The Wilmington morning star. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1909-1990, 1945-07-18

accept no responsibility for the personal
views of Mr. Pegler, and often disagree
with them as much as many of his read
| ers His articles serve the good purpose
! of making people Think
BY. wEsTBROK PEGLER
| downright, 1915, BY King Features Syndicate.)
! NEW YORK, - Yesterday these dispatches
revealed the picturesque effrontery of t h e
Buchanan Advertising Agency, which employ
ed Harry Hopkins son. David. in offering Mrs.
Eleanor Roosevelt to the Pan-American Cot
| fee Bureau as radio attraction at $1,000 a
week and the agency's unblushing proposal
to make full use of the governmental agencies
created by her husband The money to pay
Mrs. Roosevelt came from the treasures of
Brazil and eight other Latin-American nations.
Some collected from their coffee growers an
export tax of five cents a bag for this
purpose Others took it straight out of their
| national treasures.
In view of Mrs. Roosevelts denial, whether
naive or artful thatshe was thus CONNER
cializing the White House there should be in
terest in the opinion of North American COT
fee men who objected and withdrew from
| sales campaign In which they had collaborate
with the Latin-Americans. One of these men
explained that the Americans distinctly
believed that because the wife OF the President
was thus to be hired, the President, himself,
must be "in on it, too. In Latin America
presidents mistress might be maintained at
public expense, but the status of the wives
of eminent public men in their society was
such that they could not comprehend Mrs.
Roosevelt as an Independent personality in
her earning ventures.
The campaign was not spectacular sue
cess however, and, when it was over, the
Latin-Americans and the National Coffee Asso-
citation, composed of North American coffee
merchants, resumed their old straight cooper
Mrs. Betty Lindley represented Mrs. Roose-
welt in negotiating the radio job. The Dies
Committee obtained some records from
bank in small New Jersey town and the
office of this long inquiry into subversive ac-
tivities reported that these documents show
ed that Mrs Lindley received 10 per cent of
Mrs Roosevelts radio checks as her fee and
made disbursement from the account to those
purposes which have been loosely described
as Mrs Roosevelt's charities" The office
force of the Dies Committee believed that
some of these "charities" were of the type
which Earl Browder had described as trans
mission belts" and fronts for communism
The Dies Committee further discovered the
name of Mrs. Betty Lindley on public payrolls
of the National Youth Administration and the
Social Security Administration, in which Mrs
Roosevelt was strongly influential, for varying
/ periods, part of the time at $3,60O year ana
| at Otner tunes OIL d pei O4CA1I AoiSAiiS ny w
S22. The duties were described as those OF
| a research assistant and ''consultant' end
the committee received information indicating
that they did not confine Mrs. Lindley to regu-
lar hours at a desk. All this, of course, would
have been above any question of legality
Robert Stripping, the chief investigator for
the Dies Committee and J. B. Matthew's,
backslid communist who became Its chle1 IN
formant on communist organizations ana per
sonalities, inquired further and declared TINS
Mrs. Betty Lindley to be the wife OF Ernest
K. Lindley, a Washington reporter, columnist
and author of occasional books, generally with
strong sympathy for the Roosevelts and
their political detectives.
After the Dies Committee dissolved, Strip
ling, at the age of 80 and pre-Pearl Harbor
father was drafted for the army He had been
the subject of a savage radio propaganda
campaign depicting him as protected per-
son and a Stacker. He declared that he was
entirely willing to do his bit but had been
singled out because he had offended the Whlte
House by his discoveries.
/ Stripping insisted, too, that the reason Tor
drafting him was to remove him from Wash
ington and silence him. Matthews, however, IS
not subject to the draft and is still, so to
| speak, a free man.
While Mrs. Roosevelt was doing her act
for ST 1000 week, Mr.. Lindley wrote a col
urnn entitled THE Mob Spirit berating Con-
gress for it's revolt against the attempt OF
Mrs Roosevelt and others to pack the Office
of Civil Defense with their theological soul
mates, and personal friends. These included
Mayris CLANCY, dancer and protege OF Mrs.
Roosevelt, and Melvyn Douglas, Hollywood
actor.
To shame Congress and those commentators,
including the late Ray Clapper, who had gagged
at the plot to make politics through the o. c. D.
while, as it were, Rome burned, Mr.. Lindley
unfortunately brought in the name of Miss
Carole Lombard, the actress who was killed
in an airplane crash and quoted Henry Nor
genthau as having said that she gave her
life for her country because she was on bond
selling trip at the time. The fact developed lat
er, however, that Miss Lombard and IS young
ferry command pilots who were felloW-pass-
engers, gave their lives for the Roosevelt poll
itcal alliance with the union movement.
congressional inquiry elected evidence
that the pilot had repeatedly violated instruc-
tons and was off his course, taking a short
cut for his California home. when he hit a
mountain. The airline had tried to get rid
of him in the interests of safety but the old Ia
Dor board put him back, holding that he had
been fired for union activity.
Also during the time that Mrs. Roosevelt
was or was not, as you prefer, commercializ-
ing the White House, the Motion Picture Tier
aid published an item of further interest 1t
said that Miss Cherry Preisser, the wife OF
Harry Hopkins son, David had been engaged
to play in the movies for Paramount Plc'
lures, Inc. AS has been said David was en-
ployed by the Buchanan agency whose plan
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