L«T. - 3UN0C0. MONDAY. OCTOBER 7. 1.955 GOOD EVENING EVERYBODY: The spotlight swings again today. The center of interest in the world*s news switches irom Africa to Geneva. It is from there that we get the most important and dramatic information. just about fifteen years ago, a number of "grave and reverend* signiors assembled on the banks of Lake Geneva and everybody shouted i with delight. That is, everybody but Uncle Sam and a few other skeptics. The Millenium was at hand, said the optimists. The day of Mars, the great god of war. Is over, for now we have the machinery for settling disputes between nations. On this day,^rith the forces of two nations banging at each other across the“ravines of Ethiopia, the League of Nations A* takes Its first really significant action. For the first time In these fifteen years, the League makes a stab at asseting itself and fulfilling the functions for which it was created. Whether it will succeed or whether it will merely, by an ironic twist of citcumstances, bring about an even greater world conflict than we*ve ever had, becomes now the most grave and momentous question of the next few months LEAP - 2 First of ali* the Council of the League adopted the report of \ the Committee of Six* the report which declared Italy in a state of I war. Furthermore* it declares Italy to be at war in flat violationizf ——------------------ — — - .................. .... jiiu IWB^ cov That means, specifically. Article Twelve, by which memb ns of the League esxtfxsm to abstain from war until three niont the filing of the report of the Council. In- short, Italy has an act of aggression, whereas Ethiopia is not guilty of act. Thus say-s the League to begin with. solemnly decider to punish Italy for violating the C ot The decision was unanimous, all thirteen members g binding their governments to back them up. That means, that thirteen countries will promptly enforce those much talked of economic and financial sanctions as provided by Article Sixteen of the Covenai Oh yes. there was one dissenting vote. That was Italy^s. But that vote didnf t count because no country is permitted a voice in any question The next x step ftfe that the Council formal] M/CU? n which concerns K<7St/ The next bit of information that we^have is not entirely unexpected. It was merely a formal announcement from Pans that France will back John Bull to the limit In case Italy LEAD - 3 piles on John’s bad? in the Mediterranean. Though this announce­ ment had been foresliadowed for some time, it was one of those things that was not quite certain until it was officially con­ firmed . Prance naturally stipulated that if she was to back up England in the Mediterranean, John Bull would have to back her up in case of an attack by Hitler, The excitement of this news is somewhat compile at. €>4 and colored by the revival of peace rumors. At first thought these rumors seem astonishing. They come from both Geneva and Addis Ababa. The report is that Mussolini has taken the occasion of the conquest and occupation of Aduwa to offer terms to Haile Selassie. The report was promptly contradicted at Geneva by Baron Alois!, the Duee^ representative at the Palace of the League. However, the rumor is fortified by a partial confirmation from Addis Ababa. A similar optimistic move to stop the hostilities in Africa has just been set on foot here in America. The Women's International League for Peace is trying to get Fifty million men LEAD - 4 and women to sign what they describe as "A People1 s Manaate,, against war* They are going to religious, oivic and educational organizations aid try to get them lined up. They hope to get twelve million signatures in the United States alone. They have got as far as declaring what they call: *A-Mandate-Against- War-Sunday", This will be celebrated on November tenth, the day before Armstice Day. It will kx get particular attention LEAD - 5 in churches throughout the world. In Africa, Meanwhile, the capture of Aduwa is being followed up by a march upon the ancient City of Axum. When Ethiopia was knov/r; as the kingdom of Axum, it was a rich and powerful city. The old Aximite Kingdom was a prosperous concern. It had control of an important volume of trade between the Roman Empire and Asia. Owning a wide stretch on the Red Sea^r that has since been grabbed by a European Powers, the Axumites held key position and took full ^ tc advantage of it. When the country was Christianised in the Fourth Century, the Christian prelate was known as the Bishop of Axum. And the City today still has considerable significance in the minds of the Ethiopians. Strategically Axum Is not such an important place. But the Italians hope its capture will have a great psychological effect. LEADj^ So here, briefly, is the picture of the war on three fronts. First, jek as we have observed. General De Bono's troops, £ fresh from the conquest of Aduwa, are pushing toward Aksum in the North, another division is pressing on from Southern Eritrea to cut / the railway line to Addis Ababa near the frontier of French Somaliland. Squadrono of hoavy- pi ernes have been bombing tl»» territory ■noyth ^af-Mt i -M uooq Alii—ffhe advance guard of tho Southora ggiU'cairarmy-hao afc-ready been-in- touch- with the enemy, and okirmiehea have be err "reported. Still further south the division led by General Rodolfo Graziani, reputed to be the greatest Colonial fighter in the Italian army , is marching north from Italian Somalil* The first objective is the place called Jijiga. And General Graziani will come up against a force of a hundred and fifty thousand of the fiercest fighters of Ethiopia. The General l ( commanding that black army is called Dejajmalch Nassibu. One hundred thousand of his forces are already entrenched at Jijiga. Fifty thousand more are on their way to join them from Harar. LEAD - 7 Of course nobody can yet say accurately how large the casualties have been. The latest guess is six thousand. Ethiopians including civilians and soldiers and fighters, and eight hundred Italians. This is only an estimate, but it comes from Addis Ababa through the correspondent of a French paper* That1s the story from Africa so far as we have it at this moment SUPRhJME COURT This has "been a day of some importance in the history of Uncle Sam’s venerable Supreme Court, The Nine August Gentle­ men in their flowing blank robes took their seats today for the first time in surroundings befitting their dignity, their authority, and power. The occasion would certainly have made John Jay and John Marshall - well, and William Howard Taft - open their eyes. It was the first session of that lofty tribunal in its new Ten million dollar Court. For many decades patriotic citizens complained that, considering the importance of the decisions they had to render. Uncle Sam gave his Supreme Court Justices a pretty shoddy back­ ground. That complaint is no longer valid. They now sit in a large, imposing building of swanky new white marble. The function that took place this morning was concerned chiefly with formalities, ceremonies, and so forth. The Mooney was introduced today. Tomorrow begins the serious business of the new session, a term which will be fraught with the utmost importance to President Roosevelt, his administration, and to all the rest of us, Several more suits in the New Deal will come up for review before Chief Justice Hughes and his colleagues. They have already consented SUPREME COURT - 7^ ISXSS to consider that much discussed and much abused alphabet bug-bear, the triple ’'A1'. Manufacturers have complained that the processing And before we are many months older, we shall learn what the Justices || have to say. The Cotton Control Act, the schemes of the Tennessee Galley Author!tyjj the P.W.A. slum clearance program, will also be brought up on the lawful for the P.W*A, to lend money to cities for municipal electric power plants. However, when it comes to general human interest and political significance, the A.A.A. problem is tops just at present. If Governor Harry Hoffman of New Jersey has his way, the Supreme Court will have still more work to do. Just as we’ve heard the rumor that Governor Hoffman is about to declare himself a candidate for President, that is, for the Republican nomination, he makes an interesting suggestion. He proposes an amendment to tax, which provides the life blood of the A,A.A., is unconstitutional, That Isn’t the only question that will be brought up carpet, A^he Justices will alaa» be asked to say whether it is the Constitution, which would make it imperative for the SupremeCJvvrf" SUPREME COURT - | _3 CASUZ to pass on all federal laws as soon as they In other words^ we wouldn’t have to wait until somebody objected and brought suit to learn whether a new measure passed by Congress is eonst&itional or not. Any new laws would automatically have to come before th4 Supreme Court before they are enforced. Mas* Hoffman admits it would give the Supreme Court more, work, but, says he, "It will save the business man more worry.” And his amendment would make it impossible for the government to indulge inflict in any illegal expenditures or to ^psxliiE^ any illegal taxes, o ACCIDENT It was a sad, heart-sickening drama, that was enacted In the air over the Wyoming hills today. A big tri^motored airplane, on its way from San Francisco to New York. At the controlls, Harold Collison, a pilot who had flown- more than million miles. At a quarter past two this morning, he radios the airport at Cheyenne: rI^ over Silver Crown, the Cheyene water plant. Weather calm and clear, latitude f°ur thousand feet.” The operator of the airport tries to check back and verify the message. No reply. Again the operator tries to get in touch with Collison. Again no reply from the man who was known among his fellow pilots as f!No- Collision-Collison.n Then begins a long period of anxiety and searchers are sent out. There’s a hurry call for men to go and find out what has happened to that plane. And late this morning they found it, dashed to pieces against the side of a hill near Cheyenne. The 7 ' ' ' ' r - 4' L wreckage was &XXKJQ1 strewn all over the hillside. The giant air liner had bounced four times with shattering blows. Its motors wess* jbaxKKQt torn loose. And there in the wreckage lay the bodies of twelve people, all instantly, There were nine ACCIDENT passengers, including the chief pilot of the United Air Lines, and a crew of three - two pilots and a stewardess. The cautious reputation and the record without an accident Tfco? of Colllson make tragedy all the more grim. What is more. It has been the >WLiHt of that particular air line that in Twenty-eight million miles of flying, the equivalent of A Hundred and fifty million passenger miles, there hasnft been a single casualty. What makes it all the more baffling and shocking Is that, as Collison reported in his last message, the weather was fair, the air clear. Meanwhile, in another part of the West, a formidable force of searchers, both in planes and in motor boats, were combing | - | the surface of the Great Salt Lake for those three missing fliers on their way from Alameda, California, to Salt Lake City. Nothing has yet been seen of their big oil transport plane. They too were experienced men who had made that trip time and again and wta knew every land-mark along the route. They reported to bite rprnitr..arfc Salt Lake City by radio Just an hour before Collison was calling his last message to the operator at Cheyenne, If they were forced ACCIDENT - 3 down on the surface of the Great Salt Lake, their plight is a serious one. Although it is ^impossible to sink in that heavy water- it irs—al-st >>y— BAS 1: BALL We car* hardly be surprised that Mickey Cochrari*was breathless Awhen he said "Howdy» to the fans of America after winning that World Series, It seems to me that the Tigers1 catcher and manager summed up those six games pretty well when he said: TtItfs the most sensational World Series since the World Series began." Those of us who had a chance to see it or to listen in will agree with Mickey, because t ere wasnft a single game in all the six that wasnft full of thrills. There1s one thing sure- as Charlie Grimm of the Cubs said, "It was no disgrace in losing this one." Right up to the of last moment jasaii.this afternoon's play, it looked as though the Cubs might pull that game out of the fire and force the Series to go the limit. important animal again today. I mean Goose Goslfetti, who whanged And there's one peculiar circumstance: the story of the the shut-out that Lon Warneeke pitched. (the goose was an in the last hit of the Series and brought Mickey Cochran'’®' A home over the plate. BASEBALL - 2 So the old jinx no longer hangs over the Detroit Ball Cluh, The celebration that’s going on in the automobile capital tonight is a step on the gas* ninety mile and hour affair* Guess I’ll wire Amos ’n* Andy and aslr 'em how they liked the series. And tell Brother Amos to send mo his dice winnings for the next few weeks T1P1ST F / 2 - Here’s something for all you stenographers to tell the Boss about — showing him just how heroic and arduous it is tickling the typewriter keys. And all you business men can tell the fair stenog about it, giving her a hint of just how fast some typists can grind out a letter. Or rather — one particular w. Rockefeller Center typist^ The Champ. T1 1 ,1.s -wwk-1 1 vsngyfc Weekly prints a feature story about Albert Tangora, world’s champion of the shift key and space bar. Here’s how hard he works. When he won the championship several weeks ago he ticked off one hundred and twenty-eight words per minute for an hour. That comes to eleven and a half strokes on the keys a second, forty thousand, five hundred and eighty| five strokes in all. Experts calculate that each stroke represents three pounds of energy. That comes to nineteen hundred and eighty Of- fewest pounds a minute, or about sixty tohS^for the hour. That’s only for one contest. Albert Tangora has won five world titles. In nineteen years of key—rattling he has batted out fifty-six million words. TYPIST - 2 5 ^ Eight now he is an associate in a business school 7?K0 in the R&fr Buildingf Rockefeller Center. He goes in training for three months, doing setting-up exercises and road work^ every time he enters a contest. Every so often during the-day, Tangora sits down at the typewriter, for a one-minute test. While he types copy he’s never seen before, an assistant reads off a column of numbers, five-figure numbers, six of them. Tangora adds them up mentally ^JZ <rt£w * to and calls out the answer, typing all the while^ That's^make his speed work mechanical — do it without thinking. After that, any stenog either ought to get a raise^or. b. Q~J! ■WwV <£<3;-Sw-, H'-