The Wilmington morning star., 1941-02-13
, Washington DaYbook
BY JACK STINNETT

WASHINGTON, Feb. 12.-H Congressman
Fred L. Crawford (R.-Mich.) has his way,
the new u. S. army will be full of beans
literally.
The battle of the bean has opened in the
halls of the 77th Congress. Crawford is gen
eralissimo of the attacking forces. a one-man
pro-bean bloc bombarding his colleagues with
ammunition ranging from Browning's poetry
to bowls of bean soup.
The Michigan congressman is looking as
kancer and askancer, his eye grows more
and more jaundced as he contemplates the
new-fangled diets Uncle Sans soldiers and
sailors are tapping up.
What kind of an army is it, he asks Of all
and sundry, where they ski1np on beans?
The bean bloc is willing to 60 along with
Napoleon, but he thinks Napoleon didn't 60
far enough. He agrees that an army fights
on its stomach but points to history to back
his contention that the proper stoking for
the military stomach is beans.
Attacking Yankees got h Ell aggressive
bounce and surge on beans in all our wars,
Crawford avers With the mileage U. S. SOL
diers got on beans matter of record in past
wars, he sees no reason to change the fuel
formula in the training for defense.
Why is this man Crawford the champion
y
The Saginaw valley and the lower two-thirds
OF the Michigan peninsula are noted for dried
navy bean production. Crawford never misses
a chance to give the home product a boost
Recently he got up to inform his colleagues
that the congressional restaurant was featur-
ing bean soup and pork-and-beans as part of
National Bean Week observance.
ONLY BEGINNING
But if other congressman thought they'd
get away from Crawfords beanery by lap
ping up little soup and forking in second
helping of Michigan's pride, they didn't know
the bean bloc. Crawford wasn't even getting
warm at that stage
When he really cranked up, he called on
the poet Robert Browning for confederation,
quoting from THE Bean Feast in support
of his pet legume.
That was a literary nicely, sort of frill
on his peroration. He bounced a flock of
facts off those congressman.
For instance, he let the congressional breth-
rem in on the discovery that the blood of rats
fed on beans showed terrific squirt in hemo-
globin content. Mighty handy information for
congressman fresh out of hemoglobin
That didn't exhaust the bean bloc's erudi-
ton, either. He came up with the disclosure
that beans are practically dripping with vita
min B-1, that beans are fit to burst with
their load of beneficial calcium and have
hard time containing all their good old phos-
porus and iron.
The humble bean also wins the fueI.value-
per-pound sweepstakes in a scientific breeze.
Crawford got the dope right out of the De-
partment of Agricultures mouth A pound
of beans conceals 1,605 fuel units, whereas
pound of milk has only 1876, oatmeal cruel 155,
round steak 1876 and potatoes 44O
There is a serious over-production situation
in the dried bean industry, Crawford said,
michigan, California, Colorado and New Mex
leo are bean producing areas where over
production has hit hard
RESULTS ONLY FAIR
Crawford admits that the army quarter
master corps has shown somewhat less than
frantic enthusiasm for stuffing the new SOL
diers with larger cargo of beans. His re-
suits in seeking to persuade the army to in
crease bean rations have been "only fair
The bean bloc isn't licked yet, though. He
wound up his praise OF the potent protein
with these laudatory remarks:
1.-THE idea that men can march and fight
as stoutly on stomachs bloated with French
pastry as they can on ston1achs filled with
solid army beans sounds like one of those
foreign isms against which we are told to
be constantly guard
If the new army turns out to be bunch of
pastry-soft creampuffs, don't say Crawford
didn't warn you.