&

r. Hangers Nurses A Peeve »=w.

d bee parade swung wide around
the corner of Cambie and
12th, and file after file ranked
loosely along the curb facing
the City Hall. As the block filled
up, a gaunt figure, looking like
clothes rather carelessly hung
en a sketchily articulated skele-
ton, stepped out of his place
for a moment to squirt a yel-
low stream across te the far
gutter, Then he swung back in-
to line and straightened up to
hear the speakers with a dourly
eritical clamp to his jaw, like
a Scotch elder about to sample
a new minister. I had little dif
ficulty, and less surprise, in
recognizing Mr. Hangers.

Ernie Dalskog speke, Harvey
Murphy had his turn, and oth-
ers, but from my vantage point
with the rest of the press on
the city hali steps, I couldn’t
see Mr. Hangers applaud any of
them.

To be sure, once or twice he
gravely nodded his head, and
on at least one point spat an-
other gob to within nine inches
ef the first with obviously ap-
proving zest. But the rest of
the time he appeared unmoved,
and as the last speaker climbed
down from the sound-truck he
started to walk very briskly
-£ caught up

back downtown.
with him.
what do you think of

“Well,

it?” J asked him as I drew up
abreast.

E took a cursory glance side-

ways and continued to pump
his imaginary bicycle down the
hill.

“J can’t think any more’n a
newshawk in high altitudes like
this here,”’ he retorted, “an’ even
if I cud stand thub rarified air,
the miasma uf dead brains an’
senile slumber that hovers over
Gerry’s jerk-garden would make
me a somnolent as Jack Cor-
nett an’ his seven sleepers! Let’s
get lower.”

He punctuated his remarks
and blazed a trail down the
street with:a shot at every lamp
post. He was certainly not in
the best of humors.

“There are eight aldermen,
you know,” I corrected. x

“Don’t yuh think I vote? One
uf them seems tuh be knowin’
who’s payin’ him an’ what for.
Gervin hasn’t gone to sleep en-
tirely ... at least, not yet. But
others. . . ! Well, mebbe they
know too, who’s payin’ them.”

“I remember readin’ that Up-
ton Sinclair was once _ sittin’
with President Roosevelt an’ a
stye-full o’ senators at a mil
lionaire’s trough. The president
- . . Leddy, it was, not Frank-
jin .. . hoisted one too many

an’ got confidential, introducin’
all the celebrated snouts tuh
Sinclair.”

PACIFIC TRIBUNE — PAGE 12

thuh senator from
Steel’, he sez, ‘An’ that guzzler
over there’s from Coal, an’ that
one with thuh gravy on his
front is from thuh House \uf
Morgan, an’ th’ old bald-headed
swine fronts for Copper, an’ so
on. I guess yuh cud pretty well
look thuh city fathers over thuh
same way. This one from the

““That’s

B.G. Blectric, an’ that from
thuh Property Owners’ Associ.
tion an’ thuh B.C. Hlectric, an’
tVother from thuh Retail Mer-
chants Association an’ thuh
B.C. Electric, an’ so forth!”
“But you newspapers, what

know thuh truth, allus refer tuh

them as ‘Mr. Alderman So-an’-
So. The ‘alder’ part is okay, if
their heads’re in question, but

I dunno about the man part.
Sometimes, an’ darned often, I
think theyd look more natural

in maternity gowns than in
pants!”
@
KEPT a discreet silence. We
practically galloped across

Broadway, and trotted for several
more blocks. Near the Vancou-
ver Engineering Works his pace
Slackened and he sniffed the

air.
“‘Tide’s out” he announced, “Not

the tang, in thuh flats down
there that’s ‘round thuh float,
mind ye, in fact, it’s a lot flat-

ter, but it smells like air ye ec’n
breathe. Is that a picket-line
over there?” =

I told him the Metal and Chem-
ical Workers were picketting
V.E.W., and he almost mellowed
in approval.

“Theyre hangin’ tough, those
lines he pronounced, “They
seem tuh be stickin’ on ’em, an’
not runnin’ to Victoria or Ot
tawa, or Moscow or Kalamazoo
tuh get a government tuh win
their strike for ’em. They ll win.
it on the line, an’ all down thuh
line, like Big Bill an’ Joe Hill
useta.”

“But times have changed” Tf
pointed out, “We can do with a
little more finesse these days.”

“Spell it fi-n-i-s-h’ an’ it’s
what ye’re liable tuh git” he
growled, “Thuh boss can allus

win at that sorta game. He has
all thuh cards but one in any
suit, anyhow, an’ I never heard
uf finessin’ with only one card
an’ nothin’ behind it. But thuh
one card can win, if it’s played
thuh way it oughter be, an“ that’s
why thuh bosses wud like to
throw it outa thuh deck entirely.”

“TFiow’d you play it?’ I asked.

“A strike is war uf sorts, an’
war is no tea-party. Ye fight
tuh win,-tuh lick thuh boss, tuh
hit him where it really hurts,
an’ that ain’t below thuh belt or
above thuh neck, either. An:
neither do yuh care what thuh
so-called. neutrals think about
she

“But you've got to have public |
opinion behind you,” I reminded
him,

“Did yuh ever see a prize-fight-
er get any cheers playin’ tuh
thuh gallery? it’s thuh dirty
little bruiser that goes in beltin™
for all he’s worth in muscle an’
will that brings thuh crowd to
its feet, an’ he wins thuh belt
too ,if he keeps his eyes off thul
press-row an’ on t’other fellow’s.
Who ever had a worse press than

thuh seamen down Past? An’
@yuh think they're goin’ tuh
lose? ‘Bah! Amother charge

Sizzled over the bridge-rail into
Halse Creek. “Thuh public loves
a fighter!” he declared.

“Well, the IWA is winning
this fight, so it doesn’t mattei
a damn if the public is dene out
of a show,” I told him, “That's
all that matters.”

‘ way it looks now, theyll

win two an’ one-half cents
after a month or so out, some
loose kinda union security, an’
the 44hour week worked in
spasms, he charged, “A little
more ginger in the brew, an’
thuh big bosses woulda had tuh
come across with what thuh 200
small fry gave—thuh hull works,
or at least 20 cents an hour an’
all thuh rest. An’ I don’t believe
it woulda taken so long, either.”

“The trouble with you,” I told
him, “Is just that you cant get
away from that red card I'll bet

perity with suspension

rs

your sll packing. Mentally,
yourre still down in Boise in
41917.” < .

“An” thuh only little thing thuh _
matter with you, is that yer era-
nium’s still packed with Browder
wool insteod 0? brains!” he snap-
ped back, with so much heat that
i knew my criticism must haye
foun da tender spot somewhere
on his leather hide.

So I reminded him gently,
again. “It seems to me that Tf
remember you yourself- doing 4
little torching for ‘the progres
Sive section of the capitalists’
and! for a period of postwar pros-
of the
class struggle. and that not so
many months ago.”

“Yeah, ET had my. abberations,
but Churchill’s first speech after
thuh war had me reachin’ fer 4
brick again. Ye donn’t judge
thuh boss's intentions by what
yed like ’em tuh be, but by
what yuh know thuh bastard’s
allus done. I never really forgot
that, even when I was pickin’
daisies with thuh rest of yuh.
But some of yuh seem tuh be
too tender-handed tuh handle
bricks after daisies”

We were at Robson and Gran-
ville. JE stopped and Swune
around on him.

“See here do you think were
getting anywhere?’

He examined me quizzically
for a moment, and then grin-
ned.

“Tl tell all Vancouver we're
not, an’ never will, away from
thuh salt-chuk” he he admitted,
“Come down tub thuh boat-house
an well have it out there, all
calm an’ philosophical-like. Any-
ways, I figure we’re both half
right, an’ half-wrong,- an’ some-
where the answer tuh what Tf
dont like about thuh situation,
an’ it’s probabiy right between.

“Probably,” I said, “anyway,
you’ve got an idea there. Tl bring
the rum this time.” :

He was in an awful hurry te
board his car. Just so must a
stranded dolphin flounder to the
brine again.

Vancouver School Children Send :
Notebooks And Greetings To Odessa

By DULCE SMITH, Secretary, Vancouver Council for Camadian-Soviet Friendship

On May 25th, 1946, the first con-

tact was made between the
school children of Vancouver and
the school children of Odessa,
when a collection of “School Pro-

jects” prepared by Vancouver

school children was despatched to
the Soviet Embassy in Ottawa en
route to the City of Odessa.

These projects consisted of
Notebooks, Scrapbooks, ete. pre-
pared collectively and individu-
ally, containing letters, pictures
and drawings descriptive of school
work and life in British Colum-
bia and Canada. Many letters
and messages were addressed di-
rectly to the children of Odessa
and asked for replies in kind.
There were also two interesting
“murals” each some 12 feet long,
illustrating scenes and incidents
on Kingsway, Vancouver. One
scrapbook had a beautiful cover
made of B.C. wood with “Van-
couver greets Odessa” in deeply
carved lettering.

The “School Projects” have
been sponsored by: the Vancou-
ver Parent-Teachers Federation
with Mrs. J. HB. McRae, President
of the Federation and a Director
of the Vancouver Council for Can-
adian-Soviet Friendship, in charge.
She has been assisted by Mrs. K.

G. Kern, Secretary of the Can-
adian Federation of Home and
School and a Vice-President of
the Vancouver Cotmcil for Can-
adian-Soviet “Friendship. They
have received the hearty co-oper-
ation of Mr. H. N. McCorkindale
and the School Board.

The Ex-Secretary of the Can-
adian-Soviet Friendship Council
has written to Mrs. Lydia D. Kis-
lova of V.O.K.S. Moscow, telling
her of the despatch of these Pro-
jects together with lists of names
of children who wish to corres-

Will World

Well, some people would like
a bit more assurance than can
be gotten out of that. Raymond
Gram Swing, citing some sci-
entific authority, has sounded
an alarm lest the atom bombs,
exploded underseas, may set uR
a chain explosion that’ will set
the world afire and consume all
living things on this earth in
a holocaust of flame. 2

1500 Atomic Bombs
HIS view is supported by Dr.
Robert S. Stone of the Univer-
sity of California, who is con-
mected with the atomic Manhat-
tan Project. He told the Califor-

pond with children in Odessa, and
has asked her to put the Council
in direct touch with the School
Authorities of Odessa.

In connection with this first
step in establishing direct cul
tural contact between the twa
Gities, letters are being written
by the Mayor of Vancouver to
the Mayor of Odessa and. also by
the Wancouver Parent-Teachers
Federation and Mr. H. N. MceCor-
kkindale to the City Schools of

Gdessa.

Blow Up?

nia Medical ssociation meeting
at Los Angeles on May 7, that:

Those brass hats have 1500 at-
omic bombs ready to use, and not
a man jack of them really knows
what will happen. Otherwise,
pray tell me, why must they have
a “test?’ :

If they are so cock-sure that
this or that will, or will not
happen, if they are so positive
that a certain explosive pres=
sure at this or that distance
and angle will, or will not, dé
this or that dammage to ships;
sea and ocean floor, then just
why have a “test” at all?

FRIDAY, JUNE 21, 1946