The Era -- Day By Day

[Fading Fast]

("I KNEEEEEEEEEWWWWW t'eah was sump'n phoney 'bout t'at guy!" bellows Joe, slapping the paper on the table in disgust. "We neveh had nut'n like t'at at..." begins Sally, but Joe cuts her off. "Ohhhhh, t'ey did too. T'ey jus' neveh got CAUGHT! Ohhhhh, I'm goin' down'eah tamarra, an' I'm gonna deman' a REFUN'!" "But night school don't cost nut'n!" "Well'en, I'm gonna go downeah an' make a donation -- an'nen I'm gonna ask for it back!")
...

Adjusted for the particulars, how frighteningly modern does the drug-addict story read? There is always a new angle and always a dealer happy to supply the drug.

You go Amen, I'll fight for good pay and pensions for cops as hard as I'll fight to have corrupt ones arrested.

...

Provided no further changes are made in plans to redraw Brooklyn's political map, Congressman Emanuel Celler, veteran Demcrat, has been safely restored to his domain. Original plans for redrawing congressional district lines would have placed Celler's home on McDonough Street within the district whose seat is now held by Rep. Andrew Somers, with the boundary being a matter of less than a city block from the Celler residence. The boundary has been adjusted to place Rep. Celler's residence within his present Congressional district, which includes portions of Bedford-Stuyvesant and much of Brownsville.
...

Gerrymandering 1942 style.

...

(Don't look so excited, toots -- he's just an ensign. He'll be initialing reports and shuffling papers and bringing coffee to lieutenant commanders who don't even know his name.)
...

Also and thankfully, by the time he'll be in any position to do anything, the Battles of Coral Sea and Midway will be over and the war in the Pacific, effectively, determined. It will be too late for Tom to lose the war for the Allies (one hopes).

...

"WHOM he talks to." Very good, Dan Dunn, English Major.

He also was polite enough not to correct Irwin in panel two.

And in the Daily News...

"In Brooklyn where they talk of the Dodgers all year round, there was more than a usual amount of bull yesterday." "Hey Mac, all your bulls are jumping out!" I love the Daily News.
...

That belongs on the contender list for "Most Brooklyn line of 1942."

Two days and no word on Ms. Webb's grooming or the rest of the story.

Also, things have gone quiet about Flynn and the antique Belgian courtyard - the coverup begins?

...

Ahhh, Patrick, you do know how to make an entrance.
...

Seriously, though, Caniff did that brilliantly. In addition to setting up the narrative perfectly for Ryan's big entry, look at how he shifted the perspective around in the first three panels so that it made Ryan's entry (with his popped collar) so impactful in the fourth one. You can all but hear the hero music start up in the background in panel four.

...

You can't get married on $21 a day once a month.
...

Clearly, Nina's doc is no Doc Zee charing $1 a visit or he wouldn't have time to sit and file his nails.

...

If this storyline leads into Shadow having a full-on nervous breakdown, it should make the Sunday pages very interesting.
...

I assume they're earmuffs, but being a kid of the 1970s, Shadow's earmuffs always look like Walkman headphones to me.

I predict this Sunday, Shadow will regain Susie Q's affections.

...

Earlier this week, I found myself sitting across the desk from a bank manager, looking for a loan, but I must admit I never considered climbing across the desk to intimidate him. I'll be sure to keep in mind for next time.
...

Although, it wasn't a particularly successful strategy. I hope you had more luck.

 

[LizzieMaine]

When Harold and Shadow showed up as guest stars in "Dick Tracy" a few years back, the earmuff-earphone resemblance was made canonical...

Incidentally, is "Shadow2017" a member of the Lounge? Show yourself!

 

[Harp]

Too late for all the felonious huba-huba, who is Hecuba and what is Hecuba to me? stuff,
but it is good to be back to some regular Model Penal Code rigor mortis rules and regs again.
Grignio slapped with second class Murder; under the current felony murder doctrine would have
been charged first class fare instead.

I released this morning on my own cog after a fair penalty accrual, mea culpa et absolvo....
tested the raised circus tent flap with a pseud, an imperial Roman died 119ad thereabouts, left
breadcrumbs the size of softballs, just funnin' really, and caught red-handed. Figured Lizzie for the
nab since she's sharpest knife around here and the stick that stirs the drink besides.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Good to have you back!

 

[Harp]

Thanks Lizzie. I certainly missed reading the tabloids here.

The Era and all its hellish realities serve focus on present time in a manner I certainly never appreciated.

 

[LizzieMaine]

("Happy Motoring!" indeed. And if the story of Victor Fonss and Tiny doesn't become a movie, there's something wrong with Hollywood.)

A key figure accused and acquitted of sedition in the 1940 Christian Front bomb plot case is now serving as an Army private at Camp Upton. John F. Cassidy of Brooklyn was inducted on March 6th after being drafted, and David V. Cahill, chairman of Brooklyn's Local Board 214 in Flatbush, refused to disclose any of the personal information contained on Cassidy's draft questionnaire, explaining that such information is confidential. Cassidy was tried in Brooklyn Federal Court with thirteen other defendants on charges of conspiracy to overthrow the government by force, and after his acquittal, announced plans to set up a law practice. His qualifications for the bar were immediately questioned by Assemblyman Patrick H. Sullivan, who introduced legislation on January 27th that would bar Cassidy from practice law in the State of New York. Mr. William Pinckney Hamilton III, who is chairing the Subcomittee on Character and Fitness of the Appellate Division, 2nd Department in its investigation of the Cassidy matter, declared today that Cassidy's induction will have no impact on the probe, adding that "we will reach our conclusion in the fullness of time." Meanwhile, Cassidy's mother is displaying a service flag in the window of the family home at 3015 Farragut Avenue, asking reporters "what's any different from him going than anyone else?"

("Hey," says Joe. "Wheah'dja gett'em slacks, anyway?" "Davega," explains Sally, doing a forceful pirouette to display their sleek lines. "Howcum t'ey zip up t'front?" challenges Joe. "T'ey don't," explains Sally. "T'ey're jus' slightly irreguleh!")

One of the most important battles of the war so far, for the vital Soviet port of Murmansk, appears to be developing today as Red Army forces pushed the Germans back around Leningrad, and thru the suburbs of Stalino, in the far south. Well-informed London quarters reported that German air attacks on Murmansk herald the start of a full-scale land, sea, and air drive against it, and those sources further report that there have been three straight days of bombing raids against the port. Thirteen of the 68 Nazi planes participating in the raids have been shot down by Soviet fighters and anti-aircraft fire.

(RELEASE ME AT ONCE)

Certificates of graduation have been prevented to 200 women completing a six-week course in automotive motor mechanics under the auspices of Brooklyn Chapter No. 105 of the American Red Cross. Major Nan Rice, head of the chapter's Motor Corps, presided over the ceremonies held at the hall of Flatlands Post No. 391, American Legion, at 2295 Nostrand Avenue. Most of the women receiving the certificates have already enrolled in advanced classes scheduled to begin on April 9th.

The Office of Emergency Management warns radio set owners that steps must be taken now to ensure that their equipment will remain operational for the duration. With the manufacture of new sets for the civilian market banned after April 23rd, owners of present receivers should take care not to place the cabinets too close to the wall, to allow room for heat to dissipate and prevent damage to vital components. Electrical connections should be inspected regularly, and antenna and ground connections should be equipped with approved lightning arrestors. Set owners are also advised to dust the inside of their radios to prevent accumulation of dirt that can cause malfunctions, and to ensure that all tubes are properly seated in their sockets after cleaning.

(I'm warning you, Lichty -- I'm armed. Stop hanging around my yard!)

(This should be an interesting bout, with Louis highly motivated to --- WAIT, WHAT? FITZ WAS WILD? HE'S *NEVER* WILD! THE MOUND IS TOO HIGH? HE'S RUSTY? HE HASN'T PITCHED MUCH? WHO'S FAULT IS THAT, LEO? HUH?)

(Obviously a Mitford traveling incognito.)

(Oh here we go...)

(Naval Intelligence. Sigh.)

(And we shift from a Disneyesque universe to a more -- ah -- Warner Bros. approach.)

(At least he remembered to take the headphones off.)

 

[Fading Fast]

...

("Hey," says Joe. "Wheah'dja gett'em slacks, anyway?" "Davega," explains Sally, doing a forceful pirouette to display their sleek lines. "Howcum t'ey zip up t'front?" challenges Joe. "T'ey don't," explains Sally. "T'ey're jus' slightly irreguleh!")
...

How surprised would all those involved in this 1942 school protest be if they knew that, 80 years later, the name of the school itself could be cause for protest? Every generation has its things.

...

(This should be an interesting bout, with Louis highly motivated to --- WAIT, WHAT? FITZ WAS WILD? HE'S *NEVER* WILD! THE MOUND IS TOO HIGH? HE'S RUSTY? HE HASN'T PITCHED MUCH? WHO'S FAULT IS THAT, LEO? HUH?)
...

No kidding, the idea of spring training is to let the guys train. Not reported was this exchange between Fitz and the cranky old groundskeeper after Fitz left the field:

Fitz: "Hi, the mound it too high, could you please lower it somewhat?"

Groundskeeper: "Why don't you just go stand on it."

Fitz: "No, I'm sure it's too [lightbulb come on] well that's just mean."

...

(Obviously a Mitford traveling incognito.)
...

Well, we know it's not Unity as hadn't she already shot herself in the head by now because Hitler didn't love her or something ridiculously stupid like that?

...

(Naval Intelligence. Sigh.)
...

Wonderfully done:

...

(And we shift from a Disneyesque universe to a more -- ah -- Warner Bros. approach.)

...

Plus, it makes no sense that they are speaking in broken English to each other. And if it's being translated for us, it shouldn't be broken.

 

[LizzieMaine]

And in the Daily News...

Oh those Yanks.

Mr. di Cicco is a man of very dubious background who may, depending on who you ask, have been directly involved in the beating death of comedian Ted Healy outside a Hollywood nightspot in 1937. He is also the ex-husband of screen comedienne Thelma Todd, who died under mysterious circumstances in 1935. Gloria would be well advised to get as far away from him as she possibly can.

And so did romance bloom...

There is no task so difficult as sorting books.

"As loud as a treeful of monkeys and only half as smart."

Rarely is a single strip panel so utterly satisfying.

Airport? That's how we know it's serious.

"And the other 57 Varieties!"

Look at it this way, Tracy -- it'll be great for your skin.

"Coming home with lime rickey on your breath!"

 

[Harp]

Ensign Kane left in uniform, rather odd. All uniform basic issue only occurs after induction.
A bit premature cartoonist pen, that. Connie is however her stunning self.
Kane will rue this day. I think it was Owen who scribbled prose doggerel that soldiers
dream of warm beds and wives. Most especially of women. Barracks vulgate never fails:
'red meat, hard liquor, and soft beautiful women.'
Not necessarily in that order.

 

[Fading Fast]

And in the Daily News...

Oh those Yanks.
...

If they don't let them marry, they're going to have a different problem on their hands in about nine months.

...

"As loud as a treeful of monkeys and only half as smart."
...

"You've got whitecaps on your highball." Nice.

Edson's mixing in a little "the stuff that dreams are made of" to the story today.

And in the Daily News...
...

Airport? That's how we know it's serious.
...

These kids are worried they don't have enough money to get married, yet they casually hop on and off planes at a time when one airline ticket cost about the same as a new car.

...

"Coming home with lime rickey on your breath!"

"Now I'm going to take you home to your wife and I better hear some love making going on in that bedroom."

"Okay."

 

[LizzieMaine]

I wonder if it's the Wumple company plane, if there is such a thing? In which case I hope Wilmer isn't the pilot.

We know from his Sunday storylines that Mr. Edson has a taste for wild pulp-magazine style adventure mixed in with all the Victoriana, so this "Tiger Tooth Ruby" bit offers much promise.

I don't think Honey fears her brother enough to go THAT far with this deception. On the other hand, though, she did willingly and with knowledge aforethought, marry Goofy.

 

[Harp]

If they don't let them marry, they're going to have a different problem on their hands in about nine months.

Caught this story after my last post. The column traversed temporal and religious concerns rightfully
raised; and, of course the unfortunate tragedy in the adjacent coverage of widowhood so soon following
a war marriage struck a nerve. A Greek girl proposed during a time when Southeast Asia still stayed
on my personal horizon, and I declined. Thought about her this past nite despite a closed door within
mind, her beauty still haunts memory. A war in one's youth may be life's supreme test but survival
can exact the coffers of conscience down to its last cent while some wounds prove resilient to time.
What I have seen of the Second World War generation and the institution of matrimony within this
era greatly impressed me over the course of my life. As a Veterans Administration patient I have
met dozens of World War II couples happily wed for over half a century. Such a splendid generation.
I feel certain that these American-Aussie couples fared well and were no exception.
And are to be admired for having the courage of their convictions.

 

[LizzieMaine]

(A second front in 1942? Don't count on it.)

The battle against the Atlantic U-Boat menace was intensified today with concentration of the Navy of command over both Army and Navy anti-submarine operations. This unification of command, it is said, will make possible more effective distribution of ships and airplanes engaged in the submarine hunt. Although a few Japanese submarines made an appearance off the West Coast early in the war, the Atlantic situation remains the most serious, with more than 100 ships having been sunk by Axis submarines.

A 20-year-old Williamsburg girl was acquitted of second degree assault charges yesterday after she was accused of attacking two detectives who had come to her home last November to question her father on a complaint that he had taken $20,276 from his mother because "Hitler is coming to Brooklyn." Miss Marion Schweiger of 126 Grand Street was charged with throwing a flatiron at the detectives, and kicking one of the two officers in the abdomen. The father, Samuel Schweiger, was released from a charge of grand larceny on Monday because his mother, a resident of the Menorah Home For The Aged and Infirm in Bushwick, could no longer recall the details of the incident.

In Lafayette, Indiana the mother of a fifth grader is on trial for flogging her son's teacher with a belt while the boy's father stood guard outside the classroom. The boy, eleven-year-old Danny Leslie, testified yesterday that the teacher, Constance Davis, struck him over the head with a book, identified as Volume 11 of the Treasury of Life And Literature. When the boy complained that the book hurt, Miss Davis is reported to have replied "I meant it to hurt." When Danny told his mother, Mrs. Arthur Leslie, about the incident, she became enraged, and together, the Leslies returned to the school, with Danny, and confronted Miss Davis in her classroom. Mrs. Leslie then whipped the teacher repeatedly with the belt from Danny's Boy Scout uniform, leading to charges of assault and battery. Defense Attorney Francis Murphy upheld Mrs. Leslie's action, declaring that "even an animal will protect its young."

A campaign to free imprisoned Communist Party chairman Earl Browder is underway in Brooklyn, with petitions being circulated around the borough under the auspices of the Brownsville-East New York Committee to Free Browder. The Communist leader was convicted of passport fraud in 1940, and began serving a four-year sentence at the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary last year.

(The wheels of justice grind slowly, but they do continue to grind.)

("You're a funny man, George," sniffs Mrs. Lichty. "A funny, funny man.")

The Eagle Editorialist endorses Spring Housecleaning Week, as proclaimed for next week by Borough President Cashmore, as good not just for housekeepers but for the war effort. "A Gallup poll has disclosed," he states, "that there are around 3,000,000 tons of scrap iron waiting to be picked up," and much of it can be found in Brooklyn. Call MAin 5-0061, and an accredited junkman will call at your home to pick it up, AND PAY YOU FOR IT. "What could be better!"

("We otta giv'm'at rotten bed," growls Joe. "We sleep innat bed," protests Sally. "Maybe you do," replies Joe, with a decidedly sour tone. "But *I* don't!")

The Senate Committee Investigating The War Program today pondered the advisability of inquiring into more than 100 cartel agreements made by the German dye trust I. G. Farbenindustrie with American firms. Chairman Harry S. Truman (D-Mo.) stated today that the committee will go into "a number of these agreements" but it will be impossible to investigate them all. The existance of these agreements was revealed yesterday by Assistant Attorney General Thurman Arnold after he disclosed an agreement between I. G. Farben and the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey which, he stated, frustrated the establishment of a synthetic rubber industry in the United States by assigning rights to a Standard Oil synthetic rubber formula to the Nazi concern. Mr. Arnold further charged that a written agreement between Farben and the Standard Development Company, a Standard of New Jersey subsidiary, guarantees continued cooperation between the two firms "for the duration of the war," regardless of U. S. involvement in the war. Senator Truman yesterday characterized this arrangement as "treason." Standard officials will testify in response to those charges next week.

(So much for "no more fights for the duration." Of course, you could argue that it wasn't much of a fight. And yeah, Leo, let's rush Wyatt right in there. After all, leaving Fitz on the bench all month didn't work out so good.)

("The Male Animal" is an excellent specimen of the Broadway-to-Hollywood genre, with Fonda and Jack Carson at their best. And whoever is booking the stage shows at the Brooklyn Strand lately deserves a medal. Oh, and Evelyn Nesbit looks pretty good for someone who was all the rage in the Police Gazette in 1906.)

(Yeah, Page Four can't wait to get hold of this.)

(It's a wonder that, at his age, George doesn't suffer from crippling arthritis.)

(LEONA! LEONA! LEONA!)

(Yeah, this is how they ran the police department in my town when I was young.)

(Get your head down, stupid, they can see you thru the rear-view mirror!)

 

[LizzieMaine]

And in the Daily News...

Plainclothesman Ball needs to find a more productive use for his time.

Yeah, but what if you factor out Tommy Manville?

Well played, Patrick, well played.

I could watch Tracy get melted wax in the face all day.

Chuck one of Nick's agents CONFIRMED.

"Wait, I only had a one-way ticket. How am I supposed to get home??"

Hope you kept the receipt.

"Didn't you hear? She gave her notice yesterday -- she's going to be running a lathe at Sperry's!"

Aw, at least throw him the bone.

Besides, it's actually a pretty good idea.

 

[Fading Fast]

...

The Senate Committee Investigating The War Program today pondered the advisability of inquiring into more than 100 cartel agreements made by the German dye trust I. G. Farbenindustrie with American firms. Chairman Harry S. Truman (D-Mo.) stated today that the committee will go into "a number of these agreements" but it will be impossible to investigate them all. The existance of these agreements was revealed yesterday by Assistant Attorney General Thurman Arnold after he disclosed an agreement between I. G. Farben and the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey which, he stated, frustrated the establishment of a synthetic rubber industry in the United States by assigning rights to a Standard Oil synthetic rubber formula to the Nazi concern. Mr. Arnold further charged that a written agreement between Farben and the Standard Development Company, a Standard of New Jersey subsidiary, guarantees continued cooperation between the two firms "for the duration of the war," regardless of U. S. involvement in the war. Senator Truman yesterday characterized this arrangement as "treason." Standard officials will testify in response to those charges next week.
...

Hopefully, this earlier statement, "The wheels of justice grind slowly, but they do continue to grind," applies here too.

...

("The Male Animal" is an excellent specimen of the Broadway-to-Hollywood genre, with Fonda and Jack Carson at their best. And whoever is booking the stage shows at the Brooklyn Strand lately deserves a medal. Oh, and Evelyn Nesbit looks pretty good for someone who was all the rage in the Police Gazette in 1906.)
...

I've gone from liking to loving "The Male Animal" over the years for most of the reason (the cast is really enjoyable) you and Cohen note. It's also nice to see Fonda make a passionate argument for free speech and tolerance for unpopular ideas at college.

...

(LEONA! LEONA! LEONA!)
...

It will be great to see Leona again: she'd knock some sense into Connie. I hope she's kept her Club Buccaneer outfit.

...

(Get your head down, stupid, they can see you thru the rear-view mirror!)

Once again, we'll just ignore the challenging physics in "Dan Dunn," but why didn't the spy guy send a pigeon with the message?

And in the Daily News...

Plainclothesman Ball needs to find a more productive use for his time.
...

Policeman Ball would really not like the world of today.

Hollywood's newest find had a reasonably successful career in B-pictures and then television.

...

Well played, Patrick, well played.
...

I like Pat even more now.

...

Chuck one of Nick's agents CONFIRMED.
...

"He slouches and even eats with his knife*...sometimes with his fingers...and he uses awful grammar."

Didn't take Crazy Katie too long to become a bit uppity.

*What does "eats with his knife" even mean?

 

[LizzieMaine]

Eating with your knife was a common "ignorant oaf" stereotype of the Era -- the idea that one unschooled in the finer things of etiquette would slide their food onto the edge of their knife and then trowel it directly into their waiting gob.

A popular bit of doggerel of the time, often attributed to Ogden Nash --

"I eat my peas with honey
I've done it all my life!
It makes the peas taste funny
But it keeps them on my knife!"

It's similar to the way we always see Moon Mullins drinking his coffee out of the saucer -- a tipoff to the reader/viewer that the person involved is not of the better class.

 

[Harp]

With all this war news it's good to have a battery and assault file to finger through.
I will submit that as an Irish parochial alumnus of nuns, Christian Brothers of Ireland
and Jesuits, our parents fully expected corporal punishment meted out unmercifully
to facilitate education. An incorrect French verb answer bought a hard slap to the face,
kid you not. And those nuns dressed in black habit, veils, fifteen decade black rosaries looped
through a belt and wielding thrice cornered wooden rulers scared the hell out of us.

Mrs Leslie whipping her son's teacher, Constance Davis in retaliation for a relatively
minor head knock is a clear case of premeditated, deliberate intent assault and battery.
Passion here is a valid defense; tenuous though, yet a smidgen's validity which will gain
added currency inside court and before judge and jury. I would advise Mrs Leslie to plead
and avoid further contremps. Also, a female whipping another woman has-frankly speaking-
sexual overtones that jurist and jury will be cognizant of and might embellish.
Still, sexual imagery aside once in court motherhood, apple pie, and plenty of free parking
take hold and so the dice roll. But, it's 'Little Joe from Kokomo;' not Lafayette.

 

[Harp]

Ryan cut the shamrock by striking Sandhurst, assault and battery. Unconscious, Sandhurst
cannot escape Japanese, but he is complicit with the enemy, and might reasonably be assumed
an enemy. However, Ryan chose not to kill him. Yet leaving him, Ryan vacillates and imperils his
future and those of his charges, while leaving much unsettled without satisfying resolve.
Additionally Ryan has left Sandhurst to the mercy of fate. War allows a soldier to kill but not murder.
Onus faults to our hero. Spill seed but punch drop Sandhurst cold cock, and the act is complete.
Ryan should have squeezed the trigger, one round in the head, coup de grace.
As Machiavelli advised, do the killing quickly.

 

[LizzieMaine]

(It's somehow comforting that, even with the war news as dismal as it is, there'll always be a place right up front for a juicy celebrity divorce.)

Investigations were underway last night to determine the origin of an explosion yesterday morning which wrecked one of the small buildings of a Staten Island fireworks plant, killing three persons, including one Brooklynite, and critically injuring four others. The blast around 10AM yesterday in one of the buildings of the Unexcelled Manufacturing Company, 1208 RIchmond Avenue, in Graniteville, rattled windows in Port Richmond, more than a mile from the factory. The plant has been working exclusively on War Department contracts for more than a year, manufacturing thermite bombs for use by the armed forces. The Richmond County District Attorney's office, the New York Fire Department, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation have all launched probes of the explosion, and while no official report has yet been released, it is widely believed that the incident was accidental, with police stating that mixing equipment operating on a round-the-clock basis may have overheated, igniting barrels of thermite stored nearby. The explosion blew the roof off the one-story structure, sending the bodies of three men hurtling thru the air. The dead were identified as 27-year-old Michael Diversa of 305 71st Street in Brooklyn, 19-year-old Felix Daly of Graniteville, S. I., and 22-year-old Felix Bexento of West Brighton, S. I.

An American ship twice reported lost in the Far East steamed safely into harbor yesterday and docked in Jersey City, carrying 175 passengers including women and children, missionaries, and four volunteer members of the American Flying Tiger group from Rangoon. The ship, the name of which was not released, was forced to circumnavigate the globe to avoid the war's dislocation of normal shipping lanes. Passengers were reported to be unaware of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7th, and sailed obliviously thru Far Eastern waters that night with lights fully ablaze, and passengers gathered on the boat deck for an outdoor screening of the motion picture "The Great Ziegfeld."

A petition seeking to ban Father Charles E. Coughlin's weekly paper "Social Justice" from the mails as seditious propaganda will be presented to the Postmaster General by former Magistrate Joseph Goldstein. The petition, signed by more than a thousand leading churchmen of various denominations, cites statements made in the paper in opposition to the war effort, and threatening "pogroms in the streets of New York" that would exceed even those that have "crimsoned Europe." Although Father Coughlin has not broadcast since the spring of 1941, his weekly has continued publication from offices in Royal Oak, Michigan.

Mrs. Marie "Dearie" McKeever Mulvey has been chosen Brooklyn's Ideal Mother for 1942. Mrs. Mulvey, owner of a one-quarter share of the Brooklyn Dodgers, is a prominent horsewoman and is active in local charity work. The wife of Mr. James Mulvey, a Dodger vice president and the New York representative for film producer Samuel Goldwyn, and the mother of daughters Marie, age 16, and Anne, age 10, and son Stephen, age 14, and the daughter of the late Stephen W. McKeever, from whom she inherited her Dodger stock, Mrs. Mulvey will be honored on May 10th, Mother's Day, with a dinner at the Hotel Granada. The Mulveys live at 39 Maple Avenue in Flatbush.

("Maple Aveneh!" blurts Sally. "'At's jus' t'nex' block up f'm Midwood Street! I bet my ma KNOWS 'em!" "Nah," says Joe. "'At's allaway oveh onna nice side, oveh by Flatbush Aveneh. Right neah t'Patio, I t'ink." "Well, nex' time we go oveh t'eah, we oughta stop in an' have a tawk wit' Miss's Mulvey. Maybe she'cn tell'at MacPhail what faw!" "What faw what?" sighs Joe. "Faw makin' dopey trades! I bet Miss's Mulvey don' tin'k mucha tradin', oh, playehs who ain' reached te'ah full potent'l." "Nah," replies Joe, "I don' imagine..." "TA PITTSBOIG YET!")

(War Is Hell.)

(Wait'll Leo finds out that young Mr. Reiser is not only a switch-hitter, he can also THROW with either arm.)

Catcher-Outfielder Don Padgett has left the Dodger camp at Daytona Beach, bound for the Army. Padgett, picked up from the Cardinals over the winter for $25,000 to strengthen the Brooklyn outfield, has performed well over training season, but his induction will nullify the trade, with Mr. MacPhail receiving his money back and Padgett again becoming St. Louis property, albeit on loan to Uncle Sam. Padgett received his draft notice earlier this month, and is to be sworn into the Army on April 1st.

(I don't think I've ever heard anyone call her "Hay-dee.")

Hollywood is preparing for the razor blade shortage, with whiskers blooming on the cheeks and chins of various film favorites. Notable among them is boy wonder Orson Welles, who has recently been seen around the film capital sporting a fastidious goatee. Mr. Welles should note, however, that this facial decoration will not save him much in the way of blade steel, given that he still must shave his cheeks. At this stage it seems the only Hollywood personality who has nothing whatever to fear from the blade shortage is Monty Woolley, whose whiskers remain as lush and full as ever.

The mention of Miss Gussie "Looney" Freeman, prominent lady boxer of the '90s, on the Old Timers Page last week brings a flurry of responses from readers who knew Miss Freeman in those days. Reader J. S. remembers her as a "good woman with a big heart," who, when she wasn't taking on all comers in the ring, drove a large truck with a team of horses for the Waterbury Rope Works, "and how she could handle those big coils of rope." J. S. adds that Gussie spent her final years in Broad Channel, where she died about two years ago.

("Buy Defense Bonds?" A time-travel story!)

(Glenn Ford and Rita Hayworth are, in 1942, clandestine lovers, which explains the lock of hair.)

(WHAT AILS YOU MUGS!? I'm surprised we don't hear that more often.)

(Have a good trip, Mary, AND TRY NOT TO BURN THE HOUSE DOWN! And that's a nice plan, Dan, but don't you think it's possible they might just have spare tubes?)

(When you think about it, George really does have a terrible life.)

(John Hix is the arch-rival to Robert L. Ripley in the unbelievable-but-true real facts comics-page genre, and if you squint a little, most of his stuff usually sorta checks out. But I'm not convinced about this head-scratching reindeer business, I'm just not.)

 

[LizzieMaine]

And in the Daily News...

"Lots of people get along without racing stables."

I'm not sure that isn't me in panel two -- I did used to have a hat like that. Maybe I still do. I should look. Anyway, the girl in the fur had onions for lunch and I'm not happy about it.

"I never should have had that bean sandwich and a tall glass of lemonade for lunch."

Oh yes, we did have a plot going here, didn't we.

The sad thing is, he's really good at his job.

I never knew John L. Lewis had a sister.

Ah, a new Sunday storyline! Either it's about Josie's first fumblings of pre-teen romance, or it's about Harold being rejected by the Army for having a rubber spine.

"Yehudi" -- a Jerry Colonna reference. Which makes you wonder just how it is that Pat, who hasn't been stateside in about eight years, is keeping up on his goofy American pop culture.

Not only that, there's going to be a lot of disappointed kids when the Easter Bunny doesn't show up.

"The Gold Bug" by Edgar Allan Poe? Never heard of it.