WHO’S NEWS THIS WEEK By LEMUEL F. PARTON EW YORK.—This writer has al- ways thought it would be a good idea for the newspapers of a city to make an award every year to the . person who had Dr. Ditmars provided them Superlative with the most News Source good copy. In New York, I would nominate Dr. Raymond L. Ditmars, for 39 years curator of mammals and reptiles at the Bronx zoo, al- most any year. He has just left for Trinidad to catch some parasol ants, long time. supposed that the ants pack leaves and petals for shade. Dr. Ditmars puts us right on that. They gather them only for food. The curator has exploded many myths, but usually substitutes some- thing even more interesting. Rep- tiles haven't the slightest interest in sweet music and aren't soothed by it, monkeys will return to cleared jungle if it grows again; the mother snake does not swallow the little ones in times of danger. But, being thus disillusioned, we learn from Dr. Ditmars that there are sea serpents, great schools of them, in the Indian ocean and the western tropical Pacific. They are as gaudy as an Elks’ parade. with cold, beady eyes, and emit a dread- ful venom. Dr. Ditmars carries them on the books as hydrophiinae. There are fiving snakes, fish that climb trees, fish that shoot down bugs out of the air by ex- pelling pellets of water like an air gun, frogs that can swallow rats, frogs with vocal power 1,000 times that of a man, in- sects which are carried by jun- gle people for flashlamps, ani- mals which can travel 60 miles an hour and animals which nev- er lie down. Dr. Ditmars is 62 years old. At the age of 15, he began gathering insects for the Museum of Natural History. He had a year of news- paper work before joining the staff of the zoo, which may account for his being a friendly Santa Claus to reporters. * * * T IS recalled that Homer Martin, the fighting parson who contends with John L. Lewis in a Faustian struggle for the body and soul of the automobile union, was the world hop, May Still Be skip and jump champion just a World Champ few years ago— and may be still. It is only three years ago that he quit the pastorate of the Leeds Baptist church in Kan- sas’ City, got a job in the Fisher plant, organized the local of the United Automobile Workers' union and became its first international president. His battle soon turned from the bosses to the left-wingers of the union and that’s the issue of his contention with Mr. Lewis. Getting under way, he eloquent- ly plastered William Green of the A. F. of L. and it is not clear where he would be headed in case of a final break with the C. IL. O. leadership. He is tall, athletic—once a track star for the Illinois Athletic club— with a wide, ready smile and shell- rimmed glasses. He gets $3,000 a year for a whole lot of trouble and strife, but seems to enjoy it. He is 36 years old, born and reared on a southern Illinois farm. » * » THs writer knew quite a number of early-day aviators, including Lincoln Beachey, Art Smith, Bob Fowler, Si Christofferson and others, and he always Col. Turner wondered w igh In Splashes none of them ever f 1 dressed the part. Of Gay Colors They all were as Homer Martin their role certainly called for a dash of color. torial dash of d’Artagnan, Porthos the skies. $22,000, satisfies a long-felt want. His flying togs are modeled on the old-time pousse cafe, calculated to give him protective coloring against a flaming sunset, but high visibility from below. For years, off and on, he has been picking up records in pink pants and a lavender tunic, or in an ensemble blending many shades of blue, cerise and hen- na, with a rakish English offi- cers’ cap, ruddy face, Grover Whalen wax-tipped mustache and a couple of octaves of fine teeth. Here, as the old books on decorum would have it, is an outfit which would take you around the world, Colonel Turner is of California background, the title being a dispen- sation of the governor of that also colorful state, © Consolidated News Features, WNU Service, It Takes Two... Life is a game you can't play single-handed, for "no man liveth unto himself." bee By WINIFRED WILLARD ced IT WAS the close of a symphony season at a regular summering place in New York. white flannels and flushed with tri- umph, Metropolitan symphony orchestra, plause and appreciation of nation-wide audience. orchestra for many days mounting pleasure. The cheering ceased to give the leader time to good concert,” he said with a smile, “orchestra and audience.” Real wisdom for every day living in that! The passenger at table looked bored. I am sure she was. I know I was. I tried it alone, hunted be- tween meals for something to talk about or something to get her going, things to say to break the gloomy silence that always came when she came. Whatever I said brought her maddeningly superior ‘“yes’’ or her dishearteningly final “no.” Perhaps our vibrations or something were in- harmonious. I couldn't and didn’t get far alone and the cruise was a flop because she wouldn't play her part. We both missed the zest of a great opportunity that took two. Fun in Teamwork Recently I was a guest in a family of five. On the porch, at the table, in the kitchen, anywhere, every day, conversation was a thrilling game that raced and ran through politics, sports, history, current happenings, religion — anywhere keen, alert minds enjoy going. Everybody, mother, father, three strapping sons and I joined in laughing, talking, differing, agreeing. Repartee was stimulating, whoever happened to be around. It was this fine quality which the symphony conductor meant when he said to his audience, “It takes two to make a good concert.” It does take two or ten, however many doesn’t matter, to play the compli- cated game of life where each has his part and where each part needs all the others. We can't do it alone. We are done for before we begin, if we try. A man who is significant only be- cause he is a fairly common type, never lets you finish what you start to say. He has no patience with “it takes two.” He wants to be the all and only. He cuts in on you, grabs the words out of your mouth, tells you what he thinks you are going to say, leaves you wondering where you were with your story and more than a little peeved. He makes me want to push my figurative toe into his conversational door the way the agent does, until 1 have finished what 1 was saying. He hasn't any monopoly on conversational rights. He is entitled to equal chance with what he wants to say. So am I! Only he never thinks so. And he rates as a rather high class social It is most reprehensible whenever an agent tries the trick of putting his toe in my doorway to force an entrance to my home. But I am dead sure it is justifiable, conversa- tionally speaking, when any person breaks in and cuts my sentence in two just to make the opening big- ger and bolder for himself. It takes two! Stockholders’ Dilemma A while back in the far West, the shadow of a sheriff darkened a hos- pital. Stockholders owned it. But they hadn't paid much attention to its need for money. Accordingly they faced either lose or pay. One day it fell to me to travel more than 250 miles through sizzling heat across a mid-summer desert to ex- situation. Mercury stood about 105. The chairman had no notion of the party. Surely it was hot! Out of doors was a little more comfortable. After the chairman introduced me to the group he said, ‘“While she talks, we will have some refresh- ments!” I wanted to throw back at him that it takes two to play; that this was their game, not mine; their hospital, not mine; and if ice cream was their deepest craving, I might like some too. It was as hot for me as it was for them. Instead | tried to count “‘ten brittle digits in a row,” to calm down and to put their financial straits clearly before them. They ate their sweets. I talked my heart out. They lost their hospital. Then they cared. Life is like that. No use talking, the single driver stands to lose more often than the double team! The man that wants to say it all and do it all and be it all and have it all, finds out sooner or later that “no man liveth unto himself”” and that everywhere with everybody, you need me, I need you and we all need one another. Life does call for reciprocity. It does take tw» to win! Copyright—WNU Servies, Star Dust * Trimming Stars * Chaplin’s Find * Hidden Ambitions By Virginia Vale — 7] ASU PITTS has been having a lot of fun on her personal appearance tour, and has about her own box office value. She has brought crowds to the the- motion picture ex- hibitors have told her that it hasn't been their fault that they haven't shown her pictures. They've begged for them. Any picture that she is in makes money for them, it seems, no matter who else appears with her. “But you haven't been ing any pictures, Miss they said to her. Zasu Pitts just mak- Pitts," There's a good reason why Miss Pitts hasn't been making pictures, these last months. A number of other actors, also big ones, haven't been making pictures either. Not that she hasn’t been offered roles that re: t ] 3ut the companies wanted to cut her salary to the bone. These days the big likely, it seems, to go to comers to the foreign ime portations, cute girls who are being built up. Some of the big players have to swallow their pride, and do, and take the off the screen. Maybe that's why you've missing she vanted to for he who sent for money is screen cut; others stay been ites. some Miss Pitts has two opportunities to make her debut in New York as an actress; one in a musical show that, because of its authors, is prac- tically sure to be a hit, the other in a play. If her husband and chil- dren weren't so firmly established in California she wouldn't hesitate about accepting one. lemember passing mention that was made here some time ago of Charlie Chaplin's new screen find, Dorothy Comingore? He had her in a little theater performance seen oa oF FREDRIC MARCH at Carmel-by-the-Sea, where he had gone to work out the script of a new picture. Just in case you have wondered what happened next, she has changed her name to Linda Winters, and you'll see her in ‘Trade Winds" with Joan Bennett and Fredric March. Here's a chance to see if you agree with the great comedian on what constitutes good screen material, When you see “The Great Waltz" you'll see some lovely bits of scen- ery used as background, American scenery in Geneseo, N. Y. The rea- son is that Richard Rosson, Metro director, lived there for a while when he was a boy; now he's back in the old home town, shooting it for the public. : Aunt Tibby's Trunk By re D. J. WALSH Copyright-—-WNU Service, 6 UT, Mazie,” remarked Bert Howard to his pretty little wife, “it isn’t quite fair that Aunt Tibby should want to come back 80 soon; it’s less than three weeks since she left, and she had been here six months. 1 have no ob- over her about the Between and worrying fussing And then Mazie, whose bobbed tackling his co-workers in the stu- Benny declared that he'd like to be it's like to tear across the salt flats at Bonneville, Utah, at 350 miles per hour. As for Cal himself, his suppressed desire isn’t so hard to attain; he just wants to learn to play the piano. asf ODDS AND ENDS—"Carefree” isn't up to the usual Rogers Astaire standard . . . Jon Hall was rushed back from New York to Hollywood in order to be sent to Eng. land to make “The Thief of Bogdad” . . . “Sing You Sinners” is such a good picture that it's a hit in London—first time that's happened to a Crosby picture—and Para. mount will make a sequel to it . . . The Voice of Experience took a vacation that 'd a tour of Oregon and a visit to Joe E. Brown in Hollywood, and now is back in New York and on the air . . . Remember “Asta,” the dog in “The Thin Man” and its sequel? . . . You'll sce him soon with Constance Bennett in “Topper Takes a Trip” . . . Spencer Tracy has an other in" ; Oi heer, with a temper to correspond, replied thus: “If you were proper- the welfare of you'd want to keep Aunt Tibby here all the time! Do you fancy that she herself would particular that hide trunk, as , if it didn’t contain valu- she told me—no, 1 won't mn he 1d me flv Hy IQ ’ ~l 14 SO about COW y131t © and, 1 tioned out of mind; they are un- worthy of you!’ and Bert stopped to kiss his wife good-by. The first evening of Aunt Tib- by’s arrival Mazie began, ‘‘Bar- bara! do sit still! You'll make Aunt Tibby nervous!’ or ‘John! don’t walk so heavy!” Aunt Tibby had been with them several weeks when she came down with a cold. The doctor called pronounced the trouble pneumo- nia. “Which at her age,” said he (Aunt Tibby was 86), “is a serious matter. You had better get a nurse.”’ Aunt Tibby had been so humored by her niece, howev- er, that the nurse could do little to suit her, and Mazie wag obliged to fetch and carry, to run up and down stairs until, ten days later, Aunt Tibby sank into | sleep. After the funeral the relative: who had gathered from far and near demanded that the will b read at once. So the cowhid | trunk was brought n to th | tiving room and opened in th | presence of all. It contained Un David's ru books, ] old new oid wr de that this old t ables and she It is a curious trait in human nature that we will take off onr hats when a woman enters an elevator, and be most apolo- getic if we bump into somebody inadvertently; but the instant we get our hands on a steering wheel we damn all mankind woman and man alike, Too often, we are inclined to look upon traffic guides and regulations as irritating restrie- tions designed primarily to keep us from having a good time, when the truth of the matter is, they have been de- vised solely for our convenience and comfort, dicted it, fearing if she told the truth some one might put her in an old ladies’ an institu- tion she detested. She trusted her relatives would pardon her and that the old trunk would be kept for her sake; that it might prove a magic casket to the owner, just had to her. home, The trunk was left with Mazie, ' nly person who 1st desire to pos- had de- around cried, forgive sigh of con- Bert's an- sveryone her arms and l ever ght; the trunk sket for Ma- upstairs hall It many whenever she nvy, stubborn- for finery she ne glance at sufficient to dis- n a twinkling. f LI | GUARANTEE |i¢ Every tire of our | manufacture, ng our | name snd serial number, | is guaranteed by us to be | free from defects in £ | workmanship and material A without limit as to time or bi! mileage, and to give | satisfactory service under | iii normal operating |S (conditions, If our i examination shows that | (| any tire has failed under |= 51 the terms of this guarantee, [73 4 we will either ir the Bi! fire or make sn allowance |¢ is on the purchase of a new = tire. mileage. sensation of 1938. LOW PRICES 4.50-21.... 4.75-19.... 5.00-19.... 525-17.440 5.25-18.... 5.50-17.... $10.48 6.00-16.... 11.80 6.25-16.... 13.1§ 6.50-16.... 14.80 New THE ~= Interviews wi noon local paper For greater power and longer life, ", today to a Firestone Extra Power Allrubber ‘Battery ~— the battery that start your car up to 35% quicker. Patented construction featuresgive Firestone Batteries longer life, more power and greater dependability. You will be surprised at the low cost. ' Network.
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers