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About The frontier. (O'Neill City, Holt County, Neb.) 1880-1965 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 20, 1944)
1 WEEKLY NEWS ANALYSIS Red Army Forges Deeper Into Poland, Southwest Drive Perils Nazi Troops; Allied Bombers Blast Western Europe; Strikes Show Marked Increase in 1943 (EDITOR S NOTE: When opinion* »r* oxprtoord In thoor oolamno, (hoy «rr thooo of Western Newspaper Union's news analysts and not necessarily sf this newspaper.) - Released by Western Newspaper Union. ■■ ■ »— • ippM'iiu. I'll ! 4 - <T - “War It Nowhere batter i* thi» expreuion indicated than la thia Italian town of Caatel Di Sangro, lying in rubble. SOUTHWEST PACIFIC: Jungle Fighting Like the story of every other is land in the South Pacific, U. S. troops have had to fight for every Inch of ground on tropical New Guinea, where landings have placed doughboys in possession of the air strip on Cape Gloucester and a beachhead at Arawe. With the enemy dug well in the Jungle, U. S. dive bombers and ar tillery helped clear the way for the infantry as it edged forward through the dense brush about Cape Glou cester. In similar terrain at Arawe, the enemy also fell back grudgingly. While doughboys clawed forward In New Britain, other elements of the U. S. Sixth army beat south eastward along the New Guinea coastline toward a Juncture with Australian troops driving north ward. In this sector, the Allies aimed for the big Jap shipping base of Madang, supply point for their coastal positions. Ace Lost Only hours after a dispatch from Guadalcanal had announced that pudgy, 30-year-old Maj. Gregory (“Pappy”) Boyington had shot down his 26th Jap to enter the selective list of U. S. air aces, his mother received word in Okanogan, Wash., that he was missing. With a mother’s faith she said: "I am confident he is all right and he will show up somehow, some where.” Called “Pappy" because of his comparatively older age among the younger marine fliers. Boyington was a picturesque daredevil. Once, “Pappy" purposely led a squadron over a Jap airdrome, circling the field slowly and daring the enemy to come up and fight. When they did, "Pappy" nailed three STRIKES: Increase in ’43 Almost 14 million working days were lost through strikes in 1943 compared with 4 million in 1942, records of the bureau of labor sta tistics indicated. Approximately 3,337,091 workers were Involved in the estimated 3,737 walkouts, which topped the 1942 to tal of 639,961 men idle because of 2,968 strikes. Last year's strikes doubled the 1927-’41 average of 1,945, but it was pointed out that the depression pre vailed during that period, and be cause of scarce employment walk outs were less frequent. EUROPE: Plaster Defenses Flying over an 800-mile front. Al lied bombers rapped hard at Ger man defenses and industries in west ern Europe preparatory to the her alded invasion. But in Italy, bad weather restrict ed Allied progress over the moun tainous terrain, and equally bitter resistance in the future loomed with the discovery that the Germans were constructing another "Siegfried line" of concrete and steel several miles in depth, and just to the north of their present positions. Continuing the softening up proc ess of western Europe, swarms of U. S. and British bombers and fight ers lashed at German factories, the Important naval base of Kiel, air fields strung over northern, and the channel coast, along which the Nazis reportedly have erected rocket guns. AGRICULTURE: Hogs Pour In Shipment of 470,500 hogs within a 3-day span recently in comparison with 278,400 for the same period a year ago, reflected crowded condi tions in 12 leading middlcwestcrn markets, with only choice 200 to 300 pound pigs attracting $13.75 per hundredweight. Many hogs were left unsold as daily trading closed, and fearful that animals might contract pneumonia with snow and colder weather, some packers urged farmers to curtail shipments, while embargoes were imposed at other centers. Tight labor conditions restricted packers' capacities, and in Chicago, at least 200 soldiers from the labor pool of a nearby camp were sent into the packing houses to help out. RUSSIA: Tangle in Poland Russian armies forged deeper into pre-war Poland in flaming action on the enstern front, overrunning terri tory the Reds claimed as their own, but the Polish government-tn-exile insisted must remain part of the country. As the Russ surged forward into pre-war Poland, Gen. Nicholas Va tutin threw out a speurhead to the southwest, aiming toward the en trapment of 500,000 Nazis from the rear in the big Dnieper river bend. Th** Reds entered pre-war Poland at a time of heightening tension over their claims that the White Russian and Ukrainian provinces of the old state were racially related to Rus sia. Reportedly headed for Washing ton, D. C., to seek U. S. support for the Polish government in exile’s case for retention of the territory was Pre mier Stanislaw Mikolajzyk. WAR PROFITS: Want Strict Control Recommendations to change the present government procedure of re capturing excessive profits on war material by rewriting old contracts, were bitterly opposed by Senators Walsh (Mass.), LaFollette (Wis.), Lucas (111.) and Connally (Texas). Two recommendations particular ly opposed would exempt from pres Senators LaFollette and Walsh ent repricing all contracts for stand ard commercial articles, and prod ucts not actually a part of goods delivered. In the first case, the senators said, one company with orders for a standard commercial article did six times the business of the 1935-'39 period, yet would be exempt from repricing. In the second case, the senators said, one machine tool company whose product, of course, does not actually appear in finished war goods, did six times its normal busi ness, yet would not be forced to re price its contracts. HIGHLIGHTS • • • in the week‘» newt RIVER: Vagaries of the White river in Indiana have shifted the boundary line between Decatur and Perry townships in Marion county. Two schools operated by the Deca tur township authorities will have to be closed because of lack of funds. Property of the power com pany is no longer within the town ship's tax limits to provide revenue, it was pointed out. FARM HANDS: Several organiza tions in New York state, working in collaboration, filled 210.000 farm jobs last year. Only 3 per cent of the workers were normally farm hands. TYPHUS: Eleven “public” delous ing stations have been set up in Naples, Italy, by Allied military health officers to combat typhus, which is spreading in the city. PROHIBITION: Before Congress Prohibitionist* lined up in support of Rep. Joseph R. Bryson's bill for bidding sale or manufacture of all beverages containing more than V4 of 1 per cent of alcohol for the duration as a congressional commit tee prepared for hearings on the measure. As prohibitionists organized sup port, Rep. Emmanuel Celler said it was rumored that they had raised $10,000,000 for lobbying in Washing ton. Meanwhile, it was reported that the Anti-Saloon league would remain on the sidelines during consideration of the bill, devoting its efforts to persuading President Roosevelt to declare prohibition as a war meas ure under his present vast powers. COLLEGE FOOTBALL: No Deaths For the second time in the 12 years he has compiled statistics on college football deaths, Dr. Floyd R. Eastwood of Purdue U. announced no fatalities due to football in 1943. Possibly because of a lack of suf ficient amounts and quality of equip ment, nine deaths were recorded in high school football, Dr. Eastwood said. Fatalities in the sport have gradu ally decreased since he started his survey in 1931, when 31 deaths were announced, Dr. Eastwood said. Since most deaths have been due to head injuries, he suggested that grid leaders look into possible use of new crash helmets designed for military use during the present war. ’44 CONVENTIONS: Chicago Bids With 10,000 visitors expected at both the Democratic and Republican national conventions this year. Big Business in Chicago bid to have the conclaves held there, with New York also reportedly interested. In Chicago alone, representatives of hotels, restaurants, realty and financial concerns, banks and utili Chairmen Spangler and Walker ties agreed to raise $75,000 to help defray hall expenses, etc., for either party, or $150,000 for both, if they met in the Windy City. As the national committees tinder Frank Walker of the Democrats and Harrison Spangler of the Republi cans studied convention sites, the Office of Defense Transportation de clared Chicago was the city least likely to upset train schedules, since regular line sleeping cars with 11,368 beds terminate there, compared to 7,129 in New York. CANADIAN WHEAT: To Increase Imports With approximately 350,000.000 bushels of U. S. wheat expected to be fed to livestock during the cur rent feeding season, an additional 100,000,000 to 150,000,000 bushels will be brought in from Canada, accord ing to government sources. Because U. S. railroad cars will be sent into the interior of Canada this winter, from 25,000,000 to 50, 000,000 more bushels of wheat will be imported than otherwise possi ble, due to the freezing of the Great Lakes. Although the heavy dairy and poultry producing areas of the Northeast have bettered their feed situation, feed grains are needed in the drouthy south central regions, and protein meals are scarce in the southwest range districts. The to tal supply of feed concentrates was estimated at 169,000,000 tcus. SOLDIERS’ VOTE: Urge Uniformity While congress wrangled over whether the federal government or the individual states should control soldier voting in 1944, the war and navy departments recommended that applications for absentee bal lots be distributed by the services and local officials accept such appli cations any time before election. Other recommendations made by the army and navy were that voting material be designed for air car riage, and that a serviceman's vote be acknowledged by an officer no lower in rank than sergeant. Ballots must be distributed to the servicemen by mail, the depart ments said, and although it is the army and navy policy to assist sol diers and sailors in voting, "nothing must interfere with the . . . primary obligation to wage a victorious war." RAIL TRAFFIC The nation’s railroads broke all transportation records last year, both for passengers and freight. Vol ume of freight hauled was 14 per cent above 1942, the previous high, and passenger traffic shot up 58 Der cent over the preceding year. Average load of freight per train was 1,116 tons, another record Per car load was 41 tons. Average vol ume of passengers per car was greater than ever before. An in crease of about 20 per cent in gross revenue is expected. Washington Di^estj Pressure Groups Point Way To Mild Fascism in U. S. Government by Majority Rule Ceases to Exist When Various ‘Interests’ Begin Trading Votes for Concessions. By BAl Netvs Anahit ar WNU Service, Union Trust Building, Washington, I). C. At a recent White House press and radio conference, the President was explaining his pre-Christmas remark ; —that it was time to discard the term “New Deal"—the remark that gave the cartoonists so much fun. He used a fable about "Old Dr. New Deal" who had healed the patient of "internal troubles" (the depres sions). But when the patient had an accident and had broken his arms and legs, he had to call in his part r er "Dr. Win-the-War" to heal him. A correspondent asked: "Doesn’t that add up to a fourth term declara tion?" The President showed his irrita tion in his answer. He said that that hadn’t been under discussion, that the question was picayune. Then he caught himself, leaned back, half smiled, half apologized, with the remark that the questioner would understand that he had to an swer that way. Two things came to my mind at once. First, that the President was thinking about the war and postwar problems, and to be brought back to earth with a bump was very much like being awakened by an alarm clock in the midst of an interest ing dream. That was one thing I thought of. Another was just what the United States, and the whole world for that matter, would be suffering from aft er the war and what the cure would be, if any. Recently there have been several predictions that we were in "for a dose of mild fascism.” Background for Belief I never took that so very seriously until three news items were called to my attention. One was the state ment that the CIO committee of po litical action was planned as a nu cleus of a labor party. That didn’t smell of fascism but it had a slightly collectivist aroma. The next item was in the London News Letter, a little pamphlet edit ed by Commander King-Hall, mem ber of parliament, the contents of which are cabled to Toronto, Can ada, where it is printed as an Amer ican edition. King-Hall is an inde pendent in politics with slightly con servative leanings. Here are the excerpts to which I refer: “. . . There are many indi cations at what might be called the lower levels of domestic practice, that there are forces and tendencies at work in Brit ain which are going to produce great changes in our political system. Some of these changes were foreshadowed in a pam phlet entitled “The Future of Party Politics" written by Com mander King-Hall in 1937. It was there argued that a crisis, both domestic and international, was developing and demanding for its solution a high degree of national unity in Britain, and that the political expression of that unity, and the instrument for making it effective must be • national government ...” In other words, the writer means by a “national government” a co alition government such as England has now with no opposition—what amounts to a single party. The Mood in Britain And here is another excerpt, a quotation from a speech in the house of commons which the London News Letter says was given a “wide meas ure of assent." . . Government must al ways be by majority but let it not be by party controversy and party majority. In this country at the present time, there seems to be coming into being a cen tral body of opinion very well and adequately represented on all sides of this house. It is to that central body of opinion that I should like the government to appeal in a bolder and more forward-stepping policy . . .” This speaker continues his appeal for a single “central body of opin , ion” and warns against “dividing a people (the British) who provide some bridge between the extreme capitalism of the United States and the extreme collectivism of Russia.” KHAGE d Commentator. Just what all this was getting at, I understood a little better when I read an article by Freda Kirchway in the Nation on the mood in Britain. Miss Kirchway had interviewed a number of people in England and she says that “big business forces in England have recognized more clearly than these forces in Amer ica the need for government con trol.” They are ready, she says, to accept the government as a part ner to save themselves from liquida tion. Some of the people interviewed by Miss Kirchwagr gave her the impres sion that they saw in the set-up ahead “a successful, polite form of semi-fascism,” which will prove ac ceptable to the key people of these groups. She doesn’t agree with this herself and she believes British la bor will be ready to fight it at the second election after peace but she believes these people believe it. How much of a similar feeling ex ists in the United States, I do not know, but, quite independent of Eng land, many people are shrugging their shoulders and saying it is a possibility here. One thing may point in that direc tion. That is the way the various pressure groups are now operating in congress. Already many trades have been made even to the point of those "unholy alliances" (all alli ances except those in which we be long are unholy, of course) which it was charged in the senate had been formed between southern Democrats and some northern Republicans. As soon as powerful pressure groups can agree among themselves to trade concessions for votes, gov ernment by majority rule ceases and the moment you begin to break down the party lines, you are in danger of having one party which in the end is no party. I can well understand how when anyone contemplates the problems of our domestic affairs in the post war period, it is hard to keep one’s mind on the war. • • • The Change in Invasion Plans It is a perilous thing these days to write more than an hour in ad vance of the invasion if one uses the future tense. The majority of opinion “as Twrite" (that’s the sav ing line) believes that the inva sion w'on’t get under way until late spring although one report through Sweden said the Germans were ex pecting it between Christmas and New Year’s. But from the time that General Eisenhower was named as com mander and the other changes in command were named, it appeared that the shape of the whole Allied plans for the assault on fortress Europa began to change rapidly. The speed with which the Russian armies were moving toward the German frontiers set new forces in motion. Suddenly the Mediterranean be came less important in the picture as Washington saw it. It was point ed out that the British had a larger force of, men, ships and supplies in that theater than the Americans. What had seemed the most impor tant thing in Europe to America ever since our troops landed in North Africa suddenly grew less im portant. The Middle East, which had looked as if it were the gather ing point of a new blow through the Balkans, perhaps with the help of Turkey, shrank on the horizon. The shifting of British commanders seemed to make this clear. And then there were calls for greater speed on the part of the Allies, it seemed as if a fear that Russia might get to Berlin first was stirring new activity and there were stories that Spain was not as anxious for Allied friendship as she was to keep the "Bolshevists” from getting nearer her borders, that if she must make new enemies, at least it was better to have the Allies against her than to have Russia get too near her. But even without these rumors, it grew clearer and clearer that the job ahead was colossal. Hopes that Ger many could be brought down by bombing alone were given up. It really seemed as if her factories and indeed her cities had moved underground. BRIEFS.. . by Baukhage Ernesto Lecuona, chief song writ- I er of Cuba and cultural attache of the Cuban Embassy in Washington, has recently signed one of the larg est song publishing contracts of Broadway history. • • • Colombia's entrance into the war November 27 makes it the 14th American republic to join actively in the struggle against the Nazis. Suspender buttons are to be re stored to men's work pants, accord ing to an amendment of WPB's Or der L-181. • • • The navy’s famous PT boats and all they have accomplished is owed to the mahogany tree of Middle America and to the men of history who discovered its value in ship building. Their Heads, Hearts, Hands and Health Are Pledged to Victory “I Pledge— my head to clearer thinking, my heart to greater loyalty, my hands to larger service, my health to better living, for my club, my community, and my country.’' This is the pledge of the 1,500,000 members of the 4-H clubs. Accomplishments revealed at their 22nd con gress and contests in Chica go indicate this pledge has been kept—$14,000,000 worth of war bonds and stamps sold, 300,000,000 pounds of scrap collected and 5,000, 000 bushels of victory gar den products grown. Fig ures, however, cannot show the democratic power gen erated by 4-H discussion groups and educational pro ams. ' ■:*x*»xv.v.v •••. -'-Iv 'mam f * \ /Victory. \ Parade / y LIVESTOCK honors tvent to Richard Lacyf 17, of Kansas, III., pictured tvith his Grand Champion Hereford. DRESS MAKING —Verda Patterson, 17, Marathon, Iowa, received a $200 scholarship fot her clothing achievements. These garments were made from clothing previously discarded. LEADERSHIP aivards and trophies for outstanding 4-H records for 1943 were won by Robert R. Mayer, Marysville, Kan., and Emily E. McHattie, Newport, Minn. Ammmr m HEALTH champions are (l. to r.) John Weis, St. Cloud, Minn.; Virginia Nelson, North Platte, Neb.; Rena Garner, Ozark, Ala., and Detmar Couch, Eagletown, Okh. MA M 1— T-TVim COOKING winner teas Audrey Avrrill (right), of Collins, Mont. State Leader Pauline Buntin offers congratulations. ELECTRIFICATION winners: Herbert Rice, Mon roe Arn€t Leon Dernscn, Glenn Eisenbrandt, !\lnr ft and Laurence Kirk.