Today in History

[Lone_Ranger]

Something I found interesting today.

I was looking at the headlines that LizzieMaine post for us, and was wondering if, somewhere there is a December 17th, 1903 headline proclaiming the Wright Brothers first successful powered flight. I did some reading. I found this...

The Wrights sent a telegram about the flights to their father, requesting that he "inform press." However, the Dayton Journal refused to publish the story, saying the flights were too short to be important. Meanwhile, against the brothers' wishes, a telegraph operator leaked their message to a Virginia newspaper, which concocted a highly inaccurate news article that was reprinted the next day in several newspapers elsewhere, including Dayton.[44] The Wrights issued their own factual statement to the press in January. Nevertheless, the flights did not create public excitement—if people even knew about them—and the news soon faded. (In France, however, Aero Club of Paris members, already stimulated by Chanute's reports of Wright gliding successes, took the news more seriously and increased their efforts to catch up to the brothers.)


The more things change. The more the press stays the same.

 

[LizzieMaine]

December 18, 1936

BRUNETTE GETS LIFE

Pleads Guilty to Lindy Law Cop Kidnapping
(Special to The News)

Trenton, Dec. 17 -- Swift G-Man justice put Harry Brunette, Kidnaper No. 172, and the last but two of the current crop, behind bars today for life. In a lightning-like culmination of the bombardment off Riverside Drive, New York, less than sixty-three hours earlier, Brunette pleaded guilty to the kidnaping of State Trooper W. A. (Scotty) Turnbull, and was sentenced immediately.

The entire proceedings, coming two hours after the Federal Grand Jury handed up an indictment, took less than ten minutes. Then, in handcuffs and leg irons, the snarling desperado -- half of whose 25 years were lived in crime -- was sped away for transportation to a federal penitentiary.

The Lindbergh Law, the G-Man instrument that has smashed across state lines to end the terrorism of body snatching, spelled Brunette's doom. He fired his last shot at 2 A. M. Tuesday, when G-Men, raiding his New York apartment with tear gas and tommy guns smoked him out with his hands in the air.

F. D. R., CONGRESS BAR NEW TAXES

(By United Press)

Washington D. C. , Dec. 17 -- There will be no tax increases next year, and every effort will be made to balance the federal budget by 1938, President Roosevelt and his congressional leaders agreed today.

The tax and budget problems were tackled in a busy round of White House conferences as the President sped the shaping of his second-term legislative program for the new Congress convening Jan. 5.

Assurance that no new taxes will be necessary was coupled with indications that some "nuisance" levies might be eliminated and that the 1936 undivided corporate profits tax revised to lighten the burden on small companies.

VANCOUVER WANTS EDWARD AND WALLY

Victoria, B. C., Dec. 17 (UP) -- The Vancouver Island Provincial Association today demanded that Vancouver Island secede from the Dominion of Canada and establish a monarchy with former King Edward Viii and Mrs. Walllis Warfield Simpson as King and Queen.

The now Duke of Windsor was extremely popular in Victoria. He was given enthusiastic receptions in 1919, 1924, and 1927. He spent more time here than any place in Canada and was welcomed by hundreds of retired British army officers and aristocrats.

Vancouver has demanded secession from the Dominion for the past 15 years, but rival factions have defeated the moves.

 

[LizzieMaine]

December 19, 1934

JAPAN SCRAPS NAVY PACT

DEFIANCE OF ALL OTHER NATIONS VOICED

The Associated Press

Tokio, Dec. 19 -- The Japanese government acted today to scrap the Washington naval treaty of 1922 and expressed confidence in its "readiness to meet any situation which might arise" as a result.

In a ceremony regarded as historic, the powerful Privy Council recommended abrogation of the limitation pact to Emperor Hirohito, whose speedy approval is expected. The action in effect constitutes abrogation.

Many Japanese leaders regard the step as the most momentous the country has taken since it entered the World War.

Through the denunciation, the Washington treaty will expire December 21, 1936. For 13 years the pact has held naval programs of the world's great sea powers in check. Building races have been predicted to result from its end.


MAN DIES IN LEAP BEFORE AUTO TRUCK

Lawrence, Dec. 19 -- A man, tentatively identified as Joseph Piccard of Biddeford, Me. died in Lawrence general hospital at 7 a. m. from injuries received in a mysterious auto accident on Lowell street near Merrimack Park, Methuen, last night.

He was believed to be an inmate of the Federal Transient Center at the State Armory. The victim was hit by a truck operated by John M. Jones of Bedford st. , Lawrence.

Jones said he was driving his truck, owned by the Sterling Express Co. at about 30 miles an hour when his headlights picked out the man, standing beside the road. Jones was within 14 feet of him he said, when the man suddenly leaped into the path of the vehicle.

500 IDLE DOPE ADDICTS HERE A CRIME PROBLEM

By Ruth Mugglebee

Boston has between 400 and 500 narcotic addicts and 80 percent of them are unemployed -- forcing them into crime to secure the money with which to feed their craving.

This was the revelation today by Charles A. Burrows, federal supervisor of narcotics for the New England district, who is one of the army of officvials now trying to crush down pedlars and dealers throughout the nation,

If Boston had an institution set aside for the cure of narcotic addicts, Burrows declared, many of the users would voluntarily commit themselves for a cure, but as it is now they fear to seek a cure because of the criminal record which threatens. "It costs an addict from $6 to $8 a day to keep themselves in narcotics," said Burrows. "They get it through shoplifting, stealing, holdups and other forms of crime. They steal anything they get their hands on. I have known cases where addicts have gone into houses and factories and stolen gas ranges and converted them into cash."

PHOTO MADE FOFO SWOON!

SAYS AID IN BURLY SUIT

It was a full house that greeted Madame Fofo Lauka and her former manager Harry Spillios today when the municipal court hearing resumed on Madam Fofo's $50,000 suit against the Park Entertainment, Inc.

Madame Fofo wants the monetary balm for the damage she claims she suffered as the result of having her photograph displayed in the lobby of the Park Theatre last June. The picture was surrounded by a lot of semi-nude burlesque queens, she charges, and the episode did her no end of harm in Greek tragedy circles.

So far the suit has been confined to Spillios's testimony of how upset Madame Fofo got when she saw the picture and how, as a result, she was unable to give more than tow of the ten performances she had contracted to give.

 

[LizzieMaine]

December 20, 1937

F. D. R. ASKS BIG NAVY TO FACE WAR THREAT

By United Press

Washington D. C., Dec. 19 -- President Roosevelt, moving swiftly in the face of war threats from abroad to speed his navy-second-to-none program, tonight asked Congress to approve a new naval program running nearly $50,000,000 ahead of appropriations.

The $576,000,000 program calls for construction of two new super-dreadnaughts and twenty smaller craft. The budget bureau approved the request. The move to increase the Navy's strength indicates that the President, in his desire to economize, had no intention of paring down national defense expenditures.


EIGHT SOVIET CHIEFS FACE FIRING SQUADS

Moscow, Dec. 19 (UP) -- Eight high Soviet Government officials were executed in Moscow today by Red Army firing squads on charges of high treason. Among them was the former Soviet Ambassador to Turkey, Leon Kaharan.

The executions carried past the 1,300 mark the toll of lives of Dictator Josef V. Stalin's purge.


UNKISSED VALET MATE OF HEIRESS NURSES BRUISES

(Special to the News)

Baltimore, Dec. 19 -- The unkissed husband of an heiress to $600,000 was in hiding today, reportedly nursing bruises mysteriously acquired after his elopement with Jane Keyser, 23-year old sister of the man he served as secretary and valet.

The disconsolate Jeeves was Donald Crane, 32, who climaxed and possibly ended his services to William Fenwick Keyser, publisher of the Baltimore Sun, by marrying his employer's Junior League sister at Rockville, on the fringes of nearby Washington.

A policeman at Laurel, where Crane resides and presumably, he was finding solitude and seclusion, said he encountered the bridegroom late Friday a few hours after the wedding ceremony was read by a Presbyterian clergyman. "He looked as if a accident had happened to him," said the officer, "but he didn't have anything to say."


CLEVER WIVES ABLE TO REFORM HUBBIES SLOVENLY IN DRESS

By Doris Blake

"My problem," the girl reports, "is that people feel the man I was planning to marry is not half good enough for me. He cares little for clothes, and his dress, unfortunately, is slovenly and I must admit frankly that he has embarrassed me on several occasions. If he is going to a special place he will dress well and look fine. My mother has been embarrassed on account of his appearance at times too. The persons living around me and certain friends tell my mother that he is not good enough for such a fine girl as her daughter."

It would seem as though a clever girl could take that young man in hand and make him over into the perfect representative of what a well dressed man should look like. It's been done by clever wives. Some have simply disposed of the worn old things and kept the better looking ones in easy reach.

 

[LizzieMaine]

December 21, 1937

DEWEY TRAILS P. R. COUNTERS AS PERJURERS

By Lowell Limpus

Perjury prosecution threatened twenty-eight proportional representation vote counters, who lied about their criminal records, as District Attorney-elect Thomas E. Dewey took their trail last night and the Municipal Civil Service Commission stopped their pay. Meanwhile, the Commission prepared to hold a hearing today in the case of nineteen others. All forty-seven have been charged with crimes ranging from larceny and burglary to forgery and rape. They include seventeen Republicans and thirty Democrats.

Dewey was said to be working underground. It was definitely known that he was aware of the situation and his intimates confidently expected him to go into action as soon as he takes office on Jan. 1.

Civil Service Commissioner Paul J. Kern pointed out that the law prohibits convicted criminals from serving as election officials.


JAPS TRIP UP EACH OTHER IN PANAY REPORT
(By Associated Press)

Shanghai, Dec. 20 -- The Japanese Army today denied it had attacked the United States gunboat Panay, flatly contradicting official American reports that Japanese troops had machine-gunned the sinking warship after it had been bombed by naval planes.

At almost the same time, Major Gen. Kumakichi Harada issued the Army statement in Shanghai, a foreign office spokesman in Tokyo reversed the government's previous stand and admitted Japanese Army craft on the Yangtze River had fired on the Panay.


MAYOR APPOINTS TAXI STRIKE MEDIATOR TO AVOID BLOODSHED

Mayor LaGuardia, acting swiftly on a plea to "avoid bloodshed," yesterday stepped into the growing strike of taxicab drivers. With the wheels of 1,630 of the city's 13,000 hacks stilled in garages, peace conferences will open today at City Hall. The Mayor named Nathan Frankel, director of the Industrial Relations Board, to begin negotiations for a settlement.

The union is demanding a flat guarantee of $15 a week for day drivers and $18 a week for night cabmen, plus 50 percent commission over specified minimum receipts. At present, the men work on straight commission.


WIFE, 15, WINS HER FREEDOM AFTER 3 YEARS

Westchester's youngest bride, Rose Calabrese Scarpa of Armonk became an ex-wife yesterday at age 15.

Supreme Court referee Joseph Morschauser in White Plains granted her an annulment of her marriage to Anthony Scarpa, 30 year old administrator of the estate of Dr. Charles V. Paterno.

Rose, the daughter of an Armonk lunchroom proprietor, not only had her parents' consent, but their co-operation when she married Scarpa in Pawtucket, R. I. on July 5, 1934. She was 12 then, but Rhode Island laws permitted the marriage.

Referee Morschauser ruled that the parents, Mr. and Mrs. Fred Calabrese and the bridegroom "sought to circumvent the laws of New York State without any fault of the infant."

Mrs. Calabrse testified that she insisted on the ceremony when she found Rose and Anthony embracing in her parlor.

 

[LizzieMaine]

December 22, 1937

MYSTERY SEEN AS TED HEALY DIES SUDDENLY

(Special To The News)

Hollywood, Dec. 21 -- The sudden death today of Ted Healy, bald and glowering comedian famous for his stooges, assumed aspects of mystery tonight with reports that he had been severely beaten, a little more than twenty four hours before he died, at the Trocadero Restaurant, Hollywood's premier night spot.

Coroner Frank Nance announced he would perform an inquest after Dr. Wyland Lamont, Healy's physician, refused to sign a certificate of death, Early reports said the comic had died of "a stroke."

From a group of fellow actors came the story tonight of Healy's mysterious beating.

Bobby Burns Berman, New York and Hollywood cafe man, said that Healy sobbing and with tears streaming down his face, approached him early Monday morning as he stood in Vine St. with comedian Joe Frisco and Man-Mountain Dean, motion picture actor and wrestler.

SLUGGED, HE SAYS

"I was slugged out at the Trocadero," Healy told them, Berman said, and exhibited a huge welt on his head.

But he refused to tell who had beaten him or why.

He said he was going for treatment to Dr. Sidney L. Weinberg, who could not be reached at his office tonight.

Reportedly stricken at 3 A. M., Healy died at 11:30 A. M. (3:30 P. M. New York) after oxygen had been administered in a vain attempt to save his life.

Mrs. Healy, the former Betty Hickman, who gave birth to a son on Friday, had not been informed of his death. Her husband had remained at her bedside until only a few hours before he was reportedly stricken.

His latest film, "Hollywood Hotel," was previewed last night.


15 MILLION BOOTLEG CHAIN HERE BROKEN BY 56 INDICTMENTS

By John Crosson

Raids on a $15,000,000 bootleg ring, timed to prevent the flooding of the city with illegal Christmas liquor, resulted yesterday in indictments against fifty-six prisoners, including three policemen and a tax inspector.,

The cleanup, authorities said, spelled destruction to an organization which in the last three years had foisted more than 500,000 gallons of fake whisky upon the public. It revealed surprisingly, that New York -- where you can get a legal drink in almost every block -- is still loaded with speakeasies.


"POISONOUS MUSIC" BANNED BY NAZIS

Berlin, Dec. 21 (UP) -- Nazi authorities moved today to protect Germans from the insidious strains of "poisonous music," with censorship established over all imported musical scores.

It was explained that importation of "harmful music" from abroad would be stopped. The Propaganda Ministry's music department will do the work, aiming particularly against jazz, the works of Jewish composers, and modernistic music.


VOICE OF THE PEOPLE

Boys Want Tips!

Manhattan: We are a couple of telegraph messengers working for a lousy $10 to $12 a week. Why doesn't the public loosen up with a nickel or dime now and then? Why, some cheapjacks even wait for a penny change!
-- MOURNING MESSENGERS

 

[LizzieMaine]

December 23, 1936

WIFE BEGINS $30,000,000 RANSOM PARLEY FOR CHIANG

Guarantee of Captor's Safety Demanded

(Copyright 1936 by United Press)

Shanghai, Wednesday Dec, 23 -- Mei-ling Soong, most beautiful woman in China, began dickering today with a one-time opium addict, Marshal Chang Hsuch-Liang, for the ransom of her kidnaped husband, Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek, dictator of more than 300,000,000 Chinese.

What terms she has made, or has hoped to make, with the former Manchurian war lord only those involved in the garish drama know, but reports from Tokyo fixed the payment at the unprecedented sum of $30,000,000. In addition, it was believed Madame Chiang would guarantee Marshal Chang's personal safety after her husband's release./

A part of the record-breaking ransom was reportedly coming direct from the coffers of the family of Soong, wealthiest in all China. The rest was being provided by the Central China Government, of which Chiang is the head.


CHURCH OPENS FRESH ATTACK UPON EDWARD

London, Dec. 22 -- The wrath of the Church of England against Edward VIII, already unleashed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, mounted tonight with an even more stinging arraignment of the abdicated monarch by the Archbishop of York, who charged that Edward had dishonored himself as King and Christian.

The ex-sovereign's decision to abandon his throne for love of Mrs. Wallis Simpson was flatly termed by the second-ranking Anglican prelate as a decision which is "not taken by men of honor."


TIPSY WOMEN WITH GEMS TO GET COP GUARD

A special bureau was organized by the Police Department yesterday to look after wealthy ladies who have more jewelery than good sense.

It's something new in crime prevention for women who insist on getting so tight on bubbly water or plain booze that they lose grip on the baubles dangling around their throats.

An epidemic of jewel robberies culminating in the attack on Mrs. Emile E. C. Mathis in front of the swank Hotel Plaza early Sunday has brought about the new technique. Instead of a tear for every smile on Broadway, there's to be a cop for every jewel bedecked woman.

Now when a gentlewoman has a few hundred thousand scintillating around her neck and little men in yellow slickers are whirling around her head, all she has to do is call Police Headquarters. In no time at all, a police car will be at the lady's favorite night club to convey her to her apartment or hotel.


THE INQUIRING FOTOGRAPHER

The News Will Pay $5 for Every Question Accepted. Today's Award Goes to Mrs. B. Sable, 2056 Grand Av. Brooklyn.

THE QUESTION

Would you rather be Shirley Temple or Princess Elizabeth?

THE PLACE

Second Av. and E 64th Street

Pauline Wagner, E 46th St., age 13: "Shirley Temple! If I were Shirley Temple, I could do anything I want. A princess like Elizabeth must do as she's told, and it's no fun to live like that."

Marion Fusco, First Av., age 13: "Princess Elizabeth is going to be the Queen of England, and that's much better than being an actress. And her sons and daughters will be kings and queens after her!"

Sally Aiello, E. 49th St., age 8: "I'd much rather be Shirley Temple! I just love her. She's so cute and such a fine little actress. She is better than most women actresses. I don't like Princess Elizabeth, because she looks so stuck up. I bet she has a swelled head and has to be spanked when she's naughty."

 

[LizzieMaine]

December 24, 1937

FORD CONVICTED BY LABOR BOARD, DEFIES ITS EDICT

(Special to The News)

Detroit, Dec. 23 -- Henry Ford announced his defiance of the National Labor Relations Board today with a statement that his motor company will not cease anti-union activities unless the United States Circuit Court of Appeals rejects an appeal.

The statement was issued while Dearborn police were arresting 120 members of the United Automobile Workers of America for distributing the union's newspaper at Ford's vast River Rouge plant. The arrests followed 184 made a week ago on the grounds that they violated a city ordinance forbidding "hawking" or "distributing" in the area.

The Ford announcement, issued by Harry H. Bennett, chief of company police, included a categorical denial of the Labor Board's charges that thugs were hired to intimidate union members.


NRLB FLAYS FORD'S "BRUTALITY" TO UNION

Washington D. C., Dec. 23 -- In the most important industrial ruling of the New Deal, the Ford Motor Company was found guilty today by the National Labor Relations Board of wholesale, persistent, and savage violations of the Wagner Labor Relations Act.

The sweeping order cited the long anti-labor record of Henry Ford and was weighted down with eye witness testimony about the brutality of the Ford Service Department toward labor organizers. The federal authorities bore down more heavily on the world's greatest manufacturing company than in any other instance since the creation of the Labor Board.


U. S. RAIDS SNOOTY DRESS SHOP, ACTS TO STRIP RICH CLIENTS

By John Crosson and Neil Patterson

Scores of Park Avenue matrons who have purchased Paris frocks and gowns from the New York branch of Marcel Rochas, Parisian couturier, since its owpning at 32 E. 67th St. last Sept. 28, face summonses to exhibit their new finery in the United States Attorney's Office. If it is proved that no customs duty was paid on the gowns, then Mme. Park Avenue and her sisters may prepare to part with the Rochas pretties at once, Assistant U. S. Attorney Joseph L. Delaney indicated last night.

For your Uncle Sam, who keeps a jealous eye on customs revenue due him, has displayed a deplorable lack of sympathy with the announced purposes of M. Rochas. Recently he proclaimed he was opening his New York house for the "glorifying of the American woman," and to bring to her in materialistic New York the so-lovely Parisian dainties of which she has been deprived. Uncle Sam, to bare the cold stark facts, raided the maison of the altruistic M. Rochas on Dec. 15, The News has learned, and stripped from the place every article of French make that a customs squad under Agent Gordon H. Pike could find.

Sixty-eight gowns, intended to sell at $100 to $1000 were carted away, along with suits and other imported articles having a total value of $20,000. No duty had been paid on any of the clothing siezed.


MAE'S NAME BARRED FROM NBC STATIONS

Mention of the name of Mae West was forbidden yesterday over stations operated by the embarrassed National Broadcasting Company.

Red-faced over the deluge of protests after Miss West's appearance with jolly Charlie McCarthy on Dec. 12, NBC applied the ban to prevent comics from making capital of her broadcast.


VOICE OF THE PEOPLE

Gents In Beauty Parlors

Newark, N. J. -- As an experienced hair dresser, I wish these women would discourage male hairdressers and leave the work to us women who know how to do it properly. But I suppose as long as we have a lot of empty heads wanting permanent waves, we lady hairdressers will have to put up with male competietion -- VETERAN HAIRDRESSER

Pigeon Poachers

Bronx -- Just a piece of my mind to the dirty low-down skunks who recently stole three of my pigeons. You rats must be the kind who would go around taking pennies off kids in the street. -- JOSEPH FORMISANO

 

[Mike K.]

The Christmas Truce: December 24-25, 1914

Not many people have heard the story of the Christmas Truce of World War I. Military leaders have not gone out of their way to publicize it. The story lives, fortunately, because countless soldiers' letters home (in a time before military censorship) and a few photographs tell the tale....

During World War I, on and around Christmas Day 1914, the sounds of rifles firing and shells exploding faded in a number of places along the Western Front in favor of holiday celebrations in the trenches and gestures of goodwill between enemies.

Starting on Christmas Eve, German and British troops sang Christmas carols to each other from across the lines, and at certain points the Allied soldiers even heard brass bands joining the Germans in their joyous singing.

At the first light of dawn on Christmas Day, some German soldiers emerged from their trenches and approached the Allied lines across No Man's Land, calling out "Merry Christmas" in their enemies' native tongues. At first, the Allied soldiers feared it was a trick, but seeing the Germans unarmed they climbed out of their trenches and shook hands with the enemy soldiers. The soldiers enjoyed meeting their unseen enemies and were surprised to discover that they were more alike than previously thought. The men exchanged presents of cigarettes and plum puddings. They sang Christmas carols, exchanged photographs of loved ones back home, shared rations, even roasted some pigs. There was even a documented case of soldiers from opposing sides playing a good-natured game of soccer until the ball deflated after striking a barbed wire entanglement. The soldiers embraced men they had been trying to kill just a few short hours before.

Along with the revelry that celebrated Christmas some soldiers used the short-lived ceasefire for a more somber task, the retrieval and burial of the bodies of fellow combatants who had fallen between the lines. Many of the dead had been there for several months. Soldiers from both sides appeared in No Man's Land and sorted through the bodies, and in a few instances joint services were held for both the British and German dead.

The so-called Christmas Truce of 1914 came only months after the outbreak of war in Europe and was never again repeated. It served as heartening proof, however brief, that beneath the brutal clash of weapons the soldiers' essential humanity endured.

 

[carouselvic]

Christmas In The Trenches

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9coPzDx6tA

 

[LizzieMaine]

December 25, 1937

BANK GANG KIDNAPS BABY AND 3 OTHERS, FAILS TO GET LOOT

(Special to The News)

Centerville, Ind. Dec 24 -- A bank robbery attempt that went sour led to the kidnaping of four persons, one the three-year-old son of the bank cashier, a pistol duel between pursuers and kidnapers, and a wild ride through Indiana for 18-year-old Norma Schroy, nursemaid, and the boy, John Bryan Jr.

Tactics used in a previous Indiana bank robbery were employed by the two kidnapers. They appeared at the home of John L. Bryan, cashier of the Centerville State Bank, shortly before 3 o'clock this afternoon. Mrs. Bryan and the nursemaid were alone in the house with the baby. One of the men entered the house and at gunpoint demanded Mrs. Bryan telephone her husband and ask that $3,800 be sent to her at once. The other man remained in front of the house in a large green sedan.

Terrified, and fearing harm to the baby, Mrs. Bryan complied. The tone of her voice as well as her request aroused the suspicions of the bank president, who sounded the alarm.

Then things happened fast. Residents of this small town of 1,200 poured into the streets from all sides and began racing for the Bryan home. Julian Dunbar, a grocer, arrived first. He was unarmed. A bandit, at pistol point, forced Dunbar into the green sedan with the nursemaid and baby. Then others arrivesd, led by Bryan and bank manager Mark Stevens. Shots were exchanged, but the car sped away.

Mrs Bryan and Dunbar were were released a half hour later about ten miles west of Centerville. Shortly before 7 o'clock the girl and baby were released at the home of a farmer, who drove them back to Centerville.

The bandits remain at large.


BOMBERS ON A MIDNIGHT CLEAR BLAST BETHLEHEM SILENT NIGHT

Bethlehem, Dec. 24 (UP) British bombers and steel-helmeted troops ranged across the hills of Galilee tonight to stamp out bloodshed and terrorism, beneath the stars that shone upon the Christ child's manger 2,000 years ago.

Military authorities of the Holy Land, where terrorism and Jewish-Arab strife have claimed hundreds of thousands of lives during the past two years, attempted to surround a band of Arabs near ancient Tiberias in Lower Galilee. Shepherds guarding their flocks on the limestone slopes gazed in awe as the planes dropped bombs which killed eighteen Arab terrorists outside Tiberias, close by the sea of Galilee.


NEW LEGS GIVE INJURED GIRL GAY HOLIDAY

"It's a merrier Christmas than I ever expected to see again!"

With these words, beautiful Jessie Simpson, 19, who lost both legs in a train accident last April, walked bravely among Christmas Eve shoppers last night -- on artificial legs. Walking unaided except for a cane, the brave young woman went about Christmas chores gaily. "I am going to the hairdresser, and then I'll trim the Christmas tree," she told a photographer, who called to see how the courageous young woman would spend the holidays.


JANE WITHERS GETS $1,000 WEEK RAISE

Hollywood, Dec. 24 (UP) -- Jane Withers, the perfectly poisonous brat of the movies, became one of the biggest-paid child stars of filmdom today with a Christmas boost in salary to $2,000 a week.

The 20th Century Fox studio gave her a new contract after the Atlanta girl's mother unsuccessfully fought for her to accept a tentative $400,000 radio offer.

 

[Lone_Ranger]

Not many people have heard the story of the Christmas Truce of World War I. Military leaders have not gone out of their way to publicize it. The story lives, fortunately, because countless soldiers' letters home (in a time before military censorship) and a few photographs tell the tale....

During World War I, on and around Christmas Day 1914, the sounds of rifles firing and shells exploding faded in a number of places along the Western Front in favor of holiday celebrations in the trenches and gestures of goodwill between enemies.

Starting on Christmas Eve, German and British troops sang Christmas carols to each other from across the lines, and at certain points the Allied soldiers even heard brass bands joining the Germans in their joyous singing.

At the first light of dawn on Christmas Day, some German soldiers emerged from their trenches and approached the Allied lines across No Man's Land, calling out "Merry Christmas" in their enemies' native tongues. At first, the Allied soldiers feared it was a trick, but seeing the Germans unarmed they climbed out of their trenches and shook hands with the enemy soldiers. The soldiers enjoyed meeting their unseen enemies and were surprised to discover that they were more alike than previously thought. The men exchanged presents of cigarettes and plum puddings. They sang Christmas carols, exchanged photographs of loved ones back home, shared rations, even roasted some pigs. There was even a documented case of soldiers from opposing sides playing a good-natured game of soccer until the ball deflated after striking a barbed wire entanglement. The soldiers embraced men they had been trying to kill just a few short hours before.

Along with the revelry that celebrated Christmas some soldiers used the short-lived ceasefire for a more somber task, the retrieval and burial of the bodies of fellow combatants who had fallen between the lines. Many of the dead had been there for several months. Soldiers from both sides appeared in No Man's Land and sorted through the bodies, and in a few instances joint services were held for both the British and German dead.

The so-called Christmas Truce of 1914 came only months after the outbreak of war in Europe and was never again repeated. It served as heartening proof, however brief, that beneath the brutal clash of weapons the soldiers' essential humanity endured.

That's a great story. There was a special on the History Channel last night.

 

[LizzieMaine]

December 26, 1936

CHIANG FREE, CHANG FLIES WITH HIM 'TO FACE MUSIC'

(By Associated Press)

Nanking, Dec. 25 -- Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek was released "unconditionally" today by Marshal Chang Hsueh-Liang, his captor for fourteen days. Tonight, Chiang, with Marshal Chang, was en route to Nanking where Chang will "face the music."

This dramatic turn, which reversed the roles of captor and prisoner, was announced officially by the Government through its highest executive organ, the Executive Yuan (Council.) No ransom was paid, the announcement said.

News of the Generalissimo's release was received jubilantly as word spread throughout the nation. It was greeted as marking an end to the ominous crisis which for nearly a fortnight had hung over China, with the threat of civil war and destruction of all the painful work of unification carried forward under Chiang's leadership.


EDWARD IN PULPIT ANSWERS CHURCH CRITICS FROM BIBLE

Worshipers Amazed When Ex-King Reads Story of Bethlehem

(By United Press)

Vienna, Dec. 25 -- Edward, former King of England, replied piously to his critics today when he stepped into the pulpit of Vienna's little English church and read the Christmas story of "Good Will Toward Men." Worshipers, several of whom were Americans, stared in amazement when he appeared suddenly before them and began reading from the second chapter of St. Luke.

Many in the congregation were convinced that Edward, who gave up the throne of England for "the woman I love," was demonstrating that despite the attacks heaped upon him by the Church of England, he intends to remain devout.

VOICE OF THE PEOPLE

Petting In Public

Brooklyn -- I am 16 and believe me, I enjoy a good necking party once in a while as much as anybody. I don't think there is anything wrong with petting, but I do think boys and girls should try to pick less crowded spots for petting than movie houses. --- HOWARD

Finds Beauty Scarce

Manhattan -- Listen, Handsome Usher, we girls don't want you to speak to us, as you accuse us in the Voice of doing. I've only seen one handsome usher in my life, anyway. -- LIL

 

[LizzieMaine]

December 30, 1936

MOTHER RADIOS TO KIDNAPER TO PROTECT SON FROM COLD

Cops Leave Way Open For Contact As Mystery Ad Is Printed

(Special to The News)

Tacoma, Wash., Dec. 29 -- To the mad kidnaper who signed himself "Tim" on a note demanding $28,000 ransom, Mrs. William W. Mattson today addressed an urgent radio appeal that he protect the health of her 10 year old son Charles, who was kidnaped from the Mattson home Sunday night. Her anxiety was increased by the sudden arrival of cold and snow throughout the Northwest.

The wealthy Tacoma surgeon's wife broadcast the following message to the suspected maniac and drug addict who holds her boy a captive:

"Save my boy from harm. Keep him warm. He has just had a severe cold."

Charles was clad only in overalls and a shirt when he was seized by the masked gunman. The boy had also just had a warm bath before being carried off by the bearded, swarthy abductor into a drizzling rain.

The revelation that the kidnaper used the name of Tim came from a high police official tonight. At the same time, a cryptic advertisement which might have been Dr. Mattson's first overture to the kidnaper, appeared in the classified columns of a Seattle newspaper. The advertisement, similar to many that appeared during kidnaping's heyday, read "MABEL -- PLEASE GIVE US YOUR ADDRESS."

Neither G-men nor police would comment, however, on its possible significance.


POPE DOOMED TO LIFE ABED, PAIN GROWING

Vatican City, Dec. 29 (UP) -- Vatican authorities tonight abandoned hope that Pope Pius XI ever would be able to leave his bed again, even though he survives the crisis of his illness. Alarm spread when it was revealed that His Holiness, who is 72, was growing steadily worse.

No Vatican official would admit that the Pontiff was approaching the crisis of his long illness, but he was known to be suffering agonizing pain from varicose veins which burst during the day. His ailment is complicated by neuritis and asthma.


PINCUS EVADES RACKET TRIAL BY DEATH LEAP

Fear of the law, by which he was to be tried Monday with 13 others as leaders of New York's $2,000,000-a-year restaurant racket caused Max Pincus, 56, to jump to his death from the fifth story window of his apartment yesterday.

A few hours before, Pincus, president of the Delicatessen Workers Union, Local 302, made wild threats of self-destruction in an incoherent speech at a union meeting. He said he was looking for a building to jump off from, and declared "if there was an electric chair across the street I'd walk over and sing."


VOICE OF THE PEOPLE

Respect For Janitors

Manhattan: Say, listen, Revengeful Reader: I think you have the wrong slant on janitors in this city of ours. If you had to clean up after disgusting tenants, you would change your attitude. If the janitors receive any tips from tenants, which they rarely do, they righteously earn them because most landlords pay janitors starvation wages and give them ratholes to live in. -- PROUD EX-JANITOR

They Pet In Public

Brooklyn: To Howard, who says lovers shouldn't pet in public -- say, Howard, have you ever been in love? If you have, you must know that when in love you don't care where you are or what you are doing. So mind your own business and you won't notice the petters billing and cooing around you.
-- MOVIE HOUSE PETTERS

 

[LizzieMaine]

January 3, 1935

LINDBERGH ARMED IN COURT; PANIC SIEZES HAUPTMANN

by Martin Sommers, Staff Correspondent of The News

Flemington N. J., Jan.2 -- The life of Charles Augustus Lindbergh has been threatened and because of personal danger he wore a revolver strapped under his arm when he came into court here today to aid the State in avenging the murder of his son, Charles Augustus Lindbergh Jr. by sending Bruno Richard Hauptmann to the electric chair. With his right hand sometimes tight around the outlines of the gun where it bulged in his coat, the world hero sat only eight feet away from Hauptmann.

Not once did the father of the slain kidnapped baby permit himself to look at the furtive, peaked German carpenter he wants to see executed. But from time to time, as the slow selection of jurors grew tedious with technicalities, the clean-cut features of Lindbergh grew grim, and his hand on the outside of his coat closed over the deadly weapon beneath. Time and again he shifted its position, as it lay in the holster over his heart.

Throughout the entire court session, while ten of the twelve jurors who will decide the fate of the stony-eyed Hauptmann were selected and approved, only two policemen were in the eight foot stretch between him and Lindbergh. One was athletic Colonel H. Norman Schwarzkopf, directly on the armed aviator's left, and the other was a uniformed State trooper, with a gun on his hip and a bandolier of cartidges slung around him.

The jurors selected -- four women and six men, typical folk of the New Jersey countryside --- are subject to further challenges. They spent last night under lock and key at the old-fashioned, rural Union Hotel, and were admonished to read no newspapers and to shun the radio. Fifty-seven of Lindbergh's fellow citizens in the Jersey hinterland were examined yesterday. The remaining ninety-three talesmen of the Hauptmann panel will be present when the court convenes today.



JAFSIE AVOIIDS TRIAL TO HUNT MICE IN HOME

by Julia McCarthy

Dr. John F. (Jafsie) Condon, mysteriously absent yesterday from Bruno Hauptmann's trial for the Lindbergh baby kidnap-killing, stayed at home yesterday to conduct a mouse hunt.

The wits of the retired educator and intermediary in the payment of the ransom were pitted against the tiny pest that took up annoying Jafsie when reporters left off at his Bronx home at noon.

Dr. Condon withheld his opinion as to whether Hauptmann is guilty, refused to say whether or not he had identified him as the "John" to whom he handed over $50,000 of Col. Lindbergh's money in a Bronx cemetary, but admitted he "might" attend the Flemington trial today.

Sources close to the investigation have said that Jafsie, after previously refusing to say "yes" or "no" about Hauptmann, had provided the State with a strong link in the chain of circumstantial evidence by identifying the accused Bronx carpenter.


JURY WOMEN PLEASE WIFE OF PRISONER

by Grace Robinson, Staff Correspondent of The News

Flemington, N. J., Jan. 2 -- The opening day of the Lindbergh trial was one of reassurance to Mrs. Anna Hauptmann, frightened wife of this generation's most notorious murder defendant. Her first wish, that women who've had children should be among the dozen citizens to sit in judgement on her husband, was gratified early during the tense proceedings in Hunterdon County's antiquated little courtroom.

"Is she a mother," whispered Mrs. Hauptmann hoarsely when Mrs. Rosie Pill from Califon, N. J. was seated as Juror No. 2, first woman to be selected for an official place in the box. Assured that the plump Mrs. Pill had progeny, Mrs. Hauptmann nodded with satisfaction and the drooping lines around her mouth lifted slightly.


VOICE OF THE PEOPLE

Lindbergh Forebodings

Jersey City, N. J. -- Personally I've read so much about the Lindbergh kidnaping before the trial that I am taking the actual trial news very calmly. I hope justice will be done, but I am prepared for the worst. Our habit of postponing criminal trials until after all the politicians have squeezed the last drop of publicity out of it, and all the papers have had a field day, is pretty tough on justice. Had this crime been committed in England, the trial would have been over within a few days after the arrest, with a minimum of excitement and ballyhoo. -- L. P. T.

 

[LizzieMaine]

January 4, 1937

UNION THREATENS STRIKES IN 69 GEN. MOTORS PLANTS

Flint, Mich. Jan. 3 (U.P.) -- Labor leaders drafted an ultimatum to the General Motors Corporation today warning the company that it must negotiate on eight union demands -- including collective bargaining -- or face a general strike in all of its sixty-nine plants, employing 275,000. "If General Motors refuses to deal with us, there will be a general strike call," said President Homer Martin of the United Automobile Workers of America after a conference of union represntatives from ten cities.

The demands to be submitted to Alfred P. Sloan Jr., president of General Motors, included:

1. A national conference between heads of G. M. C. and representatives of the union to bargain on the following points:

2. Abolition of all piece work.

3. Thirty-six hour work week, six hour day, and time and a half for overtime.

4. A minimum rate of pay.

5. Reinstatement of all employees who have been discharged for union activity.

6. Senorirty system based on length of service.

7. Recognition of International Union, United Auto Workers, as sole bargaining agency between G. M. C. and its employees.

8. Readjustment downward of present speed of operation of assembly lines.

Meanwhile, sit-down strikers in two Fisher Body plants spent a quiet day after General Motors backed down on its announced intention to enforce with gas bombs an injunction directing the strikers and their officers to vacate the plants. Sherrif Thomas Woolcott of Genesee County refused to force the men from the plant without bench warrants.


NAZIS AGAIN SEIZE SHIP OFF SPAIN

London, Jan. 2 (U. P.) -- Danger of a general war in Europe, arising from interference of foreign countries in Spain's civil strife, increased tonight as the commander of German naval forces in Spanish waters followed a virtual ultimatum to the Loyalist government by seizing antother ship.

Only a few hours after the Valencia government refused to accede to a demand from the commander of the Nazi cruiser Koenigsberg for the surrender of the cargo of the German steamer Palos, the German made good his threat. He siezed the Mata Junquera, carrying foodstuffs to Santander, a few miles off the coast, despite the presence of Loyalist submarines in the vicinity.


ACTOR'S DEATH CALLED SUICIDE FOR LOST LOVE

Hollywood, Jan. 3 (A. P.) -- The death of Ross Alexander, rising young film actor, was pronounced a suicide today by police, who concluded that he had shot himself in despondency over the suicide of his beautiful actress-wife Aleta Freile a little over a year ago.

Despite his subsequent marriage last Sept. 16 to the lovely Anne Nagel, also an actress, the former Rochester N. Y. youth had never ceased to grieve over Aleta's death, investigators were told. It is believed she killed herself in a fit of despondency because she could not get film roles, while Alexander kept getting better ones.


VOICE OF THE PEOPLE

For Sainthood

Manhattan: After long thought I offer for canonization by the people one who has accomplished more for the womanhood of the world than any other woman of the last century -- Margaret Sanger, president of the American Birth Control League -- LEO JR.

Says it's Saccharine

Manhattan: Lemons to a darn fresh girl who has different beaux all the time but whenever she invites a beau to her house, she asks her dad can she go out tonight in a voice more sweet and innocent than a farmer's daughter, and father says yes, and the poor sap beau thinks she always asks her dad's permission for a date, and is a lovely gentle girl -- which she ain't.
-- WILLIE FOREST

Doctor In The House

Manhattan: Dammit, these double feature programs make me sick. I demand that every movie house keep a doctor on the premises to promise to take care of all of us who are made ill by the tripe co-feature. -- GENE LORD

Man Outmanned?

Newark, N. J.: Why, indeed, should men give up their seats on public conveyances to so-called ladies, when we know the women can all outdrink us, outswear us, and tell two dirty jokes for every one we know? -- DISGUSTED

 

[LizzieMaine]

January 5, 1934

NURSE SUES AMES ESTATE FOR $250,000

A $250,000 suit based on her love for her dead sweetheart, Frederick Lothrop Ames, millionaire socialite victim of a plane crash a year ago, was filed in Suffolk County yesterday by Miss Katherine Armstrong, Beacon Hill nurse, who at the time of the famed flier's death revealed their secret romance.

The suit is brought against Edith C. C. Cutler, mother of the dead aviator and the Old Colony Trust Company, executors of the estate.

In her suit, Miss Armstron declares Ames made a secret will in her favor bequeathing her $100,000 in the event of his death. This will was handed over to her by Ames shortly before his death. She quotes him as saying on that occasion, "Sweetheart, it's all fixed up. Here's the will, and you get $100,000 if I die."

This will, Miss Armstrong says, has been lost or destroyed and cannot now be produced.

In her suit, she seeks $100,000 for "services performed," and an additional $100,000 for alleged breach of agreement. The agreement, she discloses, concerns the lost will which Ames made in her favor after they had mutually agreed to marriage as soon as he could procure a divorce from his wife.


BARE WHOOPEE AT NORFOLK

Probe New Year Jail Revels

Astounded by reports of a New Year's Eve whoopee party at Norfolk State Prison colony, and information that inmates got drunk inside the prison, that scores of prisoners had greeted the New Year by smashing 50 panes of glass, and that 60 men went on strike the next day because they were served stew for dinner, Frederick J. Dillon, state commissioner of correction, made a rush visit to the colony yesterday, there to begin a rush investigation.

According to the report brought to the commissioner, the convict celebration began when three prisoners got drunk on a mixture of lemon extract, raspberry syrup, and ether.


BAILEY ABSOLVES SHORE OF BLAME

Glad To Hear Star is Reinstated

Irvin "Ace" Bailey, injured Toronto hockey star, now at the city hospital, took a star part in the reinstatement of Eddie Shore, eligible to play Jan. 28.

Bailey, on the road to complete recovery, but out of the winter ice sport, forever absolved the Bruins star of blame for the almost fatal accident.

The brain surgeon who performed the delicate operations on the Maple Leaf star allowed Irvin to grant an interview yesterday, the first since he was hurt so badly on Dec. 12. "I didn't see Eddie and he didn't see me, and we crashed. That's all," said Bailey.

 

[Feraud]

This is a great thread!
The petting in public piece was funny.

 

[LizzieMaine]

January 6, 1934

$250,000 FENWAY PARK FIRE

700 Escape 5-Alarm Blaze

A quarter of a million dollar 5-alarm fire swept through Fenway Park yesterday afternoon, quickly ruining new construction at the Red Sox home grounds, leaped across narrow Landsdowne st., to ignite five other buildings, and for a time threatened the entire Kenmore sq. section.

Fed by huge piles of oil-soaked canvas and stacks of lumber used in concrete construction, the flames made an enormous bonfire in the heart of the Back Bay, terrifying hundreds of residents of the district.

Billowing clouds of thick black smoke from a burning tire storehouse across Landsdowne St., beaten down by the heavy rain, hung close to the ground throughout the section, hampering firemen who at times could not tell how far the fire had spread. Landsdowne st. was a veritable cavern of flame at the height of the fire, with the ball park and a garage on one side, and four buildings on the other sending up showers of flames and swirling embers.

The fire was caused by explosion of a stove used in drying out new concrete which set fire to a pile of oil-soaked canvas beneath the new center field stand. Within two minutes all the wooden false-work holding the new concrete structure was burning like tinder, and the flames reached the top of the stands. Workmen scrambled for their lives, and many had narrow escapes as the waxed wooden forms burned fiercely, and a long derrick boom toppled with a crash onto the field. The fire spread along the fences and into the new left and right field bleachers, fed by the scrap lumber and canvas being used on the construction job.

Early reports that some of the older workmen on the job had been trapped by the first rush of the flames led firemen and doctors from City Hospital who had arrived with ambulances to don gas masks and grope through the structure in an extensive hunt. They found no one.

With the fire under control late yesterday afternoon, a new menace arose as the piers and walls of the new bleachers, bulged by the terrific heat, bulged toward Landsdowne st. The street was roped off. Much of the concrete in the new construction is still green, and it is feared that the burning away of the wooden supports, together with the terrific heat, may cause the structure to collapse.

Work of reconstruction of the home of Boston's American League team was commenced in October. It was nearly completed, at a cost to Tom Yawkey, young millionaire owner of the Red Sox, of approximately $750,000. The grandstand of the famous park was saved, although at the start of the fire it appeared that the entire plant was doomed. Much of the old wooden construction had been torn down to make way for the new concrete bleachers, which undoubtedly prevented a more serious blaze.


HOLD UP EGG CO. FOR $1000

Gunmen Lock 2 In Ice Box

Covering two employees with revolvers and then shutting them up in an ice box, two masked bandits robbed the Standard Egg Co. of Commercial st. of $1000 in cash late yesterday.

Both bandits were armed and had handkerchiefs covering their faces. The holdup pair, described as young and well dressed, climbed the stairs to the second floor, where the egg concern has its offices, and leveled revolvers at Saul Perlmutter, cashier and part owner of the company, who was in the cash cage.

"You keep quiet and do what we tell you to," they warned Perlmutter. "If you don't you'll be packed up and carried out in a crate."

They marched Perlmutter toward the back of the shop, where the ice box is located, and on the way met George Weisman, an egg candler. They menaced Weisman with their guns, and made him put up his hands. Then they hurled both men into the ice box and barricaded its doors with egg crates. Then they took $1000 from the cash drawer. The money was all in envelopes and represented the day's collections of the concern.


FAY CALLED GOLD DIGGER -- AND HOW!

New York, Jan. 5 -- Fay Webb, raven tressed daughter of a chief of police, who jumped into fame when she became the bride of Rudy Vallee, New England crooner, was described as a gold-digger whose indiscretions were so flagrant that Rudy could sue for divorce in any state of the Union, in a scorching denunciation in the Appellate Division courts today.

From Hoboken to Los Angeles, and from Bangor to New Orleans, she tripped the primrose path with her boy friend, though still the wife of the famnous radio, stage, and screen star, and though she was still accepting his weekly alimony checks.

These were the statements today when the Appellate division of the Supreme Court took under advisement Mrs. Vallee's appeal from Justice Wasservogel's decision that Rudy could sue Fay for divorce when and where he cared.

"Get the dough while the getting is good, and make hay while the sun shines!" This was the sage advice of Fay's boy friend, according to Sam Gottlieb, counsel for Vallee. "Mrs. Vallee is not the wronged wife, oh no, far from it. She is the wrong doer. Why, the telephone conversation between her and her adagio dancer and former school mate are sufficient to show what she is. Rudy treated her wonderfully well in giving her a $90,000 home in California and $100 weekly temporary allowance. But she had this paramour who told her she was foolish to take $100 when she could easily get $400."

These were only part of the charges Gottlieb was able to bare in open court. There were scores more, but Mrs. Vallee's attorney, Benjamin A. Hartstein, scored a point when he had them impounded.

Gary Leon, the adagio dancer whose name has been linked to Fay, was married to Marian Mitchell, a former Broadway restaurant dancer, in Detroit three weeks ago. The marriage was one at which the guests paid to be present, for it took place on the stage of a theatre, with a symphony orchestra, bridesmaids, best man, uniformed ushers, and a 250 paying customers.

 

[LizzieMaine]

January 8, 1937

4TH SLAYER SAVED; TWO GO TO CHAIR

The fourth of Brooklyn's six holdup killers was saved from the electric chair at 5:30 P. M. yesterday by Gov. Herbert H. Lehman, but two others were doomed to die at 11 P. M.

Salvatore Scata, 19, youngest of the gang which killed Edwin Esposito for $230 in B. M. T. collections, escaped with life imprisonment because he told on his accomplices and made possible their convictions.

The Governor grimly refused to interfere with the executin of Joseph "Tough Guy" Bologna, 24, triggerman of the holdup murder. Theodore Di Donne, 31, also failed of clemency. The commutation of sentence sent Scata to share the fate of Dominick Zizzo, 27, Samuel Kimmel, 22, and Eugene Bruno, 22. Their sentences were commuted to life imprisonment on Wednesday.


STRIKERS REFUSE TO QUIT PLANTS; SHUTDOWN GROWS

Detroit, Jan. 7 (A.P.) -- General Motors and the United Automobile Workers of America refused to retreat from their stands on "sit-down" strikes tonight in the face of impending shutdowns of more plants and the appearance of counter-strike activity.

Fist fights broke out at the personnel gate of the Chevrolet Motor Company plant in Flint late today, involving union and non-union employees. The fight started when someone pulled down a sound amplifier which was carrying a speech by an organizer for the U. A. W. A. to employees leaving the plant. Police said they were told non-union workers were angry because the factory will be shut down Friday night,

Gov. Frank Murphy of Michigan joined Federal Department of Labor concilators without success today in efforts to bring leaders of the corporation and the union together. Their efforts broke on this point: "Should sit-down strikers occupying Fisher Body Company plants withdraw without assurance the company will not resume operations or remove equipment?"


COPS LIST AIR RIFLES OWNED BY CHILDREN

A roundup of all air rifles given to children of the neighborhood on Christmas Day was ordered yesterday by Capt. Bernard Moore of the West 152nd Street Station. He condemned the "B. B." guns as a menace to the public's eyesight.

"The law prohibits the sale of air rifles to children under the age of 16," Capt. Moore said, "but some parents are not aware of the dangers of such weapons." Neighbors were requested to notify the police in cases where parents fail to report that their sons have air guns. Two officers were assigned to collect the guns.

The drive was spurred by the plight of Joseph Di Alto, 16, who may lose his left eye because a playmate accidentally shot him with an air rifle Wednesday near his home, 183 Lake St., Brooklyn. Di Alto is in Coney Island Hospital. If doctors fail to save the wounded eye, he will be completely blind, as another accident cost him his other eye several years ago.


VOICE OF THE PEOPLE

How His Year Began

Brooklyn: The girls of today are unfair to the boys they go out with. I took a girl to the movies New Year's Eve, and when the hour of midnight arrived, I leaned over to kiss her, but all of a sudden she slapped my face. The way I think about it, I could enjoy life better with my pick and shovel back in the C. C. C. camp. -- R. P.

How've You Been?

Brooklyn: Please inform the creator of "Little Orphan Annie" that when a comic strip becomes a medium for pseudo-philosophical commentaries and sentimental slop-slop, the only thing comic about it is the people who read it. But to give credit where credit is due, The News does make excellent wrapping paper for my lunch. -- HARRY ABRAMS.