Evening star., 1947-09-07


BEN AMES WILLIAMS.
From an oil painting by Arthur Pope.
Fine Additions
To the Rich Lore
IOf Americana
REMEMBER DISTINCTLY
Assembled by Agnes Rogers, with
running comment by Frederick
Lewis Allen. (Harper,: S5.)
This illustrated history of America
from 1918 to Pearl Harbor is quite
rightly subtitled "A Family Album
of the American People" 1t is just
as diverting and discomhting as that
plush bound volume that used to be
in every parlor.
Women, seeing themselves in the
styles of the '20s, with hats pulled
down over their ears, dropping
waistlines and rayon stockings all
agleam, will surely exclaim: Did I
ever look like that?" And docu-
mentary evidence of such interwar
Weakness as marathon dances and
hagpole sitting are almost as en-
barrassing as being confronted with
a picture of oneself at the age of
l lounging unclad on bear rug.
The pictures assembled by Agnes
Rogers and the commentary by
Frederick Lewis Allen of only Yes
terday" renoWn, do not attempt to
set up any morals or to draw any
lesson. It's just a good-natured, in
formal, often unintentionally funny
reminder of what it was like in that
23-year interval of peace.
Those years between wars covered
wide swing in the national for
tunes from the dizzy '20s to the
apple selling days of the dark '30s.
It's all in the record, for our shame
or our pride. The photographs have
been supplemented with charts
showing economic trends, cartoons
(most of them, not surprisingly, are
from the New Yorker, which lam
poon the prevailing moods and fads
of the day and ads, huckstering
everything from Arrow collars to
corsets.
All the personalities who won fleet
ing or lasting celebrity during those
days are amply represented. Lind
bergh, the greatest popular hero of
his time, is here, from his triuni-
phant entry into Paris after his first
trans ns-Atlantic flight, through the
Hauptmann trial and his isolationist
activities. You see the Presidents
Calvin Coolidge looking sheepish in
a cowboy suit. Hoover walking down
the White House steps, Roosevelt
radiating confidence as he takes Of
f1ce), the athletes remember Ger
trude Ederle?), the financiers q. P.
Morgan, midget on knee, the poll
ticians, the gangsters, the authors,
the movie stars, the bathing beauties,
the Duke of Windsor and "the
woman I love-"
II Remember Distinctly" which has
high entertainment value for the
casual browser and probably a good
deal of significance for the social
historian, ends with two pictures of
the shambles at Pearl Harbor, and
with Mr.. Aliens most philosophic
paragraph:
Would we be able-looking back
later over the record of our interwar
achievements and idiocies not simply
to apply successfully the old maxim
of great schoolmaster, To err Is
human, to make the same mistake
twice is foolish but also to gain the
broader and more essential perspec-
tive needed to do the harder thing:
To avoid making different mistakes
springing from the same sort of
myopia, the same sort of evasion and
obSessions?" M. Meg.
Il II Il
PICTURE MAKER OF THE OLD
WEST: WILLIAM H. JACKSON
BY Clarence S. Jackson. (ChdrleS
Scribner'S Sons, $780,
William H. Jackson was an enter
prising young Vermonter who pio-
neered in his chosen profession,
photography and took his chances
in his chosen country, the West. He
made a lasting contribution to Amer
ica's early knowledge of the great
country west of the Rockies through
his superb pictures and sketches,
which wear remarkably we'll with age
and constitute highly valuable pic
torial record of the development of
the region
A Civil War veteran, who found
you can't go home again, he turned
Westward, driving wagons and
droves of half-broken horses back
and forth across the plains. He pic
tured the transition from the Pony
Express to the railroads, in photo
graphs when conditions permitted,
in sketches when they did not. He
alighted for a while in Omaha,
where he did some remarkable cam
era portraits of Indian leaders, but
he soon became restless and joined
the Hayden survey, which explored
what is now Yellowstone National
Park. His photographs of those nat
ural wonders, taken under technical
difficulties that might daunt a latter
day lensman. are still impressive. He
was the first photographer Of the
cliff dwellings of Mesa Verde and of
Holy Cross Mountains.
| His son has made a highly intelli-
gent selection of Jackson's best work
and has provided a pleasant running
biography. M. Meg.
1T HAPPENED IN 1946
Edited by Clark Kinnaird. (DueH,
Sloan & Pearce;; $6.)
This is a lively yearbook full of
good illustrations ranging from car
toons to a picture biography of
Franklin Roosevelt. Mr.. Kinnaird
has put together a story that covers
the main events of 1916 in a way
that makes an interest holding mar
rative. The writing leaves some
thing to be desired. and the histori-
cal perspective is far from perfect,
but the overall job is competent.