Hills of Appalachia
By ANDY LAUGEL
Summer Kansan Reporter
Things don't change much in the coal-emptied hills of Appalachia.
Men with broad backs and calloused hands sit around a radio or a wood stove and talk about work and why there isn't any. They live in tarppaper shacks with newspapers pasted on the walls to keep out the wind.
There was a time when the whole nation was out of work, and the papers told about riots and picket lines and men huddled against the Salvation Houses waiting for dinner.
Names like Big Mike DeVanney, Mush Fake Tom and Hobo Ben Benson clattered through the night on the Fruit Grower's Express or the Union Pacific and ended up scrawled on a watertank beside a hundred other names from a hundred different places.
Or they rubber-tired it through
the belts, picking cotton or threshing wheat, gypsy-riding away from plowed out farms and dust-blown dreams.
There was a time when a cripple tried to talk a nation back to prosperity each night over the radio. And many prayed he would do it.
The papers pasted on the walls told about economic reforms, new deals and getting the nation back on its feet.
On the inside pages, you could see Mae West sprawled on a black velvet sofa with a toy poodle and you could read about Clark Gable strafing German aces and Spencer Tracy killing Indians.
The men around the radios heard how people flocked to see movies like "G-Man" and "The Public Enemy," when in New York and Chicago you could make a living with an icepick and an Italian name.
Faces like Babe Ruth's and Lou Gehrig's went up on the walls to keep the wind out.
Charlie Chaplin went up in the uniform that made people laugh at a German house-painter who was busy brown-shirting his way to World War II ...
The people saw these things in the papers and pasted them on their walls so that they saw them again until something else happened or a new hole needed mending.
Now pictures of the moon's dark side cover cracks in those ceilings and the radio talks about too much money and kids trying to get away from the suburbs.
In the coal-emptied hills, men with broad backs and tired eyes talk about work and why there isn't any, and why there isn't going to be any.
Things don't change much where the faces pasted on the wall keep the wind out.
Kansan Book Review
"When not to obey—"
By JUDIE BLACK
Summer Kansan Reporter
He believes youths should look to their parents as people first, parents second. Likewise, parents
Although it appears in the final chapter, the theme of Mallett's book can be crystalized in "It doesn't all depend on you. It depends on all of us."
Becoming an adult is a trying period in the lives of today's youths. Complex problems concerning ethics, responsibility and the adult world confront young people each day.
In Harold Mallett's "When Not To Obey Your Parents," young people can find a frank, honest guide to a clearer understanding of themselves and the hurdles they must jump in becoming a "cultured adult."
must realize their offspring are struggling individuals first and children second.
With this mutual "people awareness," both parents and young adults will realize that both are human, sometimes short-sighted and often impatient.
Mallett urges the adult and youthful worlds to meet through communication. He tells each faction to share not only their problems but also their happy moments and achievements.
If parents and children can come to realistic terms with one another, Mallett predicts, they will soon find they are simply "people ... needing other people."
This is a good book for parents to give to their "young adult" offspring and start the dialogue rolling. The reverse of this statement is also true.
W.C. Fields-‘all-time nasty guy'
By EVE FISHER
Summer Kansan Reporter "Till be sober tomorrow, but you'll always be crazy." This caustic comment by one of Hollywood's all-time nasty guys, W. C. Fields provided the proper finish for the movie many critics acclaimed as the best of his long career.
"It's a Gift," a 1924 production based partly on earlier silent films, was a classic example of Fields' special brand of humor—the humor that destroys American sacred cows like children and dogs.
Strangely enough, Fields abandoned his role of the cruel opportunist for that of a good-natured Everyman whose sarcasm
was provoked by everyday frustrations.
Baby LeRoy, Fields' target in previous films, once again initiated some of the funniest scenes in the movie. The first of these slapstick scenes came early in the film when Baby LeRoy unplugs a barrel of molasses in the grocery store of Harold Bissonette (Fields) and floods the entire building.
Upset by numerous similar encounters, Bissonette decides to move his family, nagging wife and all, to the wonderful opportunity land of California. (A distant relative has conveniently died leaving the family a ranch in the golden land.)
The auto trip to the coast is a
delightful scene, making full use of the typical Fieldsian businesses of losing his hat and wrecking a car.
Once in California, the family finds a racing grandstand is to be built on their somewhat desolate property and Bissonette negotiates a fittingly outrageous price for the land. After moving to one of the most productive orange groves in the state, Bissonette settles down, content with the life of a gentleman farmer.
"It's a Gift," one of the most realistic of Fields' films, was not widely acclaimed at the time of its release, but time has proven it superb creative and one of the best Fieldsian comedies.
'Generation gap'—not really
By JUDIE BLACK Summer Kansan Reporter
Some call it "the generation gap." Others refer to it as "the understanding gap." Many speak of it is "the communication gap." Whatever nomeclature is attributed to that impasse between generations, most persons will agree such an impasse does exist.
Several areas of contention are evident in that generation deadlock. The older generation—young during the 1930's—is quick to point to the extreme hair lengths on head and face, the trend toward uni-sex fashions, the scandalous moral standards and the absurd, often suggestive music of the "Now Generation."
Elders wrinkle their noses and cover their ears to the beat reverberating from huge amplifiers. If those adults only opened their ears to the music's words and
messages, they might make a startling discovery: The music of their lost youth and that of today's young people is identical in content.
"Wake up and live," advised a song of the Thirties. In 1968 SPANKY AND OUR GANG told the world to "make every minute count, make it groove."
Outside happenings had very little effect on a lover of the Thirties—"I've got my love to keep me warm." For Petula Clark in 1968, "love ... is warmer than the warmest sunshine."
Although the lean years of the 1930's took work and respect from many persons, "they can't take my love away from me," declared a man of the times. So said THE FOUNDATIONS in 1968 "Now that I've found you, I can't let you go."
The Thirties wanted only "you
... breathing my name with a sigh." However the Sixties, in the voices of the NEW CHRISTY MINSTRELS, demanded "you call me, any old time that you want me."
"Look through any window, what do you see?" asked HERMAN'S HERMITS in 1967.
"By the window, that's where I'll be," answered a tune of the Thirties.
THE SUMMER SESSION KANSAN
Both generations were plagued by doubts as a song of 30 years ago sought reassurance—"Please ...tell me that you love me." The Sixties were even less confident in emotional stability—"Do you love me? Do you love me ..." asked Chubby Checker in 1961.
Generations of the Thirties and the Sixties admonished war. A song of the Thirties predicted—"You put a rifle in his hand ... You send him far away ... Look at him today."
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The opinions expressed in the editorial columns are those of the editorial staff of the newspaper. Guest editorial views are not necessarily the same as opinions expressed in the Summer Session Kansan are not necessarily those, or the University of Kansas Administration or the Kansas State Board of Regents.
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The words . . . Yet as Rod McKuen observes in STANYAN STREET AND OTHER SOR-ROWS—"Words are only necessary after love has gone."
Thirty years separate the words that ask the same questions, seek the same loves and doubt the same institutions.
"I didn't start that old crazy Asian war ... I'm not the man I used to be..." tells THE FIRST EDITION in 1969.
Now You Know
The Apollo 11 astronauts will be the first men on the moon, but 23 unmanned spacecraft from earth, 17 American and six Soviet, already have landed or crashed on the lunar surface.
4 KANSAN
Jly.15 1969
The Lighter Side Pentagon pictures
By Dick West — UPI Columnist
WASHINGTON—Nearly everybody agrees that it would be nice if military spending could be reduced without unduly weakening the nation's defenses.
I don't know whether Rep. John M. Murphy, D-N.Y., had that in mind when he introduced a bill to prohibit Pentagon cooperation in the filming of motion pictures. But it could work out that way.
At the present time, as you may know, when a movie script calls for an Army, Navy or Air Force, the producer customarily borrows one from the Pentagon.
Murphy moved to end that practice after six servicemen were injured during the filming of "Tora! Tora! Tora!" a 20th Century-Fox treatment of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
Should this bill be enacted, motion pictures studios would have no choice but to recruit, train and equip their own armed forces. Otherwise, they could not continue to produce war epics on the scale to which we movie goers have become accustomed.
Once each studio has its own army, navy and air force, the military potential of the United States obviously will be several times greater than it is now.
Twentieth Century-Fox, for example, would have to scale down "Tora! Tora! Tora!" to just plain "Tora!"
This would make it possible for the Defense Department to
In event of an emergency, it could simply borrow an army, navy or air force from one of the studios, depending on which one happened to be between pictures at the time.
cut the military budget by discharging a few million servicemen.
The department no longer would need such a large force to meet its commitments in Southeast Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Hollywood.
Proper credit would be given, of course. As they marched forth into battle, the troops would carry a banner reading: "This war could not have been waged without the cooperation of 20th Century-Fox."
One immediate result would be a speedup in the withdrawal of American troops from Vietnam. The U.S. Army could pull out and let the South Vietnamese and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer assume a larger share of the fighting.
There is, however, an element of risk in this concept. It would, I fear, greatly complicate disarmament negotiations with the Soviet Union.
The United States might reach an agreement with the Russians, but if Paramount refused to sign it, claiming it needed a large standing army for its next picture, the treaty would be meaningless.
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