The Wilmington morning star., 1946-06-10
Fair Enough
BY WESTBROOK PEGLER
Copyright, 1916, BY King Features
Syndicate. Inc.}

-D
Syndicate, Inc.)
NEW YORK.-James Montgomery Flagg
missed the point in a publicity story out of
Hollywood recently wherein he fearlessly de-
nounced the bobby-sox cult Of young American
girls on the mere ground that they are untidy
and unappetizing, worse than that, these hys-
terlcal little brats are SO many and so indie
cent in their public exhibitions of an emotion
that seems to be sexual, that they call to mind
no previous example Of adolescent fanaticism.
For a, time, at least, they were associated with
the career Of Frank Sinatra whom they pur-
sued even to the extent Of picketing hotels
where he sang and resided and restaurants
where he diaed, proving the back-stairs with
a premature ingenuity and holiness that would
have been a credit to hardened she ak-thieves,
bowling like animals at the sight of him and
snatching at his garments.
This wasn't the innocent, goggle-eyed, re-
strained longing Of the bon-bon set Of 40 years
ago when the matinee idol was worshipped
from afar, nor the curious rapture Of the GER
ry flappers who idolized Geraldine Farrar in
the latter years of her career. There was some
thing distinctly nasty about their bearing and
Sinatra, himself, seemed disguised and angry
one evening when he had wrestled his way
through a pack of them to enter a restaurant
and found that, in the %scuffle, they had wrench
ed a button off his jacket and ripped a pocket.
I had thought, up to then, that this was a
claque, artificially cultivated by his press
agents, for there had been two similar cults
of personal d~evotees identified with a .trum-
peter and a clarinetist on Broadway in the
last 10 years and Mike Jacobs, the prizefight
promoter, had RECALLED me with stories Of his
early career when he sailed audiences with
hired enthusiasts to set off applause and save
bad shows from the fate they we'll deserved.
But, if that had been the case, the exploit had
gotten out of control for, on this night they
scuffled not merely to touch the hem of his
garments but to tear them off and, from the
box office point of view, they weren't worth a
dollar a hundred. How they happened to know
where he was dining and at what time so as
to be on hand for their demonstration I have
no idea and being very naive, didn't. think to
ask.
Flagg found the bobby-soxer offensive for
good enough reasons, being her naked. meaty
legs, her soiled male undershirt and general
slopplness, but perhaps, at his age, he turns
In early and has meyer had occasion to wonder
how children in the throes Of some strange
hysterla could remain out long after midnight
IN packs like coyotes, hanging around the
waldorf through some irresistible attraction,
sneaklng into the lobbies and upstairs unknown
to the public and b~razenly trying to crash the
elevators. What did they want, anyway, and
did they know themselves?
Ill-favored, i1l-mannered, unrestraiaed NV
modesty or pride and seemingly strangers to
one another but all victims of the same influ-
ence, they certainly were no compliment to
any hero Of their unsightly disturbance and
should nave been slapped and put to bed. On
one occasion, the, newspapers and police esti-
mated that more than Il 1000 of them turned out
to block traffic and moan and whine in a
demonstration vaguely disturbing and beyond
understanding. That sort of thing is not the
conduct OF innocent young girlhood and vet it
mad to be assumed that each Of these children
mad some sort Of home and most of the par
ents Who either didn't realize how troubled
they were or hadn't the decency themselves. to
keep them off the streets and under control
All this sWooniag and ~squawking could not
have been entirely the work of any promoter
intent on building an ephemeral cult for q
crooner whose influence on feminine emotions
n time became a matter of serious discussion
by psychologists and advertising men, who
regard themselves as experts ir mass-behav-
ior. Benny Goodman's following had been H.
%ter-bugs and it was understandable fiat thev
should break into the wild antics of their
dance to the dreadful squeals of his art The
scots ana patches of morose continentals in
Germany and the Balkans react similarly IN
the anguish of the pipes and, after all. litter
ougglng was but a revival or adaptation Of
such convulslons, but here there was no music
10 explain the phenomenon, for Sinatra was
not a street singer and revealed himself snar.
lngly. He couldn't brush them off.
VI late, l observe through the more or less
communist wing of the press and the panph-
let propaganda, Sinatra had adopted another
approach to youth, preaching against prejudice
and the use of such words as wop, daeo and
splck. That is nice OF him, to be sure, altbo,,oh
he seems to exaggerate the significance ~
such terms and thus to accentuate rather tb.n
abate awareness of the differences he+,.a aa
blood-strains, for which the communists would
thank him.
However, he serves youth and his o,,...
nicely if. by this adoption of a now o,oSonAS
he is able to rebuke and disperse tho 1919.
sox cult and rid the streets at night Of a borG.
of hayward girls. noioe
QUOTATIONS