The Charlotte News
Thursday, March 12, 1959
FIVE EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that the President and British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan would go to a secluded mountain lodge for their initial talks beginning on March 20 regarding the Berlin crisis, with the sessions to be held at the Eisenhower retreat in the Catoctin Mountains near Thurmont, Md. The White House said this date that the President and Mr. McMillan probably would be at the lodge for at least three days, through March 22, through a long three-day weekend. Press secretary James Hagerty said that it did not necessarily mean that the talks would last only for three days, leaving open the possibility of a longer stay or continuation of the talks in Washington or elsewhere after the weekend. In response to a question, Mr. Hagerty said that the President was hopeful that Secretary of State Dulles, still in the hospital for radiation treatment for his cancer, would be able to participate in some of the talks. There was no word whether Mr. Dulles, who had been hospitalized since February 10, would be able to travel to the mountain lodge. The previous weekend, Mr. Dulles had left the hospital for brief automobile rides in Washington parks. The lodge, situated about 65 miles north of Washington, was known as Camp David, named by the President for both his father and his ten-year old grandson. The camp had been first used by FDR, who had called it Shangri-La. President Truman had spent an occasional weekend there.
The House was poised this date to take final Congressional action to make Hawaii the 50th state. The Senate had voted 76 to 15 on the previous night in favor of statehood for the islands, the vote coming after only one day of debate. The sponsor of the House bill, Representative Leo O'Brien of New York, chairman of the House Territories subcommittee, said that he was prepared to amend the measure to conform exactly to the Senate-passed bill, which had 56 co-sponsors. House approval of a conforming measure would result in the bill being sent to the President for signature, paving the way for state elections in time to seat two Hawaii Senators and one Representative in the House during the current session of Congress. Any variance between the two versions of the bill would require Senate-House conferences and subsequent votes of concurrence. Representative John Saylor of Pennsylvania had pressed for an amendment to give Hawaii two House members, indicating that, with a population of about 600,000, it was entitled to two representatives under the apportionment formula adopted by Congress in 1941. Governor William Quinn had arrived in Washington by air too late to witness the Senate vote. At an impromptu celebration in the old Supreme Court chamber of the Capitol, Governor Quinn thanked Senate leaders for their vote of confidence in Hawaii's people. News of the Senate vote had reached the islands at mid-afternoon and was greeted with joy. Acting Governor Edward Johnson had proclaimed a two-day holiday to start at the time when the House would pass the statehood bill. Southern Democrats, during the Senate vote, had accounted for 14 of the 15 nays. The lone Republican opponent had been Senator John Butler of Maryland. Senator Henry Jackson of Washington, chairman of the Senate Territories subcommittee and floor leader for the bill, said that the Senate's action in approving the measure within two weeks after the completion of a committee hearing had set a record for major legislation.
In Graz, Austria, it was reported that city health authorities had traced a paratyphoid outbreak to powdered eggs imported from Communist China. Residents of the city had promptly dubbed the disease the "yellow peril".
In Melbourne, Australia, advertisements for a revival meeting which evangelist Billy Graham would hold at Melbourne University on Friday had been removed during the night. Organizers of the evangelist's local crusade said that some of the students were opposed to the meeting. The Reverend Graham would wind up his crusade in Melbourne on Sunday and would then take a two-week holiday on the Queensland coast.
In Raleigh, a 23-year old insurance salesman and part-time college student had told officers that he had taken poison, as he was arrested this date and charged with the $17,000 armed robbery of a Raleigh bank on March 3. The man, arrested at his Raleigh home, had been rushed to a hospital where his condition was found not to be serious. He had made the disclosure of ingesting poison while being questioned by officers at his home.
In Raleigh, it was reported that Governor Luther Hodges this date had come out strongly in favor of most of the court reform proposals of the Bell Committee, aimed at providing the state a unified court system. He had primarily agreed with the Bell group's recommendations when they differed with those of the State's Constitutional Study Commission. The Governor had appeared before a joint session of the General Assembly at noon this date to outline his ideas on constitutional revision and court reform. A basic difference between the two groups related to where final authority ought vest for court administration, the Legislature or the State Supreme Court, the Bell Committee favoring the latter. The Governor had agreed.
John Kilgo of The News reports that a Charlotte man, on a Thursday afternoon which had been cloudy with the streets damp in spots, had been on a business call and was driving at between 20 and 25 mph, when his life suddenly changed, as a little boy smacked against his car. The driver said this date that he seemed to freeze with fear after he hit the boy and that it took all of his strength to cut the ignition off, open the door and get out of the car, as the child was lying there in the street, having run from behind two parked cars. The man said that he had come "out of there like a streak. I saw him and hit him at about the same time. I knew he was hurt. I didn't know how bad at first but then I saw blood trickling out of the corner of his mouth and his ear. Then I knew it was serious. I did all I could to help him before the ambulance got there. His mother came up before the ambulance arrived. It happened so fast and yet it was so real. I was hurt, deeply and sincerely hurt. The boy was taken to the hospital and he died there. I was there with his father and mother when he died. The parents were wonderful. I've got children myself and I knew that it could have just as easily been mine. The first few days after the accident were almost unbearable. Friends would call me on the phone and try to talk with me and I would break down and cry like a baby. My wife and I went to the child's funeral and you know that hurt us. This was the kind of thing you say can never happen to you. That's what I thought before that day. But it did happen to me. I still think about it now. Sometimes I still break down. When I see children walking on the side of the road it always reminds me of it. Now when I see a child on the street I almost come to a complete stop and get over on the other side of the road. I know it's almost unbearable for a child's parents. But sometimes I think it's even harder for the driver of the car." Mr. Kilgo indicates that the man involved in the accident had been found by a coroner's jury not to be negligent in any way. But the heartbreak remained. The day on which the story of the accident had appeared in the newspaper, the man involved had clipped the "Wishing Well" feature from the newspaper and had pulled it out the previous day to find that his fortune that day had been "Follow the hand of God."
Mr. Kilgo also reports that a man whose identity remained in some question had burned to death this date in a fiery crash on Mount Holly Road, ten miles from Charlotte. County police said that the car in which the man had been riding had been registered to a man of Catawba Heights, near Belmont. That man was an insurance salesman and an insurance book had been found inside the car. A lieutenant said that the left front tire of the car apparently had blown out, causing the car to leave the road, strike a tree and overturn on the bank of Long Creek. The man had burned to death before anyone could reach him. A man who lived directly across the highway from the crash scene, said that he he had heard a loud noise and had run out of his house where he saw flames shooting up over the bank. He heard what sounded like two people screaming for help and one of the persons had been beating on the back window, hollering for help. He said that he could not see into the car because of the flames. Police said that the voices the man had heard apparently were coming from the same man as only one body had been found in the car, a 1956 Chevrolet. The Mount Holly Volunteer Fire Department had extinguished the fire.
With spring only nine days away, winter had taken a parting wallop at the Northeast this date, with snow ranging up to 14 inches having been dumped on the region eastward from Indiana to Virginia and Maine. As morning came, the snow had begun to change to rain in the southernmost areas, with sleet in some areas. Air and highway travel had been disrupted, though trains remained pretty much on schedule. Hundreds of schools had been closed for the day in several states.
The Associated Press reports that
laymen had seen what appeared to be a bright star perched atop the
slim new moon, looking much like the design of Turkey's flag,
observed from Salt Lake City to Miami, but astronomers had downplayed
the notion, agreeing that it was merely the planet Venus
"The Operation", a "stimulating, suspenseful story of surgery inside the human heart", was to begin the following Monday in The News, providing "every fascinating detail of operating room procedure", vividly brought to life in laymen's terms by author Leonard Engle. He would first present a patient who was a composite of actual cases whom the author had observed at the University of Minnesota Hospital, the composite patient being a 13-year old who had a hole in her heart the size of a quarter, as the heart operation was performed by Drs. C. Walton Lillehei and Richard L. Varco, who had led the world in development of open-heart surgery, one of the surgeries described in detail in the articles, the first of 12 stories to be presented.
In Rome, it was reported that an Italian court this date had given film star Ingrid Bergman custody of the three children born of her marriage to Italian film director Roberto Rossellini. The court had directed that the children would attend an Italian school in Paris. Mr. Rossellini had sought custody of the children. Neither Ms. Bergman, presently the wife of Swedish businessman Lars Schmidt, nor Mr. Rossellini, had attended the hearing. Both had been in Paris, Ms. Bergman with her husband and children. The actress had already been granted custody of the children by a Paris court.
On the editorial page, "Here's a Way To Stop that Spinning" finds that State Representative Frank Snepp's plan to keep Charlotte's municipal democracy from spinning its wheels made excellent sense. It indicates that it was slightly ridiculous for the city to be compelled to hold a primary prior to a municipal election when the field of candidates was too small for anyone to be eliminated, but the law nevertheless required it.
It cites examples of occurrences spanning back to 1943. Mr. Snepp's proposal was to amend the City Charter to skip the primary when the number of candidates did not provide at least two people for each office to be filled. The procedure would save the taxpayers money and save registrars, counters, judges and clerks in every precinct in the city a lot of time and effort. The proposal had been endorsed in principle by the City Council and it urges that appropriate legislation be drawn up without delay and introduced in the current session of the General Assembly.
"Business Development: A Bugle Blows" indicates that North Carolina was no longer America's slumbering economic giant, but had awakened. It finds that historians might give considerable credit for the awakening to the state's Business Development Corporation, launched by the Administration of Governor Luther Hodges to provide venture capital for homegrown industries.
The organization's progress after two full years of operation was discussed in the newspaper this date by business editor J. A. Daly. Even though the BDC was still in its infancy, it was already credited with creating or maintaining 9,119 jobs and approving 67 loans totaling more than 5.8 million dollars. In addition to direct financial assistance, scores of businessmen had received expert counseling from the organization, including assistance in securing capital from other sources.
The corporation's stockholders presently numbered 1,860 and included 139 financial institutions. Its president was R. A. Bigger of Charlotte. By helping small businesses establish in the state, it was serving the best interests of all North Carolinians. Jobs were being produced, markets were being created and profits were being generated which remained in the state and returned repeatedly through the cycle of productivity. In short, it was helping to build the safest, soundest foundation on which prosperous economic life could be constructed.
It finds that its prospects were unlimited, that it would grow and the state would grow with it, with the awakening only being the beginning.
"Quiet, Jose!" indicates that President José Maria Lemus of El Salvador had come to the U.S. on a state visit, not wanting a loan, stating that his country had a balanced budget for several years. With Congress threatening to balloon appropriations, it finds, President Lemus had best hush before coming to Washington, for if he kept on with that line, he would never learn how to spend money which he did not have.
"Movies Are Better: Except for Clowns" indicates that a couple of years earlier, Hollywood had advanced the word that movies were better than ever. While it had seemed somewhat grandiloquent to some, there had been a surprising number of decent films, with quality evident behind many blatant billboards.
The only arena which moviemakers had forgotten was the old comedies which had bridged the chasm between silent and talking pictures. While present-day movies battled life with grim realism, it wonders what had happened to the films of humor. "Who makes a pure idiot's delight of comedy any more? Situational humor certainly and there's still some slapstick, but the revered clowns have passed on."
Millions of people were still around who collapsed at the antics of Buster Keaton or at the early days of Charles Chaplin, or at a Harold Lloyd always in some impossible predicament. From way back, the Keystone Kops and Fatty Arbuckle and, in later times, the Marx Brothers and Laurel and Hardy had provided laughs, though not all of them having been funny to all people. But years earlier, their type of humor had been appreciated, a laugh for laugh's sake with very little dialogue needed.
It finds that people were taking themselves too seriously at present, as a parody or satire drew a fishy eye because it might offend someone. It suggests that with life's pressures as they were, people just could not laugh at themselves anymore and a film of simple clowning lunacy would bring the notion that somebody ought visit his or her psychiatrist.
"'Economy' Note" indicates that some of the Eisenhower Administration's righteous indignation about "spenders" had just been replaced by a guilty grin, as it was announced recently that Federal employment had dropped to 2,347,345 in fiscal year 1958, a decrease of 46,754 from the previous year. But the payroll for fiscal 1958 had been 11.4 billion dollars or 455 million more than in 1957.
It questions whether that was economy.
A piece from the Washington Post, titled "Hearts and Flowers", indicates that recently, the Senate had deigned to consider whether the national flower ought to be the garish carnation, the exquisite rose, the delicate corn tassel or merely an humble blade of timothy or alfalfa. The cause for the carnation was frequently argued in rhetoric fully appropriate to such a subject by Senator Gordon Allott, supporting a resolution frequently endorsed by his Colorado colleague, Senator John Carroll and also by Senators Alexander Wiley of Wisconsin, Mike Mansfield of Montana, Homer Capehart of Indiana and Frank Lausche of Ohio. As Senator Allott had reminded his audience, the carnation was already the symbol of motherhood.
With almost equal eloquence, Senator Kenneth Keating of New York had argued for the rose. But Senator Bourke Hickenlooper of Iowa claimed that while the rose was beautiful and the carnation evoked tender and bittersweet memories, the corn tassel was beautiful and a symbol of nutriment, strength and stability.
Senator Paul Neuberger of Oregon pointed out that the rose, unlike the tassel, could be grown in profusion without the necessity of price supports. Senator Thruston Morton of Kentucky had then interjected, making the case for grass. Senator Paul Douglas of Illinois expressed his astonishment at hearing a representative of Kentucky, of all places, disparage by implication the merits of corn. A moment or so later, however, he heard them disparaged by Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia, who related in somber tones how the golden corn reduced to liquid by the industrious compatriots of Senator Morton was destroying the "minds, bodies, families and reputations of the American people."
It had been so deeply moved by the eloquence of all of the participants in the momentous debate that it decided to withdraw its own selection of a national symbol, which was to have been the cauliflower, more edible than the Scots thistle, more nutritious than the Welsh leek and altogether appropriate, or so it had seemed before the Senate debate, "in view of the battering American statesmen and diplomats have been taking of late on at least three of the four continents."
Drew Pearson indicates that military briefing sessions at the White House sometimes could be boring, with military experts standing with charts, pointing and providing long sets of figures, with Senators invited by the President listening politely but not always attentively. The previous week, as CIA director Allen Dulles provided the figures on Russian military strength around Berlin, Congressional leaders, however, were alert and worried. They were informed that against 175 total divisions in the Red Army, the U.S. had a total of 17 divisions, and against about 330,000 crack Soviet troops in East Germany adjacent to Berlin, the U.S. had 220,000 men in West Germany, of which 75,000 were in fighting units, with the others behind desks, engaged in transport, supplies and training.
Mr. Dulles had not gone into details regarding the strength of American forces in Berlin as he did not have to do so, with several of the Congressional leaders already being experts on those figures. Among them was Congressman Carl Vinson of Georgia, who had a 1,000-acre farm outside Milledgeville where the State insane asylum was located, and when he was not home working in his peanut and cotton fields, was in Washington concentrating on the House Armed Services Committee, of which he was chairman. He had asked: "Do you think in view of this danger that you are wise in proceeding with the presently planned cuts in our military forces?" The President had replied that he had taken the matter under careful consideration and that the presently proposed military budget ought stand.
Senator J. William Fulbright of Arkansas, who, when he had been in the House almost 20 years earlier, had first introduced the resolution which led to the U.N., had then inquired: "Do you think it is wise from a psychological point of view to cut armed forces just as we have told the Russians we will not budge one inch in Berlin?" Again the President said that he had considered the matter carefully and that he did not want to alarm the American people, that he was not going to rush into partial mobilization or the evacuation of Americans from Berlin and especially was not going to fall into the Russian trap by spending the U.S. into bankruptcy, just what the Kremlin would want.
Several of the Congressional leaders had just read a Saturday Evening Post article by former Secretary of State Dean Acheson in which he had warned of the seriousness of the Berlin crisis and expressed the belief that the Russians would think twice about precipitating a military showdown, provided that the U.S. was well prepared. Having that in mind, the Congressmen argued at some length with the President, urging more advanced preparedness, but the President had stood his ground.
Robert C. Ruark, in Nairobi, Kenya, urges that a basic mistake in quelling of the Mau Mau had been Britain's decision to take what was, six years earlier, a local problem from the Kenya settlers and the paramount chiefs and turn it into a war which then lasted years, inspiring the rest of the "colored world" to riot.
The Mau Mau uprising, which had started small as a police action, inspired in time violent ideas in irresponsible persons all over the world, including in Cyprus, Aden, and the sudden flare-ups all over Africa.
That which Dr. Hastings Banda had attempted in Nyasaland recently, in which the natives were to rise as one and strike down all the white settlers, was reprising Jomo Kenyatta's "now infamous night of the long knives."
He finds a heavy spark of intelligence to have been shown by the Central African Federation's Prime Minister, Sir Roy Welensky, who had refused military assistance from Britain, considering the uprising in Nyasaland to be a local problem of that territory and the Rhodesias, to be handled locally. He had stated: "If we are not capable of dealing with what has happened in Nyasaland, the federation government will have failed in its responsibility."
He indicates that what had been planned for Kenya and now for Nyasaland had been selfishly motivated thuggery and should have been dealt with as a police action by a militia and not dignified as a war. Mr. Welensky was using the federation military force, comprised of police and white and African troops representative of all three territories. "In short, this is more along dignified lines in dealing with a flock of rock rollers, window busters and sly knife wielders."
Mr. Banda's arrival in Nyasaland, he finds, smacked not so much of the martyr as of the ham, when 2,000 Africans draped him with a leopard skin and handed him a broom, the leopard skin representing authority and the broom, to sweep out the federation. Thus far, Nyasaland was a brush fire and had been handled as one, and at least the trees remained standing.
A letter writer presents a letter he had received two or three days earlier from a Cuban friend in Havana, whom he had known for some 15 years and who lived there as a businessman of high standing. His friend indicates that prior to the displacement by Fidel Castro's rebels of Fulgencio Batista the prior New Year's Day, they had lived under "a ruthless tyranny and were too grieved to rejoice with the Christmas Holidays." He explains that it was why they had not sent Christmas cards to their friends. But the New Year had brought them, "with God's help, the triumph of the revolution against the tyranny and every Cuban is now happy and hopeful for a complete change in the social, political, and economic future of Cuba." He says that criticism, which had been spread over the world by the international news agencies in connection with the execution of a number of murderers and sadists, who in support of the tyranny, had killed and tortured several thousand Cubans, a large portion of whom had nothing to do with the revolutionary movement, had been a great mistake of the international press, probably from a lack of understanding and basic knowledge of the Cuban situation and the constant pressure on them to produce "sensational news" at a fast tempo, leaving little time to verify or ponder the news which they published. He says that he had wondered for many years if freedom of the press ought be granted to entities organized for profit, making the press a business and the freedom, a stock in trade. He finds it a dangerous situation and that the world had too much at stake to continue taking the grave risk. He indicates that the tyranny had been able to gather strength and ignore the most elementary respect for human life and dignity because, by and large, the Cuban people were too kindhearted, peace-loving and even timid in defending their rights by force, not the brutes the international press had depicted them to be.
A letter writer from Rock Hill, S.C., responds to a letter writer of March 4, who had stated he had yet to hear a sermon preached from any pulpit condemning "godless communism". This writer wonders where the writer was during the Charlotte Crusade of evangelist Billy Graham, and wonders where he went to church. He says that no church of which he was aware which belonged to the Southern Baptist Convention was a member of the National Council of Churches, which the previous writer stated was an aid to the "liberal left wing", and as to ministers who aided the left wing, he wonders again where the previous writer went to church.
A letter writer from Wilmington, N.C., suggests that "World on Defense before Advancing Hordes of Communism" could be a factual and timely statement emblazoned with accuracy of expression as headlines on the front page of every daily newspaper outside the Iron Curtain, as well as behind it. The world, and particularly the U.S., had passed through two distinct cycles of relations with Russia during the previous 25 years and was now, in word and act, about to complete the third cycle, that being defense, having passed through collaboration and appeasement. He suggests that the cycle of collaboration had become effective with the opening of overtures to Russia in 1933 for the recognition of the Kremlin as being worthy of membership in the family of civilized nations, and had continued through the Yalta Conference of February, 1945. At the latter conference, he suggests, the cycle of appeasement had begun and continued through the Berlin airlift of 1948-49 during the Truman Administration. The cycle of defense had been ushered in with the Berlin airlift and had continued to the present. He finds that the U.N. had been flexible to the boasts, threats and demands of Russia since its organization and that, by and large, all tactics adopted to date by the U.N. to counteract the spread of Communism had been predicated on the political, economic and military maneuvers of the Kremlin. He suggests that no organized effort had been initiated by the U.N. to take the offensive and that the only policy disclosed to the world to date was that of "watchfully waiting" for the next political, economic or military move by Russia. In light of the situation, he finds that Russia dictated the foreign policies of the nations of the world and of their quotas of national expenditures on the military. "Russia is the only nation on earth that has an established policy."
He seems to forget the Korean War and the two more recent confrontations, in 1955 and 1958, with Communist China over control of the Formosa Strait and the offshore islands of Quemoy and Matsu, Formosa's outpost bulwark islands. He also seems not to realize that direct conflict with Russia, a nuclear power, could lead to world war tres
A letter from Raleigh, from the chairman of the Committee on Local Government in the State House, Ed Kemp, presents a letter he had sent to Buell Duncan, president of the Charlotte Chamber of Commerce, in which he expresses his appreciation for the splendid reception given to the General Assembly during its recent visit to Charlotte, explaining that they had come away with a better understanding of the problems facing urban communities in the midst of extensive growth. He says they had also been given a first-hand view of the great impact which Charlotte and the Piedmont Crescent had on the overall economy of the state.
A letter writer expresses appreciation for an article which had appeared in the newspaper on March 9, as a result of his son obtaining a 100 percent Charlotte News route, indicating that his son was obtaining knowledge of how to work with people which would benefit him throughout life.
A letter writer indicates that it was unwise of the State Highway Department to say that Downtown Boulevard in Raleigh was the most heavily traveled thoroughfare in the state, when everyone knew that Charlotte was the first in everything and had the most, the biggest, the best and most expensive of everything, with statistics to prove it. Charlotte's promoters had proved that the Highway Department's statistics were twisted and that Charlotte's Graham Street was actually the state's biggest bottleneck.
A letter writer expresses gratitude to the newspaper for the publicity given to the Sanctuary Crusade for Kilgo Methodist Church, especially recognizing John Borchert, who had reported the stories and had been exceptionally helpful in every way.
A letter writer indicates that she was impressed after reading a story by a minister in the newspaper recently about how Christians could go out and win souls for Christ, as Billy Graham was doing. "If we are to be saved, we should want others to come to Christ. And church members should ask themselves if they are ready to meet God. No one but yourself meets God at the judgment. It is up to you what happens then."
A letter writer from Zirconia responds to a letter published on February 26, believes that the writer should receive the Nobel Prize for his statement: "Here in the South the people hold tradition sacred and woe to law or even justice if it lays its profane hands on it," finding that to sum up the South's predicament better than many long-winded sermons.
A letter writer from Santa Monica, Calif., suggests that the country move toward easing Cold War tensions by asking Premier Nikita Khrushchev when he intended to release the millions of slaves in Siberia, to permit East Germany to reunite with West Germany, to withdraw his troops from Romania, Albania, Hungary, Poland and the Baltic States, and to grant civil liberties and a free press to his own people.
A letter writer from Lincolnton hopes that all of the people in the Tenth District, which included Charlotte, and especially those who had supported Congressman Charles Jonas, would read the article in Monday's newspaper regarding the representatives from the state who had sons, daughters and other relatives on their payrolls. He indicates that Mr. Jonas's backers could point with pride to the fact that even in North Carolina, it was possible to elect not only an able Congressman, but an honest one.
Framed Edition
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