The Daily Alaska empire Newspaper, March 29, 1943, Page 1

THE DAILY ALASKA EMPIRE “ALL THE NEWS ALL THE TIME” VOL. LX., NO. 9303. JUNEAU, ALASKA, MONDAY, MARCH 29, 1943 PRESS “PRICE TEN CENTS . - e e — 4 4 &’ (4 s Jap Force Beaten Back By S L4 4 & L4 L4 4 CONGRESSMEN MARETH LINE IS SMASHED; ROMMEL RUNS Ameritans'Pushing To-| ward Sea to Cut Off German Escape ENEMY PLOWS UP | GABES AIRFIELDS Indication This Base Alsg,| to Be Abandoned | to Allies 1 ALLIED HEADQUARTERS IN NORTH AFRICA, March 29.—Field | Marshal Rommel's Mareth Line de- | fenses have collapsed under pound- ing by the British Eighth Army: and his forces are retreating nonh-l ward with Heavy losses. Scattered pockets of resismncei were left behind, but General Mont- | gomery’s infantrymen are reported | to be mopping these up one by one. Meanwhile, Allied aerial squad- rons joined the ground forces in| powerful attacks along the Axis| escape corridor. ‘ The Mareth Line broke along a | 25-mile front, ranging from 20 to| (Continued on Page Three) | The Washington Merry - Go-Round' By DREW PEARSON | NOTED EXPERT ON — | WASHINGTON. — The President | did the listening, instead of the| talking, when he conferred on| INDUS]‘RY |S DEAD farm manpower and food with [] three prominent farm leuders‘Al-: = b pert 5. Goss, master of the Na-| Man Who Worked Himself tional Grange; H. E. Babcock, vice | i Ben ) president of the National councit| Up fo President U. §. of Farmer Cooperatives, and Ezra T. Nelson, its executive secretary. | S'eel, Passes On The farm spokesmen spent about | thirty minutes of the 37-minute| NEW YORK, March 29— James conference expounding their views|a Farrell, 80, former President of on what caused the food shortage |the United States Steel Corpora- now facing the country and what |tion, is dead at his home here. has to be done to remedy it. The| FParrell, made president of the President confined his remarksfunited States Steel Corporation in chiefly to asking questions. 11911 because, in the words of Hen- He began by telling his visitors|ry Clay Frick,” he was ‘‘conspicu- that the food situation was ‘“ex- |ouosly the best man in America tremely serious.” for the position,” was at the top “That’s why I invited you gentle- |'0f the huge corporation for nearly men here today—to get your opin- |21 years. ions on what has to be done,” the He was named its chief executive President said. “Go ahead and be |Officer as well as president in Dec- as frank as you like.” :ember, 1927, and held both posi- A, iticns until his retirement- on April 18, 1932. DRAFT PROBLEM % .| Just before the Farrell adminis- “If you want my views, I'll 8IVe|{yo4ion phegan, the company had an them to you, Mr. President,” spoke |oueput of 6,000,000 tons in 1910. It up Ezra Nelson. “Two things have proquced 28,000,000 in 1931, with a to be done and done immediately.|peak year in 1929 in which its sales First of all, some one in authority |totaled close to $1,500,000,000. here in Washington must tell local' Knew Business draft boards where to head in. Farrell knew the steel business “They must be told that they|‘from the ore up.” He learned it have almost as much responsibility las a 15-year-old day laborer, mech to see to it that we have sufficient anic, mill boss and salesman, serv- manpower to produce food for the ing in upward steps with companies war effort as they have to provide |whi¢h were absorbed by successive men for the fighting forces.” |mergers in the years 1889-1901 until The President pointed out that | various branches of the steel in- many young farmers don’t want w'k'du.stry were gathered into a fold be deferred. which became United States Steel. “hhis isn’t the fault of the draft| Described once as “a salesman boards,” he said. “The young men |Plus,” Farrell attracted attention in themselves are so patriotic that|the merger years as foreign slles they do not want to remain on mo"“gfi_m of "tha American ,cel End farm while a war is going on.” ‘t_he'Company and when this com- ination in turn became a subsidi- It was agreed that steps would 7 / . y of the steel corporation, he w: have to be taken to convince S€-|.,,eon o work yp its foreign mar- lectees that they could serve their|, .. 3 country as well on the farm as in Organizes Fleet the Army. Goss suggested thal one| ¢ girgt each unit of the big com- “way out” would be to inductipination handled its own export farmhands and then “furlough” |y ciness, but Farrell, in 1903, was them back to the farm &t Dre-linstrumental in centralizing this ef- vailing farm wages instead of Army |fort and became president of the pay. e |pany. In the succeeding eight years STOP SELLING COWS | ke organized a fleet of cargo car- “The second thing that has to riers, opened 60 agencies in South (Continued on Page Four) |United States Steel Products Com- | TAKE PART IN AIR RAID REHEARSAL 3 CONGRESSMEN, secretaries and visitors march out of the U. S, Capitol building in Washingoi s air raid shelters during the capital's first daylight air raid rehearsal under the new warning systcin decreed by the OCD. The air raid shelters are in the House office building. Ickes Gives Approval ToResolufion, Suspend ~ Mine Assessment Work (International) MAP OUT PACIFIC WARFARE Commande;siof Combat Lones Told About Stra- tegic Jap Campaign WASHINGTON, March 29.—High ranking Army and Navy officers of the Pacific war theatres have just completed a series cf confer- ences on plans for future cam- WASHINGTON, March 29. — The Interior Department is in accord with House Resolution 334 to sus- pend for the duration of the war the requirement in the mining laws | that at least $100 worth of labor or | improvements must be made an-| nually on all mining claims in the | United States proper and Alaska. Alaska Delegate Anthony J. Di- |mond reports, coincident with the department’s approval by Harold L. ‘g;(;:’esl:::;(?:c hj:chSe::]ila)Tulé:a::}:“mmm against the Japs, the War man of the House Committee on|DePartment said. | Mines and Mining, that he expects| Chiefs of Staffs were called to !to convene the committee shortly to |2 joint conference to acquaint the consider the bill, which was written | commanding officers of the Pacific by Smith. ccmbat zones of strategy approved i “I shall do all T can in my official | &t* the Casablanca conference be- ‘cupuuny to have the bill recom-|iween President Roosevelt and !mended favorably and placed on |Prime Minister Churchill. f the calendar in order that it may be| Heading the group of 15 offi- cers were Lieuf. Gen. Demos Em- mons, Commanding Army Force: in Hawali; Lieut. Gen. George Ken- ney, Commander of the Allied Alr Forees in the Southeast Pacific and Lieut. Gen. Millard Harmo Commanding the Army Forces [ the South Pacific. The announcement today said Jthe officers are returning to their overseas stations in the very near { future, NOTED RUSSIAN T * MUSICIAN DIEs ' AIRFIELDS N CAUIFORNIA o NIpPONS BOMB HIT 'Enemy Positions on Bou- | passed and approved by the Presi- !dent by July 1,” Smith told Dele- gate Dimond. | Secretary Ickes approved the reso- { lution when brought to his attention | by Delegate Dimond after the lattex, had a letter from Mr. and Mrs. Milo Caughrean, residents of Flat, now working in Seattle, stating how dif- ficult it would be to do assessment work. —— e ———— D Rachmaninoff, Pianist, Conductor, Composes | Passes Away in Cal. BEVERLY HILLS, Calif., March i pionis, conavetor and| Gainville Island Are Rachmaninott, ang.‘of the last Also Atfacked survivors of the important group of Russian Romanticists who cen- ~WASHINGTON, March 29.—Am- |tered about Tchaikowsky, was|erican bombers attacking the Jap | founded on his ability as piaant,:airflelds at Buin and Kabhili scored conductor and composer. In Am-‘mts Sunday on the runways and erica, although he had conducted | protected dispersal areas, the Navy on a few occasions, he was known | Department announces, also stating almost wholly as a composer and a | all bombers returned safely to ba touring virtuoso. Returning to their bases, | the And for the wide public, his repu- | bombers crashed enemy positions on tation was the result of a little | Bougainville Island, 300 miles north- | prelude in C sharp minor, com- west of Guadalcanal. - e - ‘posecl as a youth of 20 and des- BUY WAR BONDS " (Continued on Page Four) | " (Continued on Page Five) BERLIN IN FLAMES; RAF ATTACK Nine Hundred Tons of | Bombs Dropped in Half | Hour on Nazi Capital | LONDON,' March 29 Berlin shuddered and exploded under the shattering impact of the Royal Air Foree's heaviest night attack, de- seribed officially as twice as hea as anything the Luftwaffe ever in- flicted on London, and then Unit- | €d States bombers pitched right in and kept up a daylight revitalized pre-invasion offensive against the ecntinent with a heavy assault on the Freneh rail center of Rouen. A great force of British bomb- rs cascaded 900 tons of explosives on the German capital city at the rate of 30 tons a minute in a devastating half -hour assault and the returning pilots reported they left Berlin spurting and surging in a volcano-like mass of flames. Then the RAF returned to a round-the-clock offensive with at- tacks on Holland and Belgium later indthe day. The German radio stations went |off the air, indicating additional Allied blows. R NAZIS CANT CRACK LINES - OF RUSSIANS |Red 'Army F'iights in Mud But Break Up Two Ger- man Crash Attempts (By Associated Press) The Russian Red Army fought on in mud during the night, break- ing up two German efforts to crack the Soviet line along the upper Donets River . Capturing four more villages, the Red Army moved slowly toward smolensk The Soviet midda reported “no mate front and f] 1 almost exclusively enjagements invelving mall ferees. The German communique said nly local engagements were fouzht on the ssuthern and central see- tors of the Russian front yesterday but the Russians have renewed at- tacks south of Lake Ilman near Lake Ladoga. \ R Enemy Harbor On Attu Gefs Bombing Too communique al changes on shting is devot- to isolated relatively ny While Other Craft Atfack Kiska WASHINGTON, March 29. The Navy Department announces Lib- erator and Mitchell bombers, corted by Lightning fighters, car- ried out three attacks against the Jap positions at Kiska and dropped bombs on the runway, hangar and camp. The low-flying fighters also strafed the Jap personnel. ‘The Navy also announces that a search plane bombed Abraham Harbor on the southwest coast of Attu Island. 3 S & & 4 4 IS RCAF Plane Crashes Off Maska Coast; Six Killed Including USO Hostesses wEST ALASKA VANCOUVER, B. C, March 29 Six persons, three of them USO hostesses, were killed and a seventh person is missing as the result of a crash of a Royal Canadian Air Force transport plane into the sea off the coast of Alaska, the Western Air Command announces. The brief statement said the cause of the crash is obscured but curred in a sudden snow squall The names of those killed or miss- |ing are not released pending noti- oc- fication of next of kin. It is said that the three men killed | i and the one missing were members | of the RCAF. Brifish Face Jan Atlack L /RANGO el s - Railroadsi === Major Roads|: [] 200 STATUTE MILES SLAND Kemntorced Japanese troops (black arrow) and B JAIDAAAL ish torces (white arrow) have been engaged for several days north of Rathedaung, Burma. troops by attacking Japanesc comm front between Burma and India is Map shows how Allied planes have been backing up British nications. Approximate battle indicated by breken line. Swivel-Chair Army (olonel Goes Nuty; Another War Horror OUT VERSION By JACK STINNETT WASHINGTON, March 29.—Notes on an old Congressional Record: A colonel on swivel-chair duwy in the War Department thinks interior decorating will win the war The colopel is in charge of a sec- tion employing about 600 clerks. Re- cently he decided that calendars, pictures and anything else on the walls interfered with the war efforl Out came an order, and down came the calendars. Then the mixture of and wood furniture in the same offices steel offended the eagle-toter's aesthetic | el er, demanding immediate rearrange- ment of office furniture in the| section so only steel desk snuggled against steel filing cabinet, and oak mingled with walnut. The clerks in this section spen! considerable time a-huffing and a- puffing, mating stee! with steel and vice versa. There’s a sequel. The switch came out eight steel desks shy of attaining | perfect symmetry and balance ac- | cording ot the colonel’s notions. Just charge it up to the horrors of war Just another case of an officer ir charge of “nothing” showing au thority because it has been given him and he does not know what to do. Don't ever challenge the lovalty of the run-of-the-mine government employee. ‘These kids really get clipped for sibilities. Qut came another ord- | [everything. Half a dozen survéys prove that the government gal ust can’t exist on a $1,440 annual salary in this town, where frontier prices are the rule, Yet thousands of them do get along, manage to be smartly turned out and survive the pay- check whacks for retirement (5 per cent), war bonds (10 per cent), Vie- tory tax, community chest and all the other fund drives which put the bite on Federal workers first Yet despite a real struggle to get by, these girls hatched an idea to contribute $1 apiece to buy a war- | plane to be named Government Girl. Cashing a government paycheck is zetting to be a real headache for zovernment workers. Two recent | Appeals Court decisions make the | banks responsibile for any forgeries, | even when perpetrated by Federal employees. (One CCC paymaster | issued paychecks to a non-existent camp, and local banks had to dig up about $90,000 for checks and vouch- ers cashed in good faith.) Result is, banks just sniff at government pap- ler unless the employee has an ac- [ count, which most of them don’t 5 8 & & & & 0 ° e e | e . DIMOUT TIME - | Agitation for a streamlined war| o N g | cabinet may be late. Usually Well- 'w Dimout begins tonight e i informed dopesters say an un(_)mf fal| o at sunset at 7:31 o'clock. . | war cabinet is already functioning. g ~ pu o TS BEEE S | This ace quintet of trouble-shoot- | ¢ o “citie SRR b [ ers reportedly ncludes three of the | ¢ ** THEHE B P » wisest old. heads in Washington: mapk’ begins “Tuosdny - 6% & { ¥ ) O o sunset at 7:33 pm . | \Continued on Page Five) l' ® o0 0 00000000 EA BATTLE IS FOUGHT OFF ALEUTIAN & 4 & U.S. Patrol Ships ( LARGE FLEET 15 REPULSED ' Shell After Shell Hurled Against Attempted Invasion Unit’ LIGHT SURFACE VESSELS INTERCEPT ENEMY CRAFT Two Heavy'Cfvdisers,Z Light Cruisers, 4 Destroyers Change Course WASHINGTON, Mareh 29— Shelling of Japanese cruisers and destroyers at long range by American surface vessels on the North Pacifie, halted or diverted an enemy force head- ed for the Aleutians, the Navy reports, The engagement, the first exchange between the ships off the Aleutians, was fought last Fridey in murky weather , that has concealed much of the operations in that section since the Japanese first es tablished a base on Kiska. BIG FORCE SHELLED Shell after shell whistled through the fog at the enemy force that consisted of two heavy cruisers, two light cruis- ers, four destroyers and two cargo vessels, The enemy force was located and engaged by the light force of United Stages patrol craft Just west of Attu, 200 miles west of Kiska, the big Japanese submarine and air base, The results of the sea en- gagement are not reported nor did the Navy say whether the patrol craft were damaged. The engagement was prob- ably fought at a distance of five to seven miles. EMY TURNS WESTWARD When the engagement was broken off, the Japanese forces (Continued on Page Five) - TOKYO GIVES SEA BATTLE Says “Ene hy Retreated Eastward in Disorderly Flight,” So Now LONDON, March 29.—A Japa- nese communique broadcast by the Tokyo radio and picked up here aeclared Japanese naval units fought an engagement with “en- my ships off the Aleutians on damaging two cruisers and a stroyer while the Japa- nese force suffered only slight losses. The broadcast also said that after the engagement, the “enemy retreated eastward in disorderly flight.” The communigue further made the broadeast that the ‘“enemy” forces consisted of one heavy cruiser, one light cruiser and sev- ral destroyers,