The Waterbury Democrat., 1944-03-22

he was to entertain at shindig at the National Press Club there, we might all still be sitting at tables In Foot Shor's urging Morton LOT More" and yet More"
 There was a great number of peo- pie gathered there that afternoon to hear Morton Downey sing. Some I knew. Some only knew of and was glad to know. Foremost, of course, was Morton himself. MY friend Dick Mooney introduced us, and when Morton heard I worked on the Waterbury Democrat, he drew up a chair to the table where l and the Best Gal" were sitting, to talk to us of his native state of Connecticut, and of Ireland where he has visited often, the last time just before the war.
 His grandparents came from Ktl- kenny. On his last trip he met the Lord Mayor of Kilkenny, a benevo- lent old gentleman who gave Mor- ton an item of news which I had never learned, for all that my father was a member of the Irish Party in the English House of Conl- mons and great personal friend of Charles Stewart Parnell. The news was that the Lord Mayor, (Downey couldn't recall his name) once ran against Parnell for Par lament. And that should be one fer the record.
 We chatted of that, and of this, and of radio, and of Connecticut. And I told him that no matter wherever I went, sooner or later I ran into somebody from Waterbury. And he laughed in quiet apprecia- tion and said that Waterburians certainly get around.
 He left us then for @ few min uteS, and the waiter who had been serving our needs so regally bent over the table. T couldn't help hearing what you said" he explain ed apologetically, But I thought you'd like to know. I'm from Wa terbury."
 "The devil you are," I said, that bears out what I just remarked"
 Sure" he said softly. I'm from Waterbury. But I'm living in New York now"
 So we had a pleasant chat in the emptying room. And he gave me his name which was George Heffernan; and he pulled out picture of his daughter, very pretty girl, g years old named Alyce who serves as volunteer nurse four nights a week at St. Elizabeth's hospital on Washington Heights, and of whom he is rightfully very proud. He wants to be remembered to all his friends here.
 Then he went away and Morton and Dick Mooney came back, and good-byes were said, and I and the Best Gal" went out into Sand street very much like Cinderella at the stroke of twelve.
 And that's all very delightful and pleasant; but I'm sure you'll be in- terested in learning about the Vox Pop program to be heard next Mon- day, March 27, at 8 p. m., EWT., over CBS.
 On that program, back in their homeland from the fighting in far corners of the earth, Servicemen and civilians who were battle cas- ualtieS or prisoners of the enemy, together with victims rescued from domestic disasters, will describe how they were assisted by the American Red Cross.
 The program will originate on the stage of the time-honored Academy of Music, in Philadelphia, at a last-spurt rally of team captains and crews in the final week of the Red Cross War Fund campaign. h. cluded in the audience will be vet erans from the Valley Forge and Philade ,phia naval hospitals.
 Listeners will hear first-hand dramatic stories of far-fiung Red Crcss activities on the front lines and also on the home front in such national calamites as floods, the Boston Coconut Grove fire and the recent Richmond, Va, hotel con- fiagration.
 And that reminds me of an in- teresting experience Parks Johnson recently had. He interviewed on the Vox Pop program, a submarine builder who had trial-tested the undersea craft on which his son is now serving on the fighting sea front, somewhere in the Pacific.
 By the way over NEG, Saturday March 25, at 7:30 p. m. EWT.. mem bers of the Fourth Estate will jug gle clues with Sammy Schulman IMP war photographer, and John