Confidential File

‘Stop the Press,’ Cries Flash Reporter Joe

To you, the Laurel Canyon fire may be old news.

But I just heard about it.

And I’ve got to admit that it’s a matter of special embarrassment to me, because I should have been the first to know.

I happen to be the only newspaper columnist in the world with a bona fide personal news correspondent in Laurel Canyon. His name is Joe Oliveira. His age is, roughly, 12.

His loyalty, however, is divided between me and a mimeographed weekly neighborhood sheet which he publishes himself, called The Little Press.

Ordinarily, Joe keeps me up-to-the-minute on Canyon activities, ranging from stray
cats and broken windows to juvenile plots to extort fudge bars from Sam, the Ice Cream Man.

Continue reading →

Confidential File

A Crumbled Kookie Caper, and No Comb

I don’t know Edd Byrnes personally, and it’s probably for the best.

In person, he might be a charming, very likable young man.

And if that were the case, all of my firm convictions about him would be destroyed.

Mr. Byrnes — for those of you who don’t have straying teen-age children — is the latest of Hollywood’s incessant stream of male idols.

They call him, for reasons beyond my aging ken, “Kookie.”

I first became aware of him as a peril to my peace of mind when my kids began performing the ritual of chanting “Kookie, Kookie, lend me your comb.”

Naturally, I hadn’t the vaguest notion what it meant. And I hadn’t the vaguest interest in finding out.

But I did. Continue reading →

July 29, 1959: The “Orientals” being sent to Congress from Hawaii include future Sen. Daniel K. Inouye. And notice the story about Nikita Khrushchev being invited to visit the U.S.

Confidential File

Great White Hunter White Feels Blue

I present you with my recently completed thesis on the subject: “Proper Protocol to Get a Wildcat Out of Your Back Yard.”

My collaborator on this project was Mr. Keith White, an engineer.

Mr. White, who lives in Northridge, first suspected that there was a wildcat in his back yard several weeks ago.

For no apparent reason, huge branches of eucalyptus trees began crashing down on the premises in the middle of the night. Two of them — 5 or 6 in. thick — were snapped off last weekend. Continue reading →

Confidential File

When Cash Register Is Replacing a Heart

The Almighty Dollar, that great object of universal devotion
— Washington Irving.

Sandra Gianoulis, 8, of Glendale, went to a drive-in theater last week with her mother.

They got there at 7:30. Sandra played for a while with her sister, Lynn, 7, in a recreation area on the premises. They returned to their mother’s car just before dusk.

However, a few minutes before the show was to start, the girls decided to go to the snack bar.

Lynn got out of the car first. Sandra followed, slamming the door behind her. Then, she screamed.

The middle finger of her left hand was caught in the closed door.

Quickly, her mother opened it, freeing the finger. It was bleeding badly. The tip was hanging loosely, not quite completely severed. Continue reading →