L for London is L for love in new Anglo-Yank code
British canteen girls, too, warned not to affront Americans
By Nat A. Barrows
…
The first days of 1943 find the greatest number of nations in world history engaged in one common conflict – with 80% of the area and 60% of the population of the earth on the United Nations side. Even the 21 remaining neutrals, some of which have broken relations with the Axis, are greater in area than the Axis and occupied areas, but Germany and Japan control some of the world’s most populous regions. The maps show the world at war as it enters 1943 and as it looked on previous New Years.
January
1st – Americans fight Japs in Philippines. British admit loss of Sarawak, fight Japs in Malaya, battle Italians in Libya. Chinese troops aid in Burma battle. Russians hit Nazis in winter counteroffensive. Roosevelt, Churchill confer on state of war. OPA bans auto, truck sales. Wickard says U.S. food supply greatest in history.
2nd – Manila falls. Washington announces 26-power United Nations alliance.
3rd – Gen. Sir Archibald Wavell becomes Allied commander in Southwest Pacific.
5th – 77th Congress convenes.
6th – President Roosevelt sets production goals: 60,000 planes in 1942, 125,000 in 1943; 45,000 tanks this year, 75,000 next; 20,000 anti-aircraft guns this year, 35,000 next; 8,000,000 tons shipping this year, 10,000,000 next.
7th – President submits world-record budget: 1943 expenditures to be $58,927,000,000 – $52,786,000,000 for war; $35,440,000,000 deficit.
8th – Coldest weather in six years hits Pittsburgh as temperature drops to -9°F.
9th – Allegheny County struck a “gold mine” filled with coal on old Bell Farm which was purchased for $3-million airport. Country purchased farm for $260,000 and coal believed to be worth $200,000.
12th – William Davis named Chairman of War Labor Board of 12. Joe Louis signs to fight for Uncle Sam for $21 cut.
13th – Japs’ Bataan attack beaten off after 24-hour artillery duel. Donald Nelson named sole chief of war production.
15th – President orders Army enlarged to 3,600,000 in 1942.
16th – William S. Knudsen shifted to job of war production chief in War Department.
17th – Navy announces sinking of three Jap ships off Tokyo Harbor by U.S. submarine. Berlin announces death by “apoplexy” of Field Marshal Walther von Reichenau.
19th – Foreign ministers at Rio Conference decide to vote Axis break irrespective of Chile and Argentina. Former County Treasurer William M. Turner, central figure in $62,000 delinquent tax scandal of 1939, declared “unfit” to stand trial by two court physicians. Carole Lombard dies in plane crash in Nevada.
21st – WASHINGTON: Western Hemisphere plan announced at Rio Conference, provides abolition of trade barriers, common currency.
22nd – Japs launch New Britain attack.
24th – Pearl Harbor investigation blames inexcusable negligence by responsible officers. U.S. announces sinking of three Jap ships in Battle of Macassar Strait. Peru, Uruguay announce break with Axis under Rio Conference decision. Governor James maintained legal right to fire any State Civil Service employee without cause or hearing, defying Federal Security Board.
26th – U.S. troops land in Northern Ireland.
28th – Two hundred and fifty lose lives in torpedoing of Canadian liner Lady Hawkins off Puerto Rico.
29th – Germans recapture Benghazi.
30th – Grand jury recommended indictments of 78 members of district election boards.
February
1st – Huge truck and trailer hurtled down into upper Hays Borough, smashed auto and killed its driver, tore front off a house, splintered two garages and smashed another car. Driver and helper injured slightly.
2nd – President asks $500-million loan to China.
3rd – Finnish President says defensive war against Russia must go on at side of Germans. War deaths in 1941 placed at 1,250,000 or more.
6th – Pacific War Councils of United Nations set up in Washington.
8th – Maj. Gen. Fritz Todt, builder of Nazi super highways and Siegfried Line, killed in air crash.
9th – Liner Lafayette (Normandie) burns in New York Harbor. Adm. William Standley nominated as Ambassador to Russia. House passes $100-million Office of Civilian Defense bill with ban on frills, including dancers.
10th – Chiang Kai-shek, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru meet to talk mobilization of Indian forces. La Guardia quits as OCD head; James Landis succeeds him.
11th – Women and children evacuated from Singapore as Japs pour onto the island.
12th – Nazi battleships Gneisenau and Scharnhorst, cruiser Prinz Eugen dash from Brest to Heligoland.
13th – Aviatrix Laura Ingalls convicted as unregistered Nazi agent.
14th – Joseph Libonati, 59-year-old stationary engineer, was sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of Carrie Kolb, Elliot divorcée. A 78-year-old truant officer, Charles Atkinson, was reinstated following a three-day strike by Millvale students over his dismissal.
15th – Singapore falls.
16th – First father-and-son draft registration as all men born between Feb. 17, 1897, and Dec. 31, 1921, registered. Bandits tie up manager of Stanley Theater and seize $8,000.
17th – Jesse Levy, Brookline “numbers prince,” walked out of courtroom a free man because, as the state puts it, he allowed his 64-year-old father “to take the rap” for him.
18th – Stanley Theater bandits arrested in Akron, Ohio. Lightweight champion Sammy Angott unknowing driver for gang.
19th – Churchill shuffles cabinet; Capt. Oliver Lyttleton named production chief, replacing Beaverbrook.
20th – Japs invade Timor.
22nd – Soviet troops retake Kerch.
24th – Bomb in Ankara, Turkey, narrowly misses Nazi Minister von Papen.
25th – Government employees reported to number 4,800,000 – one in 11 of workers.
26th – Russian Ambassador Maxim Litvinov urges two spring offensives on separate fronts.
28th – Maj. Gen. Walter Short, Adm. Husband E. Kimmel, Pearl Harbor commanders, retired from service pending future court-martial.
March
1st – IN SEA BATTLE OFF JAVA: Nine Jap warships, 17 transports reported sunk; for United Nations, three cruisers and two destroyers, bulk of Dutch East Indies Navy.
3rd – British bomb Paris munitions factories. Worst snowstorm in Pittsburgh history, 18.2 inches deep, paralyzed city for 24 hours. Transportation system changed.
6th – U.S., Canada agree to start Alaskan (Alcan) highway.
8th – Japs land in New Guinea.
9th – British announce withdrawal from Rangoon.
10th – Lt. Gen. Joseph W. Stilwell appointed Chief of Staff to Com. Chiang Kai-shek.
15th – Hitler prophesies defeat of Russia in coming summer.
17th – Gen. Douglas MacArthur arrives in Australia.
18th – U.S. headquarters in Australia announces Yanks have been arriving for two months.
19th – Lt. Gen. Joseph W. Stilwell takes command of two Chinese armies in Burma.
20th – Dr. Ben G. Graham, superintendent of schools since 1930, died of a heart attack.
22nd – Sir Stafford Cripps arrives in India on errand to settle British-Indian political differences.
23rd – Occupational questionnaires to be sent to men in third draft.
24th – Japs occupy Andaman Islands south of Burma.
26th – Thirty-one men were killed in an explosion of 20 tons of dynamite in a cement quarry near Easton, Pennsylvania.
27th – British send hundreds of bombs over Ruhr industrial areas, Belgium, Holland in opening of spring air offensive.
28th – British Commandos raid Saint-Nazaire, Nazi sub base.
29th – Sir Stafford Cripps announces offer of Dominion status to India – after the war.
30th – Twenty-one American republics form Inter-American Defense Board in Washington.
31st – Japs bomb plainly-marked base hospital on Bataan.
April
2nd – Japs seize Akyab, Burma, threatening oil fields.
3rd – Navy reveals loss of seaplane tender USS Langley. Lloyd Wilson, USN, shot and slain while sitting in a parked car with his fiancé near Erie.
4th – U.S. recognizes Free French control of Cameroon and French Equatorial Africa.
6th – Japs bomb India, Mandalay.
7th – Youthful gang of four auto thieves arrested after stripping and stealing 150 cars in Pittsburgh District during previous nine months.
8th – Gen. George Marshall, U.S. Chief of Staff, arrives in London.
9th – Bataan falls.
10th – Jap dive bombers sink British carrier HMS Hermes off Ceylon.
11th – British withdraw India offers after Indian rejection.
15th – Hugh S. Johnson, columnist and former NRA administrator, dies at 59. Mayor Scully charges Councilman McArdle with attempted political blackmail in choice of police inspector. A 12-year-old Hazelwood boy was seriously injured when he inadvertently set off a bomb planted in a parked car in Hazelwood. Bomb believed placed there by numbers racketmen in attempt to “get” confectionery storeowner.
16th – Ruhr, Saint-Nazaire, Le Havre, Low Countries undergo greatest daylight raid of war by more than 400 planes.
18th – U.S. bomber squadron raids Tokyo, Yokohama, Kobe, Nagoya. New Vichy “Chief of the Government” Pierre Laval forms cabinet.
19th – Treasury asks public to invest tenth of income in war bonds.
20th – Department of Justice files suits in federal court against Carnegie Illinois Steel Company and Jones & Laughlin Steel Corporation, charging violations of priority regulations on selling steel.
21st – Ten-day furloughs granted automatically to accepted draftees upon recommendation of their local draft boards.
22nd – Mother of six children leaped to her death and two others suffocated when fire burned a section of Highland Building in East Liberty.
25th – $50,000 fire razes Carnegie Department Store. U.S. troops occupy New Caledonia, joining Free French for first time. Gen. Henri Giraud, popular French hero, escapes Nazi prison.
26th – Draft registration for men 45-65.
28th – Rents frozen at March 1, 1942, level for $86 million.
29th – Five thousand idle at Bethlehem Steel Corporation, Cambria Works, because of unauthorized strike of 500 coke oven workers.
May
1st – Explosion kills 8, injures 13 in Central Railways Signal Company plant in Versailles. Army decides to enroll 150,000 women as non-combatants – the WAACs.
3rd – Sugar rationing launched by OPA.
4th – British force starts taking over Madagascar, Vichy French island.
6th – Corregidor falls.
8th – Navy sinks 11 Jap warships in Coral Sea battle, loses carrier USS Lexington. No gasoline rationing in Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania, says Leon Henderson.
9th – Three gallons of gasoline fixed as pleasure driving quota in East.
11th – Billy Conn breaks hand in brawl with father-in-law. Japs broadcast Philippine conquest is complete.
12th – Nazi spring offensive opens in Russia.
13th – Fifty-six men killed in mine explosion six miles northwest of Morgantown, West Virginia.
14th – French conquest to immobilization of French warships at Martinique, Guadeloupe, French Guiana.
15th – Enemy sinks cargo vessel mile and a half from mouth of Mississippi.
16th – President frees Earl Browder, communist leader convicted of passport falsification.
17th – Retail price ceilings go into effect to cut living cost.
18th – U.S. force including tanks arrives in Britain in largest convoy thus far.
19th – President decorates Brig. Gen. James H. Doolittle, disclosing it was he who led air raid on Tokyo.
20th – British drop 40,000 incendiary bombs on Mannheim and Reich Marshal Hermann Göring says in speech that it’s toughest war yet. Gen. Edward Martin, Republican, and F. Clair Ross, Democrat, nominated for Governor.
22nd – President orders registration of 3,100,000 males in 18-20 age group.
23rd – Ninety-seven more hostages reported executed by Nazis.
25th – Mexico declares war on Axis.
26th – U.S. offers Russia regular United Nations Lend-Lease status.
27th – Reinhard Heydrich, deputy Protector of Bohemia, seriously injured by bomb. Martial law proclaimed.
28th – Seven Czechs executed in Heydrich investigation.
30th – Prague radio announces 44 more Heydrich executions. Actor John Barrymore dies at 60.
31st – British launch record raid on Cologne with 1,250 planes dropping 3,000 tons of bombs in 90 minutes.
June
1st – Twenty-seven Czechs reported executed in Heydrich case.
2nd – Brookline-Overbrook hooded bandit caught as he stalked sixth victim. More than 1,000 British planes drop 3,000 tons of bombs on Essen, home of Krupp armament works.
3rd – Jap planes bomb Dutch Harbor, Aleutians base; enemy occupies Attu, Agattu and Kiska in Aleutians. House votes war declarations against Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary.
4th – Japs bomb Midway Island. “Hangman” Reinhard Heydrich dies of bomb wounds; Nazis shoot 25 more Czechs. Total reaches 200.
5th – Naval and air battle of Midway Island begins.
6th – U.S. forces sink four Jap aircraft carriers, two cruisers, damage three battleships, four cruisers, three transports at Midway. We lose carrier USS Yorktown.
8th – Strike hits 10 A&P stores as 400 clerks stage sympathy strike in support of bakers who walked out.
10th – Nazis raze Lidice, Czech village, executing all men, sending women to concentration camps, children to “educational centers.”
11th – Five killed, 20 hurt in chemical explosion at North Side paint factory. Senate votes servicemen’s pay boost to $50.
12th – Decisive battle for Libya opens.
13th – Office of War Information formed, Elmer Davis named chief.
18th – Hooded bandit, 18, gets 20- to 40-year sentence. Winston Churchill arrives in Washington.
20th – Bardia, Libya, seven miles from Egyptian frontier, falls to Rommel.
21st – Tobruk taken by Nazis.
22nd – French Underground and de Gaulle sign accord.
25th – Maj. Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower placed in command of new “European Theater” of U.S. Army.
26th – Pittsburgh experiences first test blackout of the war.
27th – Washington-London statement promises attack to ease pressure on Russia.
28th – Accomplices of eight Nazi saboteurs landed by submarine on East Coast arrested.
30th – Youths in 18, 19, 20 age groups register for draft.
July
2nd – British flank Rommel and halt 350-mile drive 70 miles from Alexandria at El Alamein. Sevastopol falls after siege of eight months.
4th – U.S. bombers with Yankee crews make debut over Europe.
7th – Twenty-nine Bund leaders indicted.
9th – Army swears in first WAACs.
10th – Russians withdraw as Germans establish two bridgeheads over Don River.
11th – Army of 250,000 Yugoslavs opens guerilla offensive against occupation forces. Jock Sutherland quits as coach of Brooklyn pro football team to enter Navy as lieutenant commander.
12th – Illinois village takes name of Lidice.
14th – German Gestapo chief of Croatia assassinated on Zagreb’s principal square; victim’s bodyguard massacres 700 in retaliation.
15th – Russell Roddy, 18-year-old Latrobe youth, deliberately ran down stepfather, then accidentally crashed his auto into bridge killing his mother who was a passenger.
16th – Marshal Rommel assaults British positions at El Alamein in desperate bid for a breakthrough.
21st – Adm. Leahy named President’s military adviser.
22nd – Dr. Henry H. Hill, dean of University of Kentucky, appointed superintendent of Pittsburgh schools.
23rd – British call up 18-year-olds for military service.
26th – Polish government-in-exile reports 250,000 Poles murdered by Nazis thus far in campaign to eliminate Polish intellectualism. Ten-ton trailer truck gets out of control of Lawrenceville Hill, killing 3, injuring 3. Chauncey McDonald, 25, a former suitor of Isabel Shaw, killed her, then shot self on Sharon St.
31st – U.S. launches new aircraft carrier USS Essex.
August
1st – British air armada of 600 planes bombs Düsseldorf and German operations bases.
3rd – A hundred stores in Triangle open at night for shoppers.
4th – Fifty animals die in Ringling Bros. circus fire.
5th – Pope Pius protests mass deportation of Jews from occupied zones.
6th – Max Stephan of Detroit sentenced to hang for aiding escaped Nazi flier.
8th – U.S. forces launch offensive in Solomon Islands and bombard Jap-held Kiska in Aleutians. Six Nazi saboteurs executed and two others get life. Harry Dankert, the fake John Steinbeck, recognized by truck driver at Ligonier and arrested.
9th – Three U.S. cruisers sunk in Solomons.
10th – Navy announces U.S. troops on Tulagi Island of Solomons after three-day battle.
11th – Indian troops called to help suppress riots in Bombay and New Delhi.
12th – Winston Churchill flies to Moscow for conference with Joseph Stalin.
13th – U.S. troops win Henderson Field on Guadalcanal Island.
17th – Flying Fortresses make first raid on Europe, bomb Rouen.
18th – British place Gen. Bernard L. Montgomery in command of the 8th Army in Africa.
19th – Some 10,000 Commandos, including U.S. Rangers, with tanks and heavy guns, raid Dieppe, France.
21st – U.S. Marines raid Makin Island in the Gilbert group.
22nd – Brazil declares war on Germany and Italy.
23rd – American Legion brands strikes and lockouts as “treason” at convention here.
25th – Duke of Kent, the King’s younger brother, killed in air crash en route to Iceland on military mission.
26th – U.S. fliers bomb Jap counterattack force in Solomons. First daylight air-raid test successful here.
27th – Battleship USS Iowa (45,000 tons) launched in New York.
28th – Chinese retake “bomb-Tokyo” Chuhsien and Lishui air bases.
30th – Soviet fliers raid Berlin.
September
1st – Japanese Foreign Minister Tōgō quits and job is taken over by Premier Tōjō.
2nd – Germans manacle Dieppe prisoners.
3rd – Britain marks third anniversary of war by sending several hundred planes to unload bombs over Karlsruhe, railway and production center.
4th – Forty Nazi divisions and 1,000 planes bounce off Stalingrad defenses.
5th – Rommel’s forces start slow retreat in Libya.
6th – Laborers forced to pay fees to union to get jobs at Meadville war plant.
8th – Japs lose heavily in New Guinea mountain assault.
9th – Millvale police go on strike; want chief ousted.
10th – Baltimore customer awarded $50 from retailer in instance of 2¢ overcharge.
11th – Nazis advance to Volga above and below Stalingrad.
12th – Japs massacre wounded Marines on Guadalcanal. David H. Diehl, General State Authority director, charges “bungling” at Oakland Hospital dedication attended by Governor James.
14th – British Commandos raid Tobruk.
15th – William M. Jeffers named rubber administrator. Carrier USS Wasp sunk in Solomons.
17th – U.S. tanks and artillery beat Japs at Tenaru on Guadalcanal.
18th – British announce use of four-ton bombs.
21st – Nazi executions in occupied nations at 207,000. Overbrook Junior High School teacher branded “petty chiseler” for obtaining extra sugar under a phantom daughter’s name.
22nd – Stalingrad defenders hold Nazis in house-to-house fighting.
23rd – Willkie sees Stalin. Morton Kagen, 26-year-old attorney, slugged by Patrolman Martin O’Toole, president of Fraternal Order of Police. Kagen said he thought O’Toole was a thug and called for police.
24th – Fifteen dead, five missing, in B&O train wreck near Dickerson, Maryland.
25th – Victory Fleet builders round out one year with record of 488 ships (5,450,000 tons).
28th – Census says U.S. population on Jan. 1 was 133,965,000, contributed to by 2,728,000 births during the previous year. Three-year-old Eleanor Hughes, with a sewing needle imbedded in her heart, dies in Children’s Hospital following failure of attempted operation.
29th – Nazis bomb southern England; direct hit kills 38 at boys’ school. J. A. Witt, 79-year-old Brushton storekeeper, found shot to death in grocery store; unknown bandit believed killer.
30th – Governor James orders 35 mph speed limit in Pennsylvania. Hitler promises to take Stalingrad.
October
1st – Germans make costly advance in Stalingrad streets.
2nd – Patrolman Martin O’Toole ordered dismissed by police trial board for slugging attorney. Willkie welcomed in Chungking.
3rd – U.S. Army occupies Andreanof Islands in Aleutians group. State liquor store employees stage one-day walkout in protest of low wages.
4th – State liquor clerks suspended for walkout. Stalin says Allied aid far below contribution of Russia to the cause.
8th – Lord Halifax visits Pittsburgh war plants.
9th – Liquor drought near in county and state stores remain closed for sixth day.
11th – 2nd Lt. William Abbott granted divorce from Mrs. Ann Eaton Abbott, charging wife “too extravagant.” Australian fliers in Egypt bomb Crete, leave fires visible 50 miles.
12th – Malta reports downing 37 planes during resumption of Axis assaults, the assaults themselves indicating convoys to Africa.
13th – Jap cruiser, four destroyers, transport sunk off Savo Island; U.S. loses one destroyer.
14th – Japs bombard Henderson Field on Guadalcanal as they land reinforcements on north coast.
15th – John M. Hopwood, Pittsburgh industrialist, resigns as chief of War Materials, Inc.
16th – Liquor clerks get 15% raise. RAF (350 planes strong) gives it to Cologne again.
17th – U.S. troops reported in Liberia, Africa.
18th – Vichy reported granting citizenship to 100 Gestapo agents to facilitate German activity in unoccupied zone.
19th – Japs broadcast they’ll “severely punish” U.S. fliers captured after Tokyo air raid April 18.
20th – British Admiralty announces toll of 530 Axis ships sunk by British and U.S. navies so far; also, launching of HMS Howe and HMS Anson, two 35,000-ton battleships. May Robson, stage and screen actress, dies at 84. Floyd Shawley, 25-year-old Army deserter, eludes Army posse in Ligonier Mountains, after daring Military Police to come after him. William Lyngvar shoots and seriously injures eight-year-old sister in Monroeville home.
21st – Submarine toll in Western Atlantic reaches 501. Twenty-four Bundists get five-year prison terms, the maximum.
22nd – U.S. forces repel Jap land attack on Guadalcanal.
23rd – RAF raids Genoa and Turin in heaviest attack of war on Italy. Frank Philips, chairman of board of Philadelphia Co., dies at age of 65.
24th – British 8th Army, with air superiority, opens third offensive in Africa. RAdm. William F. Halsey Jr. replaces VAdm. Robert L. Ghormley as chief of Solomons action.
25th – RAF bombs Milan, Italy.
26th – Major land, sea, air battle underway in Solomons. U.S. loses aircraft carrier.
29th – Hitler reported to have ordered Stalingrad taken regardless of cost.
30th – Jap fleet reported fleeing Guadalcanal area.
November
1st – Japanese naval forces withdraw northward after suffering severe damages at Guadalcanal, Navy reports.
2nd – Australians capture Kokoda, Jap base on New Guinea.
3rd – Dewey wins governorship of New York, ending 20-year Democratic state rule. Henry J. Yute, City Director of Supplies and head of scrap salvage drive, dies a victim of overwork.
4th – Gen. Martin defeats F. Clair Ross by 215,000 votes for Governor. Republicans show high gains. Rommel’s forces in Egypt declared to be in full retreat. British capture 9,000 full prisoners, including Gen. Ritter von Thoma, commander of Afrika Korps.
5th – Republicans gain seats in Congress, imperil Democratic control. Employees of three large Pittsburgh department stores go on strike.
6th – British sign armistice with French at Madagascar. Wages are “frozen” at Sept. 15 level, and income is limited to $25,000 a year.
7th – Powerful U.S.-British forces land on Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts of French North Africa.
8th – Allies take over Algiers. Vichy breaks off relations with United States.
9th – Strike ends at department stores.
11th – Nazi troops pour into unoccupied France as Hitler declares armistice broken.
12th – Gen. Eisenhower reveals that Gen. Mark Clark and other officers paved way for North African campaign in underground visit three weeks before. WPB extends gas rationing to entire nation.
14th – British bombers blast Genoa. Capt. Eddie Rickenbacker and all but one of his companions, missing in South Pacific since Oct. 21, found alive.
15th – Adm. Darlan appoints Gen. Giraud as French military chief in Africa.
16th – Three-day naval battle in Solomons ends in destruction of 28 Japanese warships, including two battleships and five cruisers.
19th – RAF raids Italy’s Fiat airplane works at Turin.
21st – Half of Jap forces landed on Guadalcanal wiped out, remainder dispersed, Navy announces.
23rd – Dakar and French West Africa join territories under control of United Nations without military action, with Adm. Darlan as administrator.
27th – French scuttle major part of fleet as Germans march on Toulon.
28th – Boston nightclub fire kills nearly 500.
29th – Prime Minister Churchill warns Italy to get out of war or face prolonged air attack from Britain and from Allied North African bases.
December
1st – Adm. Darlan assumes post of Chief of State in French Africa. Mileage rationing begins. Bus, trolley, rail lines here groan as Pittsburgh gets “first taste” of gasoline rationing.
2nd – Mystery baby found abandoned in 10th St. Hotel.
3rd – Lt. Col. Boyd “Buzz” Wagner missing for four days on flight from Florida to Alabama.
5th – Navy lists official Pearl Harbor losses. Paul V. McNutt named manpower administrator.
6th – Claude Wickard named food production, rationing administrator.
7th – Tank battle rages among Tebourba hills; air activity increases. Nation remembers Pearl Harbor.
8th – Steps taken to place French ships in Dakar at disposal of the United Nations. Public Utilities Commission orders Peoples Natural Gas Company to reduce gas rates about 15% and to refund $3 million to 160,000 Western Pennsylvania consumers.
9th – Pat Fagan ousted as District 5 president of UMWA after 22 years of service. British drop two- and four-ton bombs on Turin, Italy, knocking city’s industry out of the war.
10th – Hitler again revamps lineup: Gen. Kurt Zeitzler goes in for Gen. Franz Halder as Chief of Staff; Col. Gen. Hans Jeschonnek, 44, and youngest of his rank, placed in charge of Air Force staff; Adm. Frick becomes Navy Chief of Staff. Gen. MacArthur’s headquarters reports all Gona in U.S. hands.
11th – Strike at D. L. Clark Candy Company on North Side cuts flow of “pogie bait” to fighting men.
13th – Allies raid from Italy to France.
14th – Bootlegging crops up in liquor shortage here.
15th – One fireman killed, 233 injured as smoke, fire does more than $75,000 damage to William Penn Hotel. Fifteen hundred Italians lost as subs sink British prison ship.
16th – WLB denies right to enter municipal labor disputes.
17th – Canada curbs drinking for duration.
18th – Gas sales halted on Atlantic Seaboard. Henderson resigns OPA.
19th – British invade Burma. War workers get gas.
20th – B and C gas coupons cut to three gallons. Pittsburgh’s mystery baby identified as son of ex-convict.
21st – Zero weather hits here (coldest December on record). 43,260 Nazi prisoners taken on Don Front.
22nd – RAF bombs blast Munich.
23rd – Germans bomb own troops to halt Russian retreat. Ossified bride weds. Twenty-two die, three seriously injured as huge rocks crush bus near Aliquippa.
24th – RAF bombs Italian factories near Turin. Darlan assassinated.
25th – White House has tenth Christmas with Roosevelts.
26th – Darlan’s assassin executed. Allies drive on Tunisia.
27th – 300,000 Nazis face annihilation.
28th – Reds gain on six fronts.
29th – Red Army speeds Rostov drive. Smoking banned on streetcars, buses in Pittsburgh city limits.
30th – Pittsburgh has second biggest flood in history as waters rise to 36.6 crest.
31st – Flood waters subside slowly as damage runs to millions. Thousands made homeless.
Anything can happen – and did!
Led by football, sports contributed daffy chapter to country’s war year
Upsets so common they cease to be upsets
By Robert Mellace
New York – (Jan. 2)
Sports made the most of its last big fling until victory is achieved.
The year 1942 was a spectacular year of upsets. There were, among other things:
The dethroning of the proud Yankees by the upstart St. Louis Cardinals.
The comeback of overworked Alsab.
The phenomenal pole-vaulting of Cornelius Warmerdam and distance running of Gunder Hägg, the swift Swede who broke a record every time he stepped up to the track.
‘Skins get even
The Washington Redskins getting hunk with the Chicago Bears for the 73–0 pasting of two years ago.
It was perhaps the craziest season in football history.
The young St. Louis Cardinals started rolling, Aug. 4. Theirs was an unprecedented rush that was never checked. Although the Brooklyn Dodgers closed well, such was the drive of the Redbirds that they overcame a 10-game deficit. Then they outplayed, outran, outfought and outsmarted the Yankees and freshman Johnny Beazley came through in the clutches.
College football struggled through a season marked by startling reversals of form and transportation difficulties to finish with precisely one unbeaten major team – Tulsa. The consensus was that Ohio State turned out the most powerful combination among the rah-rah boys. Georgia Tech and Alabama gave the Southeastern Conference priority on New Year’s Day Bowl games by drawing UCLA, Tulsa, Texas and Boston College, in that order.
Sinkwich No. 1
Georgia had the college player of the year in Frankie Sinkwich. Holy Cross powered the biggest upset by exploding the invincibility myth of unbeaten Boston College.
The Great Lakes Naval Training Station turned out the top service team.
A mass movement of champions and foremost contenders to the services left little first-class boxing talent.
The outstanding developments of the year were Beau Jack, an Augusta Negro who came from nowhere to win the lightweight leadership by successive knockouts; Tami Mauriello, who made rapid strides among the heavyweights; and Ray Robinson, flashy Harlem welter.
Boxing muddled
Jimmy Bivins of Cleveland repelled everybody of consequence except Joe Louis and Billy Conn, but disappointed in his New York bow.
Joe Louis defended his title – once for Navy and again for Army Relief, but the biggest one of all – the rematch with Billy Conn – was called off because the arrangements shocked Secretary of War Stimson.
Ben Hogan, the top money winner, bagged the Hale America tournament at Chicago’s Ridgemoor. This tournament passed for the U.S. Open, which was cancelled.
Sam Snead finally won a major tournament – the PGA at Absecon, near Atlantic City.
Alsab comes back
Ted Schroeder, of Glendale, California, won the national tennis singles convincingly enough to be ranked with the more accomplished players who have attained that status.
Closing with racing, Alsab finished one up in three meetings with Whirlaway. Shut Out helped Greentree to the Kentucky Derby and Belmont Stakes, among other rich events, lost to Alsab twice and beat him twice. Occupation won the Belmont Futurity, but Count Fleet set a world mile record for two-year-olds, won the Pimlico Futurity and generally was recognized as the finest juvenile.
Betting soared to new heights, and racing contributed nearly $3,000,000 to war funds. Taxes in New York alone amounted to $10,000,000.
If he cared for one, which he doesn’t, that is the one excuse the sucker who bets on horses could offer.
SHOWSHOPS —
On trial in 1942, Hollywood faces 1943 with more confidence
By Kaspar Monahan
Any survey of the movies for the year just passed must necessarily touch on the effect of the impact of war on the film center. Any survey of the theater, ditto.
The most profoundly affected was Hollywood. In some respects, the war did Hollywood a good turn. The growing restrictions of materials – and the studios use up tons of everything imaginable – the loss of manpower and moral obligation of producing product in step with a warring nation’s mood, actually had good results and the setting up of a Spartan-like regime in the place once referred to maliciously as “Lotus Land” and "Baghdad-by-the-Sea.”
Not all of a sudden, you understand, but pretty swiftly once the national urgency became apparent to the film people from the big wigs on down through the rank and file. Before Pearl Harbor, Hollywood was in a quandary, and not all its own fault either.
What to do?
What to do about entertainment? Theoretically we were at peace, but with our sympathies unmistakably on the side of the anti-Axis nations. Any film dealing with the war (before we got in) did considerable fancy footwork, pussyfooting work, in fact. There could be no name-calling, little identifying of the common enemy.
After Pearl Harbor, the bars fell down. The floodgates were open.
Then came the “anti” films, but the first of them for the most part were poor, ill-conceived and hastily devised. The hymns of hate with a hysterical overtone, the “comedies” and comic-strip compilations of celluloid portraying the shrewdest enemies of mankind in history as witless fools and burlesque zanies – these were a discordant, foolish ripple. Through 1942, they would crop up. But along about midway, Hollywood, from pressure within and without, started to realize this was no comic opera war and that its grim and terrible reality was a challenge to the cinema as the dominant medium of entertainment. In short – to adopt a realistic attitude and to do something about it in the way of hard-hitting, no-punches-pulled movies.
Pointed way
Wake Island struck the keynote of an awakened Hollywood, spoke in powerful dramatic terms to a nation which is sturdy enough to stand the truth and wants the truth. Mrs. Miniver faced reality too. Both were popular. Other films, though not in the same class with this pair, dealt directly or indirectly with the situation with candid approach. Notable among the late arrivals of 1942 is the current Commandos Strike at Dawn at the J. P. Harris. I like the way it faces the fact and the way its characters react to the challenge to all free peoples: In short, you can’t have freedom unless you’re willing to fight for it with everything you’ve got.
These films pointed the way. Hollywood is now no longer in doubt. We have reason to expect great things from Hollywood this year.
In other fields, the industry came through nobly. In promoting war bond sales, it stood second to no other business in the nation. In September, their valiant efforts poled up the sales to prodigious heights as all the country’s 16,000 film houses joined in the drive with a vim. Its glamor girls and boys dropped their customary ennui and went on long treks all over the nation, whopping up the bond rallies and appearing at countless shows for the boys at the camps.
The theater
Supreme triumph of the legitimate theater from both the standpoints of entertainment and the morale of the country was Irving Berlin’s magnificent This is the Army, produced with the fervent blessings of Washington and with the indispensable cooperation of the Army. It is being made into a movie and will reach millions in contrast to the thousands served by the footlights production.
This is the Army was the highlight of a very good year for the local Nixon. Another glittering jewel left at the shrine of Thespis was Gerty Lawrence’s Lady in the Dark. There were a number of worthy exhibits in 1942 and they all managed to reach Pittsburgh despite the growing demands on railroad transportation.
Transportation? Aye, there’s the rub as we speculate on the current year. Until the summer layoff, there are indications that show troupes bound for Pittsburgh (which after all is not so very far from New York) will reach their destination.
But there can be no assurances as we get deeper into the war that this happy condition will continue indefinitely. As for the rest of the “road” – well journeying farther west than Chicago will be a venture I wouldn’t care to bet on. Lady in the Dark, with its massive scenery, decided that the Westward Ho stuff was outmoded and turned eastward after its Chicago engagement.
In dealing with the war in 1942, the theater lagged far behind its Hollywood cousin, the year producing only one outstanding drama on the subject. This was Maxwell Anderson’s Eve of St. Mark which was locally presented at the Pittsburgh Playhouse. There are differences of opinion on John Steinbeck’s Moon Is Down, but I, for one, stand with the dissenters. For a drama about occupied Norway, vastly preferable is Lester Cowan’s movie Commandos Strike at Dawn. The Norwegians would be the first to agree to that statement.
This map really brings home the MASSIVEness of the war and the lesser and lesser numbers of neutrals that remain.
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Business chronology for 1942
January
2nd – Manila falls to Japs. Stocks open year firm, close higher under lead of rails. Retail sales of autos and trucks banned. After production of 200,000 units, car output to be banned for duration.
5th – Auto industry asked to deliver $5-billion finished weapons in 1942. Steel operations 96.4%.
6th – President Roosevelt in address to Congress asks for expenditure of $56 billion for arms program. President calls for production in 1942 of 60,000 airplanes, 45,000 tanks, 8,000,000 deadweight tons of merchant shipping.
7th – President in budget message hints many items may be rationed; estimates next fiscal year deficit as $35.5 billion; government debt at $110 billion. Production of vacuum cleaners cut 25-40%.
8th – OPM puts distillers 60% on war alcohol. Donald M. Nelson appointed war production chief.
9th – New Blue Network formed to segregate WJZ from NBC.
12th – U.S. Steel 1941 shipments 20,458,927 net tons, a record. National War Labor Board given broad powers to adjust labor disputes.
13th – Hosiery industry hereafter to rely to synthetic fibers. Government to pay premium on production of copper, lead, and zinc mined above 1941 quota.
17th – Government approves $400-million program to make artificial rubber. Maritime Commission announces contracts negotiated for 623 additional merchant ships to cost more than $1 billion.
19th – Marriner Eccles, chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, advocates higher taxes, withholding tax, no sales tax, no more excess profits taxes, lower exemptions.
20th – Ganson Purcell made chairman of Securities & Exchange Commission, succeeding Edward C. Eicher who was made a chief justice in the District of Columbia court.
21st – Chamber of Commerce grants railroads 10% passenger fare increase. Reorganization of war program scraps OPM, centralizes authority in War Production Board.
22nd – Steel Workers Organizing Committee asks Republic Steel for wage rise.
23rd – Erie RR directors declare $5 dividend on preferred.
24th – Radio and phonograph makers ordered to cut output in half in the next three months and to undertake $2-billion military program.
February
1st – Ceiling prices fixed in new automobiles for rationing.
2nd – General Motors cuts dividend to 50¢ from 75¢.
3rd – J. P. Morgan & Company, Inc., shares offered to public for first time in history.
9th – Clocks advanced one hour for war time. President asks $27 billion added funds for Army and Maritime Commission; signs appropriation bill for Navy of $26 billion.
13th – Conversion to war work of radio industry ordered, effective in three months.
14th – Sales of new tires banned for duration. Wholesale refrigerator stocks frozen.
16th – DuPont cuts dividend from $1.75 to $1.25. Supreme Court holds regulation of war profits up to Congress, not courts; finds against government in suit to recover $8 million alleged excess profit of Bethlehem Steel in World War I.
17th – Chrysler cuts dividend from $1.50 to $1, reports 1941 net income at $9.22 a share, against $8.69 in 1940. Secretary Ickes calls for voluntary cut of 15% in use of gasoline. Complete allocation control established for aluminum.
19th – Rationing begins on retreads and recaps.
27th – RCA reports 1942 net income at best level since 1929. New York Stock Exchange reports 1942 net loss of $608,864, against net loss of $895,749 in 1940. House rejects proposal to suspend 40-hour week.
28th – Japs invade Java. Emergency price ceilings set on canned goods.
March
2nd – Rationing of new autos begins. Men’s clothing styles restricted. Twenty defense communities given 60 days to reduce rents.
5th – Stocks of typewriters frozen preliminary to rationing. Japs take Batavia.
9th – Installment payments restricted to 15 months from 18.
10th – WPB bans manufacture of tractors using tires after May. House votes to increase debt limit from $65 billion to $125 billion.
11th – Wholesale prices of price goods frozen at March 7-11 levels.
14th – WPB orders 20% cut in gasoline deliveries in 17 Eastern states.
16th – High stock exchange commissions effective; average 25% higher. Maritime Commission orders 234 more Liberty cargo ships. Manufacture of jukeboxes banned.
17th – Nelson reports plane output up 50% since Pearl Harbor. Roosevelt opposes anti-strike legislation.
18th – Retail gasoline prices frozen.
19th – U.S. Steel reports record sales for 1941; net profit $116,171,075, against $101,211,282 in 1940.
20th – Princeton University survey finds 48-hour week best for peak efficiency in war production.
23rd – Stock Exchange resumes full-figure stock and bond sales totals. General Motors’ 1941 report shows net profit equal to $4.44 a share, against $4.32 in 1940. Retail prices frozen on refrigerators, vacuum cleaners, stoves, washers, ironers, radios, phonographs and typewriters.
24th – Stock Exchange seat sells at $17,000, a new low since 1897.
26th – Standard Oil Company (New Jersey) in constant decree provides free public licensing during war of the company’s patents for producing synthetic rubber and gasoline.
27th – Frozen stocks of refrigerators released for unrestricted retail sale.
April
2nd – Metal office furniture stocks frozen.
8th – George P. Rea resigns as Curb Exchange president.
10th – SEC orders Commonwealth & Southern to recapitalize in common stock; company to fight order.
15th – Walter S. Gifford, president of American Telephone, says company’s dividend payments are uncertain. General Foods cuts dividend from 50¢ to 40¢.
21st – President orders seizure of all alien patents for war and civilian use.
23rd – OPA announces gasoline rationing in Eastern states to start May 15.
24th – Otis Steel stockholders vote to merge company into Jones & Laughlin. President Roosevelt favors merger of telegraph companies.
27th – Atlantic Refining cuts dividend from 25¢ to 15¢. J. P. Morgan & Company, Inc., made member of Federal Reserve System.
28th – Stock market in new low ground for 1942. OPA fixes prices on virtually all consumer goods at March levels; rents frozen in 302 war production centers.
29th – President Roosevelt signs $19-billion war supply bill which provides renegotiation of war contracts. American Tobacco cuts dividend from $1 to 75¢.
30th – Refrigerator production halted.
May
4th – American shipyards complete 106 ships first four months, exceeding full 1942 output.
5th – WPB halts use of iron and steel in more than 400 civilian articles; virtually ends production of durable consumer goods.
7th – WPB bans use of copper in more than 100 civilian articles.
14th – Federal grand jury indicts eight chemical corporations and 20 officials on charges of monopoly in dye industry.
15th – Gasoline rationing in Eastern states starts.
18th – DuPont cuts dividend from $1.25 to $1. Retail prices, under freeze order, returned to highest levels of March.
28th – Federal grand jury indicts 20 corporations and 30 individuals in baking industry, charging conspiracy to restrain trade in bread and other bakery products. Chrysler announces plans to build world’s largest war plant.
June
1st – President Roosevelt authorizes purchases of war materials abroad to be admitted duty free.
5th – Aircraft companies discontinue quarterly reports.
8th – President Roosevelt asks $39.5 billion for war for fiscal year ending next June 30. Auto industry war orders total $14 billion.
11th – President Kellogg of Edison Electric Institute says electric power facilities of nation are more than adequate for war production.
12th – Stock sales 220,220 shares, smallest full session since Aug. 26, 1940.
19th – Erie RR declares 50¢ dividend on common stock and certificates; first dividend on common in 76 years.
July
1st – Price Administrator Henderson permits 15% price rise in 1942 canned fruit pack.
2nd – Secretary Morgenthau says war will take 55% of national income in 1943.
6th – Daniel Willard, Baltimore & Ohio president for three decades, dies.
9th – Fur coat ceiling set at last year’s top.
10th – War production chief Nelson predicts $45-billion war output in 1942 and between $70 and $75 billion in 1943.
13th – WPB restricts garden tools, merry-go-rounds, vanity cases, magic lanterns. George P. Rea, former Curb president, made president of Drexel Technology Institute, Philadelphia.
16th – War Labor Board awards 44¢ daily pay rise to workers in “Little Steel,” basing grant on 15% cost of living rise since Jan. 1, 1941.
17th – WLB limits production toiletry and cosmetic items to save chemicals and other critical material. OPA freezes size and quality of soaps. WPB curtails bicycle models in July and August – 32% of 1941 rate.
18th – Stock sales of 99,810 shares, smallest Saturday since Aug. 24, 1940.
19th – New and retread tires banned on beer and soft-drink trucks.
21st – Permanent gas rationing starts in East.
22nd – Bethlehem Steel accepts WLB order on 44¢-a-day wage increase under protest; order provides maintenance of union membership. Ceilings eased for machinery makers.
August
4th – Westinghouse Electric discontinues wage-salary bonus plan because of law requiring renegotiation of war contracts.
5th – Grumman Aircraft raises dividend from 50¢ to 75¢.
8th – American Iron & Steel Institute revises annual steel capacity as of July 1 to 89,198,320 net tons, rise of 628,000 tons compared with Jan. 1; capacity up nearly 8,000,000 tons since the war started.
20th – Net profits of 72 steel companies in first six months, $116,407,000, against $167,421,000 in last half of 1941, according to American Iron & Steel Institute; total is smallest six months since first half of 1933.
24th – U.S. agrees to buy Mexican silver at 45¢ an ounce, a 10¢ premium.
25th – SEC orders American Power & Light and Electric Power & Light to dissolve.
26th – WLB grants U.S. Steel employees 5.5¢-an-hour wage rise, retroactive to Feb. 15.
September
7th – President Roosevelt in Labor Day address tells Congress to act to curb inflation or he will take the necessary signs himself. Record passenger traffic for holiday.
9th – Double-time pay for Sundays and holidays abolished by executive order.
11th – Baruch Committee report suggests nationwide gasoline rationing, appointment of czar for rubber.
14th – Federal Reserve cuts reserve requirements of New York and Chicago banks from 24% to 22% of deposit liabilities.
15th – William M. Jeffers, president of Union Pacific, named rubber czar.
25th – Fourteen non-operating rail unions ask 20¢-an-hour wage rise, union shop.
29th – Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe declares $2.50 dividend, bringing 1942 payments to $6, best since 1931.
October
1st – President Roosevelt’s tour of nation’s war plants announced after his return to Washington. W. L. Hemingway, of St. Louis, made president of American Bankers’ Association.
2nd – Coffee shortage reported in many cities.
5th – James F. Byrnes appointed director of economic stabilization. President Roosevelt stabilizes bulk of nation’s economy – wages, rents, salaries, food prices – under new anti-inflation law. Price administrator sets emergency price ceilings on all food items hitherto exempt.
8th – Gold mines ordered closed to divert miners to strategic metals. Stock sales cross 1,000,000 shares for the first time in 1942.
16th – General Motors announces completion of arrangements for $1-billion revolving credit with 400 banks.
19th – Steel operations 101.1% of capacity, all-time record on tonnage basis.
21st – President Roosevelt signs Revenue Act of 1942, biggest tax bill in history.
27th – Economic Stabilization Director Byrnes sets $25,000 salary ceiling.
29th – New York Federal Reserve Bank cuts discount rate to ½ of 1%.
30th – Great Britain releases $50 million in frozen profits of American film companies.
November
5th – Homestake Mining fails to act on usual monthly dividend.
6th – Department of Commerce reports income payments for September at $10 billion; yearly rate $116.2 billion, a record.
9th – Stock sales at highest of year – 1,207,653 shares – as market rises on U.S. invasion of North Africa.
11th – New York Central declares $1 dividend, first since Nov. 2, 1931.
17th – Gas ration in East cut from 4 gallons to 3.
19th – Office of Defense Transportation launches “don’t travel” appeal.
20th – Big Five railroad brotherhood to seek 15% wage rise. Treasury announces record of $9 billion for December financing.
23rd – Walter C. Teagle resigns as chairman of Standard Oil (New Jersey); Ralph W. Gallagher elected chairman of board. Walter S. Gifford, president of American Telephone, says company will fight FCC order contemplating drastic rate reduction on long-distance calls.
26th – House Interstate Commerce Committee approves measure providing merger of telegraph companies.
29th – William S. Farish, president of Standard Oil (New Jersey) , dies.
30th – Nationwide coffee rationing starts. $9-billion Treasury financing drive starts. U.S. debt crosses $100 billion.
December
1st – Nationwide gasoline rationing starts.
4th – Donald M. Nelson says U.S. now producing armaments equal to all Axis nations.
6th – Paul V. McNutt given full control of manpower. James Byrnes and Leon Henderson ask Interstate Commerce Commission to cancel increases in passenger and freight rates applied earlier this year, involving $500 million in transportation revenues.
7th – Secretary of Agriculture Wickard made food administrator.
9th – Record-sized special offering of 65,527 shares of International Paper common stock at 57.75 per share quickly oversubscribed.
11th – Treasury announces sales of war victory securities reached $6.6 billion level, indicating success in $9-billion drive.
U.S. War Department (January 4, 1943)
Communiqué No. 286
North Africa.
In the course of heavy air operations yesterday, 28 enemy aircraft were destroyed with the loss of seven of our airplanes.
Flying Fortresses, with an escort of Lightning planes (P-38s), made a heavy attack on the harbor at La Goulette (Tunis).
Hits were seen on two ships, on the docks and on the powerhouse. Oil tanks were also hit and left on fire. Our aircraft were attacked by a large number of enemy fighters and in the ensuing combats, 19 of the enemy were shot down, 17 by Flying Fortresses and two by Lightnings.
The docks and the military camps at Sousse and the railway between Sousse and Sfax were also bombed.
There was patrol activity by our troops in the norther forward area and in the same region Hurricane bombers attacked enemy ground targets and Spitfires shot down two enemy fighters.
In the southern area, P-40 fighters (Warhawks) on sweeps attacked enemy vehicles and P-38s shot down an enemy bomber.
Enemy bombers with strong fighter escorts attacked Bone twice yesterday, in each occasion, they were engaged by our Spitfires which shot down four enemy bombers and two fighters. On January 1, a patrol of P-38s off the Tunisian coast encountered four German transport planes and shot down three of them.
U.S. Navy Department (January 4, 1943)
Communiqué No. 239
South Pacific.
On January 2:
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U.S. motor torpedo boats attacked eight Japanese destroyers in isolated engagements in the vicinity of the northwestern end of Guadalcanal Island. The attacks resulted in one torpedo hit on one of the destroyers and three possible hits on two others.
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Enemy aircraft bombed our PT boats and inflicted slight damage.
The Pittsburgh Press (January 4, 1943)
Navy batters 2 ships near Guadalcanal
Enemy continues attempts to supply starving troops on island
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Stukas help Rommel –
Afrika Korps in last stand
Allied planes pound Axis in Tunisia, Crete
By Edward W. Beattie, United Press staff writer
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Men aged 18 to 45 must carry cards
Washington (UP) –
All men 18 to 45 who have been subject to Selective Service for six months must carry draft classification cards beginning Feb. 1, the Selective Service Bureau of the War Manpower Commission announced today.
Under the new regulation, all registrants in the 18-45 group must thereafter carry both their classification cards and registration certificates. The penalty for non-compliance will be fine or imprisonment or both.
The order does not apply to registrants aged 45-64.
The purpose of the ruling is to assure closer touch between registrants and their local boards. Some men have changed residence without notifying their boards and should communicate immediately to avoid being rated as delinquents, the bureau said.
Justices change their minds –
Supreme Court may reverse school flag salute edict
Washington (UP) –
The Supreme Court today opened the door to possible reversal of its two-year-old decision that public school pupils could be expelled for refusing to salute the American flag, even though their religion forbade such saluting.
The court agreed to review a lower court decision which flatly rejected the high court’s ruling. The lower court held that children of three members of the Jehovah’s Witnesses sect did not have to obey a West Virginia Board of Education mandate to salute the flag.
The opinion of two years ago, written by Associate Justice Felix Frankfurter, split the court 8–1. Chief Justice Harlan F. Stone dissented.
Three who then concurred with Justice Frankfurter have announced that they have changed their views – Associate Justices Hugo L. Black, Frank Murphy and William O. Douglas.
Thus, of the present eight-man court, at least four are known to favor reversal.
The position of Justice Robert H. Jackson, who was not on the court two years ago, is not known. But even if he should vote to uphold the previous decision, the court would be split 4–4 thus affirming the lower court. There have been only eight members of the high court since Justice James F. Byrnes resigned to become economic stabilization director.
The new appeal is from a three-judge federal district court ruling that the children of Walter Barnette, Paul Stull, and Lucy McClure of Kanawha County, West Virginia, did not have to salute the flag if it violated their religious principles.
32 Jap planes, 4 ships bagged by battleships
Every one of 20 enemy dive bombers downed in first Solomons raid
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Names of high officials invoked in attempt to defer Buchmanites
Legislators and draft chiefs declared in favor of more to place men in 2-A
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Member flays annual report of Dies group
Subversive elements still in government employ, committee says
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Nine plead innocent in Boston club fire
Boston, Massachusetts (UP) –
Nine of 10 defendants pleaded innocent today when arranged in Superior Court on manslaughter, conspiracy or negligence charges growing out of the Cocoanut Grove fire which took 489 lives.
The only defendant who failed to appear was Police Captain Joseph Buccigross, who is charged with neglect of duty and corruptly failing to enforce fire laws. It was announced in court that he was confined to his home by illness. Special arrangements will be made for his arrangement.
In continuing the cases until Jan. 12 for the filing of special pleas, Superior Judge Frank J. Donahue released the defendants in the same bail as when they were arrested Thursday. It totaled $88,500.