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Show 1B11 l.fl j it: ' ' d.': .. ... The Private Papers Of a Cult Reporter: Vuu probably read, in the stories about John Burrymore, how saddened he was over the loss of his interned Jap valet and the Jap's family . . . On the other hand, some of Charles Chaplin's Jap servants turned out to be spies . . . The most ironic situation situa-tion of all, we think, concerns Eugenia Eu-genia Clair Flatto, Grand Hostess of the American Gold Star Mothers' oniiuai convention . . . Before the war, Mrs. i'latto had a loyal Jap gardener . . . He had been here for many years had even fought for this nation in the last big war . . . But, becau.se he is Japanese he had to be Interned . . . Mrs. Flatto now has a new gardener, who is acceptable to the authorities a German, who can't even speak English! One of President Roosevelt's closest clos-est advisers, a New Yorker, was feasting in a delicatessen. As he started to leave, the owner handed him a small package . . . "This," he explained, "is for the President. It contains some of my best corned beef and pastrami. Please take it to him with my compliments" . . . The next day when the President opened the package, right on top of the spicy cold cuts were two dozen of the delicatessen man's cards . . . FDR sent for Steve Early and, handing the cards to him, dryly instructed: "Here pass these around to the various Embassies." When FDR was assistant secretary secre-tary of the navy, they say, he was visited by some ladies of the Temperance Tem-perance Union. They wanted him to christen the ships with soda pop instead of champagne. "The trouble with you ladies," said Mr. Roosevelt, "is that instead of opposing the christening of a vessel ves-sel with champagne, you should encourage en-courage it. And get a great temperance temper-ance lesson." "Why, how can we?" queried one of them. "Well," he replied, "after the first taste of wine, the ship takes to water and sticks to it ever after." Then there's the one about the Mussolini troops, who will go down in history as men who'd rather eat and make love than fight . . . One Italian captain decided to do something about it, and after a pep talk he charged: "Avanti!" ("Forward!") ("For-ward!") and so shouting he led them into battle. When he turned, the captain found himself 50 yards ahead alone! With all his men still seated on the ground applauding applaud-ing and yelling: "Bravo! Bravo!" Admirers of Herbert Bayard Swope were disappointed not to find an anecdote about him in our recent re-cent pillar called "Newspaperman Stuff." M. Throckmorton Cohn, who says Swope is a guy you always find in a photo finish when newspapermen newspaper-men are discussed, relays this one about him. While exec editor down on the World, Swope formed a habit of depending de-pending a great deal for the exact time on the clock in the tower of the Tribune which was directly across the way . . . Every now and then the Trib clock would stop. This riled Swope no end ... So one day he got it off his chest by running this on the World's editorial page: "The Tribune tries to tell the administration administra-tion how to' run the government, yet cannot keep its own clock going." For almost a year she has been trying to crash the Broadway heavens heav-ens ... To attract attention she circulated the fable that she is an heiress to millions and that her family fam-ily pays her a large sum weekly to keep out of the theater . . . Naturally, Natur-ally, that kind of a story got her a lot of publicity, and playwrights and producers catered to her as a potential poten-tial backer . . . The thing exploded right In her pretty face when she was threatened with eviction over a $20 hotel bill. Most top salary players could not squander their money even if they wanted to. The greater part of their salaries goes to taxes and professional and living liv-ing expenses. The rest is handled han-dled by business managers. Hollywood stars are not the gourmets gour-mets they are cracked up to be. They have to eat sparingly of simple sim-ple foods in order to maintain their figures and physical condition. Most stars' dream of Paradise is to be able to eat steak and potatoes and pie whenever they feel like it but they don't. . Don't Believe What You Hear About Hollyicood: Modern Americans believe more myth and legend about Hollywood than did the ancient Greeks about the boys from Mount Olympus, from Ajax to Zeus, inclusive. Although there is a Hollywood Chamber of Commerce to promote this mecca which doesn't exist, there is no Hollywood City Hall or city officials. That vague territory is just the northwest section of the city of Los Angeles. |