JUMPER ^ ^--/^v5> (^ New Y0rk»s fashionable Fifth Avenue saw a strange scene of excitement today, crowds, police, the Fire Department, newspaper reporters, and nevf^photographers. There were shouts and outcries, and t&» jitter^ suspense prolonged for hours. It all happened at the corner of fifth Avenue and Fifty-Fourth I ^ Street, old and aristocratic Fifth Avenue, where the Hotel Gotham 11! stands in sedate and quiet dignity. The first I heard about it was an excited phone call from Freddy Benham. I thought it must be something connected with soft ball because we played Freddy’s team, the Circus Saints and Sinners, in the mud on ^unday. But it was something else. Freddy had run right into a hot news story, and being an old time ; -Vs'i I a newspaperman, he Just automatically covered it - and was phoning in. <z£+fdi At Hotel Gotham, John Ward, a twenty-six year old mmwo# T Chicago, went with his sister to visit another sister living m the J 1 hotel, on the seventeenth floor. A family argument ensued, and fes _ . . hashed to the window. They thought Brother John went dramatic and dasnea . ^ ail but John climbed out and he was going to Jump, an^1 end > P ! crawled along a ledge outside of the window. And there upon the JUMPER - 2 ledge he teetered, on .he brink of a drop of seventeen stories. To jump or not to jump, that was the question. And nobody knew what John would do. Both sisters fainted.When they were revived, one of tnem TT pleaded with John to come in. nDarling,tf she implored, ^come back. You have too much character to do this. Come in and have a drink.* Character or no character, John wouldn^t come in and^have ardrninW^ warn want to be let alone,” he replied. ”Ifll think this thing out for myself.” And think it out he did, taking plenty of time, smoking gtgarmg-fcnggTTirwntylrsr cigarettes and thinking - there on a two foot ledge, with seventeen stories to fall. A huge crowd iJBcfehSExxinEKEfc gathered in the street and gazed upward. Police formed lines to keep back the spectators and stop anyone from passing - lest the figure up there hurtle down to land on somebody* He was just above the front entrance, so the hotel guests could only leave by dashing out with a speedy sprint, hoping he wouldn't come down at that particular moment. The Fire Department was there with a net, but they didn't believe JUMPER - 5 it would do any good with a fall of seventeen floors. Newsreel cameras grinding, broadcasting equipment with oroadcaster there broadcasting. A Catholic priest came to try his persuasion. He looked out of the window at John an the ledge and asked the sort of question that always aroused attention. «What1 s your religion?” he called. And the reply came: T,I*m a Presbyterian, I guess.” So that didn’t do any good, and the priest could only say a prayer. They called a psychiatrist from Bellevue Hospital, and he undertook the psycho-analytical method. He said it was a case of a crowd complex. Having collected a crowd, John would hold it as long as possible, stay in the limelight as long as he could. And that seems like the correct science, because on the ledge John stayed He crawled out there about noon. End of John Story A little after four, John / and a cup ofc-oofl— was handed out of the window to he’m.He balance in a regular Harold Loyd way, and drank the cup of coffee standing on the dizzy ledge. His brother-in-law,trying to entice his, asked if he wouldnH like to go to the ball game, but John said no, he dich^t care for baseball just then. The police got a rope. thinking they could lasso# him wrhen he was off his guard, but he never iwas off his guard, and I suppose if they did lasso# him they might take a chance on hanging him as he fell. x numbering some fifty thousand by now. l‘he idea was that if John couldn't see all the admiring spectators, his position on the teetered dizzily as he took At last reports the police had^wsw#* away the crowd ledge might lose its its attraction aid he might come in. But a phone ltv£f call just.before I came to thl# microphone^s there. And if there's any charge in the next that he* s still in the next few minutes, I*11 eud of jam - % a LOS AUGELES ^ow 8 CO;^nc:^<:^ence, a wild one? Here it is. Los Angeles — Today a young woman named Hazel ftnl« Hefley, stood on the ledge of a sixth tm floor hotel window, and said she1d jump. And there she stayed, poised at the perilous brink. She yelled-- "They're trying to kill mel" Nobody found tea* out who was trying to kill her. The Fire Department came and spread nets for an expected six-story fall, an^ then detectives of the Police Psychopathic Squad smashed open the hotel door. Apparently she was just about to jump ?/hen they grabbed her and hauled her in. •^■11 this while John on the ledge outside of the hotel window was thrilling the multitude in New York. The same thing simultaneously on both sides of the continent. HINES Ne* York’s current legal and political sensation is beset by rumors today.^District Attorney Thomas Dewey is prosecuting tie renowned Tammany leader, James J. Hines, charging him with having been a political ally of the Dutch Schultz numbers racket. Several others are Indicted along with Hines, among them Dixie Davis, who was the Dutch Schultz lawyer, y It has come to light that of late Dixie Davis.has been allowed to leave prison and visit an actress, whose name has been connected with his for some time. They say the Dutch Schultz lawyer got leaves of absence under guard to visit a doctor and have his tonsils treated, during which time he called upon the actress. f I That has aroused all sorts of speculation, andj today the rumor is that Dixie Davis is prepared to confess and incriminate Tammany Leader Hines. to be a witness for the state and testify against Hines.) that’s the supposition based on the curious\ fact that he has been allowed to leave prison and make visits. far east The Japanese report there has been fighting in the disputed area along the frontier of Japanese controlled Manchukuo The and Russian Siberia. Tokyo dispatches tell of detachments of the A Red army pushing across the border into Manchukuo. The Japanese claim were driven outyHThese incidents, which sound so dangerous, are in reality as dangerous as Japan and Soviet I Russia want to make them. Either side can turn the frontier or they can play them down clashes into a peril A as mere border brawls. RUSSIA You may perhaps remember the name of Krylenko, remember it in connection with many of those dreadfa* Soviet trials in the past. Hed justice and its merciless killings, with Kreylenko, the prosecutor, raging at the fear-broken defendants, and shouting for their aeath. So what’s the news about Krylenko today? At what new trial will he play the cold, unfeeling demander of death? If there is any trial, he’ll be on the other side, in the criminal dock, accused - with the prosecutor crying out that he mujt be shot. For!Krylenko, who^was the Red court attorney for Stalin’s vengeance, charge It was noticed that in the Soviet purge during the past year or so, Krylenko was not the prosecutor. Vishinsky took his place. That looked bad for^ia^ And it looks worse now. Today an article appeared in the official Communist newspaper,PRAVDA, an article written by Prosecutor Vishinsky. In it he accuses Krylenko of that familiar Soviet crime. Trotskyism, describes him as - na Trotskyist ene-ny of the people.")Krylenko Is accused of the very crimes of which he himself used to accuse others, +-V, rjpftth He’s caught in the very system sending hundreds to their deatn. of terror that he did so much to cr 3 ITALY. (^The antl-semitic movement in Italy took a more serious tar^in an article in Mussolini»s own newspaper rt' wen • i o tig--—f7Tain1~T*r'Jr~b',g‘i th'fr slls for a new policy of •gargi- racism. ^ There are really two angles to it — one connected with Some ±SQ|[±fix imperial powers follow a policy IT,. of white supremacy in their colonies.IS We Americans should have no difficulty in understanding the idea. In the British Empire a good deal of color line is drawn. The French on the contrary pay little h or jnTianlt attention to differences of Boiiie last "ycfti* that tho Kthlop^n putu^ l ..iip 1 n rtrn '^^n.tT'Tr ... atti tud:o-■ ^—not't&o ■ jt'ye d4 s or poepl^^n Bthionlon' ■ Thi. a ifi i fflmpiir brought ^ac 1 c in - Mussolini's paper, jeers at France for accepting the darker races on terms of equality. The second racial angle Mrasiras concerns anti- l XHIlI±t±K±SBE seraitism. \The world is astonished to see Italy ITALY - £ linine up with Nazi Germany along the Aryan line^) The old Nordic theory supposes the superiority of • tall blond, blue- eyed Stexamili Germatic peoples. The vast majority of I are certainly not tall,blond a** blue eyed. In fact, the «' majority of Germany are not. So, it Is decidedly surprising to see Mediterranean Italy go in for Aryan supremacy._ the more so as Italian Jews look so much like Italian Christians you can hardly tell them apart. I think it is mostly an angry Italian reaction against the Jewish people throughout Europe and America whom the Italians claim are proponents of anti-Fascism. ZtJU- I recall talking in Rome to Italian officj** who W^rxHji expressed their resentment at Jewish^influence 1 against Italy. They said iky: they understood that Mussolini»s alliance with Hitler would naturally antagonize the Jews. But, they added that some account should be taken of the Rix±®ry lack'tf^nt^mitism.So I suppose the Fascist government is fostering anti-semitism as a way of set**** getting Anyv^ay, the recent statement^of race policy in Mussolini land are today confirmed by a declaration in the Ducefs own srew^paper - and it is no wonder that the news ft dispatched from Rome ± xxmx a tells us that Jewish aSSfela**’ in &s italy are alarming. SPAIN If General Franco ^ surprised by the Barcelona offensive, he can only blame himself. It^s the most elementary of military strategy for the Left Wingers to stage an attack in Catalonia for the purpose of drawing off the Rebel pressure in front of Valencia. That’s what the Allies did during the World War, the British and French staging a push in the west while the Germans were making things hot for the Russians in the east. . f f Today’s dispatches tell of swift early successes by the Barcelona forces. They attacked suddenly and with Tiolent strength. They forced a crossing of the Ebro River, and swarmed all over the eneqjiy trenches. If they should be able to break through any depth, it would certainly disorganize the Franco attack on Valencia. ■— r> % Today in the city ofa court announced its verdict, passed Judgement on army officers who staged in May. They plotted to kill President Vargas and seize the government, and in the fighting a number of people were killed. The usual way of revolution and supression would lead us to expect that the days news would S# death xkhs sentences. But not at all. The leaders of the a — fascist plotters^mere lieutenant sentenced to ten years in prlson*ifnd the commander of the National Palace Guards who was in the plot, was likewise sentenced to ten years. In most KBirajc countries the merejjuilt of revolt would have brought the extreme pi penalty and in any nation conviction for the killings might have meant the capital penalty. Myij^the government of BrazilmmeI‘ way* CHANDLER The great poison mystery in the Kentucky primary battle rises to new heights of controversy today- and^it was surprising enough to begin with. Senator Barkley,!* the administration leader running Tor renomination with the backing of President Roosevelt, is Opposed by Governor^Chandler , who suddenly falls ill in the middle of his rip-roaring campaign. And the word is - poisoned. ThatTs startling, even in a knock-down, drag—out Democratic battle, in which the startling is rather to be expected, almost a commonplace. Today, the political poison mystery resounds with the xiaci clash of pro and con. The chief of detectives in Louisville, who might be expected to be on the trail of the criminals, speaks as follows: "The Chandler charge of poisoning,” says he, "is a bedtime political story and a deliberate hoax for campaign publicity purposes.” He declares that the candidate’s illness is i! dust tummy-ache. True, a doctor has signed an affidavit stating waT^^ABut/. argues tbe his belief that Governor^Chandler was^pois chief of detectives, "he cannot get another reputable physician to agree with him, and our investigation proves the whole thing is || '! 1 ! 1 ill 9 Bill m a hoax.” CHANDLER - 2 is reiterated with picturesque details. Jetemmommsb made it a A a case of multiple attempts at poisoning. "They tried to get the Governor twice before," said he^ "and-—they tried o—g-et-nafea4* The story tells of a stump-»speaking Ohawilgr tour, battling for the nomination. "The first poison attempt," W "was at a little place outside e# Covington. The papers spoke of the Governor eating hamburgers there and it was thought that he became ill because there was something wrong with the hamburger. But," he continues, "I gave a piece of sandwich to a doctor, and he said there was some chemical on it." The second attempt has a sinister touch, reminiscent of the Borgias. "That time," relates the Chandler spokesman, "something was put in the Governor's glass. The water kind of turned blue. I noticed it and gave it to a doctor ijrtio said ijj waspoison," i*d the s^kesmaif^ells hSfche, td\was pS^onedV he sWte," saj^ he "sdwethin^ .d It madd^me vio^^^ly il^ AAffy From the^handler side, however, the charge of poisoning j "On\one tr\> int\the western partW the ■ put twicX into \he beer X drank, ad to\rest a\month ^ ill 1 ■ ? j I! get oV^r it." 1 11 11 |1 (; ! CHANDLER - 3 Yes, it’s rather startling even for a Democratic political tattle, all this poisoning, with the counter-charge that it^s a poison hoax, as Administration Leader Senator Barkley to Qevortiey-ef Kentnetowfor the nomination. fights it out y ending Well, time’s up — and out fchxxs on the ledge seventeen stories high, John is still there. And M SO LONG UNTIL TOMORROW