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Show 'Way Back When By JEANNE dicta ro it oxen dki'kndio.nt ON CHARITY TU may not agree with the prln-1 prln-1 ciules advanced by Adolf Hitler, or you may be nn enthusiastic admirer ad-mirer of his. In either case you will be interested In looking at the man and his life to see what lesson les-son we may leurn. Perhaps the greatest inspiration to be drawn from the German dictator's life Is a word of encouragement for those whose early lives may seem failures. fail-ures. Adolf Hitler was born on the Bavarian Ba-varian frontier of Germany In lt!!l9, the son of a customs odlcial who had political ambitions for him. The boy developed a desire to be an artist. His father opposed him, so Adolf refused to study In school. He was the despair of his father and mother. When he was eighteen, eight-een, he went to Vienna and applied if for admission to the Academy of Art His art was too poor to qualify and they directed him to the architectural archi-tectural school, but his loafing In early grades made It impossible for him to pass entrance requirements there. At nineteen, his mother died, and as his father had died five years before, he was left alone. For three years he slept In a cheap men's hotel in Vienna, getting get-ting his meals at a monastery and occasionally begging from passers-by. passers-by. In the winter he shoveled snow to make a living. Whenever he earned a few kronen, he stopped work and went to some cheap cafe to deliver political speeches. He painted poor water colors which a friend peddled for him, he painted picture postcards, and when hungry enough was a house painter. During Dur-ing the war he was a corporal. Here was a man in his thirties who had never shown any real promise in anything he did. Then, Adolf Hitler formed an ideal of government. FATHER DIVINE WAS A HEDGE j TRIMMER WHAT are the limits of human i credulity? To what heights ! may not the spell-binding orator j rise? For thousands of simple l blacks in that section of upper New j York city known as Harlem, the ! answer to those questions is "God! Only God is the Limit!" For George i Baker, once a Baltimore hedge ! trimmer and dock worker, who is reported to have served 60 days on a chain gang, is the negro who claims to be God. Early records of his life have not been found and George Baker, who now calls himself Father Divine or God, will not talk. It is known that he came from the South, and that he worked at odd jobs in Baltimore Balti-more in 1899. Starting as a Sunday Sun-day School teacher, he established a new cult, and moved to New York with a few followers who believed him to be God. New disciples joined him and were provided with food and lodging, while he found jobs for them and collected all their earnings. earn-ings. In 1919, he changed his name to Father Divine (God) and conferred con-ferred the title of Angels on all who turned their possessions over to him. Thousands of dollars became be-came his in return for new, more glamorous names, such as Ruth Rachel, Hozanna Love, and Frank Incense. Today Father Divine's Angels An-gels number about 1,000 and there are 3,000 "Children" or followers who retain some of their possessions, posses-sions, living in apartment houses and flats of Harlem. Heaven is his headquarters, where meals are served and where about 75 Angels sleep. He has established Extension Exten-sion Heavens now in Bridgeport, Jersey City, Newark, and Baltimore; Balti-more; and he owns profit-making stores and shops throughout Harlem. Har-lem. It has been estimated that his income is $10,000 per week, but no property is held in his own name. 6-WNU Service. |