Odd Oklahoma

Oklahomans are hardened to school scandals. Two former Oklahoma City School Board officials were sentenced to prison, Treasurer Ray Scruggs for stealing some $500,000 of school money, Attorney Frank Wilkins (now out on bond while his conviction is appealed) for taking bribes in connection with sale of oil royalties on school property. Last summer a grand jury recommended the ouster of all nine members of Oklahoma City's School Board, charging, among other things, that the board had failed to take sealed competitive bids for extermination of termites infesting a school building. Unflustered by this departure from Oklahoma's normal tolerance, the School Board defiantly fired 34 "disloyal" teachers and other school employes.

Last week, however, not only Oklahomans but the rest of the U. S. sat up and took notice when it appeared that Oklahoma City schools were odd not only at the top but also at the bottom. Haled before their high school principal for persistent hooky-playing, Milton Walser, 19, and Manford Ishmael, 18, airily explained that they had been busy leading a blackshirt movement to establish a new political and economic system in the U. S. by "bloodless revolution."

Walser, a dark lad with curly hair, was "commissar," and Ishmael, who wears a wisp of black mustache, was "vice commissar" of a secret group calling itself "C?C" (Curiosity Club). Its members, 24 boys, nine girls, all wore a uniform of black shirt, black breeches and black boots. Male members also were expected to grow mustaches. Meeting in members' houses, they discussed sex, atheism and a program they distilled from Plato, Aristotle and Edward Bellamy's Utopia. Specific points in their program: less restrictive marriage laws, more sex education, a plan (a kind of first cousin to "Thirty Dollars Every Thursday") to give everybody cash certificates to be spent within a year. The group also had rifle-shooting practice to develop members' "individual qualities and reliance."

Undecided whether they had chanced upon a "communist" or "fascist" plot, public officials promptly investigated. Assistant County Attorney E. W. Brown summoned Commissars Walser & Ishmael, vainly demanded the names of other members. In Washington Chairman Martin Dies of the House Committee Investigating UnAmerican Activities wired for full details. Said he: "This is very important."

Said Commissar Walser's mother, "I think that I'll go home, get these boys together, roll up my sleeves and bat their heads together."

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