Miscellany, Apr. 9, 1951

No Vacancy. In Barbados, British West Indies, a housing conference called to discuss the problem of a million and a half homeless West Indians was indefinitely postponed, due to lack of housing accommodations for the delegates.

Memo to the Boss. In Tokyo, Railway Employee Yusuke Shikauchi sneaked off to a baseball game on company time, wound up on the front pages of the newspapers next day for winning the automobile raffled off at the game.

The Hasty Heart. In Seattle, angered by a trolley motorman who forgot to call out her stop, a woman passenger 1) beat him with her umbrella, 2 ) followed him to a telephone and yanked it off the wall when he tried to summon help, 3) pelted him with canned goods from her shopping bag, 4) smashed the window of another trolley when its motorman refused to let her board it.

Skeleton In the Closet. In Columbus, Ohio, a deputy sheriff saw John Dyer carefully signal before making a right turn in his automobile, stopped him to present one of the city’s safety awards, discovered he had no driver’s license, hauled him into court.

Steps Going Down. In San Francisco, trying to make a getaway from the bank he had just robbed, 19-year-old James Wheelock decided to waste no time unlocking his own car, got into another, ordered its occupant to drive away, learned that the car was jacked up for repairs, jumped into a third car that drove up, found it occupied by a cop.

Fireside Chat. In Pittsburgh, while Mr. & Mrs. C. A. Stengel were watching TV at the neighbors’, an announcer interrupted the program to let them know that their house was on fire.

… And Gentle People. In Louisiana, Mo., the proprietor of the Wahl Hotel took an ad in the Press-Journal: “During the 25 years that our hotel has been loafing headquarters, there never was a time that I did not loaf with you and treat you as a guest. This loafing has now advanced to a point where it is ruining my business! This is my way of asking your cooperation —saying Goodbye to all of you, my loafer friends—with respect to all.”

No Exceptions. In Southport, England, the city council decided that James Clarkson, a 35-year-old laborer, should be docked 55¢ for his 1½ hour absence from his job at the city wharves, even though he had spent the time rescuing a man trapped in a sandbank.

Afterthought. In Connecticut, which already has a law requiring windshield wipers on every car, legislators considered a bill making windshields mandatory, too.