Zurich Herald, 1942-01-01, Page 2CE C E
OF
PRESS
UR. AGGER FOR DEFENSE
RhIRIT OF ¢PUNA
Chtnigkking has a Rotary 010,
'the members of which are partly
natives and partly Britiel and Anl-
en'it:aats. At the bottom of the usual
weekly notice recently there ap-
peared the toile -whiz erre;
"And when we meet again, let's
speak
Of anything yon like --of pigs
that squeak,
Of our vacation ---books or toys,
Of our imagined troubles or real
3ars,
Or 'viCe-versa-•=but•—•mY friend,
Don't ask ore when the wa r
will end,
Don't whine about the price -
Maness,
Don't tell me that your fer-
vent's squeeze,
Don't tell me of ' the housing
dearth,
Don't tell me there's no peace
on earth,
Don't say that transportatiau's
bad,
Don't wail that eotfee caul be
had,
Don't sing that old worn-out re-
frain,
Please—don't-when next we
meet again!"
The spirit of Chungking is rap- t
resentative of the w111 of the Ohl -
nese people to break the spirit
of Japan.
—St Thomas Times -Journal.
NICKEL IN THE WAR
Some stinting facts are present-
ed
resented in a statement made by the In-
ternational
nternational Nickel Company of
Canada, Limited. World nickel pro-
duction and consumption this year
stave set airtime records, and more
than 90 percent of it is being used
in war orders. The United States
:this' year has used more than two-
thirds et the world's total ndckel
output—double the peacetime fig -
tures. Prices were unchanged this
year at figures which have pre-
vailed for 16 years, And in an af-
lent to meet a constantly growing
demand International Nickel is
*pending *35,000,000 to increase its
production by 60,090,000 pounds
aan`i:ally.
Canadian nickel is playing a vi -
tat role in the war, and it is a
atource of satisfaotion to all Can-
adians that their base metals in-
dustry has seized so magnificently
its chance for public servioe.
—Ottawa Journal.
A FREE COUNTRY?
We read with vast surprise that
guards have been placed inside
the Japanese embassy at Wash-
ington in order to prevent Mr. No-
mura slitting Isis belly open it
the ceremonial Japanese style.
Surely if Mr. Nomura wants to
commit suicide he should be a.1 -
lowed to do so. What is happening
to American liberty?
—Winnipeg FressPress.
LIFE CHEAP TO JAPS
Oriental life Is about the cheap-
est thing on the market. If 5,000
Steps are sunk it means nothing
except that 5,000 Japs are remov-
ad as a potential fighting force.
Breaking down Jap morale cannot
be an objective at a1L That may
seem calous, • but it is the key to
ilbeir. philosophy.
—St. Catharines Standard.
000D OLD DAYS
Th® metals controller announce
s. ban on a whole lot of doodads
and things, ,including brass cloth-
es hooks.; whish brings us back to
the good old days when we hung
einx coat and hat. on a 3 -inch nail
stuck in the Wall.
—Ottawa Citizef
ALIBI
Goebbels must be hard put to it
dor a satisfactory Attu explaihing
the large-scale German retreat in
Russia. Couldn't he just say the
• y is coming- home for Christ-
mas?
--Christian Science Monitor,
A coiled rattlesnake, we are told,
le able to strike two-thirds of its
length. Now let's see—how long
is Japan, and how far away from,
ear British Columbia, coast?
—Stratford Beacon -Herald.
—v—
PLACE FOR GOSSIPS
Wonder where gossips would
*sued if there wasn't any .middle
orf the sidewalk.
---Kitchener Record.
'I.%E: BOOK SHELF
BOTANY BAY
by Charles Nordhoff
and Norman Hall •
,IA penal colony of Australia` in
the eighteenth century is the,set-
ting for another thrilling tale of
Adventure by ' Nordhoff and Hall,
authors, of "The Bounty" and "The
,1Ruaricane."
D3ugh Tallant is convicted in
liegland of highway robbery and
is sent aboard a convict ship to
oerve a life sentence. at Botany
/Bay. 'On the same boat is Nellie
Garth sentenced for protecting
two highwaymen.
Valent, Nellie ami a few .fellow
prisoners determine to escape from
the pitiful, sordid life of tile settle -
anent. After heart.brea.king delays
t1 ;l aa'ltitless attempts they set sail
Babe Ruth, the veteran Bang of Swat, is doing all he can to help
keep Uncle Sam right in there pitchin' against the country's enemies.
The photo shows the Babe in New Yorklooking s
noer p1u 0lased 000 worth
of United States Defense Savings i3.ds
in a small boat, are picked up by
a freighter and eventually landed
in England.
A. pardon for Hugh and the pros-
pect of his life partnership with
Nellie bring the story to a very
happy ending.
Botany Bay ... by Charles Nor-
hoff and Norman Ball .. . . Mc-
Clelland and Stewart . . Price
813.00•
Saving Ontario's
Natural Resources
No. 70
Beaver occur all over Ontario.
They were absent for many years
from the southern portion of the
Province but have staged a mar
-
Yellow comeback under the protec-
tive laws and are now found in
Many places close to our farming
communities. They should be wel-
comed by the muskrat traipera for
they raise and hold the water lev-
als on many small creeks and
lakes that provide good habitat
tier the smaller fur bearer.
In the North country the beav-
er are becoming more important
each year. For a long time the In-
dians and the white trappers were
encouraged to get all the sur they
could with the result that they
periodically found themselves with-
out
ithout any animals to catch. When
this happened they starved or they
had to be supported by the Gov-
ernment, a rather costly procedure
for the people.
A few years ago the government
decided to put certain areas under
management in an effort to prove
that the Indians could be made
se1t e ig porting. One such area was
set aside around the Whale River
on the east coast of James Bay.
About 60 beaver were the total
population of many thousands of
square miles of the region. The
Indians, who were very poor, were
told that they could have complete
rights to the region but they must
leave the beaver until they in-
creased and in the meantime the
Government, would hire them as
guardians. An educational cam-
paign was started among these
forest people with the result that
they now know that the beaver
is theirs by. right but that it nlust
• be protected and fostered until
the increase is large enough to
yield an annual take,
°.t1ho last information 1• received
showed that the beaver In the area
had increased to 50,000 pairs and
that the Indians were fully aware
e their potential value. In a year
or eo they will start to catch part
of the increase but you can be
sure that it will only be part. They
would not go back to the o`d ways
even it they could.'
SCOUTING
One .of the current widespread
war service activities of Snouts
is the 'collecting of medicine bot-
tles for military hospital's in prac-
tically every province. Bottles of
certain sizes are sought, as called
for. A recent request was for col-
ored bottles, and gal1an' •glass jars
for the Central Medical• Stores. Al-
ready many thousands of dollars
have been saved to the Govern-
ment by this Boy Scout activity.
* * *
100,000 tons of wastepaper was
celleoted by Brtiish Boy Scouts
during 1941.
•
* e *
For courage aid coolness shown
in the rescue of a young mother
and her baby .and an elderly wo-
man during an air raid, two North
timberland Boy Scouts, brothers,
have been awarded the Scout Gilt
Cross for Gallantry. The brother's,
Joe and John Chambers, 15 and
17 years respectively, were on
street fire watch during a blitz. A
bomb partially wreaked a house,
and a young woman ran. out, tem-
porarily unnerved. The." boys has-
tened to her,' and got her safely
to a shelter. They tan "learned,
from her disjdinted remarks, that
her baby was still in the house.
John: leaped over a fence, entered
the house, found the baby, and
returned, shielding it with his body
from shell fragments and flying
glass. He .brought :mtu also that
there was an elderly woman in
the house, and that she refused to
leave. Together the brothers re-
turned, and between them picked
up the old lady and brought her
to safety.
,
As a variation tenni Scout war
hero stories from Britain comes
a unique account of the circum-
stanceseundes which a London Boy
Scout was chosen to take the role
of Oliver Twist in a radio presen-
tation
resentation for that famous story of
Charles Dickens. Mr. Hugh Stew-
arrof the B. 13. C., who had for
some time been seeking a boy
with the desired voice, suddenly
heard it on a crowded bus. The
bus stopped, and before he could
reach the lad, who was in the uni-
form of a Bey Scout, the boy dis-
appeared. Stewart had noted the
color of the Scout's neckerchief,
however, and through this was able
to locate his Scout Troop, then
the boy himself. The boy, Scout
Phillip Jones, agreed, and his
voice will be heard in the role of
the famous little Dickens charac-
ter who had the courage to ask
'for here porridge.
THE WAR WEEK
Commentary on Current Events
Ebb and Flow 'f World War
Across ,, °'ceans and Continents
Phe soaps of the war is ap-
pr+oaebing a maximum of vastness,
extending from the western shores
of America; across the Pacillo,
across Asia, Europe and A.friea,
and Woes the Atlantic to
the eastern shores of America.
lvezywhera in the Pacific Japan
to on the offensive. Hong Kong
is being mereilessly pounded, the
Philippines increasingly harried,
Singapore threatened by an over-
land drive lb om Malaya and Pearl
Harbor preparing for further con-
fltot.
Singapore
The naval base on Singapore Is -
laud has been called the wor'ld's
largest. Fifteen years of labor and
$80,000,009 went into its construc-
tion. Wean hold the entire Bri-
tish fleet, drydock the biggest
battleship. Its eighteen -inch coast-
al guns have a twenty -live -mile
range. Dominating the sea lanes
between the Indian Ocean and the
waters of Oceania, guarding the
oil and rub ber of the Indies and
the tin of Malaya, Singapore is
widely regarded as impregnable
to attack from water, most vulner-
able ,to attack by land. It was by
land last Week that the Japanese
:were striking toward this key to
the Allied Far Eastern defense.
The only land approach to Singe•
pore runs dawn the Malay Penin-
aula. Frons its beginning at the
top of .the Gulf of Siam to its end
above Singapore, the peninsula of
Thailand, in the first days of the
Pacific conflict, opened the way
for an unopposed Jacpane'se drive
more than half way down the nar-
row approach to the British Malay-
an frontier, some 360 miles north
of Singapore. The sinking a the
Royal Navy's capital ships, Prince
of Wales and Repulse, gave the
Japanese control of Malayan wat-
ers. With these advantages, plus
numerical superiority, the soldiers
of the Rising Sun battled their
way forward last week , against
the stiff opposition of British Em-
pire troops.
Jungles and Mountains
The terrain, in many ways, was
one of the most difficult yet en-
countered anywhere In the world
by the war's fighting men. Mal-
aya's damp, hot jungles climb up
the sides of granite mountain
ranges. Rubber plantations, a few
paved roads built by the British,
the oipen pits of great tin mines,
break the clotted mass of under-
growth. Along the peninsular coast
lies a belt of fairly flat,,., open
Muted.. The-_, almost., impenetrable
•b 15ik is the home of tigers, leop
ards, elephants, rhinoceros, vam•
pica bats, brilliantly plumed birds
and deadly reptiles. Its climate
has always been unhealthy for the
white man.
r.(he Japanese had apparently
preired carefully for the fighting
in the lush wilderness. Clad in.
lightweight unifroms, supported by
one-man tattles and other special
equipment, adopting the infiltra-
tion and ambush tactics of the Am-
erican Indian, the Nipponese sol-
diers forced back their foe. At one
point they were 250 miles from
Singapore. They compelled the ev-
acuation of Penang on the West
Malayan coast; that exotic resort
town and secondary naval base
could serve as a springboard for a
jump to the Indies or for raids
on Burma -and -India -bound ship-
ping. Meanwhile, a Japanese laud-
ing on British Borneo appeared
to be an attempt to gain a base
on Singapore's flank.
Philippines
In the first phase of the war
Nipponese 'blows were chiefly aim-
ed at Manila. Last week a land
offensive was attempted. Tokyo as-
serted that troops were landed on
beach -heads north of the capital
and later far 'to the south on the
island of Mindanao. A hold on this
island would provide Japan with
valuable bases for raids on Manila.
Hong Kong' Siege.
A century -old outpost of empire,
the island of Hong Kong (thirty-
two square miles) is perched on
the South Chiva coast, •overlooks
the long simply route between Ja-
pan's main islands and the Malay
Peninsula. More than a year ago
Hong Kong's link with the Chin•
ese hinterland was severed by Jap-
anese troops; still it served as a
clearing 1101155 where Free China
ordered the American goods that
REG'LAR FELLERS—Slightly
Used
.......melectrnisatelemrnmaninurneunlexemar*Osmocuccernemus* *Mi.**
CERTAIN N, r'li si e R DUFFY 1
IF YQU WANNA BUY A NEW
CAR FUS' TURN IN YOUR '
OLE ONE— ,X. -L we YOU
A SWELL. DEAL ON IT,1
x. DON'T CARE WHAT
CONDITION .IT'S IN /JEST
8RINC, IT HERE AN lttl-.
GsIVE YOU 50 leo ON rr,
eventually :traveled the Hanna
Road. 'i'lie city long stood as a
symbol of British prestige in the
t , .. .. .is .,,.e in an Anglo -Japan•
ere war was seen as a potential
menace to Nipponese sea lines; its
prolonged defense would mean a
diversion of Japanese strength
item u,,ler more vital sectors.
Last week -its second of siege --
the Empire garrison on Hong
Kong was hard pressed. A "J•apau
ere land -and -air assault captured
Kowloon the city's mainland
section, A landing was effeoted
on Hong Kong island itself 'and
quickly the invaders rolled back
Umatilla lines of the defenders. In
London it was said that British
Empire strategists had ;long ago
"written off" as inevitable the loss
of the outpost.
• Nazis Retreat
The war that came to Europe in
September, 1939, is entering its
third Winter. ,its first was one of
great uncertainty—the . period of
the "pb,ony war," when millions
lay in idleness along the Western
Front while Germany, flushed with
vietory,,,i dolantl, quietly proper
ed her netarBlitzlerieg. The second
Winter followed England's darkest
*sour, when her cities shook to
their foundations under merciless
Nazi bombings, when only the ad•
vane° of General Wavell in. Libya
and tb,e heroic resistance of Greece
against the lumbering Italian arra-
les brought a ray of hope.
Today, at the threshold of the
war's third Winter, the picture
of the battlefields in Europe favors
the Allies. In sub -zero eold last
week the German similes on the
Russian front were falling back,
pushed by 'a Widening series of
forceful Soviet offensives. In Libya
the ell but beaten German Africa
Corps was struggling to prevent
withdrawal from turning into full-
fledged rout as empire troops
swept onward through the .desert.
Jap Sub Operates
From Mother Ship
Midget Two -Man Submarines
Used In Attack on Pearl
harbor
Allied naval forces in the Pacific
may find pitted against them
"schools" of tiny, two-man sub-
marines—probably no bigger than
a whale.
Secretary of Navy Frank Knot'
revealed that they were used in
the "sneak attack on Pearl Har-
bor.
Knox said one was destroyed by
depth charges and another was
captured.
Naval experts estimate these'
tiny subs are about 50 feet long,
seven feet wide, and have a dis-
placement of about 60 tons.
• There Is no indication as to
how many were used in Pearl Har-
bor, but they apparently did no
New Ail' Force Chief In
Hawaii
Brig. -Gen C. L. Tinker is the
new commander of U. S: air
forces in Hawaii,
dainage. At'iea5t• one, however, did
succeed be, penetrating tie harbor
deftuces and coining within "a few
yards" of an ,American ship before
it was destroyed.
Submarines°'tile aloe of the Jap-
anese two-man craft are too small
to operate over distances greater
than a few hundred miles. Naval
experts assume that those engag-
ed .in the attack against 'earl
Harbor were operating from esu
mother ship stationed out• at sea.
This ship, probably a recon4ition-
ecl freighter, would bo large en-
ough to every several of these
"baby subs," naval experts said.
It was assumed that the mother
`ship carries them within cruising
range of their objective and then
lowers them into the sea. That
would present no technical pettie •
lem, since the U. S. crane sitip
Kearsarge has cranes than can lift
200 ton weights.
Naval observers believe'that the
baby subs are miniatures .of reg-
ular submarines.
Once in the water they, would
proceed to their target with bat-
tery -driven electric motors driv-
ing thein at an estimated eight
or nine knots beta* the surface.
Standard Diesel -type engines would
give them 12 or 13 knots on the
surface.
The chief asset of 511011 tiny
craft is their "it,'bility to operate in
shallow waters and to get 'through
harbor defences. Once within
striking distance of their prey they
would loose smaller, probably 10
foot torpedoes. They would not
have to carry the standard 20 foot
torpedoes because they attack at
shorter range. ,
Naval experts estimate that two-
man submarines would be able to
stay at sea five days before re-
turning to their mother ship or
base. Living quarter's would be
extremely cramped, and supplies
and fuel • limited.
Prepared
Mr. Churchill who spends his
week -ends in the- country when
he's not too busy t� get away
from Downing Street disclosed
that he carries a tommy-gun in
the back of his automobile—jest
in case of parachutists.
LIFE'S LIKE THAT
By Fred Neher
9-42
"Office politics . . . he's„ campaigning for a raise!"
t.'*'
BACK SO SOON ? FAST WORK,
MISTER. DUFI Y?'BUT WHERE'S
YOUR OLE CAR? -i
By GENE BYRNES
THAT'S IT 1 I H1S HAIRPIN Ie
WNAT 14E1.0 THE WHEEL. ON
AI" 7„`"__LL. NAVE LEFT; A-1.!
17,17 \,.
ti