Confidential File

Nice Heart-Warming Variety of Larceny

I have, in rare moments of self-examination, confessed to filching stories from fellow newspapermen.

Consequently, I am not in a position to be outraged when someone lifts one of my pieces.

Sometimes, I'm even delighted.

Today is one of those times.

Last
month I told you about a rather remarkable woman. A woman who, by all
the rules of life and death, should have been dead 10 years ago.

She is Lucille Warnecke. And she's very much alive.

But in 1949, shortly after she and her son, Mike, then 4, contracted polio, doctors held out no hope for Mrs. Warnecke.

A priest was summoned to the hospital to administer last rites.

But Mrs. Warnecke,
possessing an indomitable will to live, survived. She went on to
recover from the major effects of the paralysis and continue her life
as an energetic, almost unbelievably active housewife.

With the aid of leg brace and wheelchair, Mrs. Warnecke
ran an efficient, loving home for hubby Dwight, son Mike and two
daughters, adopted from a Japanese orphanage after her bout with polio.

American institutions had refused to permit adoption.

But Mrs. Warnecke got her kids. Then, pressed by Mike for a brother (the family was getting lopsided on the distaff side), Mr. and Mrs. Warnecke adopted a boy from the same orphanage in Tokyo which had supplied Mary, then 7, and Patty, then 5.

When I recounted the story for you, I said that Mrs. Warnecke was faced with another problem.

Seemingly insurmountable, but the kind she apparently handles best.

She
and her husband had adopted the Japanese boy, all right, but airline
regulations forbade John Joseph, their new son, to fly the Pacific
without an adult to supervise.

After all, John Joseph is only a year old.

Furthermore, airline officials were forced to give a firm, but sympathetic "no" answer when Mrs. Warnecke asked if they would contact a Los Angeles-bound passenger in Japan for help.

So I printed the story, hoping someone would come up with an answer to Mrs. Warnecke's problem.

And somebody stole the story.

He's Ralph Edwards of "This Is Your Life" fame. He's also a guy who perpetrates minor miracles.

I was caught up in a conspiracy.

Ralph's office asked me to pretend that I could present Mrs. Warnecke's appeal on nationwide TV if she'd come to Los Angeles. I was to lure her here from her new home in Kansas City.

Pretty sneaky, but all for a good cause.

In the meantime, Ralph's staff arranged a lot of nice things. A new car for Mrs. Warnecke. Nine months of free rent for the family in Kansas City. And a reunion between Mrs. Warnecke and a bunch of wonderful people who helped her when she was close to death.

But most important, they put John Joseph in his new mother's arms.

You are very welcome, Ralph. Come back and steal again sometime.