POLITICAL NOTES: Wyoming Drama

“Bom!” goes the drum, “De-de-Bom, de-de-Bom!” Strong, bearded men quiver as their fingernails are extracted. “Bom!” goes the drum. Grotesquely scalpless women shriek, moan. “Bom!” goes the drum. Half-clad dancers leap in the fire’s garish flicker. Seventy-five years ago such a picture was common around Cheyenne, Wyoming, which was later named for these super-redskins. Last week, U. S. Senator Francis Emroy Warren, 82, Chairman of the Appropriations Committee, last governor of Wyoming territory, first governor of Wyoming state, rancher, realtor, arose from his Cheyenne verandah, strode down the asphalt street. White-haired, senectissimus of all U. S. Senators, Mr. Warren had recently completed his annual summer report on appropriations (TIME, July 26). Mr. Warren had public respect, not only as a Senator, businessman — many had that — but as a substantial patron of the drama. Perhaps he recalled, as he passed the Masonic Temple, how 20 years past he had endeavored to bring Hamlet and The Second Mrs. Tanqueray to Wyoming by building the Capitol Avenue House. It had burned, although Gentleman Gambler “Old Tom” Heany had for a time made a very respectable gambling house from the remains. Senator Warren passed the red-brick schoolhouse, the Elks Club house, bumped bustling Babbitts, paused before the skeleton of an impressive modern building — his new theatre, which will open this winter. Manhattan producers are pleased to have a stopping-off place between Denver and California. Soon stage-effects will gleam where once campfires flickered. Again half-clad dancers will leap while “Bom!” goes the drum.