The Era -- Day By Day

[Harp]

As far as zippered girdles go, they're usually set up with a hook-and-eye underflap that you close first, and then pull up the zipper for a smooth line. It works fine if the garment fits properly, but if it's too tight, the opening gaps, flesh is exposed, and the zipper can be unpleasant.

Sounds just like a flak vest...body armor, protective vest, M69. Had a front zipper, nylon flap close first,
and then pull up zipper for a tight smooth gig line. 7lbs. Unpleasant garment, zipped or unzipped.
Would not stop a 7.62 AK-47/SKS but hell, even Lucifer himself carried the AK47, whiskey tango foxtrot....

 

[Harp]

Okay, so I went to the new release page and am considering just signing up and paying $75 per volume as they release all 13 of them over the next four years. This year I'd get 3 volumes covering years '34-'37. I know it's more expensive, but it might be nice to do it over four years and maybe they'll even have some neat stuff added into the new release.

As Lizzie said, fine literature is an investment. Solid. This Christmas.

 

[LizzieMaine]

(Terrorists or freedom fighters? Depends on who you ask.)

Soviet forces have won the first major engagement of the spring, repulsing thirty powerful German counterattacks on the central front, smashing over melting snow toward a river barrier protecting an important German provision. Authoritative reports today stated that thousands of Germans were killed as they abandoned fortified points at dozens of positions on the Bryansk front some 200 miles from Moscow, and Soviet troops are now reported involved in heavy fighting on the outskirts of a "big town" that is stated not to be Bryansk itself.

Japan is sending five and a half divisions, probably more than 160,000 men, to reinforce her spreading Burma offensive for a decisive thrust against British and Chinese troops defending the bridgehead to India. A Chinese military spokesman reported today that more than 40 Japanese ships were sighted near Rangoon last Sunday, which sources believe were carrying at least two full divisions for deployment in Burma.

Despite the Good Neighbor Policy, South America still thinks of the United States as the homeland of jitterbugs, gangsters, debutantes and gum-chewers, according to a Brazilian exchange student who yesterday addressed the Brooklyn Rotary Club. Maria Yedda Leite told Rotarians that Hollywood does a poor job of depicting to the rest of the world what Americans are really like, failing to properly show America's "great scholars, great scientists, wholesome family life and high moral standards." Miss Leite, a student at Barnard College, stressed that South America "knows little about the United States except what the movies have shown us."

The War Production Board has ordered the International Harvester Company to come to immediate terms on a union contract covering eight plants in the midwest, but has also barred the inclusion of a closed-shop clause in that agreement. The WPB declared that both industry and labor have the obligation to put aside differences in the interests of wartime unity, and that the Board itself not only has the right, but the obligation to impose a compulsory settlement in contract disputes.

("But how can we win the war without cursive???")

In Washington DC, a 17-year-old theatre usher today confessed to beating a 25-year-old member of the Jehovah's Witnesses sect to death with a claw hammer, after she had gone to his mother's home to play phonograph records outlining the beliefs of the sect. Police say Richard L. Whilhite led members of the homicide squad to the apartment, and pointed out the bloody, partly-clothed young woman's body wedged into a clothes closet. The victim has not yet been identified, but the portable phonograph and cards found in her pockets identified her as a member of the religious group. Lt. Jeremiah Flaherty indicated that the woman had also been "criminally attacked," and called her murder "the most brutal crime" he had ever seen.

A group of between 50 and 100 persons greeted 60 Williamsburg boys early this morning with a surprise sendoff as they prepared to leave for the Army. Passers-by watched the young draftees heading from the offices of Local Board 161 to the Myrtle Street subway entrance, and quickly surrounded them before they could descend the stairs. "Wait a minute, fellows," declared a voice from the crowd, as the chairman of the Citizens' Army-Navy Welfare Council of Upper Williamsburgh pushed forward to present the departing youths with "buddy kits," filled with useful items for new men in the service. There were laughs and handclaps and the boys realized that the gang at home wasn't forgetting that this is their war too.

(Smile, boys! America's Biggest Small Town loves you!)

The Eagle Editorialist endorses the Justice Department's move to ban Father Coughlin's "Social Justice" newspaper from the mails, and looks forward to Attorney General Francis Biddle responding to Father Coughin's brash, rash challenge daring the Attorney General to subpoena him to testify in Washington "if he has the intestinal fortitude to do so." While the Federal Government, in the EE's view, should never allow itself to be forced into making any kind of a response to any insolent challenge, it is evident that the American people are "fed up" with Coughlin and his paper, which blames "the Jews, the New Deal, and the Communists" for the war, and believe that they constitute a "potential social peril of the most ominous kind."

(Spring's new trend: adult bibs!)

Screen star Myrna Loy will arrive in Reno on Sunday, there to begin divorce proceedings against her husband, film producer Arthur Hornblow Jr. Miss Loy will fulfill her six-week residency requirement at a ranch near the city.

(Two games into the season and already second-guessing the front office. No wonder MacPhail drinks.)

Leo Durocher will be Fred Allen's guest on the comedian's oil company hour Sunday night at 8 over WABC. Lippy, whose appearance on the Allen show last spring was a big hit, is joining the New England funster to "inoculate the 1942 baseball season."

(And maybe there isn't even any Boody Rogers at all! Maybe he's just some mumbling street character sitting in the Automat doodling aimlessly on a paper napkin!)

("Oh, not her again!" sighs the sergeant.)

(I don't think it goes with his complexion.)

(Deeeeeeeeeep breath now...)

(These are the most lackadaisical Nazi fiends we've ever seen. Is the Skull in charge?)

 

[LizzieMaine]

And in the Daily news...

Tomorrow: "BARE KICKBACK SCANDAL IN POLICE UNIFORM SALES."

Because, you know, we love H&H, but they're not the only game in town. Whatever happened to Childs?

Is this really how a garbage scow works? How does it stay afloat?

"In a nice cozy burrow!"

"And if this works out, do I get a finders' fee?"

Check the mail, kid.

Fade to black.

"This is the end, boys. I've sold out. The new owner, a Mr. Anastasia, wants me gone by Saturday. But he says he'll have work for all of you, whether you want it or not."

It's really all a matter of perspective.

I asked for mine but they wouldn't let me have it.

 

[LizzieMaine]

And a baseball bonus...

"He din' use my pitcha!" fumes Sally. "Ya shunna pushed 'im down," sighs Joe.

 

[Harp]

Fr Coughlin should have been reined in by his ecclesial superiors,
saving church and nation the harm done by a fool whom perilous times
soon outraced, and whose personal bias was far too pernicious for any
decent Roman Catholic cleric to hold.

 

[Harp]

The Daily News Jeanne Crain snippet jogged memory index....
...I have wondered since The Godfather if she was=wasn't the Jeanne Lord character
as depicted Mario Puzo, ba***rd swashbuckler quill of all rapine rumor and innuendo.

-----

Normandie looks lovely. And I know what Padraic is thinking.

 

[Fading Fast]

(Terrorists or freedom fighters? Depends on who you ask.)
...

The word irony doesn't even begin to describe the idea of Goebbels launching a "politeness" campaign.

Darn prescient of the army air officer talking about bombing Tokyo with Doolittle's raid two days away. You have to assume that particular officer had no idea it was being planned.

...

Despite the Good Neighbor Policy, South America still thinks of the United States as the homeland of jitterbugs, gangsters, debutantes and gum-chewers, according to a Brazilian exchange student who yesterday addressed the Brooklyn Rotary Club. Maria Yedda Leite told Rotarians that Hollywood does a poor job of depicting to the rest of the world what Americans are really like, failing to properly show America's "great scholars, great scientists, wholesome family life and high moral standards." Miss Leite, a student at Barnard College, stressed that South America "knows little about the United States except what the movies have shown us."
...

We're still a year away from the release of "The Human Comedy."

Also, so what, here's your choice: a dictatorship bent on global domination that also subjugates its own citizens whom it says are "inferior" or gum chewers, gangsters, jitterbugs and debutants. Hitler or American pop culture - you really can't decide?

...

The Eagle Editorialist endorses the Justice Department's move to ban Father Coughlin's "Social Justice" newspaper from the mails, and looks forward to Attorney General Francis Biddle responding to Father Coughin's brash, rash challenge daring the Attorney General to subpoena him to testify in Washington "if he has the intestinal fortitude to do so." While the Federal Government, in the EE's view, should never allow itself to be forced into making any kind of a response to any insolent challenge, it is evident that the American people are "fed up" with Coughlin and his paper, which blames "the Jews, the New Deal, and the Communists" for the war, and believe that they constitute a "potential social peril of the most ominous kind."
...

Coughlin and his ideas are vile, but the EE first contradicts itself ("Government...should never allow itself to be forced into making any kind of response...") and then argues the it's okay to ban his speech because Americans are "fed up." Inciting to riot or treason as reasons, yes, of course, but that doesn't seem to be the EE's argument.

...

Screen star Myrna Loy will arrive in Reno on Sunday, there to begin divorce proceedings against her husband, film producer Arthur Hornblow Jr. Miss Loy will fulfill her six-week residency requirement at a ranch near the city.
...

In preparation for her stay, Ms. Loy is said to have recently screened a copy of "The Women."

...


(Two games into the season and already second-guessing the front office. No wonder MacPhail drinks.)
...

His is one of those jobs where he earns every dollar of his high salary.

The bookies are, effectively, supposed to run each of their books like a parimutuel system - so they need to cut the odds further on Hogan and Nelson and boost them on the others till their books "balance." (A balanced book is, effecively, a parimutuel system.)

...

(I don't think it goes with his complexion.)
...

Meanwhile, Slap Happy thinks, "I could play a chauffeur."

And in the Daily news...

Tomorrow: "BARE KICKBACK SCANDAL IN POLICE UNIFORM SALES."
...

I assume that is future actress Jeanne Crain a year before even her first uncredited role.

...

Because, you know, we love H&H, but they're not the only game in town. Whatever happened to Childs?
...

Based on the ads we had been seeing, Childs fired its marketing department and, while looking to hire a new one, saw that sales were increasing, so they just quit advertising altogether.

...

"In a nice cozy burrow!"
...

Annie missing a day of school, I don't believe it.

 

[Harp]

Darn prescient of the army air officer talking about bombing Tokyo with Doodle's raid two days away. You have to assume that particular officer had no idea it was being planned.





Coughlin and his ideas are vile, but the EE first contradicts itself ("Government...should never allow itself to be forced into making any kid of response...") and then argues the it's okay to ban his speech because Americans are "fed up." Inciting to riot or treason as reasons, yes, of course, but that doesn't seem to be the EE's argument.

Audacious, bold, brilliant raid.

Constitutional construal maze amaze, but truth ultimately prevails.

 

[ChiTownScion]

Fr Coughlin should have been reined in by his ecclesial superiors,
saving church and nation the harm done by a fool whom perilous times
soon outraced, and whose personal bias was far too pernicious for any
decent Roman Catholic cleric to hold.

I think that they reined him in as best they could at the archdiocese level. Anything such as relieving him of his duties as a priest would have required action by the Vatican, and Pius XII wasn't going to do that in 1942 for a number of reasons- good and bad.

That he had such a large following is even more disgusting.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Coughlin's immediate ecclesiatical superior until 1937, Archbishop Michael Gallagher, supported his views and his political activities, so there was going to be no intervention while he was in office. Gallagher was replaced after his death, however, by Archbishop Edward Mooney, who not only didn't agree with Coughlin's politics, but also found him personally repugnant. One of the first things Mooney did upon taking office was to warn Coughlin about making claims that FDR had gone insane. But Mooney -- perhaps cowed by Coughlin's personal popularity -- failed to intervene when Coughlin moved in an explicitly anti-Semitic/pro-German direction 1938-39. It was the National Association of Broadcasters, fearing FCC action to suspend licenses of stations that carried Coughlin's program, and not church authorities, that put Coughlin off the air after the 1939-40 broadcast season.

At this moment in 1942, an emissary from Attorney General Biddle is being briefed for a trip to Detroit to confer with Mooney about the likelihood of full sedition charges being brought against Coughlin. Meanwhile, a fleet of private delivery trucks is preparing to distribute "Social Justice" to subscribers in the East, obviating the need for the mail.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Incidentially, I had no idea that people bet on golf. The opportunities for chicanery there would be even more broad than they are with horses.

 

[Harp]

Sedition, even against a virulent bigoted anti-semite, peering at the world through
his own rose colored eyes, is a difficult charge to prosecute. Coughlin was followed
in time by other Catholic recalcitrants two decades later, and, like Coughlin, eventually
were relegated to a back burner obscurity.

 

[Harp]

Incidentially, I had no idea that people bet on golf. The opportunities for chicanery there would be even more broad than they are with horses.

Bob Baffert did himself and the sport a great harm. Added emphasis to the prior season
at Santa Anita where horses were mercilessly ridden to ground, and, when deaths
occurred, its track was blamed suspect. Back stretch rumor spelled whispers,
while the Pegasus collapsed for all practical purpose. The Thoroughbred industry
collapsed within itself with inconsistency and seeming timid purpose. Now, two years
later time will tell whether the coin flip call is solid fast track sound.

 

[Fading Fast]

Incidentially, I had no idea that people bet on golf. The opportunities for chicanery there would be even more broad than they are with horses.

The answer to every question that starts "Do people bet on..." is always yes.

 

[LizzieMaine]

(As Joe and Sally squint down from high in the back of Section 37, somewhere far from Ebbets Field, Private Solomon J. Pincus, USA, lies in his bunk and thinks of home.)

A jury of six women and six men will decide the fate of hard-boiled 18-year-old waitress Anna Meckling, accused of throwing her newborn baby girl down an airshaft after giving birth in the bedroom of her home at 745 Flushing Avenue last December 19th. Without the slightest trace of emotion she told the jury yesterday how she and her boyfriend, Jerry Clifford, who worked with her in the same Court Street restaurant, had wanted to get married, but were too poor to do so. Miss Meckling admited that she lied to police when she named another boy as the father of the child, stating "I loved Jerry, and didn't want to get him in trouble. I never had any other sweetheart in my life." Judge Jonah J. Goldstien married the young couple in his courtroom last month after Jerry Clifford had been arraigned on a statutory charge because Anna was under the age of 18 when the romance began. He received a suspended sentence on that charge, and sat behind his wife as she testified yesterday. Jury summations are expected to be completed in the case this afternoon.

Official rationing of sugar begins in three weeks, using a coupon system that will allot one-half-pound per week to every man, woman, and child for at least the first three weeks, with the possibility that the allotment will be increased or decreased after that time depending on prevailing conditions. Distribution of ration books will take place at designated elementary schools between May 4th and May 7th, and all persons applying for a ration book must under penalty of federal law first declare any quantities of sugar they have on hand. No person, or family, will be issued a ration book who holds more than six pounds of sugar, and a coupon per pound will be removed from all books issued for all quantities of sugar held between two and six pounds. It is emphasized that even persons who do not buy or use sugar must apply for ration books, as it is likely that the same coupons will be used in the future for the rationing of other goods. It is also emphasized that all coupons are numbered, and each stamp will only be good for a designated time period, preventing any attempts at hoarding coupons.

(Ah, the Dodger Cocktail. NO, MR. MACPHAIL, YOU'VE HAD TOO MANY!)

(The reissued "Gold Rush," with Chaplin's narration and musical score added, isn't the same picture as the silent 1925 original -- the pacing is different, and elements of the plot and the ending are changed, not entirely for the better. But that was Chaplin - he could never stop messing around with his movies.)

The Eagle Editorialist, who can remember when bicycle racks were common items of street furniture, endorses the idea of Magistrate Jenkin R. Hockert of Queens that the Long Island Railroad be asked to install bike racks at its terminals for the convenience of commuters.

(Future headline: ARREST DOCTORS IN TIRE BOOTLEG RACKET.)

A 42-year-old St. Louis man, facing indictment in connection with stink bomb attacks at the Star Theatre and other theatres in Brooklyn, was given a suspended sentence after pleading guilty, on the condition that he enlist in the Armed Forces. The warrant for the arrest of Charles O. Smith was discovered in February when he attempted to enlist in the Navy at a St. Louis recruiting station. Smith told Justice Jonah J. Goldstein that he could do more for his country in the service than he could behind bars.

(ED HEAD! ED HEAD! ED HEAD!)

(I wouldn't trust a guy wearing officers' lapel insignia with an enlisted man's hat.)

("Um, that's just my regular voice.")

(Leona sighs and remembers the days when SHE was the one pulling off the schemes.)

("Get Some Cash For Your Trash!")

(Jeez, Dan, what is it with you lately and the pyromania?)

 

[LizzieMaine]

And yeah, there's no day like Opening Day!

 

[LizzieMaine]

And in the Daily News...

"The danger of going wrong and getting caught."

"Easy Kredit Terms."

"High-flying ball-busters!"

Maybe the bones won't hurt you, but you won't enjoy the smell.

"Sorry, we're not seeing umbrella salesmen today."

Guess which branch Skeezix will join.

Y'know, hon, this holy-martyr act is getting old.

"Ah well, that's the way it goes. Hey, you think if we head back now we'll make it in time for the ball game?"

Poor, poor Pop. The only six customers he ever had.

Sure, Moon, bring everybody down.

 

[Fading Fast]

...


(Ah, the Dodger Cocktail. NO, MR. MACPHAIL, YOU'VE HAD TOO MANY!)
...

It's kinda fun to see the Plaza Terrace become the "in" place in Brooklyn since we saw the ads for its opening at the end of last year.

...

A 42-year-old St. Louis man, facing indictment in connection with stink bomb attacks at the Star Theatre and other theatres in Brooklyn, was given a suspended sentence after pleading guilty, on the condition that he enlist in the Armed Forces. The warrant for the arrest of Charles O. Smith was discovered in February when he attempted to enlist in the Navy at a St. Louis recruiting station. Smith told Justice Jonah J. Goldstein that he could do more for his country in the service than he could behind bars.
...

The draft deus ex machina solves another problem.

...

(ED HEAD! ED HEAD! ED HEAD!)
...

It's funny how today you simply don't expect to see the starter finish the game. Heck, if he makes it through the seventh you're surprised.

And yeah, there's no day like Opening Day!

O'Dwyer, but no Amen. Big miss by Amen.

Lizzie, you know where we are going after the game, right? Dinner, drinks and bowling. Maybe we'll meet Fitz!

And in the Daily News...

"The danger of going wrong and getting caught."
...

That is a heck of a statement. Valentine bit off more than he can chew. Bigger picture, though, the guilty shouldn't be reassigned or allowed to retire, they need to be prosecuted. And again, based on the movie "Serpico" (based on a supposedly true book), all of this was still going on in the 1970s. The uniformed and plainclothes cops were engaged in systemic graft according to that book.

...


"Easy Kredit Terms."
...

He'd really be in trouble today where all you have to do is click on the "Pay in four easy installment" button. But as always, there's no gun to his head making him click.

...


"High-flying ball-busters!"
...

In today's terms, MacPhail would be said to understand the needs of all the Dodgers' "stakeholders." Once again, nothing is really new; although, we often rebrand things to make them seem new.

...

Y'know, hon, this holy-martyr act is getting old.
...

I'm trying to keep an open mind, but Normandie has not won me over. Right now, I'll take conniving Burma over her. I did not find Normandie's "loyalty" to Sandhurst ennobling; I thought it was pretentious, stupid and dangerous (to her, Pat and her child).

...

Sure, Moon, bring everybody down.

Holding Moon's foot as he takes the shot is a nice touch.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I'm rereading the storyline that introduces Sandhurst as Normandie's husband, and a lot of her present attitude goes back to her feeling that she owes her aunt for raising her as a child, and if Aunt Augusta wants her to marry Sandhurst, that's her obligation. Given what Sandhurst *does* during this storyline, it's hard to imagine feeling any kind of obligation to him at all -- he goes to great lengths to get Pat sent to prison after Pat and the kids save his life -- but Normandie is, in many ways, still a child playing grownup in terms of the way she looks at the world. That was five years ago, but I don't see that she's had a lot of emotional growth since then.

Oh, and lest we think Abraham & Straus failed to do its opening day duty...

(Kind of a lesser effort compared to what the other stores are doing, and besides, white shirts make a lousy background for hitting.)