The Brussels Post, 1960-05-05, Page 4_eAttri Selett—
ohe Chinon tlit Olcibieekta
flying light nett to
►
•
IN SPIRITED MOOD — President Eisenhower Is Shown at his
news conference recently where he sharply rapped generals
who have challenged his .defense plans. The President declared
he be I (eves the U.S. could retaliate destructively against any
Red attack.
r
Police Said "Sorry"
Let Escapers GO
When a snap Spends long, grey
years oonfined in a gaunt and
comfortless prison, the Possibil-ity 0.4 escape is often his only in.,
ettlation against Insanity. Some-
times the desire for freedom be-
comes an obsession.
Marcus Bassett had such an
obsession, Why otherwise would
he have attempted to escape
from Sing-Sing — the New York.
State prison at Ossining — with
only a month of his five-year
sentence to run?
lie had been sentenced in '1917
for grand larceny, He was a pri-
son "trusty" and, with remissions
was due to be released on Nov.,
13th, 1920.
At 7,30 p.m. on Saturday, Oct.
lath, he broke out of prison
witti George Stivers, a notorious
car thief, with no imminent pros-
Peot of official release. Stivers
was in the first year of a twenty-
year term for killing a New
York patrolman.
On the evening of their escape
the two convicts were 'tidying
•the key room which, at Sing-
Sing, is enclosed between a dou-
ble set ed steel gates at the foot
of the front office stairs, Keeper
Bernard Simmons was on duty
Ibetween the two gates. Station-
ed at the office entrance, armed
with a revolver, was keeper Wil-
lard Webster.
As Webster entered the key
room to check on the "trusties"
one of them struck him from
behind with a sand-filled sock.
Be slumped unconscious to the
floor. His relief, Peter Cogle,
who followed him into the room,
was felled with a length of iron
piping. The two guards were
then robbed. of their arms and
as hundred dollars in cash.
Now only keeper Simmons
stood between the convicts and
freedom. Creeping up behind
him, they struck him down and
darted through a door into the
'basement of the warden's resi-
dence.
The warden, Lewis E. Lewes,
was away -attending s conference
at Columbus, Ohio, and the two
were not prepared to find their
way into the kitchen barred by
Louis Cummings, the warden's
*hen.
He saw than enter file base-
ment and immediately locked
the kitchen door and threw his
weight against it. They threat-
ened to shoot hint through the
door, but when he refused to
unlock it they abandoned the
Laundry.
and made ter the prison
laundey.
Here they smashed a window
and jumped out on to the lawn.
Fixing their revolvers at other
keepers who barred their way,
the two desperadoes made their
way out of the prison grounds
and up the hill towards Ossining.
In. James Street they stole a car
end drove furiously for the Con-
necticut State line.
Within minutes of their escape
the prison alarm siren was wail-
ing. Off-duty guards were re-
called and posses were quickly
orangized to search for the es-
capers. All roads around Ossin-
ing were blocked, but it was
feared that the convicts had al-
ready slipped through.
Throughout the week-end the
hunt went on. Reperh came in
regularly from people who had
seen the men — garage attend-
ants who had been held up, mo-
torists who had been forced to,
band over their cars to the des-
peradoes, shopkeepers Who had
been robbed of provisions.
But always the police arrived
too late to pick up the trait
Seven posses, involving more
than 150 men, took up the chase,
but the convicts remained Trus-
tt-atingly elusive.
All around Ossining cars were
topped by state troopers and
their occtmants questioned, At
Port Chester a green Cadillac
was halted at a road block. Five
New York State guardsmeri
questioned the two men in it
And. warned them that criminals
were at large.
After apologizing for the hold-
up, the police waved the driver•
on and the Caditlee roared away,
The •two men in it breathed
sighs of relief and - wrapped.
their overcoats more tightly
routd their prison uniforms.
By Monday -morning the hunt
•
was on in earnest. Warden
',awes had returned trent Ohio.
and was personally supervising
the search.. He contended, not
witbeut justification, that the
attempts. made so • far to catch
the fugitives had been bungled.
Tie wanted to know why only
a handful the• one hundred
prison attendants on leave in
Ossining had returned to prison
on hearing the siren, why the.
convicts had been allowed in the
key •rcem when he had expressly
forbidden it, and why a general
alarm had not been telegraph-
ed to surrounding town.s and
cities until hours after the es-
cape,
• There was a report that some
State policemen had called aft
the hunt on Saturday night be-
cause of bad weather, This was
hotly denied by Captain John
A. Warner of the State
He alleged. that his men had not
been told of the escape until
some hours after it had occurred.
He further claimed that the Sing-
Sing otficiala were trying to
shift the blame for their own
carelessness.
Days passed and the .conster-
nation of the authorities in-
creased as more reports of the
fugitives activities came in. In-
furiatingly, they seemed to have
A knack of being, where the po-
lice were not.
The searchers gained a small
crumb of comfort when police
•cormbing the Mount Pleasant
area in Westchester County came
across a suspicious character
lurking in a cemetery, They
challenged him — "Are you en
escaped convict?"
The man was so taken by sur-
prise that he replied, "Yes," •
Unfortunately, his name was
not Bassett or Slivers. He was
Walter McIntyre,, and he had es-
caped the night befOre from an-
other jail..
For the next few days the two
convicts stole - and . abandoned
tars, tabbed people of food and
money, and held up petrol sta-
tions. Perhaps because. they had
no idea where they were going,
they continued to elude capture.
By Thursday, October 21st, the
police confessed themselves baf-
fled. Reports revealed that the
two men were somewhere in the
wilds of Connecticut and it was.
•teared that if they got into the
Mink Mountains they might re-
main at large for weeks,
Police in neighbouring states:
and in Canada were circular-.
ized, and more and snore people
joined in the hunt. Residents and
farmers armed themselves with
cudgels, pitchforks, and a variety
of firearms and fell in with the
searchers,
The following day Bassett and
Slivers were seen by a posse in
a New Hampshire forest near
Warren. The armed searchers ex-
changed shots with the fugitives
as they disappeared among the
trees.
The searchers closed in and
aeon there was a two-hundred-
man cordon circling the fotest.
Bassett and Stivers made two
attempts dining the night to es-
cane, but both were stopped by
a fusillade of slash,
The end came' at dawn. Bassett
and Stivers were found sitting.
in the shade of an apple tree
=Inching feat.. They offered no
resistance. They were hungry
end completely exhausted.
They had led the police a Mere
ry chase 'through four states in
six dayt •hs but their stamina had
finally been sapped by lack of
sleep.
They were giVen plentY of that
to catch up on it.
Burrowing Under
The Channel.
The British have a special
word for it — "chunnel." They
mean "channel tunnel," the pro-
posed route under the English
Channel that would link Britain
with the European continent af-
ter all these centuries,
The "chunnel" concept has
been around long enough to have
been used — and abandoned —
by vaudeville comedians. Today
it still Is just a plan, but many
believe it is closer than ever
before to becoming a fact. Tour-
ists with cars are especially
hopeful this is the case. For it
is sometimes alleged that the
20 miles of water that separates
Dover and Folkstone on the
English side from Calais and
Boulogne on the French coast
are just about the most impass-
able water barrier in the world.
Last year 293,000 determined
motorists and their vehicles
nevertheless got across. Car-
carrying ships, ferries, and
planes ply this gap regularly, but
In summertime and never In suf-
ficient quantity. Try to take your
car to Europe for a holiday be-
tween mid-June and mid Sep.
tember, and you are likely to
find yourself on a very long
waiting list, unless you were
foresighted enough — and could
be positive enough in your vaca-
tion plans — to make a chan-
nel-crossing reservation by
March.
In 1958, for example, I applied
In April for a crosschannel ferry
reservation for my car for 'the,
following August, My destina-
tion was Spain. It was very late,
I was told. Even then there was
not a single car-space available
until the last days of August to
Calais, Boulogne or Dunkirk.
After persevering, I finally
managed to obtain a reservation
some six days after the date we
were due in Spain, on a boat
that took us to Ostend, many
miles in the opposite direction,
and on a voyage that began at
1:30 a.m. and set us ashore at
6 a.m.
It was about that time we be-
gan to understand the veal rea-
son for the outburst of channel
swimming that occurs each sum-
mer. And one could not help
meditating how nice it would be
to dive beneath the channel in
an elongated version of the Hud-
son River tunnels that connect.
New York and New Jersey.
For over 150 years, men have
been dreaMing of burroWing
Under the channel, The idea was
bruited first in 180/ Eighty
years later, several theusand
yards of shaft and pilot tunnel
actually were dug before fear of
French soldiers thereby hived-
Mg England caused a halt to be
called,
Even today, the ttinnel con-
cept faces difficulties, Depend-
ing on the access at each end,
it might total 25 or even 35 miles
In length, which would make, it
by far the longest in the world.
If it deeded cars operating
der their own power, ventilation
would be a problem. That is
Why some claim it would have
to be an electric railway Wh-
eel, carrying inert autos on nets
cars. Then, too, there is the pes-r
sibilita that Were' the costly
prOject could be completed it
might be outdated by some more
modern, innovation, such as an
adaptation of the hovercraft,
writeafter,ity Hayward, hi the
Christian Science Monitor,
Feet ever have tehterided that
A bridge of the tegeireil length
is feasible, particularly When the
site Mid volume of shipping
'using the chentiel IS ton.hiered,
But What la In eked a 'Channel
air-bridge already is in- opera-
tion, and one company calls it-
self just that. Small planes
carrying two or three cars and
their passengers make the hop
in about a half-hour, With the
increase of cars and travel, this
form of transport has prolifer-
ated mightily.
Recently, the state-owned
British Railways, which operates
a majority of the cross-channel
sea ferries, reportedly made an
overture to buy into Silver City
Airways, the pioneer car-ferry
airline, Already, Silver City is
said to carry on its five routes
one-quarter of the cross-channel
business formerly carried on
British Railway boats.
Silver City began air-ferry
operations from Lydd, Kent, to
Le Touquet, France, in 1948. The
first year they flew 285 cars. Last
year, they carried over 67,000.
Tice steadily increasing demand
to hurdle the water barrier at-
lows air operators to content-
plate new planes for their short
hop that will be capable of
carrying six cars and their pas-
sengers.
I recalled the channel tunnel
project twice last summer. Once
`was on a train rocketing through
the Simplon Tunnel in the Swiss
Alps — twelve and a half miles
long, and 7,000 feet below Mt.
Leone, It cuts the trip from
Brigue, Switzerland, to. Iselle,
Italy, by many hours, The other
"chunnel" reminder was at
Chamonix, France, where bor-
ings were beginning for an auto
road under Mt. Blanc to Italy.
This seven-and-a-half-mile shaft
will shorten the Paris-Milan all-
weather distance by nearly 300
miles,
Both these tunnels are means
of cutting the Alps down to
size. What is greatly needed now
is for the English. Channel like-
wise to be trimmed to more
manageable proportions.
Hints On Pressing
Synthetic Fabrics
Once in a while, even with
the so-called "no-iron" fabrics
of the newer synthetic fibres,
the fastidious woman will feel
that a little touch-up ironing is
necessary. To avoid "glazing"
of the fabric, which results in an
unattractive shiny appearance,
follow these hints:
Be very sure your iron is set
properly for pressing fabrics of
nylon or orlon acrylic fibre. It
is important to use a low tem-
perature -- about 250 degrees
Fahrenheit — or the "rayon" or
"synthetic" setting on automa-
tic irons. Higher temperatures•
are not necessary for these fibres,
Use a steam iron, or a dry iron
with a press cloth. Pressing on
the wrong sid of the fabric also
will help to prevent glazing.
TRUE HUMANIST
The true humenist must know
the life of science as he knows
the life of art and the life of
religloe.--George Sartori.
Floats Salvation
In A Bottle ,.„
Front a distance, the man cook'.
ed like a temperance crank on A. spree. As fast as he could grab
them he., was heaving whisky
bottles of all nixes and shape*
into the mud-red •Coosa River,
which meanders through Mop,
agile Perk outside, .Gadsden, Ala..
Thebottle-thrOwing individual.
WAS Jewel. T. Pierce, 51, a Nil-
time textile ttiill. supply clerk
and licensed • preacher at the
Congregational. Methodist
Church, Almost every Sunday
afternoon ter the past 22 years
he has been 'busy spreading the
good word by ,sealing a go-to-
church tract and a couple of
Bible verses in empty whisky
bottles and casting .thers far out
on the rivea
Over the years he has put
some 27,800 bottles Adrift. Most
bottles washed ashore some-
where • along the twisting, 400-
odd mile Coosa-Alabama-Mobile
river route to the Gulf. of .Mesti--
ce, but some-rode out to sea and
thence into the world. In an-
swer to enclosed RSVP's he has
received 5)640 replies - from .19
states and eight foreign coun-
tries, including Germany and
Greece.
Many replies are from former
backsliders who write that the
message they found led them-
back in church, and one man
said he was prompted to reacti-
vate a church that had "died"
from lack of attendance. A
youthful bottle-finder in Salo-
nika; Greece, wrote that he lack-
ed clothirig, and Mr. Pierce sent
him a suit,
One reply came from a man
who abused the "bottle preach-
er" for "meddling in other peo-
ple's affairs." It turned out, as
Mr, Pierce learned later, that the
man was a. bootlegger.
WARM? — This man is not
wearing an all-Weather cap.
He's an aircraft worker at the
plant of Republic Aviation end
he's guiding the nose df a F-
105D fighter Which is being
carried on a fork-lift truck.
Clock-Watching
One in every 'five city-dwellers
is suffering from strain in one
form or another. That it the
conclusion reached by several
eminent ;doctors who recently
dompleted a 'four-month survey
into the causes of nervous debil-
ity among Men and Women,
They found that nerve cons-
plaints are only half as common
in country towns and villages
where the pace of living is much
sifter. Working against the
clack, money Worries and en-
hanpineat at hoine are among
the stresses and strains which
affect toWnsfolk,
"Fat too many doctors treat
these patient§ as Malingerers,
fobbing thesis Off with useless
Medicine iii order to keep theM
quiet," say the experts. °The
patient with a stress disorder,
at Adele/Ws as a Chile of Measles
er influenia."
But, they add, it a doctor
tempts to deal With all such cases
he couid end up as One hirriseiti
An the beautifiit sentiments in
the inOrld wefalt /die than ci sine
Ai lovely ectioneen
Built A Glider
To fly Out Of 4011
The career of Johns Kamer' Alte
Allister, a United States est'ape
specialist, furnishes an excellent
example, of resourcefulness. Itr
June, 1919,. while ha WAS serving
e term in Sing-Sing, McAllister.
lashioned a dummy from dough
Obtained from the :prison 'bakery
sleep, The head was Made of pute
ty and, adorned with hair - smug-
fled froin the barber's shop,
McAllister made the dummy in
his own image :and in the half.
light of the. coil. it looked most,
realistic. •
After finishing his work in the
brush shop one evening 111.eAl.
lister, having placed the dummy
'in his cell, hid in the yard while
companions went to bed, Ail
night guards patrolled the ear-
ridors without noticing anything'
amiss,
The next morning, when the
prisoners lined up, the guards
noticed a vacant space. It was
thought one of the men had over,
slept ands search of the cells
was ordered. A peed shook wnet
he thought was McAllister by the
foot; it came away in his hand.
Meanwhile McAllister was.
miles away, and was only 'recap-
tured 'after p gun battle with de-
tectives.
For sheer brazen effrontery
the most impressive story was
that of etthe three convicts who
planned to escape from the. peni-
tentiary at Leavenworth, Kau-
sal, in a glider;
The man 'who conceived this
fantastic idea was linseed Hos-
ier, a rum-runner who had been
.arrested when his 'plane, car-
rying ruin from Canada to De-
troit, crashed near the home of
A sheriff in the Detroit area. He
shared his plan with 'two other
Convicts and together they smug-
gled materials from the machine
and carpentry shops and tools
them on to the reef of the shoe •
factory.
They planned 'to launch this
glider from the dour-storey roof
in the hope that would take them -
over the thirty-foot-high north
wall, which was about .six yards
from the shoe 'factory. It was
just a question, •Hosier said, of
Wanting for a strong, south wind.
The glider • was eventually
completed: It was eighteen feat
long and had a. sixteen-foot wing-
open. Then It was found that the
mecignis would only carry two
men. One of Hosler's two assists
ants was told he would be left
behind. Naturally, this didn't ap-
peal to him, so he revealed the
plan to the prison authorities.
Hosler's fantastic scheme came to
nothing and the glider was des-
troyed.
Honour among thieves? It's
surprising how often escape at-
tempts are foiled because a fel-
low convict, through sheer jeals
lousy, informs on, the would-be
escaper. It's' surprising, too, the
effect this can have on a man
after he has spent months pre-
paring for his big break,
Patrick J. Hanley, a habitual
criminal, was committed to Mas-
sachtnetts state prison in 1895.
He made several attempts to es-
cape. -Then in 1910 he hit on a
scheme which he was convinced
would succeed, He eorifided in A-
felloW convict, whe immediately
revealed the plan to the warden.
Aftee this Hanley took a vow
of silence and refused to utter.
a word. He communicated only
'by signs and writing and became
known as Corky the Sileht. He
kept his vow for ten years —
until his release in October, 1920.
Men who do succeed in break-
ing out of prison usually hasie
one predominant idea — to ,get
es far .Away teem the prison as-
possible, just oven' A r#4104
ago, in Northern Rhodesia, a
group of escaped convicts slinm.
ed no inclination to go far from
'the prison building, They had.
simply broken out to rob *
4ewelier's shop in a nearsbn
town anti they rettuned to prison,
after hiding the loot in thet
grounds,
Men have found, their way Ott,
of prisons in coffins, Wuhan
packitut oases, in wardens' uni.
TOMS. in trucks, sewer pipe*
Private ears and handcarts,
In New York's Tombs Prisons
Bill Sharkey donned memento"
clothes and left with ether
women when visiting time was
over; Rim Martin, a hold-up ex-
pert, left Charlestown prison
a barrel of garbage; and John,
Levy tried --- unsuccessfully —
to make his departure from Sings
Sing prison sewn up in a mat-
tress.
Perhaps the most impudent
escape of all occurred In Franke
fort, Kentucky, when a quintet
of singing convicts achieved frees
doss 'by means of an operatic arias
They made frequent outside aps
pearances, closely chaperoned, of
course, at church elections, Dues
ing one concert they bowed off.
stage to thunderous applause.
There 'were loud calls for an ens
core, but they did not return,
Finally a warden and a guard
went backstage to persuade the
modest quintet to take another
bow — but the wily nopvicts had
ducked out the back way and
were speeding away in a getaway
oar!
To the convict, patience is Is
virtue of infinite value and pris-
on inmates have plenty of time
do acquire it, It, was patiencehhat
earned Slick Willie his freedom
from Sing-Sing, He spent sin
months filing away at the win-
dow bars of his cell with a make.:
Shift saw and filling the holes up'
with chewing gum that had been
darkened with black boot polish,
He also used the gum to take
an impression at the lock on
the mess hall door and later
made a key to fit it. He waited
for a rainy night, then stole out
of his cell and into the mess hall
where two nine-foot ladders
were kept. He tied the laddeis
end to end and used them to
scale the twenty-foot wall. A
heavy downpour of rain proved
a silent ally, preventing him be-
ing picked out by the search-
lights.
CARDINAL DIES — Atoysius Car-
dinal Stepinac, 61, died Feb. 10
at his home in Krasic, Yugosla-
via. The Cardinal had been con-
fined to Krasic since his release
In 1951 after serving five years
of a 16-year prison sentence
Imposed by a Communist court.
He Was convieted, on a charge
of collaborating with Nazi Gere
many during World War'
DESERT DOGFIGHT — This is a photegrdah released by United
Arab Ropublic officials Which they olefin shows an Israeli jet
flohte Woo' down derine t eefreht aver the Syries
hrael issideri *civil a tkefit
HOW BLOWS IT? — Inflattai is o•ttedestry Oat* of :thti fat,.
low's business In Jakartai Indonesia, Hari Busy IsloWihg U eriothei• to add to hit voluminous ytacli. Berrie' of
been linked te:Other in forth doll-like fide-ten-