Evening star., 1943-08-10
By WILLIAM Fl. STONEMAN,

Foreign Correspondent of The Star anc
Chicago Daily News.
LONDON, Aug. 10.-Compared tc
its great sister cities across the At
lantic, once luxurious London is q
rundown, shabby toWn-grim, tired
and warworn. The old city and its
people eXude an atmosphere OF
seediness and poverty, an unkempt.
ness which is undiminished by the
fact that it is honorable and is
borne with gentility and dignity
To an old resident of London, re-
turning after long spell in North
Africa and vacation in America
the place is shocking.
A couple of nights ago we wan
dered down Fifth avenue and Mad
ison avenue in New York City or
our way to take the Clipper back
to "Blighty"
The dimout, always a joke to
those who have cracked their shins
in the blackouts of Europe. simply
helped emphasize the brilliance OF
New York shopwindows, crammed
with treasures of American every
day life.
There were fine clothes and shoes,
windows full of fancy groceries,
lines, lemons and melons. Two
household supply stores on Madison
avenue displayed splendid assort-
ments of knives and kitchen uten-
sils. Through the windows of air.
conditioned bars and restaurants
and hotels you could see well-fed
people eating late suppers. Lesser
places also gave forth odors of good
cooking.
New Workers Well Dressed.
The people who sauntered along
the broad sidewalks through the
heat wave were we'll dressed and
well shod and were not afraid to
pause and admire themselves in the
glistening plate glass of the store
fronts.
Highly polished taxis moved along
the streets and despite gas ration
ing good many fancy private cars
were among them.
1t had been announced that resi-
dents of the Eastern seaboard would
be allowed to take cars with them on
vacation trips and that the supply
Of beef had begun to improve. There
had been some rumpus over riots in
Harlem but, in downtown New York,
Negroes mingled freely with their
fellow Americans and most of them
were anything but shoddy.
1T is nice of the British to let us
fight their war for them" a we'll
dressed, successful citizen remarked
over Tom Collins in the Commo-
dore bar. when are they going to
stop making suckers of us?'
His words still rang in our ears as
we walked out of Victoria Station
and had our first glimpse of London
in 10 months. They have formed the
background for everything we have
seen since.
Need New Clothes.
The first thing that struck us was
the appearance of the people them
selves. Everybody, it seemed to us
at first glance, needed some new
clothes and month in the north
woods and maybe a bath. We in
stinctively looked around for those
small children in fresh, bright
clothes whom we had had around us
during two months at home in
America. We saw few children and
we haven't yet seen one who
wouldn't be put down Immediately
as the child of poor parents If he
were lucky enough to appear on the
streets of New York or Chicago
Our first impression that the peo-
pie looked tired and poor increased
when we began to meet friends
whom We had seen less than year
ago. They all seemed older-not 10
older, but years older. That,
at least. was the first impression,
before we had had time to
grow accustomed to the scene. May
be it was because the peoples clothes
were shabbier than those of the
Americans or maybe because, in fact,
the people of London are immeasur-
ably older.
Yet the British themselves do not
seem to feel that they have suffered
particularly.
Its not SO much worse they say.
The food situation is not SO good
and, of course, everybody is wearing
old clothes, but you wouldn't notice
it so much if you hadn't been away"
If the people look weather. beaten,
the city itself is certainly an orphan
of the storm.
Club Repainted.
According to local gossip the only
place in town that has been re-
painted this year is Boobies Club,
famous haunt of men-about-
on St. James street. Every other
building in London seems to have
been left just about as it was in the
summer of 1941. Roofs have been
patched, windows replaced, rubble
removed and shaky buildings shored
up, but old gaps of blitz time remain.
There doesn't seem to be a new
building in town and except for
Boobies Club, the Office buildings
and houses look gray and smudgy.
The food shortage doesn't seem
to be much worse than it was be-
fore the demand on restaurants had