The Waterbury Democrat., 1939-07-19
BY s. ,. FIREMAN

author and radio commcntatorl
 BY $. J. FIREMAN
 Dear Walter:--
 You ran an item recently con- corning sa labor organizer who had been picked up and charged with subversion because he had in his possession a book caleld "Strictly Prom Hunger" was flattered by the importance lent to my little volume of breakfast-table essays, but l wasn't surprised. A young lady whom I met on the coast last fall told me 8 somewhat similar story. She had applied for 8 posi- tion at a large New York depart ment store and was being inter- viewed by the personnel manager. This executive, very sympathetic and kindly, regretted that there was no opening at the time but assured her he would place her as soon as possible. As she was leaving he stopped her, and pointing to the book under her arm, said: There's one suggestion I'd like to make, my dear. I don't think it's very wise, when you apply for a job, to carry around dangerous radi- cal literature" The book, of course was "Strictly From Hunger" and I may add that the girl was too or she wouldn't have been there in the first place.
 Now that I have been elevated to the company of Alexander Berkman snd Emma Goldman, perhaps a short survey of my past might prove interesting. I grew up the usual healthy and extraverted boy except that when my companions stuffed their blouses with green applies ] generally carried time bombs. Af- ter the porch of our house iil Providence Plantations, Rhode Island, had been blown off few dozen times, my father issued a ukase that I was to be dipped In a pail of cold water before being allowed to take my place at the dinner table. This cut down on the number of explosions but resulted in what is still referred to in New England as "Perelman's Head Cold or the Deerfield Massacre" His. torians have estimated that in the ten years at the dawn of the cen. tury I consumed over three mean tons of headache tablets and 2,00( linear yards of mustard plaster. Yot will get a faint idea of my condi. ton when tell you that my sneezes were audible in Crawford Notch New Hampshire. Of course, any. thing is audible in Crawford Notch New Hampshire, including the dror of a pin, but 1t will give you faint idea, which is all prom ised you originally.
 About the time people were be. ginning to say "he could shave I he only wanted to-" my father fel afoul of a pamphlet Dorothy Par ker is right, that word should b' "famphlet') entitled Poultry ant Profits. When the smoke clearet away we found ourselves staring a several thousand Plymouth Rock ard White Wyandottes eating thei heads off. When they finished eat ing their heads off, they started oi ours. To this day I can drive ove chicken with placid smile on m. face as of work well done; ant where another man takes two week off to fish his favorite trout stream I drive around the back roads o Pennsylvania maiming and mang ling chickens.
 I confess that during this perio, of my life I lost touch with higl explosives except to feed the roos ters a pinch of trinitrotoluol O nitrogen tri-iodide just to see hoy far they would catapult. This wa not lost on my parents, who hel a family conference with teal an' decided that I had better be packed off to a higher education befor the flock was annihilated. wa enrolled in a small but sordid uni versity as a pre-medical studen and left to my own devices. Thes consisted for the most part in fill ing chemical retorts and alembic W1tn ngnly uIlStdUic Bnoco "i' toasting them with Bunsen burner I understand they are still pickin glass out of the chief chemistry in structor, although his hair gre' back long ago. However, due t petty jealousy on the part of tn faculty and chorus girl who hap pened to be hiding under the be in my room waiting for a shove to subside. I was graduated ahea of my class.
 The casual passerby some day later in Ann street and the vicinit of Chatham Square might have ob served a youth of an open, earnes countenance, whose few belonging were contained in scarlet ban danna handkerchief suspended fror a peeled willow stick. Obviously
 "greenhorn," the lad soon attracte the attention of a group of stree arabs, who lost no time in hurlin