The Key West Citizen Newspaper, May 7, 1941, Page 1

Key West, Florida, has the most equable climate in the country; with an average range of only 14° Fahrenheit Associated Press Day Wire Service For 61 Years Devoted to the Best Interests of Key West VOLUME LXII. No. 109. Alicé Reid Griffin. Found Guilty Of Witnesses Proved Bawdy House Operator Arrang- ed For Transportation From Georgia Here SENTENCE ——— | Federal Judge John W. Hol- land shortly before 3 o'clock this afternoon sentenced Alice Reid Griffin to three years and four months in a federal Prison. Judge Holland ordered that the convicted white slaver be turned over to the United States attorney general to be placed in an institution of a reformatory nature for the pe- riod of the sentence. Defense attorneys imme- diately filed notice of an ap- peal to the fifth district cir- cuit court of appeals at New Orleans. The Reid woman, however, said she is willing to begin her sentence, pending the appeal. i A 12-man jury in Judge John W, Holland’s court shortly after noon today found Alice Reid Griffin guilty as charged in a federal indictment of Mann act violation. The Reid woman, who was ar- rested March 11 by F.B.I. from Miami, was convicted on the government's allegation that she brought & “prostitute, Mar- geret Allen, from Atlanta, Ga., to work at the Alice Reid bawdy house on Howe street. Witnesses vesterdav afternoon had testified that the Reid wom- an went to a house of prostitu- tion in Atlanta, made arrange- ments to pay “Jimmy” Harmon and another man $50 apiece for every woman they procured for the Key West house, and brought the Allen woman here in a car belonging to Catharine Poynter. As Defense Attorneys Bart A. Riley and Louis Harris argued their case before the jury this morning, the Reid woman. still had not taken the witness stand in her own behalf and the de- fense had not produced’ a wit- ness, Drawing liberally on quota- tions from the Bible, the Consti- tution of the United States, Vic- tor Hugo and Shakespeare, Har- ris told the jurors this morning his client was a “kind-hearted woman” who had been betrayed by her deeds of kindness even as had Jean V: an, Hugo's hero in the novel, “Les Miserables”. The Mann act, he said, was not intended to protect admitted s, but was for the pur- aving innocent girls from being sold into slavery. Harris, and Riley, who follow- ed him before the jury, based their entire case on a_ bitterly derisive attack on the govern- ment's witness Describing the Allen woman and Harmon, who is serving an eight-month term in the Fulton county (Ga.) jail, as thieves from the lowest Stratum of society, the attorneys (Continued on Page Four) S, White Slavery’ CHI ISSa SS SS LION OF JUDAH ROARING AGAIN (By Associated Press) ADDIS ABABA, May 7.— “King of Kings of Ethiopia, Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah, Elect of God, Light of the World”. This was the title that Haile Selassie packed along with him to England in 1936 when Italy threw him out of Ethiopia. Now s back, entering this capital city yesterday— with the title and more, for the English who wouldn't help him five years ago are just as mad now at the Ital- ains as he is, and just as set on driving them entirely out of the country. As a descendant of King Solomon and the Queen of Shebah, by his own reckon- ing, Haile Selassie can look down on upstart royalty like the Windsors. He is 49—a small, bearded chief of tall, bearded tribesmen. The out- side world first became aware of him in 1923 when he en- tered Ethiopia in the League of Nations, to which he ap- pealed when the Fascists in- vaded. A dozen years later, his beard, his pre-Chamberlain umbrella, his entourage of tribal chieftains and his in- credible arr, of titles caught the ic fancy and made his name a by-word. NIA PISO P APS £2 (ALLOCATION OF AIRPORT FUNDS | TENTATIVELY MADE AVAIL- ABLE FOR WORK ON BOCA CHICA PROJECT A tentative allocation of $305,- }000 has been made available to ‘work on the Boca Chica airport, a telegram to County Attorney Julius F. Stone, Jr., from H. Har- vie Perkins, regional CAA air- port engineer, revealed today. Perkins’ telegram said _ the! work will be handled by U.S.! army _ engineers, apparently | meaning the end of previously } announced plans for its construc- | tion by WPA. | Perkins suggested, that j title should be secured by the county without delay... A letter | to Carl Bervaldi, chairman of the county commission, will |! give further details, he said | TWO PROPERTY ' | land | | t SALES RECORD Charles Spe resident, yesterday purchased for about $1,900 a 50-foot lot on} William street, southeast of Flem- ing. The property formerly be-| longed to Phillip B. Roberts, Key West. By | a ' Connecticut R. Pritchard, in another transa on, bought from Mary A Lowe a lot on Fourth street near Seidenberg. The transact volved about $500. House Passes Four Bills | Affecting Monroe County: (By Asseciated Press) TALLAHASSEE, May i four 7.—The af- which Representa- The bills fol- measures County troduced by > Papy permitting g of liquor establishments 300 feet of the San Carlos 1} at Key West operated by ill 778, creating an elective office of the County At- torney of Monroe County.” “House Bill 777 am law creating the Over and Toll Bridge Dis House B 58. Monroe Co: mills to ha sued to esta’ within 300 | school, | Dodge City | Eastport |Fort Myers ‘Huron Che Kry West Citizen THE SOUTHERNMOST NEWSPAPER IN THE U.S. A. ‘LAUNCH; PROBE. INTO ATTEMPTED DUANE. SUICIDE WITNESS IN DEATH INQUEST OF MISS THELMA BALLAN- TINE SLASHES SELF WITH SAFETY RAZOR BLADE 4 Thomas Duane, rooming house} employe who testified yesterday | at an inquest into the death of; Miss Thelma Ballantine, one of | the roomers at the establish-| ment, today is being held in| county jail for investigation; after an apparent suicide at-! tempt. Duane was rushed to Marine hospital last night after witness- es said he had slashed ‘open his left wrist with a safety razor{ !blade. Later, after treatment, he} was taken to city jail, then trans- } ferred to the county jail this morning. ; Ernest Sanchez, first person to | see Duane after the wound had} been inflicted, said the man staggered out of a beer garden at | Simonton and Catherine streets, blood pouring from the gashed wrist, holding the blade in his! right hand. Sanchez said Duane called: “See, I did it now”. With blood pouring from his wrist onto the ground, Duane staggered down Simonton street, | disappearing in an alley. Later, as police officers searched for him, a telephone call informed them that a wounded man had been seen near the beach at the southeast end of Duval street. Officers found Duane stretch- | ed on the Duval street pier, ap-} jparently too weak from loss of ! blood to walk farther. Duane’s testimony at the in- quest merely established the fact that the woman had been se~ tiously ill. Jurors later ‘recessed | | juntil Friday to await analysis of her stomach contents, since there is a question whether her death had been a result of the pneu-j monia from which she was suf-| KEY WEST, FLORIDA, WEDNESDAY, MAY 7, 1941 Churchill Gets Vote Of Confidence On Hi [Excellent Conduct CBSE SS SSS & KEY WEST PROJECT IS GIVEN APPROVAL The Citizen is in receipt of the following wire from Sen- ator Claude Pepper at Wash- ington: “I am glad to advise that the President has approved WPA Project 50268 in the amount of $82,558.00 to re- habilitate, renovate and im- prove buildings and utilities and improve grounds at Key West Barracks, Fort Taylor and East and West Martello towers, which are harbor de- fenses of Key West”. UNARMED EXPERTS RIDE TO BATTLE WITH NAZI ARMY MANY GERMAN OFFICERS IN FRANCE HAVE NO INTER- EST IN GUNS; ATTENTION PUT TO PRODUCTION By ANGUS M. THUERMER AP Feature Service Writer BERLIN, May 7.—You can man officers who have no inter- fest in guns and field maneuvers. | Doesn't sound like the German } army, does it? But ask one of those fellows {how to run a coal mine where and how the best steel is made in occupied France. Ask him for 20 ways that an army can use wool, mercury, mineral oils. He’ll tell you—and how! He would be one of the many Overwhelming Of War (Bs Associated Press) | LONDON, May 7. — Prime | Minister Winston Churchill today |won an overwhelming House of ;Commons vote, 447 to 3, in sup- port of his conduct of the war. Voting after the veteran Lloyd George had flayed the adminis- | tration for its defeats in the near east and for the inability of For- jeign Minister Anthony Eden_ to predict the future attitude of Tur- ;key, Spain and Egypt, the house ;members ended their two-day de- bate by handing Churchill full power to continue his prosecution jo the war. Churchill, who admitted frank- ily that Great Britain needs a igreat deal more help from the | United States than it is getting, jsaid American ships soon would | Me oY crossing the seas at a rate suf- | ficient to insure England from the |danger of blockade for another ; year. “The United States,” “js not yet fit for war.” Churchill told the commoners the army of Gen. Sir Archibald 'Wavell now numbers more than | half a million men in the near east {and is fully prepared to continue ; the fighting. He denounced the argument jthat Britain should abandon her Mediterranean control and with- draw to the waters of the Atlan- tic. Churchill said his government will demand an end to the pro- Nazi government of Iraq and will i fight vigorously to hold its Medi- he said, imeet in France today many Ger- | terranean position. NESS DROWNINGS » SAID ACCIDENTAL | CORONER'S JURY RENDERED i | VERDICT YESTERDAY AFTERNOON fering, or of an overdose of aj Specialists attached to the Ger-| sedative. HOW TO REPLY TO SPEED COPS): (My Annootated Prenn) | SAN FRANCISCO, May 7.—So ; | Civil Aeronautics Authority for | you think you know how fast that | “w other car was going? well, you're | apt to be wrong. | The California Automobile as- | sociation has records of 21,000/ tests, made recently, indicating | only 18 out of 100 drivers are | able to estimate the speed of a passing auto within five per cent. More than half of those tested | were 20 per cent or more in error. | SEP PeERE ay Ly RST | | { TEMPERATURES Highest last|Lowest last | 24 hours night | eS 63 | "7 68 | 84 63 76 64 me 58 7 é1 79 69 64 56 87 81 61 79 xt 4 Abilene Apalachicola Atlanta Birmingham Boston Buffalo Charleston Chicago Cincinnati Cleveland Denver Detroit Duluth SLesseze El Paso Galveston Havana Sas2 Jacksonville Kansas City OD eAIR pA | KEY WEST Little Rock Los Angeles Miami Mobile Nashville } ! |for factories ‘cers when they } soon | current specialists | duties , force. Before the been an man armed forces. war he might have economic expert at a ity, a crack industrial leader, a pre manager or a business expert. Came the war and. mobiliza- tion. He was ordered to the r economics staff”. Members of this branch went with or followed close- ly behind fighting troops in France. Consultation with his economic adviser might have caused an artillery commander to bombard all round an im- portant industrial clant with- out firing a shell into the plant itself. Germany was watching which “might turndd to producing goods »*for the Reich as soon as troops had driven past The value of each dustrial unit in was known to out known in- fighting areas economic offi went into the field. An economic officer, upon en- tering a town in which a factory , was known to be operating, would se that it was supplied as ith electric 1 or whatever ep it making as possible water, needed tc what it had bee French control Behind this organization of is Reichmarshal Hermann Goering who holds the strings on German eco- nomic life in addition to his as chief ofthe air ex w perations in . the work expe Teally The job was machine. be} | cidental death in the drowning PRICE FIVE CENTS German Bish Unis Stags Aerial Warfare On Large Scale House Kills Senate-Approved Bill Relative To Candidates) TALLAHASSEE, May 7.—The House today killed 59 to 29 the! Senate-approved bill prohibiting | from becoming | candidates for some other) office unles sthey resigned 90 days be- State officers fore the primary. | Opponents of the bill declared the measure was aimed chiefly | at Jerry W. Carter, who cam-| paigned for governor and senator while a railroad commissioner. | Rep. Shivers of Washington hibit officials running for other} | moving county said the bill would pro- | offices at state expense. Governor Holland’s plan to} money in the general revenue, fund wag approved by the House | and rejected 6-5 by the Senate | finance-taxation committee. | SAFETY PATROL — LEFT THIS A.M. GROUP DEPARTED ON EARLY | BUS EN ROUTE TO WASHINGTON 13 | Parents and friends turned out this morning at 7 o'clock to watch 17 boys and girls of the city’s | L. H. Rogers, former operator | nel had resulted in destruction Is i of BRITAIN INCREASES ARMY IN IRAQ WAR’ NEW TROOPS MOVING INTO IMPROVED POSI- TION (By Associated Press) CAIRO, May 7.—Three more; transports of British troops were into position Basra in Iraq today, but official sources admitted actual informa- tion from the fighting front is scarce. A brief communique said British position had ani the improved id reports indicated Iraq troops had been driven back. (German inspired reports from Berlin said Iraq soldiers still were menacing the airport an moved on to take up strong po- sitions near the British position at Basra.) OHIO COUPLE WILL MAKE HOME HERE HIGHLY PLEASED WITH CITY; CAME HERE FROM WASH- INGTON COURTHOUSE fae afety Patrol leave for Washing-/of the Fayette stock farms near|°! six British planes, A corner’s jury yesterday aft-jton, D. C., in two Florida Motor | Washington Courthouse, 0. univer- | ernoon rendered a verdict of ac-/| Line busses. ., and around | |Hundreds Of Planes Bat- tle Over Channel Along South Coast Of Eng- | land (By Asaociated Press) Aerial warfare on the scale of the giant German raids last Sep- tember raged over Europe, the | British Isles and the channel ‘last night and this morning, as both sides seemed intent on put- ting their sky battle on a 24-hour basis. ; Hundreds of German and Brit- ‘ish planes battled over the chan- }nel along the south coast of Eng- | land this morning, as_ British \ aircraft rose to repel a daylight |Taid which followed by less than place $750,000 of Murphy Act} around the Habanniyah airport|@0 hour the departure of the night raiders. Glasgow was admitted in | London to have taken a terrific | pounding through the night, but | the air ministry insisted Ham- | bure had been hit every bit as hard. Explosions whieh-—noeked | the German city after the first ‘load of bombs had been dropped were said by British flyers to have been the regult of fir . “arsenals” i t Hamburg. | British formations at the same | time were raking the French coast with bomb and machine | gun attacks. | A. Berlin communique said | the morning fight over the chan- with no German losses, while London jan ex-judge with the American|S8aid six German and one Brit- h The patrol members will arrive | Kennel club, New York, has ar- , ish plane had been shot down. eduction chief, a factory|early Sunday morning of Mr.|in Washington tomorrow night!rived in Key West with Mfrs. | In the night bombing attacks, and Mrs. Roy Ness in the waters |to begin a round of the capital's | Rogers to make his permanent; London said Germany lost nine of the P. & O. steamship slip. Points of interest, with a parade | home here. fof her raiders, while Berlin did The jury, called by Peace Jus-| scheduled for them down Penn-| Highly pleased with the city,/ not make an estimate on the tice Franklin Arenberg, said ' was the opinion of the body that it { sylvania avenue. | Students who left here with Mr. ; section of the United States, but | the car was driven by Ness and and Mrs. Myrtland Cates, director | only in Kev West had he and Mrs. that its plunge into the 25-foot channel had been accidental. The couple came here from Brooklyn, N. Y., and Ness was here on a housing project. GRO YOUTHS HELD IN JAIL THREE ARE AWAITING AC- TION OF JUVENILE AUTHORITIES p Three negro youths this morn- ing were being held in county jail awaiting action of thorities on a possible charge of breaking and entering. The boys, one of whom was sentenced in 2 making under juvenile court less than a month | ago on a charge of petty larceny, were seized by sheriff's office: on the complaint of Sam Thomp- son, Emma street resident. Thompson said he returned home yesterday afternoon to find . three boys in his house, gathering | up glass demi-johns which he had |stored. Thompson caught one of the youths by the shirt, tearing it off, but all three escaped, taking with them some of the demi- (johns and a fountain pen Sheriffs officers, acting on Thompson's complaint, identified the thieves as members of a gang and located them shortly after- K. W. H. S. ALUMNI Election of officers tomorrow night, 8:00 o'clock. Lobby of La Concha Hotel Be sure to attend. JOE ALLEN. Social meeting of Junior Woman's Club, 5 o'clock Rotary Club meets 12:15 p.m. St. Paul's Parish Hall. Lions Club meets at 6:30 pm Lions’ Den, Seminary Street. juvenile au- | ;of the patrol, were: ! Gerry Albury, Dolores Boney, | Dot Martin, ‘Antonica Smith, | Cerezo, Jack Smith of Division Street School; Phyllis Six | Billy Spencer of Harris School; | Ralph Solano, Hector Castillo of St. Joseph's School; Jenny Saun- | {John Owen Monsalvatge of; the | High School. bs GALVESTON LAN! BUILDING BURN |KEY WESTERS WATCHED FIREMEN BATTLE FLAMES IN NEGRO DWELLING i | | Hundreds of Key Westers last night watched firemen battle | flames in a one-story negro dwel ling at Galveston Lane. Answer jing an alarm at a few minutes {after 12 o'clock, fire engines rush jed to the scene, but the blaze was |not extinguished until the home, jhad been destroyed. | Until early this afternoon, resi {dents of the house had not been |identified, although firemen said jpe one was injured. \ELLIOTT GLEATON GRANTED DIVORCE iliott Gleaton, who gave Key West as his address. yesterday xn a divorce from Adele Bryant leaton, Coral Gables, on the d that her pi ous | mar- riage had not been dissolved. The couple married in October, 1940 at New London. n. Gleaton’s di was the second on the same charge to be granted here within 2 week. Herman H. Berry, who also gave ree President.|County Commission meets in|Key West as his address, won a/ County Courthouse, 8:00 p.m. divorce on that ground last week, ders, Larry DeLouse, Nilo Albury.+- Rogers agreed on a site for their permament home. The couple came here from employed | Rosemary Kerr, Zelma Dee Grif-| Washington Courthouse after he | |fin, Myrtland Cates, Jr., Johnny | had disposed of the stock farm there, the largest in Ohio. Mr. and j and Mrs. Rogers are living at the | Carleton home on Windsor Lane, ntil a home is. completed for thém on Flagler street. al COVERED WITH TRADITION CAMP SHELBY, Miss.—Staff Sergeant William Roloff of the 112th Engineers sleeps under a blanket used by his father, John Roloff,, when the latter was a private with the same outfit on the Mexican border in 1916. | Rogers said he had been in every | number of RAF casualties. STUDENT BORROWERS MAKE GOOD RISKS (By Asnnctated Press) ANN ARBOR, Mich., May 7. Student borrowers make good risks, the University of Michigan reports, During a 43-year peried, only | three-fourths of one per cent of money loaned by the student fund was charged off as a loss, The majority of final failures to pay were due to death or to per- manently disabling illness, the president's 1939-40 report-says Since the fund was ertaBlisied at the university in 1897, a totel of $1,811,271 has been loaned ‘to | Students. Plans Are Made To Have THREE BUILDING PERMITS ISSUED Three building permits for re pairs and construction yesterday led $1,370 in Building tn or Ralph Russell's office Permits wert. issued to the Church of God for construction of a two-story frame buildin to cost $1,000; to Milton Russe 323 Margaret street, for a new roof, $70, and to Bernard Alien, 733 United street, general pairs, $200 | SOUTHERNMOST FLOWERS MOTHER'S DAY FLOWERS 616 DUVAL PHONE 136 Opposite Monree Theater re-. _Army Deliver Special Mail (Washington Correspondent of The Key West Citizen) WASHINGTON. D. C.. May 7. The War and the Post Office | Departments have agreed on sn errangement gwhereby all rea) istered; insetpd, and special de livery mail to Army enlisted men at Key West Barracks and Fort Taylor will be delivered by the Army. This Army service will be ren dered at ali military posts, camps and stations, except to officers homes, headquarters, hospitals ‘and other places where it definitely known that delivery can be made and expedited by the use of special delivery mes sengers” COD. parcels,. however, will be delivered by the Post Office [Powe is 4