The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1935-03-25
AS | See It
by GEN. HUGH S. JOHNSON,

TULSA, Okla, March 25.-Without getting
i even so dramatic as "breathes there man
with soul so dead" there is some elemental kick
to coming back under the tent Of the particular
sky where you were born and spent your boy
hood.
When first saw this country, Sapulpa was
boX-car on siding Tulsa was a little snuggle
Of huts and Okmulgee was a slightly larger one
only so miles away. but that was a days journey
if you went on horseback and travelled hard
Jew down here yesterday-Chicago to Tulsa
in .our hours in Vultee Transport plane of the
American Air Lines with every seat occupied
over 200 miles an hour on the regular schedule.
It would have been faster except that for the
first time in many tens Of thousands of miles of
flying I felt an altitude of 1900 feet and had
to ask the pilot to fly lower.
People do not recognize what is happening to
them in these near miracles which are literally
making over both the face and the trend Of our
national lie. A days hard riding to get from
one huddle Of territorial huts to another so
miles aWay-four hours of comfortable floating
to get from one great metropolis to another more
than 600 miles away. For Tulsa is metropolis.
1 know Of no more modern city and-athOugh
it doesn't think Sol know of few that are bet
ter of in a business way just now They are
doing a good deal Of new residential building. 1t
is not at all easy to rent house. The stores are
full Of people and they are well dressed and not
long-faced. Spring is already here full fedged
in flowers and greenness.
IF lie rest of the country were as we'll off there
i wouldn't be any depression. For in this spotty
way we shall pull out of this mess. Every dis
triot that gets some better makes every other
district a little better and that is the great
blessing of having 125O00000 people in one
country within one tariff wall.
The afternoon I got here my favorite nephew
Tommy, age 10, had just won the all-city high
school oratorcal prize. I persuaded him to
repeat that speech which he did very earnestly
o+o fip 1ocic
It was a beautiful harmonized medley of
Father Coughn and Huey Long entitled 1.-THE
New Social Order" The only difference was that
there was some sense to Tommy's discourse.
But don't LET anybody tell you that both of
those tom-ton. beaters haven't made an impress
sion with the schmuss they are leading out to
this country
OF course, I got all kinds of news queries as
to whether I am down here to run for the Sen
ate. 1t would be great honor, but came down
here to see my mother That leads me to an
other modern miracle that just couldn't have
happened 10 years ago or even five years ago.
During the war when 1 was trying to raise
our army, I had to complain to Surgeon General
Gorgas about the incompetent supervision of
medical examination of men for the draft. He
said he would send me good doctor In day
or two faG old fellow in a converted private's
uniform came in and said, Lieut.. Billings re-
ports for duty, sir" His cap did not fit. His
eggins were on backwards His hair was too
long. 1 just groaned inwardly and said, all
right Doctor. Your Office is across the hail.
After he went and while was cussing about 1t
happened to look at the assignment card, and
got a shock. 1t was DR.. Frank Billings of Chi
cago, one of the greatest diagnosticians the
medical profession ever produced. He became
one of my closest friends.
OF course, it was crime to send him on that
job-like using 16-inch gun to kill mosquito
We kicked about it until he was made a briga-
der general in charge Of all disqualification.
THE sequel is this: Last winter my mother
i was desperately ill., No two local doctors
agreed I went to Okmulgee to bring her to New
York. She couldn't be moved Bernie Baruch
offered to fly down and bring two of the best
doctors in the East. just then I heard that one
of Frank Billings boys, DR.. Goodman, was
making local reputation a diagnostician in
Tulsa.
He came and gave my mother one of those
head-to-heel examinations which the tri-
ulnph of modern medicine.
After the days needed for that kind of a 60
ing over he said, This is common condition Of
old age miScalled pernicious anemia and it is
nothing else. The treatment is very direct, SIM
pie and certain. 1 am going to startle you. We
will have her worst symptoms out of the way in
two weeks, and she VIII be normal for her age
in two months"
stayed few days to see this treatment |
working exactly on schedule. 1t is now more
than two months and that is why I came to
Tulsa. A man like Frank Billings is not gone |
from the earth merely because we do not see him
any more.
There has been much progress in medi- |
cine and surgery as there has in air traffic the
outlook of little high school orators, and in the
change of Sapulpa from a boX-car, Tulsa to a
great industrial city, and Oklahoma from the
wild and woolly territory knew a boy to one
of the II or IA great states on any yardstick you
want to use to measure it.
1 wish I could say the same of the statesman
ship from Abraham Lincoln to Huey Long.
Copyright, 1885 by United Feature Syndicate Inc. All
rights reserved. Reproduction in whole
part forbidden.