The news magazine of the screen produced by Warner-Pathay News. Living glimpses
of history in the making, presented as a public service, and as a special service
to Wisconsin schools by Wisconsin's largest bank, the first Wisconsin National
Bank of Milwaukee, established in
[...]
At Eisenhower for President headquarters in Washington, DC, the movement gains
impetus as Senator Lodge of Massachusetts announces that
Ike's in the New Hampshire primaries.
He tells of past political discussions.
During these discussions, he said specifically that his voting
record was that of a Republican.
He also pointed out that his political convictions coincided with enlightened
Republican doctrine and that the family tradition was Republican.
It is worth noting that in our conversations with General Eisenhower, he pointed
out that he would never seek public office, but would consider recalled a
political service by the will of the party and the
people to be the highest form of duty.
I therefore authorize you, Governor Adams, to enter the name of Dwight Eisenhower
in the primary election for the expression of the preference of the Republicans
of the state of New Hampshire for President of the United States.
At the General's headquarters outside Paris, he confirms Lodge's statement and
says he'll accept a clear-cut call.
But right now, his first concern is his present job, building Europe's defenses.
It is on this task that he now reports.
In this common effort, many advances have been made during the past year.
Morale is definitely sturdier among civilians and armed servants.
In numbers, efficiency, and in spirit, the soldiers, sailors, and airmen of our
Allied force have been strengthened.
With the news of Eisenhower's willingness to run, the Washington office from
which the drive is directed grows busier as Eisenhower
leaflets and buttons go out.
Though he may not campaign for nomination, Eisenhower is definitely in
the presidential race.
Northern California digs out after the worst series of brissards in 50 years.
Roaring in from the Pacific, the storms have blanketed the
countryside and halted all movement.
Sometimes you have to dig for 10 feet to reach the roof of a car.
With buildings nearly buried, the mailman's work becomes strenuous.
Along one highway, a snow depth of almost 20 feet is measured.
Below, almost hidden in the snow, lies the crack express train city of San
Francisco, which stalled at Donner Pass some 7,000 feet up in the high Sierras
while en route from Chicago to San Francisco.
In Colfax, 34 miles away, nurses and other rescue workers board a relief train to
go to the aid of the 222 passengers and crew members
marooned on the snowbound streamliner.
These scenes give an idea of the depth of the snow.
The relief train finds the going tougher as it chucks higher in spite of a rotary
plow in front to clear away.
Donner Pass got its name, by the way, from a party of pioneers who were stopped
here a hundred years ago by brissards.
There were no diesel trains to come to their rescue, and many
perished from cold and starvation.
Though nature has run wild here, snow is unnecessary, though they provide waters
that irrigate California's farmland.
Six miles from the streamliner, heavy drifts force the relief train, whose
forward section can be seen ahead, to stop.
Provisions for the beleaguered passengers are loaded on army weasels,
which because of their caterpillar tread can get across the snow to the
stalled city of San Francisco.
The weasel is an amphibious vehicle developed during the war, and since found to
have a variety of peacetime uses.
Here is the city of San Francisco, hopelessly blocked by snow drifts.
Its sides festooned with icicles.
It's been here three days with the passengers aboard.
A news magazine cameraman is the first newsreel man there.
For the last two days, the passengers have gone without heat.
Sixty were overcome by gas fumes that are taken off on sled stretchers, but none
suffered serious injuries, and they report that spirits were
cheerful on the snowbound train.
Then the monumental task of digging out the streamliner begins.
Passengers are on their way home, but for two more days, the train lies
embedded in its prison of snow.
Now she moves.
She's on her way.
Man has won this particular skirmish in the unending
battle with the forces of nature.
The liner Queen Mary brings Winston Churchill, prime minister of Great Britain,
into New York Harbor for a series of vital talks with President Truman.
Down the gang plank to a Coast Guard cutter strides Mr. Churchill.
To Floyd Bennett Field, New York, an auto whisks the prime minister, who will
proceed in President Truman's plane, the independence, to Washington.
At 77, he's still vigorous.
In the capital, the reception includes full military honors.
Mr. Churchill, whose main purpose is to develop cooperation between Britain and
America in relations with communist countries, is greeted by President Truman,
who agrees that peace is what both our countries strive for.
The presidential yacht Williamsburg is the scene of some of the conferences.
Churchill makes it plain that he seeks aid only for a common defense effort.
Now the British statesman enters the capital for an address to a joint session of
Congress and honor rarely accorded foreigners.
He speaks now of Europe's united defense effort.
The sooner strong enough forces can be assembled in Europe under united command,
the more effective will be the deterrence against a third world war.
If I may say this, members of the Congress, be careful above all things,
therefore, not to let go of the atomic weapon until you are sure, and more than
sure, that other means of preserving peace are in your hands.
At Frenchman's flat, Nevada, the atomic weapon of which Churchill spoke is tested
as a tactical weapon of war.
A film badge goes on the rifle to show how much radiation it receives.
Scientists want to learn the effect of atomic rays on military equipment.
These dummies likewise are fitted with instruments to
measure the radiation they undergo.
Army trucks roll through the night carrying into the bomb zone combat troops.
The first, as these previously secret films reveal, ever to take part
in atomic tests in the field.
Five thousand hand-picked men move up in the cold dawn to take positions for the
last of five atomic explosions.
Generals William Keene, Joseph Swing, and Mark Clark watch the operation.
Their troops are only seven miles from
the point where the bomb is to be detonated.
Nervously, the men await the blast.
The tremendous
detonation, felt 260 miles away, shakes the earth under the soldiers, and the
blast fills the air with flying dust.
The test is a terrifying experience, but it shows that the atom bomb
can be used in support of troops.
Above them, to a height of six miles, rises the atomic cloud.
The test is successful. A new use for the bomb is developed, and a new weapon is
added to our arsenal, one that will never be used, America hopes, but that will
serve as a deterrent to aggression.
Vegetables are the raw materials for Sr. Luigi Livraggi's art.
Sr. Livraggi of Milan, Italy uses potatoes, cabbage, eggplant, peppers, and
celery to create odd and decorative sculpture.
His deft fingers are at work now on a bird, which seems almost to
come to life before your eyes.
Here's one of his finished works, a swallow in flight.
A ballerina made of vegetables pirouettes gracefully for you.
And here's an elephant hoisting a log.
A dancer and a bird are followed by still another ballerina.
Next is a rooster whose every feather is made of vegetables.
Two racehorses with their jockeys parade to the post, and here, the roguie
presents a whole aviary of birds.
This cuckoo clock is a model for the sculptured cuckoo, but you'll never see any
of these masterpieces in the museum.
Mercilessly, they're tossed in the pot for supper, thus nourishing
body as well as mind.
At China Lake, California, the Navy demonstrates a new and complex device for
observing and recording the flight of guided missiles.
Film is threaded into the mobile motion picture camera.
The camera performs two functions.
It is telescopic, bringing the missile photographed closer to the eye, and it
slows down the missile's meteor-like flight.
In the telescope tube of the camera, an officer sees his
reflection on the parabolic mirror.
The camera is called little bright eyes because of these huge binoculars through
which the operator follows the target.
The camera is mounted on a mobile anti-aircraft gun turret.
The operator, who must have high technical skill, takes his seat.
Through the binoculars, he will follow the missile's flight while his hands
control the camera's movement.
It can effectively film a missile at distances of from 1 to 20 miles.
Now the target is spotted. It's a plane, a tiny speck off there, rather than a
guided missile for security reasons.
The operator follows it with his binoculars, and the camera's
parabolic mirror swings round, too.
Here's the film from the Navy camera.
The coat marks on the right are made by an electronic counter, which registers
speed, distance, rate of climb, and other factors.
The camera, exposing film five times as rapidly as our conventional camera,
reduces the plane's flight to 1 fifth at speed.
The telescope magnifies the plane three miles away 22 times.
A Navy invention advances development of our new weapons.
The Revolutionary War was raging in America when England's Captain Cook
discovered the Hawaiian Archipelago, a tropic, mountainous
paradise of volcanic origin.
It was a fertile territory swept by sun and gentle trade winds
and surrounded by rolling seas.
Today, the United States knows the islands as one of its most valuable outposts,
slightly more than 2,000 miles away, reached in nine hours by plane, or a
leisurely four and a half days by liner.
The islands, comprising some 6,400 square miles, are the most
important group of the central Pacific.
These sparkling shores were probably the last habitable
area to be occupied by man.
Centuries ago, setting out from Asia via Malaya, Java, and Tahiti, waves of
adventurous Polynesian tribesmen landed in the Hawaiian islands.
They traveled in boats like these across thousands of miles of open sea.
Cook, searching for new routes to the Orient, landed by accident at Waimea Bay in
Kauai in 1778, thus ending 1,200 years of isolation.
Cook called his discovery the Sandwich Islands.
More explorers followed. The islands became an important point of call, but
Native life began to disintegrate under outside influence.
Then King Kamehameha the Great unified the islands.
In a decisive battle on Oahu, Kamehameha defeated his last enemies, driving most
of them to their deaths over the Pali, where a modern highway now runs.
The wars had wiped out the Native religions. Missionaries came, and Christianity
began to spread rapidly through the islands.
At the same time, under the direction of the New England businessmen, the Natives
began to plant sugarcane.
The Hawaiian royal family lived in Iolani Palace.
Last to reign was Queen Lilio Kalani, who wrote Aloha Oi,
Hawaii's most famous song.
In 1893, a revolutionary movement ended the Hawaiian monarchy, thus passed royal
power, for the islands were annexed by the United States in 1898.
American influence is shown in the first houses built by missionaries,
reminiscent of New England architecture.
The missionaries also established the first print shop, where the Bible
was printed in the Native language.
Today, the sugar industry started by early settlers forms the
islands major source of income.
Some 28 plantations, like this one on Kauai, produce 8 million
tons of sugarcane a year.
Pineapple is the second biggest industry. Once an exotic local fruit, it is now
an important item on the American menu.
Tourists form the third biggest business. Each year, some 50,000 visitors land in
the islands, where they receive a friendly welcome.
The even temperature of the Hawaiian islands, cooled by currents from far away
Arctic seas, averages about 75 degrees.
And riding a surfboard is as easy in January as in June.
The island's capital is Honolulu, on the island of Oahu. The famed
Aloha Tower dominates the city.
The University of Hawaii, located here, has 20,000 students.
Statehood is a burning question. A constitution is voted, which would
permit Hawaii to join the Union.
And in some places, what may be our future 49th state looks
like Texas or Montana.
These cattle are grazing in the real far west.
Other parts of the islands betray their volcanic origin. A lighted match turns
into steam vapors escaping from vents running
deep into the Earth's boiling center.
You can hardly go out of sight of a volcano in the islands. While most of them
are inactive, Mauna Loa on the island of Hawaii is very much alive. Mauna Loa, in
fact, is the biggest and most active volcano in the world.
Lava sands are the basis of several black beaches on the island of Hawaii.
This is the start of a hookilau, a great fishing body in which the choicest
varieties are caught for the big feast.
It's a celebration in which everyone joins, and even the keiki's, the children,
can hula in the time-honored manner.
In the history of the islands, this famed native dance has served as
both a religion and a language.
The Loa was a traditional feast, a favorite dish is poi
made out of the root of the taro plant.
All inspiring beauty, natural wealth on land and in the seas, a deep sense of the
past and of a new world to come, these are the things that distinguish Hawaii,
America's front door on the Pacific.
For seven days, the storm-crippled flying enterprise is towed towards port by the
British tug turmoil whose mate Kenneth Dancy has joined Captain Henry Kurt
Carlson aboard the listing ship.
When storms shattered the enterprise and healed her over, Carlson ordered her
abandoned. At the last minute, he decided to stay
aboard alone to try to save her.
The turmoil with an American destroyer standing by tows her 300 miles towards
port. Then, 80 miles from safety, new storms crash over the enterprise.
The five-inch tow cable snaps. An engineer on the turmoil said
later he wept when it happened.
The gale goes on. Men aboard the destroyer try to send food to Carlson who's been
living on pound cake and warming his hands over a candle.
Each attempt to tie on a new tow line ends in failure. The gale gets worse. The
enterprise now only 41 miles from Falmouth is going down.
Carlson and Dancy are told a helicopter will fly out from England to pick them
up. New winds force the plane back.
The gallant ship is flat on her sides and the heavy swell almost
conceals her from the attending boats.
A great mass of debris and deck cargo is washed into the sea. As the ocean poured
over the superstructure, Carlson and Dancy leaped from the funnel.
The turmoil picked them up after they'd been in the water for four minutes. Now
the turmoil, the destroyer Keith and the tug Englishman chartered by the press,
circle the ship in its last tragic moments.
The turmoil wires its base that Captain Carlson and Dancy are safe and have
gotten warm clothes and a shot of rum.
Half an hour later the enterprise is 90 percent underwater. Her bow is almost
straight up in the air and then she begins to settle in 40 fathoms of angry sea.
Taking with her two million dollars of cargo, steel, automobiles, antique
furniture, objects of art which can never be replaced.
Ironically the sea turns calm. The turmoil brings Carlson and Dancy to Falmouth
where the Captain's Danish mother and father wake with a crowd of 10,000.
Carlson and Dancy are greeted by the town's mayor, Councillor. Carlson apologizes
for not bringing his ship home. With Dancy on the left, he tells how he slept on
the slanted side of the cabin wall and prayed and read a book of
maritime law to pass the hours.
Then he's honored with a triumphal parade before he heads home to America.
Landing at New York's Idlewild Airport, Carlson is greeted by his wife and
daughters. A few weeks ago he was just another sea captain.
Today, thanks to his heroic effort to save his ship, he's an international hero
and New York City gives him a hero's welcome.
A storm of paper, the mildest storm Carlson's faced showers upon him on the ride
up lower Broadway as the city opens its heart.
But the most touching welcome of all is that bestowed by
Woodbridge, New Jersey, his hometown, which gives a neighborly parade to the 37
-year-old Danish-born sea dog.
The high school majorettes have never strutted so well before, and Carlson says
the reception amazes him as he speaks at the municipal building.
Really, I'm speechless. My boss sent me out a few
months ago with a beautiful ship, and I come back with it, back without it.
And yet, you all seem to be very, very heavy and cheer me, and
really, I'm amazed. I do not know what to say.
I don't understand it all, but the warmth I felt here today
in this township from all of you has more than a thousand-fold compensated
for my little inconvenience out in the Atlantic
the last three weeks.
At home, Carlson refuses offers totaling thousands of dollars and says
he'll go back to sea again.