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Los Angeles Times file photo Update: “Listening to the heavenly music of Larry Lee and his orchestra in the beautiful Florentine Room of the Beverly Wilshire Hotel recently was John Carroll, film player, and Steffi Duna, film actress,” according the back of the photo, stamped Feb. 14, 1936.
Update: I’m pressed for time this morning, so I’ll add more later. As nearly everyone realized, this is John Carroll.
April 25, 1979: John Carroll dies at the age of 72.
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Crying Need It has been decreed by someone who watches over us that motorists are better served by readjusting the white lines on many busy streets to create left-turn islands for those brave persons who might wish to make a left turn. This has been done lately, among other places, on Wilshire Blvd. in Westwood.
It seems like a fine idea and maybe it is. But let us take a searching second look. In ordering the macadam re-lined, the traffic experts have eliminated one lane of traffic. Instead of three lanes there are now two. When the rush hour is on this is not a matter to dismiss lightly. Traffic backs up for blocks. TO PUT IT ANOTHER WAY, our overseers, to make life easier for the infrequent left-turners, have penalized the hundreds of drivers who want to go straight but find themselves trapped in a two-lane bottleneck. Clearly, if such things are done on the basis of the greatest good for the greatest number, someone has goofed. But the new lines are drawn and motorists better get used to them. However, there's one minor detail that seems also to have been overlooked. Erasing the old line. How is a tourist, or even a long-time resident, supposed to find his lane when he is confronted with two sets of white lines, the old and the new? What this city needs, obviously, is a great big new municipal eraser. ::
WHEN ALL the legal and journalistic talent assembled to cover the Finch murder trial, Dick Whitson wonders why the state doesn't bring Caryl Chessman down from San Quentin to see that everything goes okay.
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NO NOVELTY Publicity proclaims aloud An innovation for the crowd, But many quarters hold this view: Movies that smell are nothing new. –WILLIAM BAFFA ::
LOCAL WRITERS are tall in the saddle this week. Leonard Wibberley, the bearded prophet of Hermosa Beach, has a fine short novel in the Post titled "The Hands of Cormac Joyce," and Newsweek has a fine appraisal of Erle Stanley Gardner, whose 100th book, "The Case of the Waylaid Wolf," is in print.
His first Perry Mason book, "The Case of the Velvet Claws," published in 1932, was dictated in 3 1/2 days. He now turns out a book in three weeks. His secret in writing a mystery: "Never tell the reader everything." ::
EVEN STEVEN — A man who lives in an outlying community and has to get up at 3 a.m. to go to work in downtown L.A. couldn't start his car the other morning.
He was tinkering with it when an officer drove up, put his flashlight beam on him and demanded to know what he was up to. The householder explained and asked him about a push. The officer was sorry, he couldn't. "If I did, it would take me an hour to fill out a form telling how I got a scratch on my bumper," he explained. The same day an officer in a police car drew up behind a stalled auto at Pico and Sawtelle Blvds. after dozens of cars had gone around it and cheerfully gave the grateful driver a poosh. ::
AT RANDOM — Did you see the air photo of snow-covered Big Bear in yesterday's paper? Photog Gene Hackley got it on the second try. He and pilot Herb Green first took off in a helicopter but couldn't get the needed altitude — both weigh over 200 — so went in a regular plane . . . This is to inform Beverly Garland that her handsome Christmas card postmarked London, Eng., Dec. 23, 1959, arrived yesterday. Sometimes it is difficult to understand what goes on. |
Encounter With a Pencil Salesman
He came out of the rain yesterday afternoon, into my office. Tied around his waist was a Folger's coffee can. It obviously was his display case for razor blades and pencils, when open. But it was closed. The small bundle under his arm was his wardrobe — extra clothing to compliment the faded flannel shirt, dirt brown sweater and worn pants he had on. Mike had just arrived in town, he told me. He'd hitchhiked down from the north. And he was calling on me because a friend had suggested that he drop by as soon as he hit town. Over a cup of coffee and a cigarette, Mike talked about his life. He was born in Ireland, came to the states as a baby and when he was a 15-year-old merchant mariner stoking coal on a cargo ship, the explosion which marred him for life happened. "Took me 12 or 13 years to get used to being a cripple," he said, "but finally I did. I stay on the road now. Keep moving. Stay one jump ahead of them." "Ahead of whom?" I asked.
"Like up in Yellowstone. There got to be so many panhandlers there that they kicked us all out. Winos, drunks. I got no use for them, either. Kids with deaf-and-dumb cards were all over the place. The kids can talk just as good as you and me, but I don't blame them. I blame their parents." Mike's right eye blinked spasmodically as he talked. "I got no teeth," he said. "Had a false set once, but somebody clipped me for them. Don't know why anybody'd want to steal a crippled man's false teeth. "Things like that are always happening to me. On the way down from San Francisco, I set my bedroll outside some truck stop and somebody clipped that. Three good blankets, parka coat, my reading glasses — they're all gone. "I saved up for that coat out of the money I earned begging," Mike explained. "Or," he corrected, "selling pencils." I asked him if he had to get a permit in each city, if the law gave him much trouble. He smiled and the tic on his eye went to work again. "Lot of towns put the heat on you. You live by your wits. Keep ahead of the beef. "Take me," he continued. "I work the quiet places. By a small market, maybe, where I won't draw too much attention. I hit the working class. They're the ones who help you. Not the rich people. That way, I make four, five, six dollars a day. That's enough." "How long do you plan to stay in L.A.?" I asked. "Not long," he answered. "I keep moving. I go all over the country. You do better that way, better than staying in one place." A Lodging for the Night
Casting a glance at the window, he added, "Kind of wet out. You know a clean hotel?" I made a couple of calls. I got him situated at the Y for the night, gave him a few bucks to tide him over until he could get back in business tomorrow, and stuck him in a cab. A short time later, I got a call back from the man I talked to at the Y. "I'm sorry," the man apologized. "All our single rooms were filled up, so we offered Mike the best we had. He'd have had a couple of roommates." "You mean he wouldn't take the room?" I asked. "That's right," the man replied. "In fact, he was quite insulted. "The last I saw him," the man added, "he was back out in the rain, going down the street."
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| Jan. 15, 1953: Hedda Hopper says, “Fernando Lamas' romance with Lana Turner sure paid off. He has been offered four pictures here, including 'One Night of Love' at Columbia, 'The Diamond Queen' at Warners, and another opposite Kathryn Grayson. Broadway's calling him for 'Carnival in Flanders,' but he has one picture to make for MGM before his contract with that studio ends. I don't believe his current flame will lead him to the altar. Lamas told me ages ago he didn't want to marry.” |
Investigators say Julian A. Frank, 32, insured himself for a National Airlines flight that crashed Jan. 6, killing 34 people. Evidence suggests that Frank may have set off a bomb.
Now this is interesting — someone deleted the name of a witness who testified about payoffs in the women’s garment industry in Los Angeles.
"Behind the Great Wall" in AromaRama!
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Blood was found in Mickey’s car and he was unable to provide an alibi for where he was at the time of the killing, but charges were dropped after he resigned from the university. |
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| Steve Hodel, whose father, Dr. George Hodel, has been turned into a serial killer franchise, will be appearing at the Los Angeles Police Historical Society Museum on Jan. 15, the 63rd anniversary of the killing of Elizabeth Short, nicknamed the Black Dahlia. Tickets for a VIP reception are $50. |
Anti-Togetherness
Newspapermen are there to get at what the subject has to say, even to prod him into saying something he hadn't intended. Whether his hair is mussed or there is egg on his coat or he gets aggravated at their questions is irrelevant. From experience, they feel they elicit the most from him when he is at ease, not under the eyes of cameras. TV MEN ARE THERE to get the story, too, but they're also looking for a show. They feel there may be added dramatic value in a man blowing his top when trapped into replying to an embarrassing question or gulping or sneezing or tugging at his collar or scratching his chin. Obviously the man most likely to succeed in making friends and influencing people, vital in an election year, is the best actor, one who remains unruffled and smiles an ingratiating if rehearsed smile, no matter what he is asked. A professional actor knows it's as easy to feign sincerity as it is to pretend to be surprised, terrified, happy or sorrowful. And so there's no togetherness in press conferences since the camera crews walked out on Gov. Rockefeller and Gov. Brown. If the TV men can't bring their equipment in the room while the pencil and paper boys are asking questions they're under the orders from New York not to play. ::
SUDDEN THOUGHT — Civilization is when you can't tell whether a roaring noise in the night is the sonic boom from a jet plane or the garbage grinder next door. ::
CLASS REUNION ::
TWO NORWALK deputy sheriffs who visit the nearby schools instructing youngsters in traffic safety were at McGee School in Pico Rivera recently demonstrating how long it takes a car to stop in an emergency. Deputy Lee Kerr gunned the car to 25 mph, stepped hard on the brake, then let the youngsters measure the distance required to stop — 43 feet. A surly fifth-grader looked at the measuring tape and exclaimed, "Aw, that car's rigged to slide farther than it should! It doesn't really take that long to stop!" So you see, it's not only a generation of vipers, it's a generation of unbelievers. ::
When the landlord hollered, the wife demanded an accounting of the C note. Trapped, he told her he'd loaned it to Carl, who needed it desperately to pay a bookie debt. The wife closed in on Carl, indignantly denounced horses and men, not necessarily in that order, with the result that Carl had to dig up another $100 or betray his pal. Sternest test of friendship Carl has ever undergone. ::
A MAN observed wandering a golf course, looking through binoculars at homes on the fringe of the fairways, was arrested recently as a burglary suspect. He denied he had any intentions. He admitted, however, he was a potential Peeping Tom. "But all I could see," he insisted, "were heads and TV sets!" ::
MISCELLANY — Profound quotation on a notice of Leon Saulter's exhibit (painting and sculpture) at 746 N La Cienega Blvd.: "The ultimate, which is the goal, is never attained, but searching for it becomes the art" . . . Pat Buttram on CBS Radio: "It's an adult western when the hero wears a .45 Colt and the heroine a 38 sweater." |
| Art Buchwald talks to Gregory Corso on the rise of the Beats. "This is going to be a great age," Corso says. "I can feel it. If we can only get some beatniks in the armies of the world we can burn down war."
An unidentified suspect is arrested in the kidnapping and slaying of 10-year-old Mary Lou Olson of National City. Her killing was never solved.
“It takes a brave man to walk in and assume the coaching job of the Los Angeles Rams. That man is Bob Waterfield,” Paul Zimmerman says.
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| Jan. 14, 1960: “The presidential primary is an extensive and exhaustive ordeal which cheapens the quality of the discussion of national issues and puts an excessive premium on the arts of demagoguery," Walter Lippmann writes.
He adds, "At the best, these scattered and haphazard primary elections should be regarded, if and when the votes have been thoroughly analyzed, as samples of public opinion to assist the convention in making its final judgment. They should never, as Sen. Kennedy proposes, be treated as decisive." |
“In other words, so far as this city is concerned, during the year 1919 the white race was gradually approaching extinction, being second to the Indian….”
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| Jan. 14, 1920: "Mr. Early admitted that he hugged and kissed the embryonic star as part of her stage education." |
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Madame Paulhan climbs out of her husband's plane after making a trip.
"Mon Dieu! How can I tell you? One floats away, one glides through the
air, and that is all. How can I describe it? It is impossible," Mme. Paulhan says.
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| Jan. 14, 1910: Another day of wonders, a day of 19th century miracles become the popular sport of the 20th century — that is briefly the story of the fourth day of the Los Angeles Aviation Meet. |
How to View Smog
The story states: "The smog cuts down the visibility, sure. The lowest it got was four miles at 9 a.m. It was back up to eight miles by 2 p.m. "There's even an explanation for our smog. 'It was just a lack of wind to blow the smoke away,' explained the weatherman. 'Usually we have plenty of circulation to keep it all stirred up, but it just didn't happen this morning.' " IT IS CLEAR from the above that we have taken the wrong approach to our smog problem. We keep talking and grousing about it when we should ignore it. From now on, let us pretend it isn't there. Perhaps the supervisors will appoint a Board of Sweetness and Light which will assure the eye-watering, nose-blowing taxpayers that they just imagine it. ::
WHEN A Manhattan Beach family returned from a New Year's weekend in the mountains it found this scrawled note on the front door: "Congratulations. You have won a 19-year supply of Christmas trees." Seemed like a harmless gag until the family found 19 tired trees piled in the back yard. Happens every year, although in the Hollywood version some diabolic alcoholic places an ad in a paper stating the innocent victim will pay for used trees delivered to his home. ::
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ANDREW AND Virginia Stone constitute one of the most versatile husband and wife teams in motion pictures. He writes, produces and directs; she is the film editor. They also write the music for their productions, for instance, the title song for their recent opus, "The Last Voyage." ::
FOR PURPOSES of publicity, the Lanvin perfume people recently sent an emissary to the town of Hell, 58 miles east of Indio, to try to prevail upon the overseers, forked tail or not, to change the name to Arpege. The town, some will recall, is named occasionally in gag weather stories. You know, as hot or as cold as. ::
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June 29, 1948, Ronald Reagan and Jane Wyman divorce. |
| Jan. 13, 1952: Hedda Hopper asks Jane Wyman: "Don't you kinda miss a man around the house?" |
Mike was the old man's name. He had no teeth, one good arm and legs that stopped at the knees.
ladailymirror.com 