Evening star., 1942-11-18

lee of the Navy. 2 KT
At a table in
the crow d 1t. Comdr. BIakesIee.
Comdr. Blakeslee began his intro
ductions. The first was Miss Mache
Haniotis.
'Mache has seen a lot more than
her fellow students at Anacostia
High School. In Greece, just a
week before the worst of the bo.:lb-
ings, Mache escaped with her
mother and father. Twice the boat
carrying them to Egypt was bombed,
Near Capetown . . still on their
way to America . they saw the
periscope of submarine. The
torpedo missed. But the war hasn't
ended for Mache and her parents
yet. Her brother escaped to England.
He's a flyer now in the RAF."
Explains Empty Chair.
Coming to the empty chair be-
side Miss Haniotis, Comdr. Blakes-
lee explained that Helene couldn't
be. here"
"Helen's off in land where olive
oil is medicine =. one that's used
to offset a certain swelling, an iden-
tifying mark of starvation. Helene's
husband is dead, killed fighting in
Albania. She still has her son, but
when she looks at him she wishes
olive oil was still to be had. Per-
haps. today, Helene and her son are
climbing hill near Athens, hunting
herbs to serve as food. But the hills
picked bare. Each day Helene has
gone farther and farther. Each eve
ming Helene stares at the wheat
line. She's hoping little more
wheat has arrived from America"
Elizabeth Daubanton of the
Netherlands was introduced next.
Although she is here with her par
ents, it was explained, all her
friends and other relatives are in
Holland and two cousins are in a
German concentration camp.
They were taken away after a
street fight with some NaZi soldiers.
The goose step on the beloved cob
hlestones had become too much to
bear"
The narrator's voice took on a
deeper note as he came to the empty
seat beside Elizabeth. He started
telling the story of another Dutch
boy, 10-year- Jan.
Jan is Alone, Now.
when Jan was baby, his moth
er and father took him to Java,
JAMS father went to sea when the
war came to Java. He never re-
turned. Jan and his mother were
alone. And then . the Japs in
vaded Java. Fleeing ahead of the
Japanese. Jan and his mother found
passage on a plane. A Jap Zero
ended their flight. JAMS mother
showed him how to release the
parachute. She pushed him from
the burning plane. There wasn't
time then for her to jump, too. The
plane crashed just a few feet from
where Jan landed in his parachute.
The 10-year- old boy is alone in the
world
The red-headed youngster with
the crutches beside his seat at the
head table was introduced as Tom
my The little boy, who has been
going to the clinic at Children's
Hospital since April, grinned as the
narrator said that some day per
haps in two years, Tommy will be
able to run with the other boys
Sometimes the narrator went
fn
there's no place to play but in the
street. That's why the chair beside
Tommy is empty
Billy will have to learn to walk
all over again. His parents work
hard. They've saved a little-but
not enough for the disaster of
truck running down their only child
No, Billy couldn't be with us today.
He's lying in bed, his arms and legs
useless-useless. that is, without
years of costly care
Former Star Of Films.
The face of a next guest, a sailor,
looked familiar but the audience
couldn't quite place him until
Comdr Blakeslee introduced him as
Specialist Wesley Barry of the Navy
A murmur of recognition, breaking
into applause, punctuated what the
narrator said next.
"Yes. he's the same freckle-faced
kid you saw in 'Penrod' and School
days in the movies"
Then, in a more serious voice,
the narrator went on
He and his fellow sailors, soldiers
and marines can tell what it's like
to be in a strange town. I guess
they've all walked down the street
at one time or another, looking in
the lighted windows. maybe seeing
q woman in an apron setting the
table for dinner, or girl they'd like
to know, laughing. They know their
way around now, know that there's
always a welcome for them, some
thing to do, some one to talk to at
the USO."
Again an empty chair.
"Cavanaugh couldn't be here. He
vas in the Army. too, not pro-
fessional soldier, either. Until the
war he was q clerk, like any you
see hurrying along a Washington
sidewalk about 4:30 in the after
noon. He was at Dieppe. The
Eazis took him away in q lorry,