March 6, 1944

Broadway Ballad

The Orchid Garden: Zanuck’s newest click, “The Purple Heart.” The author is listed as Melville Crossman. That’s Zanuck …

Editorial Dept. Novelette: It happened in the city room of one of the Big Town gazettes … Two of the boys were back to say hello … One (who has never been out of the country) wore the Army oak leaf … The other wore the gray-green of the Marines, with a couple of hard-won stripes … Tippled and blustering, the major called upon the Marine to salute … The kid responded quickly … After all, he had been only a copy boy; the major had been an editor, if you please … It was a tight, tense moment … A real editor looked up from his work with studied puzzlement … “Tell me,” he said in clipped, quiet, carrying syllables, “which one of you was it who killed six Japs on Guadalcanal?” … The major waddled out the door … The kid was too modest.

From the St. Petersburg Times.