The Daily Alaska empire Newspaper, December 20, 1940, Page 1

TH VOL. LVL, NO. 8599. DAILY ALASKA EMPIRE “ALL THE NEWS ALL THE TIME” JUNEAU, ALASKA, FRIDAY, DECEMBER 20, 1940. MEMBER ASSOCIATED PRESS PRICE, TEN CENTS BRITISH FLEET NOW IN ACTION RAF MAKE NIGHT RAID ON GERMAN AREA BOMBERS IN BIG ATTACK IN BAD WEATHER Ruhr Va!leyl?helled—fx- plosions Result from Assault on Essen (By ASSOCIATED PRESS) In the war between England and Germany, Royal Air Force bembers flew in bad weather last night and atfacked “sev- eral targets” in the rich indus- trial Ruhr Valley area and also other points in Western Ger- many. This is the official statement of the British War Ministry, Four heavy bomb explosions are rcported by the RAF fliers in a raid on Essen, site of the great Krupp armament works. Other RAF flicrs flew low over the Rhineland city of Bonn and sct at least “one big fire.” - e HOLDEN TO-COAST Alex Holden flew to the coast to- day in the Alaska Air Transport Lockheed, taking three passengers out C. L. Saintsbury, Max Behr- man and Vincent Anderson, all for Hirst. S e A New Yorker recently took a necktie into a Fifth Avenue es- tablishment to be repaired, point- ing out it had had considerable wear since 1912 when he won it by betting on Woodrow Wilson. — e — Clhe ‘%\NWQ‘_ ad Robert S.Alles /s B WASHINGTON—Several months ago the Defense Commission, with a fanfare of publicity, announced the appointment of a Priorities Board. It was headed by Donald Nelson, former managerial wizard of Sears Roebuck, and included William Xnudsen, Edward Stettini- us and Leon Henderson, Commission aces. But despite its brilliant person- nell, the Board, like so many other things about the Defense Commis- sion, isn’t all that appears on the| surface, What only insiders are aware of is that the Board's vaunted powers cover only the priority of distri- bution, That is, it can regulate the kind of planes a manufacturer can make and who shall get them. This is important, but far from the whole story. For an equally im- portant priorities problem, that cf production, is totally untouched by the Board, In other words the Board is not attempting to con- trol the supply of essential raw ma- terials. OLD MISTAKE An ironic feature of this situa-| tion is that it is a repetition of a major error of the World War In- dustries Board. The old Board also started out by setting up priority controls only over distribution. By the summer of 1918 the mistake was realized and the loophole plugged, but not without the loss of vital time. This lesson was not lost on thej Army and Navy, and after the war, industrial mobilization plans provided for a complete priorities, control covering both raw materials and distribution. - Today Army officers connected with the job of industrial mobili- zation, privately are much dis- turbed about the situation. Some (Continued wn Page Four) Defense; " NewRortinglTipeiady 'l'l.lll new portrait of Mrs. Franktin Delano Roosevelt was made by L. F. Bachrach in the Monroe room of the White House, where the cabinet meetings were held from the administration of Andrew John- #on to that of Theodore Roosevelt. Mrs. Roosevelt is standing be- fore a painting of her grandfather. U. 5. ARMY UNITS TO - GARRISON NEW BASES | NORTH ATLANTIC COAS WASHINGTON, Dec. 20. undisclosed number of United | States Ariy units will leave New York for Newfoundland early next month to garrison the northern- most of the Atlantic Naval and air Bardia Is | Surrounded \ | bases being acquired' from Great | Britain, The War Department discloses| B B""Sh that the troops. will sail for the | outposts even before accommoda- | tions are ready for occupancy. Sy 5 | Until the shore accommodations H H are completed, the soldiers will use llbyan "allan Held Port Is | transports as floating barracks, — i . Expeded '0 Fa” at Washing citrus fruits with hot i | concentrated solutions of bora i Any Tlme Now ‘before storage prevents growth of | | green mold | CAIRO, Egypt, Dec. 20.—British| TR e e T {troops have complely surrounded| o o o ¢ o6 0o 0 @ 8 8 o @ the Tibyan port of Bardia and are| o = {preparing for a final assault On|, ANNUAL CHRISTMAS ° .the Italian held town. ° EDITION OF EMPIRE . | :I‘hls is the official report made| o PUBLISHED SUNDAY e | |this Friday night. ° P | It is further said the British brc-| g The 1940 Christmas edi- es engaged the Italians in some| g tion of the Daily Alaska Em- e points and thrust them back but|e e will be issued Sunday admitted the fighting was heavy. | mornin and distributed to all o e morning and distributed to o e all subscribers. The edition e e will also be on sale at all e sfoc‘ Quor"‘”’ e newsstands, at hotels and e/ i ® drug stores. . . The edition is in four sec- @ NEW YORK, Dec. 20. — Closing | e tions, eight pages to the sec- @ quotation of Alaska Juneau mine|e tion, with general news, @ stock today is 5, American Can 86%, | e Christmas gift suggestions e Anaconda 26%, Bethlehem Steel|e and announcements by Ju- e 84%, Commonwealth and Soythern neau’s progressive merchants e '%, Curtiss Wright 8%, General|e to late Christmas shoppers. ® [Motors 49%, International Harves-|e Merchants who have not e |ter 51, Kennecolt 35%, New York(e done so already, must have e |Central 13%, Northern Pacific 6,| e their advertising copy in the ® United States Steel 67%, Pound|e Empire office not later than e $4.04. - ® noon Saturday (tomorrow) e ey @ to insure insertion. The ad- e DOW, JONES AVERAGES ® vertising deadline is noon e ‘The following are today’s Dow,|® tomorrow. . Jones averages: - industrials 128.89,| e . . rails 27.14, utilities 19.56. ® 0000000000 A |at an end. is (‘xp“clEd | said | ships. A communique from the RAF These headquarters in Caire reports “great damage” has been inflict- i Libyan New Threat Workmg to LINING UP { 'FORBATTLE §§ - UPON DESERT |British Troops Continue! Pressing Against Ifal- ians, Libyan Front (BY ASSOCIATED PRESS) Heavy British troop movements| out of Cairo to the we: ported in the British offis patches today, emphasizes Minister the desert offensive is by no means Prime Churchill’'s statement that Fascist Marshal Graziana, Com- mander of Italy’s Libyan armies, to select Tobruk, 30 , a5 the scene for the battle. | Semi-official bulletins from Rome the British forces included 1,500 planes and 425,000 soldiers, kacked on the coast by British war- ed as the result of an aerial raid - last night on Derna, the Italian ¢ ‘coastal base, 175 miles ‘inside the ol ew e'_ p ForDefense Of Kidnap; IsPlanned Soua Illes President Tfiifmates that ' Changes fo Be Mad 'FBI Men Almost Catch Changes fo Be Made Would-be Snatcher in ‘ Cabbage Patch Trap SANTA ROSA, Cal, Dec. | Wealtliy and socially prominent, |the parents of three-year-old Marc WASHINGTON, Dec 20.—Presi-| dent Roosevelt told the newsmen |at a conference today that noth-| 90— ing definite has' yet been decided about revising the set-up for the National Defense Commission, but| a revision was | De Tristian Jr., recent victim of a he smid [urthermore, sensational kidnaping, have been lO come. once again singled out by an ex- As for the reports of some re- | tortionist. arrangement and Mutting a 3-man | group in charge of speeding up the The extortionist seeks money as defense program as disclosed yes- the price of safety for their child. FBI agents, working secretly terday in pubiished statements, the | through a letter from the Count President characterized them as |and Countess De Tristian, through aper stories | statement said the |the Santa Rosa post office, frus- |trated the scheme and barely | missed capturing the extortionist |in a trap set in a cabbage patch. ‘The suspect snatched a cigar box | which he thought was filled with | money and vanished in the dark- ness before officers could seize him ‘wednesdny night. NOGERMANS SENT TO AID ITALY, REPORT (By Associated Press) Fascist headquarters in Rome de- clare there are no German troops' pl A"E (R ASH in Italy, that none are enroute "to any Italian front and none will | be sent. | Les Cook, Northern Airways pxlm, This statement is an apparent|who was a frequent Juneau visitor denial of the report made yester-'two yecars ago when he was busy ay that already 50,000 German|flying passengers out of the Inter- | soldiers are beipg Junkered to ior, walked away from a crash the | | Italy to join the Italian forces in|other day. the war against the Greeks. Cook, according to the Atlin/ The Rome denial, according to News-Miner, crashed near White-! many sources, is taken with a horse when his engine conked out “grain of salt” as it is known Mus- and a broken fuel line threw a solini admits defeat in the Gre-|blinding spray over the windshield.! cian warfare and has intimated he! The piloi had only 2300 feet of would like assistance from Hit-| altitude because of heavy fog when| ler. the engine quit and in the forced | ——o —— landing, the -plan’ was thoroughly | There are about 1540 nflwny&wrecked although Cook was said to President was proposing a set-up of a “High Command” for the speed- ing of the defense program and this group was to be composed o[ Secretary of War Stimson, S tary of Navy Knox and wlllldm Knudsen, Industrial Production Chicf of the Defense Commission. The President today said only one of four or five set-ups were (nder consideration. | One newsman asked the question about the stories circulated that ap- proximately 30 Danish ships, tied up in American ports, wers to be taken over by the United States Goovernment and then turned over to the British Government. The President replied that this was a “new one on him.” | | | { | LES COOK IN | tunnels in the United States. have been only slightly injured.* en, at anclent spinning wheels, some of them with their babies in their laps, are spinning yarn for, olnnteh for the valiant army of China. Some three thousand women belong to the cooperative where this picture was taken. The organizations turn out. among other war lupphn, 2,000,000 blankets a year. in Near Future ! i constructed by non-union labor. J Keep China’s Soldiers Warm o' B e SECRET DEFENSE PLANS FOR UNITED STATES ARE REPORTED IN MAI(ING L‘ltLSt of Deanna | By JA(K \'llNNL'l"l‘ ‘\ WASHINGTON, Dec. 20. — Na- | tional defense has a brain trust. | Don't get the idea, though, that it's anything like the group that start- ed the New Deal winging on its way The national de: brain trust is composed entirely of laboratory magic dabblers and workshop genii. The official name of this gray mat- ter corps is the National Inventors Council, The chairman 1is Dr, Charles F. Kettering. There are 13 others in the group. -And theirs i the darndest job in the whole de- fense setup. ! If there is something that isn't on earth; if no one has ever thought of it before; even if no one knows whether it really ex- ists—but it's needed—it's up to the council to produce it. “What we need,” says General | Hopeful, “is a rocket torpedo that can be fired to a height of about | five miles, and will level off, chase down a bombing plane and blow |it to splinters.” | And right away 20 to work. | “If we could just make air- | planes out of plastics,” says Gen- eral Wisher, “and stamp them out at the rate of a thousand a day.”, | And another inventor, either on im' under the direction of the coun- cil, starts retorts steaming and presses pressing. 3 Deanna and Vaughn Iiere ls a new pu:zme al’ Dedl\xh | PLASTIC PLANE IS NEAR These may sound like fictions, but the plastic plane is nearing cagagement., Deanna jus. |reality and some experts say the celebrated hcr 19th bu'mday. | aerial torpedo for defense against | | bombing attacks is just over the AFL MEMBERS ' ARE INDICTED| These aren’t the only duties of Conspiracy Charge Made . associate filn pio ducer, wio have annsunced tiei: | this new brain trust. One of the most important is sifting all sdeas“ and suggestions that pour in from | the public. Since the council’s creation, more than 6,000 suz:h' ideas have collected and they :x'eK 11l h Before Grand Jury-True | =s i, e it i f st h d Bills Are Refurned |ih nacons detenses. They sange all the way from crackpot schemes SACRAMENTO, Cal, Dec. 20. —|that must have been conceivéd in The County Grand Jury has indict- a welsh rarebit nightmare to prac- ed five members of the AFL Union tical suggestions from embryo Edi- ® on charges of conspiracy to commit| sons who are willing to contribute malicious mischief. their bit to giving the Unlt.ed The charges involve daubing of States a little hypo in the national creosote on 10 Sacramento houses | (Contioued on Pege Six) & the inventors WARSHIPS OF BRITISH ARE MOVINGNOW IBombardme—nifiof Vital Fa- scist Port of Valona Reported Today NEARLY HUNDRED TONS OF SHELLS ARE HURLED Bardia Secfor Also Under Siege-20,000 Italians Are Impounded (BY ASSOCIATED PRESS) Warships of the British fleet in the Megjterranean Sea, bold- ly sailing up the Adriatic Sea past the “heel” of the Italian boot, are weported this morning by the London Admiralty, to have thundercd nearly 100 tons of shells into the vital Fascist port of Valona, on the Alban- ian coast. Big guns boomed too, in the battle for North Africa. Mus- solini’s own High Command re- ported heavy artillery fire has been exchanged with the Brit- ish warships in the Bardia sector, Libya, where it is esti- mated that 20,000 Fascist troops are now under siege. British commentators seized on the naval shelling of Valona and the British fleet’s accom- panying sweep of the lower Ad- riatic, also reported by .the Biitish Admiralty today, un- challenged by the Italian fleet, as proof the British domination of the Mediterranean Sea has been extended now to the Ad- riatic which is “Italy’s home walers. ADRIATIC IS SWEPTNOW ~ BYBRITISH DesIroyersE—ncounier No ' "Enemy” Shipping- ltalians Cut Off | (By Associated Press) While the British pounded Val- ona, described by the British Ad- miralty as the main supply port of the Italian Army in Southern Albania, a force of British destroy- ers have “swept the Adriatic Sea as far north as Bari and Durazzo without encountering any enemy” shipping. The Grecian Government spokes- man in Athens officially announces that on the Greek front the hard- pressed Italians are retreating up the Albanian coast road toward Palmerg Bay, hoping to reach Chi- mara, 10 miles north. The Greeks, according to the spokesman, are tightening their grip on the strategic towns of Klisura and Tepelini. London quarters assert that Italy’s failure to command the (Continued on Page Four) SHOPPINC DAY TILE: € HRISTA ,‘“{ r/,- ‘5.