The White House Week

Sir Ronald Lindsay, the British Ambassador, took Winston Churchill to the White House for a friendly chat. Enormous Kate Smith, radio singer, was escorted there by Brigadier General Frank Thomas Hines, to get presidential thanks for her entertainment of disabled soldiers. German Ambassador von Prittwitz introduced Dr. Oscar Eckstein of Berlin, adviser to the German Potash Syndicate. Actor Fred Stone, whose mother died two days before, dropped around with his daughter Paula for a brief how-do-you-do. Ambassador Edge, New Jersey Wet, home on leave from Paris, after a conference with President Hoover announced that he was returning immediately to his post but would be back in the U. S. to make Hoover speeches in the autumn campaign. With Secretary of Labor Doak, John L. Lewis, President of the United Mine Workers of America, called to give Mr. Hoover some advice on stabilizing the bituminous coal industry. Harvey Firestone, tiremaker, popped in to pay his respects, as did General John Joseph Pershing. James Cash Penney shepherded a delegation of wives of the managers of his stores. The choir of St. Olaf Lutheran Church of Minnesota had its picture taken with President Hoover.

> When Calvin Coolidge used to be there, Will Rogers could run in and out of the White House without formality. Last week he was brought there by a fellow-Oklahoman. Secretary of War Hurley. Afterwards Will Rogers reported:

Pat talked too much. He told the President all about what I was about to tell him about my world tour. Pat and Bernard Shaw are the only two people who can outtalk me. I had the President stopped. . . . While I was in there we fixed up all the affairs of the world. The only thing we didn't get to was Al Smith and Huey Long. . . . The President was in fine humor and he told the jokes. Said Pennsylvania, the second richest State, was the only one that had passed the tin cup for relief from the Federal Government. He laughed and got a kick out of this.

"They pay 12% of the taxes," he said. "Under the relief program they would receive only 3%. So all they would lose by Government relief, instead of relieving themselves, would be 9%. Now there's one that would do justice to you, Will."

He also said no Western State had asked for aid, not even Alfalfa Bill Murray. I'm going to send Bill a telegram tonight.

He's worried about this money hoarding. When we were on this subject the President looked directly and severely at me and asked me: "Write a joke against these hoarders. Humor might show 'em how foolish they are. Now, go do that." So after all my kidding about Hoover Commissions, I am finally on one, "The Hoover Anti-hoarding Joke Commission."

> After White House receptions at which he shakes thousands of hands, President Hoover goes directly upstairs where is waiting for him a basin of antiseptic diluted in hot water. Into this the President plunges his red swollen hand to relieve the ache. Last week the White House secretariat announced that the President would hold no more receptions, shake no more hands. "To greet so many visitors presents too great a task for the President at such a time as this when official demands occupy every waking hour."

> President & Mrs. Hoover took no special notice of their 33rd wedding anniversary.

> To a request from 122 business leaders that he declare a "two-year moratorium on destructive competition" (i. e. suspend the anti-trust laws) President Hoover turned a cold shoulder. He rejected the proposal on the ground that the prohibition against price-fixing was as important now as ever.

> Last week William Andrew Mellon attended his last Hoover Cabinet meeting as Secretary of the Treasury. A profuse exchange of kind words followed. Back at the Treasury Mr. Mellon took the oath as Ambassador to Great Britain, cryptically remarking: "This isn't a marriage ceremony. It's a divorce." At the same time Ogden Livingston Mills was sworn in as Secretary of the Treasury. When Ambassador Mellon was handed his commission, he declared: "This is the first time I've received something." Secretary Mills twitted him on his jokes: "Really, you're getting to be a regular Jimmy Walker."

> Speaker Garner, calling at the White House, noticed some new chromium door knobs at the entrance to the executive offices. Said he to a White House policeman: "Why, those are the same kind of handles they have on caskets. Is anyone expecting a funeral around here--say, about March 4?"

> Last week President Hoover again shuffled his secretariat. He made George Aubrey Hastings, his researcher, the executive director of the White House Conference on Child Health & Welfare. French Strother, magazine writer, was taken back into his old job as literary secretary.

> Work on Hoover Dam was delayed last week when heavy rains flooded the Colorado River. Water broke down a trestle, overflowed the diversion tunnels and threw 500 men out of work.

* Disguised as a fortune teller of Damasciis (see p. 45). Not to be confused with famed Bartab Koran, a crystal gazer, who claims' credit for forecasting President Hoover's election in 19-28, the Japanese earthquake, the Manchurian crisis. Attracting enormous crowds to vaudeville, Bartab Koran has predicted that this year Newton Diehl Baker would be nominated by the Democrats, that the Democrats will carry all before them until Election Day when Herbert Hoover will be reelected. Calling at the White House, he was photographed with the President to whom he gave a gold idol from Tibet.

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