Evening star., 1945-05-15

In Hollywood you'll likely see a
first-class fistic exhibition in a
night club any time. Things are
different in Washington, however,
where even night club personalities
must take time out to 60 to Grit
fifth Stadium for their slugging.
Among the ringside lung busters
the other evening, watching Bee
Bee Washington pound Johnny
Finazzo, the Spectator spotted Ralph
Hawkins. Usually Ralph can be
found fighting off jitterbugs at the
Casino Royale.
Ventriloquists all over the coun-
try are plenty worried-here's the
reason for the crisis.
In a very few years the wise
cracking dummy as we know him
today may be extinct, a skelton
museum piece, miserable pile of
sawdust. To put it frankly, there's
| going to be terrific head shortage.
A few months ago a 70-year-old'
gentleman, the most famous maker
of dummies in the entire world, re-
tired. And with him the ability to
carve an animated face out of wood
was relegated into the realm of lost
arts. A kind of stork for all the
famous dummies in this country,
including Charlie Mccarthy, Frank
Marshall has lived a quiet, useful
life in Michigan, ILL.,, for nigh onto
10 years.
Mathematically speaking, if you
could divide the last 80 or 40 years
of Franks life into three-month
periods you might get an idea Of
how many dummies the master
craftsman has turned out. At first,
three months may seem like pret-
ty long time to jimmy pair of eyes,
nose and mouth into a slab of
pine, but no one, regardless of the
time spent, has even come near to
turning out a dummy as lifelike as
Frank could.
In the days before CM CBergen's
| famous brat), signed, sealed and
delivered, Mr.. Marshall charged
fiat $35 for G. Q. D. mechanical
baby. The imitation of national
fame sent Mr.. Marshall's prices
soaring so that by the time the
Trade Winds Roy Douglas had ne
gotiated Eddie" with the stork, he
cost Roy in the neighborhood of
$3.50.
1--we had several dummy makers
swear they could reproduce a head
for Eddie for a nominal $780," the
ventriloquist said, but Eddie and
I were both disgusted with the re-
suits. After loaning Eddie out as
a pattern and missing three weeks
work fos nothing, I gave this up"
A few ventriloquists were smart
enough to foresee the situation, Roy
explained, and instead of putting
away canned goods and nylons, they
became what you might call head
hoarders. Bergen finagled three re-
serve heads for Charlie some time
ago. He has nothing to worry about
at present.
To give you an idea of the beating
dummy has to take, Roy told us
about a recent trip he and Eddie
made to Panama. Dampness is very
bad for Eddie's esophagus, so bad
in fact, that his mouth kept ex-
panding to point where Roy had
no alternative but to shave it back
to normal size
When we arrived back in the
States" Roy said, poor Eddie
looked like a firSt-year dental stu
dent had been putting in some extra
hours on him. Adding insult to in
jury, friend of mine who is a
radio announcer Afor a toothpaste
company asked me if he could use
Eddie as a horrible example of what
happens to little boys who won't
scrub their teeth I had a plastic
surgery job done on Eddie fast. I
wonder, sometimes, why I ever got
into this business" Roy said.
You see Roy was a happy-go-
lucky magician until he tried to
knock down dummy doll at Coney
Island with three balls for Is cents
L got so provoked when I couldn' t
knock one down." Roy said, 81 gave
the guy SIS and took the thing
home"
Most people we know get pretty
crabby when they 60 two days with
out sleep, but not Dell Doan Mr..
Doan simply says so what" and
goes right on standing on his head.
What Dell is doing on his head in
the first place is best explained by
a visit, this week, to the Lotus.
What happened was a. mixup In
hotel reservations, as we'll as train
schedules, with the result that when
the acrobat arrived at the Lotus he
had no time to catch up on his
sleep.
1T doesn't bother me-" Dell said
in his thick Danish accent, moth
| ing does"
Guess the strong man speaks the
truth. He has never dieted a day
in his life, not even when he was
younger and found the best way to
get publicity was standing on his
head atop tall buildings Since
Dell's been discharged from the
Army, he contents himself with do
ing easy things like standing on his
hands while piling up four brick
shaped blocks under each of them
or carrying himself and a few odd
objects around balanced on a single
hand.
Governor Jim Davis was part of a
recent unbilled attraction at the
Troika. He sang You Are My Sum
shine" with Topsy and Eva Dun
can. Also in the party was George
Observation-Disclosures OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES