of
New York and Robert Ramsay of
West Virginia in England.
Robert Grosser of Ohio and
George Gillie of Indiana were born
in Scotland; Noah Mason of Illinois
in Wales, and Pehr Holmes of Mas
sachusetts in Sweden.
Outside of congress a number of
high placed officials are foreign
born, prominent among them De
fense Commissioners Knudsen and
Hillman. But the delegate from
Alaska, Anthony J. Dimond, was
born in New York!
• • •
FINGER-PRINTERS
Most sought-after jobs in the gov
ernment recently are finger-printers
in the Federal Bureau of Investiga
tion. One reason for this is that
finger-printers often are promoted to
G-men.
There was an inundation of appli
cations for these jobs after enact
ment of the Alien Registration law,
many from young lawyers. The
starting pay is $1,440, and being a
finger-printer is no sinecure.
For one thing, it is hard on the
eyes. Finger-printers are required
to classify an average of 90 prints
a day, and after a time the optical
strain becomes serious. The aver
age “life span” of a finger-printer
is four years, and most of them seek
promotions or transfers to other po
sitions, the ablest becoming G-men.
G-men have a new method of tak
ing finger-prints. The old ink pad,
with smears, is out. Instead, they
use a nice clean pad saturated with
an invisible iron salt solution.
The fingers are pressed on the
pad, then the imprint is made on a
card which is sensitized with an
bther chemical responsive to the iron
solution. This produces a perfect
impression of the finger’s loops and
whorls without soiling the skin.
• * *
MERRY-GO-ROUND
According to the congressional
anti-monopoly committee, there are
5,800,000 uninhabitable homes now
being occupied by tenants in the
U. S.
For its ultra-modern army, the
quartermaster corps actually is buy
ing tomahawks. This is the proper
catalogue term for a certain type of
small hatchet used in the army.
Wendell Willkie is signed up to
write a book on the campaign and
his British experiences. Bobbs-Mer
rill has the publishing contract.
GENERAL |
HUGH S.
JOHNSON
Jour:
United Ffciiurr* J
Washington, D. C.
FARM EXPORT PROBLEM
It is belatedly gratifying to learn
that the department of agriculture
is now considering the “two-price”
system of disposing of farmer’s
crops—both as to domestic and for
eign consumption.
For export trade it will buy up
the surplus which no home market
consumes and sell it abroad for the
1 best price it will bring. To in
crease domestic consumption, it will
extend the food-stamp plan for sur
plus products, which is also a two
price” system giving lower price?
| to the poor to insure an adequate
j diet to all our people and to remove
the American reproach of “starva
tion in the midst of plenty.”
As I understand it, although th(
details are not yet plain, the pub
lie, all of us, will pay for the dis
count below market prices on the
food stamp sale of butter, eggs,
citrus and other fruits, meats anr
fresh vegetables—and even cotton—
for the poor. 1 can’t see much the
matter with that, much as I dislike
the growing cost of government
This column began boosting the
food-stamp plan long before it was
announced and as soon as Henry
Wallace told me about it. My only
regret was that I had not thought
of it first.
I believe George Peek and I did
think first of the “two-price” system
on export surplus—way back in 1921.
It is almost a necessary corollary of
our tariff system. We have main
tained here partly by the tariff, a
structure of prices far above that
of the rest of the world. No tariff
and no purely domestic device can
keep on that high level the prices
of surplus crops—wheat, cotton and
animal fats. This is because the
price of the surplus fixes the* price
of the whole crop whether sold
abroad or at home—and nothing
that can be done at home can pre
vent that dire result.
The net effect is that, while all
the rest of our people enjoy the high
er American standards, the farmer
producing the export crops is thrust
outside our tariff walls. In equity
there is no argument against his
having a “parity price” (one for
what he sells on the domestic mar
ket on the same high level charged
for what he buys) but there is no
good argument for his receiving such
a high price for what he produces in
excess of domestic requirements
which must be sold in export.
There are only two alterna
tives, and one of them is abortive.
The sensible one is that now sug
gested, to insure an American price
for the part of the crop consumed
at home and to sell the surplus for
what it will bring. The other is
what has been attempted for the
past eight years—to jimmy up the
American price for the whole crop
by loans, by restriction on acreage,
by storing unmanageable surplus,
and other inventions.
It kept up precariously the Amer
ican price, but it constantly threat
ened the American markets by ac
cumulating an unmanageable sur
plus. It priced American farm
products out of world markets they
had enjoyed for a century.
♦ ♦ ♦
WILLKIB'S ‘BLITZ*
Mr. Willkie was asked, on land
ing, for comment on my statement
that he had only been permitted to
see what British authorities wanted
him to see. His reply was that I
didn't know what I was talking
about.
Of course, I never said anything
remotely resembling that. I said
that he had been completely ad
vised by the voice of hard-bitten ex
perience how to make effective the
kind of pilgrimage on which he was
embarked.
He was advised (as we all know
now) that Winston Churchill is the
most adroit advocate of our time,
and perfectly and properly. He
was advised to listen to him re
spectfully and then say, if familiari
ties had progressed so far: "Well,
Winnie our hearts are all with you
but you are a Briton—praise God,
half American—and I want to go
home as all-American and make a
realistic report to the American
people.
I only criticized Mr. Willkie for
not doing that, but exposing himself
to every emotional impulse—not for
seeing only whdt the British gov
ernment wanted him to see. 1 be
lieve that they would have withheld
nothing from him. He elected the
emotional, spectacular and blitz
publicity role. He took what he was
told from Mr. Churchill. He con
tented himself with an exploration \
of British fortitude, which we of
British birth took for granted.
He did it a time when one of the
most serious pieces of legislation
ever presented to our people was
before our congress. He became a
part of a British effort to bums-rush
that legislation—Lord Halifax’s as
tounding visit to our congressional
committee demanding a “time
table,” Mr. Churchill’s glorious and
masterful speech (the interior tex
ture of which reveals much careful
effort to appease or allay American
opinion on this bill) and, finally, Mr.
Willkie’s appearance advocating ex
actly what Mr. Churchill would like,
further giving away of the navy.
HOUSTON HOME JOURNAL. PERRY, GEORGIA
Kathleen Norris Says:
Don’t Look for an Angel
Instead of a Husband
(Bell Syndicate—WNU Service.)
He likes the best seats at shows, always comes for me in a taxi, sends me orchids.
By KATHLEEN NORRIS
A TROUBLED girl writes
me from a Kentucky town
to ask just how she can be
sure that she loves her young
man enough to marry him; just
what tests of heart and soul and
mind he should pass before she
will know that he is the one and
only love of her life.
“Should I think he is abso
lutely perfect in everything?”
asks Nancy. “Because, while I
love him very much, I do see
his faults! They’re not very
serious, but suppose they grew
more serious after we were
married? I can’t imagine my
self liking another man better,
or indeed liking another man at
all, but at the same time Ken
neth does fret me in certain lit
tle ways and I’m wondering
how important they are.
“For example, he’s extravagant;
he likes the best seats at shows, al
ways comes for me in a taxi if the
family is using his car, sends me
orchids and gardenias when there’s
really no occasion for them. Then
he takes everything so lightly; I
love books, poetry, art, but if I take
him to an exhibition or concert he
only goes to please me, and I know
it. Also I never knew such a man
for sport! Duck season, bass fishing,
perhaps going to Florida or Catalina
for marlin, tennis, golf, bridge, dom
inoes; he plays everything and he
will bet on anything. Since these
things—or rather what they may
lead to, really disturb me, am I safe
in marrying this man I have known
all my life and respect and love so
well?”
What really disturbs ME about this
letter is the almost infantile sim
plicity and self-centeredness of Nan
cy. It seems incredible that any
girl could grow to marriageable age
with so romantic and idealistic a
viewpoint.
I’ll tell you something about mar
riage, Nancy, and at the same time
tell some of the other girls and
brides who write me the same sort
of question.
Marriage an Eye-Opener.
Marriage is one of the eye-openers
of life. War is another; serious pov
erty, long illness, enforced solitude
and a religious vocation are some
of the others. When you marry you
wake up with a bump from all your
little-girl dreams of that gallant
suitor, who was going to ride into
your life on a great white horse,
leap to earth to kiss your hand, and
put you on a pedestal of devotion—
more, of idolatry, forever.
The man you marry is as selfish
as you are, perhaps even more self
ish. He doesn’t know it any more
than you do. His innocent amaze
ment that because you love your old
friend Barbara you want to ask her
to dinner once a week, that be
cause you don’t like cornbread you
aren’t ever going to make it, that
you will send your mother five dol
lars’ worth of flowers when she is
ill and then insist that he turn out
all the lights upstairs before he
comes down to dinner, is just as in
nocently inconsistent as a hundred
things you do.
Early married life is full of pin-
I pricks, jars and shocks. Often a
young wife actually forgets the
thrill, the glamour, the joy of be
longing to Philip, the pride of wife
hood, in her bewilderment and dis
tress over trifles that mean selfish
ness, indifference to her wishes, per
sistence in his own way.
Face Percentage of Differences.
This is inevitable. Courtesy and
affection may cloak the situation for
a shorter or longer time, but eventu
ally the man and woman must face
a certain percentage of differences.
Differences of opinion, of custom, of
habits, or everything.
Not only that. The situation is
complicated by the fact that a man
is one thing when he is courting,
UNPREDICTABLE
Do you look toward marriage, with
an idealistic and romantic viewpoint?
“I‘lease don't" says Kathleen Norris,
“for marriage is one of the eye-openers
of life and in its early stages is full of
jars, shocks, pinpricks ... it is un
predictable.” In today’s article are tips
on how YOUR problem can he solved.
and quite another when the respon
sibilities of married life have set
tled upon him. Your extravagant
sweetheart may not turn out to be
merely reasonble in what he spends
upon you, as a husband, he may be
penurious. The night-club-loving
man often is the home-staying hus
band. The man who fussed so long
and so anxiously about not wanting
to see too much of your family, may
become as devoted to your people
as you are. The husband who
doesn’t particularly care for chil
dren will be the most devoted of
fathers; the dreamy unsuccessful
man who couldn’t hold a job turns
out to be a genius, and surprisingly
gives you fame and wealth.
Nothing is predictable about mar
riage except it is unpredictable.
If it is contracted between two rea
sonably agreeable and adaptable
persons, a man and woman with
some generosity of spirit, with at
least the intention of making it a
success, it can develop from the
young passion and confusions and
suprises of the honeymoon into the
finest, deepest and truest relation
ship human beings ever will know.
What True Marriage Means.
It can mean that in all the years
to come the bond only draws closer
and dearer. That the man comes
home at night to gentleness, under
standing, affection; that the woman
grows slowly but steadily to feel
that she need fear no crisis, no
shock or sorrow in her life as long
as Phil is beside her to help her
face it. Years of companionship
make marriage, and happy marriage
is attainable by 99 couples out of
every 100, if they but knew it. True
marriage means joys shared, sor
rows shared, nursery delights and
fatigues and crises and responsibili
ties shared, picnics and anniversa
ries, the successful dinner party, the
unsuccessful dinner party, illness in
the house, money worry, the raise
in salary, vacations, visitors—and
always the same man and woman,
planning for them, talking them
over, building between them the
strong web of married friendship.
When a woman says to me; “from
the very beginning Ned has been the
sweetest, the gentlest, the most con
siderate of men. There’s never had
to be any adjustment, any conces
sions on my part. We were sweet
hearts 25 years ago and we are
sweethearts today,” she is saying as
much for herself as for her Ned.
She is saying “we were both fine,
gentle, reasonable human beings,
disciplined into consideration and
wisdom before we were ever mar
ried.”
A lovely woman was praising her
husband after 16 years of wedlock
in terms that brought tears to her
eyes and his.
“I was a foundling,” she told me
later, “for the first 18 years of my
life I had nothing and nobody be
longing to me. I hungered for home,
for love, for a chance to live. Char
ley was my bosses’ son when I had
a factory job, he had been crippled
and we thought he could not live. But
he did live, and he got well, and all
our happy years followed!”
In other words, she told me that
she and Charley had both been to
the hard school of life, and had
learned some of its lesson before
marriage and not after it.
Mary Celeste Mystery
The Mary Celeste was a sailboat
which left New York harbor on
November 7, 1872, under Capt. Be
jamin S. Briggs. She was laden
with alcohol and bound for Genoa.
Five weeks later the ship was found
abandoned in the Atlantic 300 miles
west of Gibraltar. The crew haa
never been heard from.
JiED
WfHl.Phillipr Jr
WNU SrrvtoT
THE PAPERS OF PRIVATE
PURKEY
Dear Mom:
I did not write you before because
there is more work to be done in
| an army than I
thought, so this is
WPylw just to say I am
well except for a
9 little flu ’ some
trouble with my
' arches and the
fact I can’t get
used to not being
able to say “Okay, later,” when I
am told to do something.
Training has started and I guess
I am being trained to be a letter
carrier from all the walking they
make me do in all kinds of weather.
A modern rifle arrived in camp to
day and attracted wide attention.
We expect to have several in time
if there is no strike trouble.
Only the top of my uniform was
ready when I got here but the bot
tom has arrived now. lam well and
hope you are the same. Do not
worry about me, mom, as I have
to go to bed early and am too busy
saluting to get into trouble, although
if being in the army ain’t being in
trouble I don’t know what is.
Love,
Oscar.
• « •
Dear Mom:
I thought I would drop you a few
lines to let you know I have not
seen no fighting yet. I heard funny
noises last night and was very nerv
ous, but everything was okay this
morning so I guess it was all imag
inary.
They do not get you up by bugle
no more in the army. They use an
electric buzzer. I _— ——
kept getting up
and looking for a
front door on my
tent because I
thought it was
the milkman or I
somebody. Where
I made my mis-
take was going back to bed when I
found no milkman, and just yelling
“nuts” to the buzzer the rest of the
morning.
The guardhouse is not a bad place
and I will be out in a few days,
Love,
Oscar.
• * *
Dear Mom:
I am out of the guardhouse which
I mentioned in my last letter but
I still don’t like buzzers. If the bu
gle was good enough for Grant, Lee,
Sherman, Teddy Roosevelt, and Per
shing, it is good enough for me. I
was talking this over with a buddy
and he says he thinks the buzzer is
being used just to make the army
mad. An army is no good unless it
is mad, he says. Well the buzzer
will do it. A bugle would make me
mad at 5 a. m. too, mom, but it
is sort of romantic. It kind of stirs
you up and makes you feel like you
was a fighter. A buzzer just makes
you feel like you was a stenogra
pher.
We have a couple of millionaires
in my company. One of ’em is a
Rockefeller. It is a funny thing how
no matter whether you are rich or
poor your feet hurt just the same.
The photographers are always tak
ing pictures of these rich guys but
none of me but you know how I
look anyhow so do not worry.
I am well except for that buzzer.
I can’t help hollering "Come in”
whenever I hear it.
Could you send me some warm
socks, a homemade cake and some
dice?
Love,
Oscar.
• • •
*
Dear Mom:
Well, just a line to let you know
everything is still okay at the ar
senal of democracy as it is called
in the newspapers. I am getting
along well, except the coffee is lousy
and the cream is plain sabotage.
Another modern rifle arrived today,
so I guess things are speeding up
hi the defense program.
I nearly got in the guardhouse
again. I asked the captain for a
- typewriter so I
letters that way
) I this is a machine
war, ain’t it?” He
got very sore.
Never mind the dice I asked you
to send me. The camp is now full
of ’em. Dice are the one thing
which ain’t behind schedule.
Love,
Oscar.
• • •
THE DIZZY PACE
(From the Conneautville, Pa.,
Courier)
Gresh’s girls have measles.
Mel Davis called on Harley Hills
Monday.
Mrs. Ruth Inman is up with an
attack of lumbago.
Our roads are so full of awful deep
ruts that it is impossible to get by
without a team along.
Carl Hills was at the home of his
parents, helping with wood.
Fox hunters were out every day
last week running foxes.
Make Scroll Design
For a Hooked R Ug
By RUTH WYETH SPEARg
U ALF the fun of hooking ru ss k
m making your own designs
All you have to do is to markup
pattern on burlap with a wax
crayon and then go over it with a
warm iron to set it. Simple flow
ers are easy to draw. Scroll de'
signs combined with flowers are
popular now. The scrolls of the
handsome rug shown here were
hooked in gold color outlined in
brown. The edge medium bine;
the center darker blue and tl*e
flowers in tones of red and deep
rose with leaves in two tones of
green.
This diagram shows you how to
make a scroll pattern that you
may use in different ways. Just
rule a piece of paper in one-inch
squares and then follow the dia
gram outlining the scroll so that
its lines cross the squares exactly
as they do here. Now, cut the
scroll out and trace around it on
the burlap repeating it at each
corner; then fill in the flowers.
• * •
NOTE; There ace several other rug de
signs with directions for knitting, crochet
ing and braiding in Booklet No. 6 of the
series of home-making booklets which
Mrs. Spears has prepared for our readers.
Copy of Booklet 6 with description of the
other numbers in the series will be mailed
to readers' who will send name -nd ad
dress with 10c In coin to:
MRS. RUTH WYETH SPEARS
Drawer 10
Bedford Hills New York
Enclose 10 cents for Book 6.
Name
Address
COLDS
. . . such as tough
coughs, chest tight- AAI
ness. Rub with vULllw
Penetro pleasing,
quick disappearing, MISERIES
mutton-suet base. „
Extra medication.
Rub tonight to help you get extra
benefits of rest, one of Nature’s
greatest colds fighters. 10c, 25c sizes.
PENETRO
Angling Like Virtue
Doubt not but angling will prove
to be so pleasant, that it will prove
to be, like virtue, a reward to it
self.—lzaak Walton.
DON’T BE BOSSED
BY YOUR LAXATIVE-RELIEVE
CONSTIPATION THIS MODERN WAY
• When you feel gassy, headachy, logy
due to clogged-up bowels, do as millions
do —take Feen-A-Mint at bedtime. Next
morning thorough, comfortable relief,
helping you start the day full of your
normal energy and pep, feeling like a
million! Feen-A-Mint doesn’t disturb
your night’s rest or interfere with work the
next day. Try Feen-A-Mint, the chewing
gum laxative, yourself. It tastes good, it' s
handy and economical... a family supply
FEEN-fl-MINTTo*
Rebound Tells
Attack is the reaction; I never
think I have hit hard unless it re
bounds.—Samuel Johnson.
BAmQS\:<<^^B(essedßeUel
Increasing Evil
The love of pelf increases with
the pelf.—Juvenal.
GRAY HAIRS
Do you like them? If not, get a bottle of
Lea’s Hair Preparation, it is guaranteed to
make your gray hairs a color so close to me
natural color; the color they were before
turning gray, or the color of your hair that
has not turned gray that you or your
friends can’t tell the difference or y® ar
money refunded. It doesn't make any din
ference what color your hair is and it >»
so simple to use—Just massage a few drops
upon the scalp for a few days per oxrec-
Uons like thousands are doing.
Your druggist has Lea’s Hair Prepara
tion, or can secure a bottle for you, or a
regular dollar bottle of Lea’s Hair Prep
aration will be sent you, postage pam oj
us, upon receipt of one dollar ca P ~’
money order or stamps. (Sent COD I*°
extra).
LEA’S TONIC CO., INC.
Box 2055 . . Tampa, I la
| IVEW ideas !
aDVERTISEMENTS are your guide
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today’s NEWS about the food you eat and
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in this newspaper.