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Show Page Two FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 1959 THE SALT LAKE TIMES (Seliind lite Jdeadtined Suddenly the political fortunes of at least four members of the President's cabinet, and maybe a fifth, appeared to hinge on their statements about a great culinary controversy last week, and another statement a cabinet member probably wishes he had never made. We refer to the nation-wid- e cranberry tempest, more of the which later. For it seems far from over, and doubtless will have politcal repercussions, and may affect the 1960 presidential congressional campaign. At the same time the cran-berry furor exploded, Labor Secretary James Mitchell con-templated his own diet, while eating a hat made of cake on the steps of the Labor Depart-ment. Mitchell had promised the AFL-CI- O that he would "eat his hat" if unemployment did not fall below 3,000,000. It didn't, largely as a result of the steel strike. So Mitchell contributed to the week's silliness and hum-bly ate the cake fedora which just as well could have been crow, or humble pie. He tried to keep his dignity as best he could while humbling himself and proved himself "a good sport." But by drawing new attention to the unemploy-ment issue the Republicans would rather forget, Mitchell may have hurt his own admitted hopes for winning the GOP vice presidential nomination next year. This, topping the failure of Mitchell's Mediation Service to settle the strike without a Taft-Hart- ly injunction, has hurt his popularity with Labor, which accused him of making a farce out of unemployment. Even Vice President Nixon, Mitchell's best supporter for the vice presiden-- . tial nomination has begun boom-ing House GOP Leader Halleck of Indiana as a possible vice presidential running mate. While the Labor Secretary was "letting 'em eat cake," the really big national rhubarb developed when cranberrv ernwprs and the berries "only the last Sun-day and expected to have them with his Thanksgiving turkey." And the industry stood up and cheered when the Agriculture Department was first to declare that the Government should re-pay the industry for the harm the Health, Education and Wel-fare Department over publicized tainted berries had done. Still, this hardly helped undo the harm done sales of the $150,-000,0- 00 a year industry just as the cranberry eating holidays were beginning. HEW Secretary Flemming's own wife hardly helped her husband when she said during the peak of the cri-sis that she might still serve the cranberries at their own Thanks-giving table. , But Flemming was hurt most of all by the same chemist, Dr. Boyd Shaffer of the American Cyanamid Co., who first report-ed that the weed killed used on some western crops gave cancer to rates. Shaffer, later said "a fiuman would have to eat 15,000 pounds of cranberries a day for many years" to suffer any ill ef-fects of the chemical, aminotria-zol- e. This set off a whole new, more formidable round of de-mands that HEW Secretary Flemming should be fired or re-sign. This brought the thoughts of many back to Dr. Flemming's predecessor, once removed, and the controversy, similar to the berry tempest that also forced her to resign. Charges of malad-ministration of the Salk polio vaccine helped force Mrs. Oveta Culp Hobby out as first Secre-tary of Health, Education and Welfare in 1955, and the admit-ted failure of HEW to foresee the public demand for short sup-plies of the Salk Vaccine which resulted in shortages, black mar-keting, price rigging, etc., be-came a key issue of the 1956 presidential campaign. It is pointless to recount those days of travail, except to recall that the nature of the polio con-troversy, affecting children and man's triumph over disease, and failure in the initial distribution of the vaccine, were far greater than the cranberry controversy. The fury of the polio distribu-tion furor forcer everyone in the top echelons of the HEW to quit "under fire." Assistant Secretary Roswell Perkins was one of the last to go as Treasury Undersec-retary Marion Folsom succeeded Mrs. Hobby. But Surgeon Gen-eral Leonard Scheele also left "under fire" and under blacken-ing clouds of dissension. Nelson A. Rockefeller, Gover-nor of New York and an unan-nounced candidate for the GOP presidential nomination, was for-tunate. He served as Undersec-retary of the Department HEW from its creation in 1953 and many say he really ran HEW for Mrs. Hobby. But Rockefeller luckily resigned his, post in De-cember, 1954, which was only a few months before the Salk vac-cine tempest rocked the country. Otherwise, the Salk vaccine crisis would still surely hang like an albatross around Rocke-feller's political aspirations. canners found themselves on the firing line, and denounced an-other Cabinet member, Flem-ming, for irreparably hurting them. Suddenly, there were cran-berries everywhere. Democrats twitted the Republican business man's administration for hurting business. Senator John Kennedy of Massachusetts toasted the GOP with cranberry cocktails as scores of others proclaimed themselves the true friends of the cranberry. Vice President Nixon had well publicized extra helpings of the delicacy, politically important, cranberry growing Wisconsin. Congressmen demanded investi-gations. Others pledged them-selves to seek reimbursement for losses suffered by the industry. Frederick Mueller, Commerce Secretary, was denounced for evading an active pro role cranberry in the controversy. Friends of Attorney General Wm. Rogers say he was fearful that the Jus-tice Department would be run into an unpoular prosecution of the underdog berry industry. Businessmen contributors be-seig- ed the GOP National Com-mittee to protest. And surprisingly, Agriculture Secretary Ezra Taft Benson, the long time cabinet "whipping boy," emerged as the real hero of the big cranberry war. Benson was the first to declare during the first few days when every-one else was silent that he had' Demo Chairman Asks For Contributions Paul M. Butler, Democratic National Chairman, addressed this appeal to fellow Democrats: "We are behind on rent and printing bills and we are meet-ing our. payroll on a week to week basis." The plea came in a letter ad-dressed in the Democratic Di-gest, a party magazine. A week ago Butler advised the state organizations behind in their quota payments to the Na-tional Committee that they will be penalized in housing and seating at the party's 1960 con-vention if they did not pay up. The latest plea says the com-mittee's receipts this year have been the greatest ever for a non-president- ial year, but it is di-verting nearly one third of its income to pay old debts. The chairman asked more Democrats to join the party's sustaining membership drive as well as already paying members to increase their contributions by a few dollars each. . . U. S. Steel Names 2 New Officials Harvey B. Jordan, executive vice president, production, with a career in the steel industry started 45 years ago, was named executive vice president and I chairman of the general admin- - istration committee of United States Steel Corporation. Edwin H. Gott, administrative ' vice president, central operation (steel and coal) succeeds Mr. Jordan as executive vice presi-dent, production. The announcements were made by Roger M. Blough, chairman of U. S. Steel, following a spe-cial meeting on November 10 of the corporation's board of direc-tors. Mr. Jordan was previously the vice chairman of the general ad-ministration committee, which is a Pittsburgh Operations com-mittee comprised of officers and other officials of U. S. Steel, in-cluding the presidents of major divisions. Mr. Jordan, who was born in Lansing, Mich., attended Penn State College for two years and received an LL.B. degree from John Marshall Law School in Cleveland in 1926. He began his career in the steel industry during the sum-mer of 1914 as an employee in the chemical laboratory of cen-tral furnaces and docks of the American Steel and Wire in Cleveland. In 1915, he became clean up foreman of the plant, rising steadily to the post of su-perintendent in 1929 and joining the Cleveland operations offices in 1933. He was successively director of manufacturing prac-- t ice in 1934, manager of opera-tions in 1935, assistant to vice pdesident in 1937, assistant vice president in 1938, vice president in 1939, and president of the Wire Division in 1950. Mr. Jordan has been executive vice president in charge of pro-duction for U. S. Steel since 1953. . Mr. Gott, born in Pittsburgh, was graduated from Lehi Uni-versity in 1929 with a bachelor of science degree. He joined U.S. Steel as an industrial engineer at Ohio Works in 1937, after 7 years in operating department of the Kopers Philadelphia Coke Co. He was transferred to Clair-to- n Works of U. S. Steel in 1939 and to Gary Works in 1941. Succesively at Gary Works Mr. Gott served as plant industrial engineer, assistant division su-perintendent, rolling, assistant division superintendent, main-tenac- e, and assistant general superintendent, services. In 1949 he was made assistant general superintendent of South Chicago Works and two years later was appointed general superintend-ent of the Youngstown District Operations of U. S. Steel. In 1953, Mr. Gott was made general manager of operations, steel. He was promoted to vice president in 1956. - Army 1st Lt. Gary R. Farrer, son of Mr. and Mrs. Frank F. Farrer, 1728 Cornell Circle, re-cently completed the ten week officer rotary wing qualification course at the Primary Helicopter School, Camp Wolters, Tex. The course is designed to train Army aviators in helicopter fly-ing techniques and the employ-ment of rotary wing aircraft for observation missions. MORE ON EC-MO-RE Where Bit's FA 0 IF T All the Time THE NEW mm 1230 On Every Radio Szz THE LIGHTER BOURBON STRAIGHT BOURBON WHISKEY 90.4 PROOF Y&gj--) ElMONT DISTIUINO CO., IAWRENCEBURG, IND. '"" Zemo Great for Minor Burns,Cuts Zemo, a doctor's formula, liquid or ointment, soothes, helps heal minor burns, cuts, bruises. 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