National Affairs: Sweetheart of Dauphin County

At first glance Pennsylvania’s Republican Congressman John Grain Kunkel (pronounced Koonkul) is a very ordinary looking fellow. It is almost impossible to imagine Congressman Kunkel wearing a burnoose, strumming a guitar by moonlight, or joining the Foreign Legion to forget Dorothy Lamour. He wears spectacles, which would probably keep him out, anyhow. Congressman Kunkel is 48, a bachelor, 6 ft. 1 in., has grey hair, is shy, wears quiet clothes, and looks as though he enjoys reading railroad timetables.

But Congressman Kunkel electrifies the Republican women of Dauphin County (Pa.). And Congressman Kunkel has never flinched when faced with masses of his female constituents in the grip of emotion. He has faced them before. Last week he faced them again. He had invited the Co-operative Republican Ladies of the Dauphin County Councils to come to Washington for lunch (at $2.50 a plate) at the Statler. Eight hundred joyfully accepted. They arrived on a special train, surged out, straightened their Kunkel ribbons, dabbed at their noses, spied Congressman Kunkel standing with his back to a Union Station pillar. They charged.

Kunkel faced them as calmly as William Cody facing the thundering buffalo of the western plains. He smiled, he shook hands, amid a sea of spring hats, he nodded. When Mrs. David Carr Sr., vice president of the Councils, showed him her knees which she had bruised slipping in a puddle, he made no audible reply. When one constituent kissed him and dozens squealed happily, he just braced himself. When sightseeing buses finally took the 800 off on a tour of the city, including the zoo, he walked away steadily and surely.

The Folks He Loved. By the time the ladies arrived at the Statler for luncheon they were a little more subdued. They had ridden around town for 3½ hours. They had made a bargain-basement attack on the Statler’s powder rooms. They had somehow swept 25 non-Kunkel ladies along into the dining rooms with them, thereby complicating the seating arrangements and causing some bad tempers. But when Congressman Kunkel reappeared they immediately and happily sang, to the tune of Bell Bottom Trousers:

Once there was a Congressman,

He was ever true,

To the back-home folks he loved,

And who love him too.

He was always on the job,

Morning, noon and night,

When his other chores were done,

Letters he would write.

Stripes or plain trousers,

Coat of brown or blue,

Congressman Kunkel, we are all for you!

Congressman Kunkel did not let them down. After they had sung more songs, with lyrics written right in Dauphin County, the ladies discovered that he had brought in all sorts of Congressmen and Senators, several of whom even made speeches. Cried Congressman John Jennings of Tennessee: “This is the most beautiful audience I have ever addressed in my life, and I hope you all live forever.” When Pennsylvania’s Republican Senator Ed Martin showed up, the ladies sang some more:

“Praise the Lord, he’s got the ammunition. . . .

For a son-of-a-gun of a Senator’s he.”

Then came the most Kunkelish moment of all. Mrs. Betty Wood of Harrisburg rose and presented Kunkel with a radio-phonograph. “I have so many nice things to say about Congressman Kunkel that I’m getting goose bumps,” she giggled. “After today I predict that he will be called the sweetheart of the Congress of the U.S.A.” She turned on the record-player and out came Let Me Call You Sweetheart, in which the ladies all joined.

After that Kunkel said shakily that he was overwhelmed, and the ladies surged out and over to the Capitol to get photographed with him. Then there were more glad cries, more milling, more handshaking, and gradually the ladies disappeared. Congressman Kunkel put his hat firmly on his head, went to his office, transacted some business, and talked to reporters. He sighed reminiscently; the luncheon check had come to $2,300. Then, and only then, did he go out for a fast drink.