The Brooklyn Daily Eagle from Brooklyn, New York • Page 15

KX EDITORIAL SOCIETY LETTERS I CLASSIFIED COMICS behind EWS the Wa DM 1 fi Ml .1 Daily frPAUL MALLON 1 NEW YORK CITY, TUESDAY, MARCH 26, 1935 Washington, March 26. LOVE LABOR Secretary Hull wrote a formal rebuke to Here Hitler a few days back, but you never will see it. He composed it In the form of an official note, but decided not to send It. The note expressed regret at Hitler's latest DEACH COMBING Nobody's as secretive, we've decided, as a beach-comber. We wandered down to Coney recently, ran into half a dozen of them, talked to all, and got only one to talk.

First beach-comber we saw was walking right by the waves, straining his eyes for something that might prove to be a coin or a gem. When we. asked him how he found business he seemed to take it as a direct affront, glared and walked rapidly away. Four others acted in a like manner, as if all had promised their parents they wouldn't talk to strangers. Last one we approached was Just the same at first, but when we pressed him he opened up.

Confided that his name was Joe Neary, and that violation of the sanctity of treaties, especially the separate American treaty of peace, which Included the military clauses of the Versailles Pact. The story being told on the Inside is that President Roosevelt ordered it held up. He did not want to make any move which would embroil him In the latest European fuss. Mr. Hull's associates fondled the idea of sending it later, after things calmed down.

But when Der Furore tore up similar pro rrTTYiV fa Paul Mallon -r 'f I at the present time he's living In a deserted bath- house at the far end of the beach. We asked him about stray dogs at Coney. He said: "They're all over the beach when I start work In the morning. But when they see men they run away. They seem to live on dead fish washed up by the sea.

This Is the first Winter I've noticed them around, and I've been working this beach for five years." 11 R. NEARY explained that beach-combing la fine evenings during the Summer, when it's possible to pick up change, Jewelry and other valuables lost during the day. "But," he added, "the life-guards scare us away whenever we get In their way." Winters, we gathered, there's nothing much about except a few gew gaws which have kicked about since the Summer. Once a friend of Mr. Neary's picked up a chunk of ambergris, a discharge from whales used as a base In the manufacture of perfumes.

The stuff Is very valuable, the piece found In this case was roughly appraised at $300. "But the guy who found it was Just about starving. So he sold it to a shop-keeper for five dollars. We're a poor bunch," said Mr. Neary.

Coney Island Beach Created by Engineers-Old Man Sea Trying to Even Score by Biting Deeply In at the Foot of W. 1 1 th St. OIRNALIST The "Front Page" and other Dic- tures we could name always took a great de CONEY ISLAND no longer an Island and minus the rabbits (conies) supposedly responsible for its name-still can boast of its great public beach. How many of the millions of persons who on sunny Sundays gambol along the broad, scalloped edge of tan sand know that that beach is as artificial as a scenic railway? How many of the peeling-nose and mahogany-back light in depicting a reporter as a cynical saloon-frequenting, slang-throwing individual who was on the inside about everything, and who would rush into the city room at the last minute with a cigarette dangling from his lips and his hat pulled low over his forehead, shouting, "Hold the press. I've got a scoop." It always occurred after he had solved the town's biggest crime and, eventually, he would marry the Mayor's or banker's daughter and live happily ever after.

We were rather surprised, however, when we were mistaken for one of those immortals while brigade guess that but for the grace of God and the daring Second Article of a Seriei of man a decade ago the beach would not be there at all? How many bathers of today realize that the sea is still- trying to even the score for a trick played upon it, and that at this moment its teeth are deep in a new bite at the foot of W. 10th while its molars grind away at a larger area further to the east? Very few, of course. Yet the story is hair-raising. Hair-wetting, if you will. And the man who knows it best is Philip P.

Farley. It was Mr. Farley who in 1907 urged the extension of Flatbush Ave. through Barren Island. This he later had the pleasure of building.

It was he who decades ago predicted the necessity for a jetty at the nose of Rockaway Point to save Jamaica Bay. This was recently done. It is he who today clenches his tests from the French and Italians, they decided to save him the trouble of tearing up this one. SOUND-OFF A better way of communicating Mr. Hull's exasperation to Herr Hitler was worked out slyly.

The State Secretary decided to express himself ofl-the-record at one of his press conferences. These conferences are attended by all foreign press representatives who want to attend. No doubt Hitler now has a transcript of Hull's remarks, although they cannot be repeated out loud. All that can be said is that Mr. Hull's manner was extremely diplomatic, painfully so.

The only thing he permitted the newsmen to publish about It was that this Government considered Hitler's action as a threat to the entire peace structure of the world. That, of course, is the mildest possible version. The diplomats thought that this off-the-record Bound-off was rather neat. It avoided diplomatic embroilments. It prevented Hitler from snubbing Hull as he did the French and Italians.

HOOVER The private Republican reaction here to the new Hoover reorganization program certainly was not jmcouraging to Mr. Hoover. A few here praised it faintly, but most Republicans In Congress Just remained wearily silent. It is increasingly apparent that, if Hoover is going to assume the leadership of the party, he will have to do it without much help from Washington. There has been more inside talk lately among them about letting Mr.

Hoover have the next Republican Presidential nomination, but not in any encouraging way. Most of them do not yet know what they want to do. POUR The only Hoover dig which penetrated the skins of the New Dealers deeply was the one about foreign farm products pouring in while the AAA is holding down domestic production. The situation behind that is: Foreign farm Importations have been running about twice as large as last year. The March figures to be published soon will show two and one-half to three times as much as March last year.

If you dig into the last official figures, you will find that the quantity of farm imports in February last year was about fifteen million units and this year thirty-seven. The value Jumped from to $10,000,000. However, value is not a good barometer, because prices are much higher. The New Dealers contend these importations are mere seepage, and the ultimate question to be settled by debate between them and Mr. Hoover Is how many drips makes a pouring.

COUNT To afford an idea of which farm imports are increasing and how much, the following official round figures for February may be cited, showing increases over the same month of the previous year: Butter, 3,000,000 pounds, or five times as much as in February, 1934; live cattle, 38,000 head, six times as much; pork, 168,000 pounds, or 34 times as much; canned meats, $4,000,000 pounds, three times as much; corn, 1.8 million bushels, or 121 times as much; wheat, $1,000,000 bushels, 28 times as much. WORDS The trick in ttie Hoover statement was in its wording. His exact words were: "Because of food destruction and restraint on farm production, foreign food is pouring into our ports, purchase of which should have been made from our farmers." No one can deny the food was destroyed. Mr. Hoover's implication was that the New Dealers are responsible.

The New Dealers say It was the drought. TJ" SCAPES The truth is the AAA curtailment program has been curtailed so much that little of it remains. The AAA-ers are more or less openly getting out from under the policy. The latest step in that direction lifted the ban on Spring wheat. The reason for it was the dust storm and drought prospects in the western part of the Winter wheat belt, as stated.

The corn-hog program already has been modified to call for a 10 percent reduction in acreage instead of 20 percent. TJOCl'S The strangest phase of the new wheat program Is that the AAA will pay the farmers exactly the same amount for growing wheat this year as it paid last year for not growing it. The explanation is that the wheat program was a two-year proposition. The farmers agreed to cut acreage for two years by whatever amount the AAA designated. The fact that no amount was designated this year makes no difference in the contract.

Mr. Roosevelt's new shrpping proposal will contain a new type of direct subsidy to supplant the ocean mail contracts. The Idea will be to equalize building and operating costs here with those abroad, the Government financing the difference. not concerned with his neighbor. Steeplechase, for example, had a fair beach because of a jetty on the west end of its property, but Raven-hall's, Just beyond, had no real beach.

I recall there was no beach whatever in front of Feltman's. "Because of the fences across the foreshore, people frequently had to walk all the way back to Surf Avq. to get from one spot along the shore to another. covering an assignment recently. The chairman of the affair had introduced us to a member of the club as a reporter.

He looked us over carefully and then cautiously asked, "Do you carry a gun?" We looked at our interrogator Interrogatingly. "Yeah, you know, carry a gun, pack a rod," he continued in all seriousness. We looked at him again to see if he weren't spoofing, and then asked just what we would do with a gun. He regarded us with a pitying look. "You're a reporter, aren't you?" he asked as if to satisfy himself.

We replied in the affirmative. "Well, If you're a reporter," he continued, "don't people ever try to take you for a ride?" OYALTY Mrs. Claude Bissell, who used to live on Montague "in a house that's now four different stores," writes from Richmond, to tell of a lady down there who's still true to the Confederacy. Person's name is Mrs. S.

K. Gamble, and annually she sends taxes to the 70-year-dead government. Gets them back next day marked: "Address Insufficient." Doesn't seem to mind having the money returned. It's the principle of the thing. fists because some public officials will not agree to set off harmonious new buildings with sufficient space to allow their beauty to be seen.

With such a record, Mr. Farley might well don the mantle of the prophet. However, when it comes to sand, he would rather be in his shirtsleeves. "Now, listen," he warns, In his office at Borough Hall, "don't picture me as King Canute, telling the sea to stand back. No one can do that, "We knew, or hoped we knew.

In general what happens along the foreshore. We let the sea help us. Now I'll give you the facts." Boardwalk in Ocean Fairchild aerial photo (ahore) shows the scalloped bench of Coney at It Is today, the "weak spot" at If est 10th St. being in the. foreground, and Steeplechase Pier shown half tray along the beach.

Black linen in the sea indicate breakwaters. litre at top left shows the beach, with tram lapping at house foundations, 17 years ago, before Engineer Peter P. Farley (upper right) started his work. The Picture in 1918 LOOD DONOR Joseph Gould, who lives at 294 B1 eluded one that any boardwalk built must be sufficiently high so adjoining owners could go under it to the beach. The first contracts were let toward the end of 1921.

Henry St, is a blood donor. He gets paid Here, then, is the picture of how things stood back In 1918, when Mr. Parley began his career as consult ing engineer to the Borough of Brooklyn. Used Sandboxes State engineers estimated that the "You know, I was hesitant about going into the work, because I knew the dangers. Our plan was to put a boardwalk In the ocean.

That was it, to build a boardwalk in the ocean. The Inner edge of the boardwalk today Is where the water used to come at high tide in 1918." Hesitant or not, Mr. Farley went ahead with the work. This was his theory: The foreshore of sand is always moving. From a short distance below the low water line to the high water line the grains are always zigzagging about, the net drift along the south shore being to the west.

A perfect beach would be one where each grain of sand moved on was replaced by a newly arrived grain. This is possible where the line of seafront is unbroken, but not where inlets interfere. Once, when Rockaway Point was east of Barren Island, Coney Island managed to get almost as much sand as it lost westward. When Rockaway Point built out and out, the equilibrium became more and more disturbed. What was known as Duck Bar Island disappeared, Pelican Beach vanished, Coney Island began to yield.

ocean had eaten away nearly 400 feet of Coney Island beach in 10 The edges were sinking, holes were developing. Ignorant critics said it showed the silliness of trying to fool with "dat ole debbil sea." Experts swelled the clamor by contending that immediate doubling of the length and size of the jetties was necessary. Engineer Farley sat tight. "I wasn't too sure," he explained. "We defied natural law.

Something had to happen. You see every beach has a natural slope. The remnant of the old beach had a perfect slope. For the new beach we built up the sand three feet above low tide to a place 20 feet seaward of the boardwalk and then started our slope. "The first development was a drop as steep as a railroad embankment at the outer edge of the beach.

It took several months more before the sea ironed out the slope." years and that by Ihe end of 1935, at the same rate of progress, sea foam would splash the roller coasters Most of the repair money has been expended at the foot of W. 10th St. New sand has been pumped in there twice. Each time the sea has torn it loose in a short time. Why? Engineer Farley frankly does not know.

"It's a mystery," he says. "There is no reason why this particular spot should give way when the others stand firm. Of course it may be a split or a current coming from Rockaway Point. There may be a wreck under water to the east of W. 10th but we can't find one." Mr.

Farley also sees signs that the very east end of the beach will be denuded in time. Already it is perceptibly thinner. In a couple of years pumping of more sand will be necessary. He is not disturbed at this, saying that the way the beach is holding up, considering the savage trickiness of combined high tides and strong winds in such months as this, is "very satisfactory." Tomorrow: Fingers in the Sea on Surf Ave. Local old-timers were recalling for selling his blood by the pint to folks who are sick and need new fluid for their veins.

Joe is not very much interested in the people to whom he makes his sales. For instance, we asked him: "Do you find that you get upset by the people you help save?" Said Mr. Gould: "Honest, Mr. Muffin, I couldn't tell you the name of a single case I ever worked for. I Just go to the hospital, and I give my blood.

It's good blood, I'll have you know. But me, I never ask questions. It's my belief that a person who is In this business should not ask questions." Mr. Gould was silent for a moment. And then, reflected In what he said, was a touch of the great Spirit of the Physician.

"You see, we guys are not Interested much in getting credit for what we do. Our business is kind of tied up in not being proud of it." how Pelican Beach, once seaward of what is now Plumb Beach, had dis solved like lump sugar in hot coffee, and they were wondering how soon Coney Island would also sweeten the sea. Individual Coney Island waterfront magnates were not pulling to Beach Finally Held Mr. Farley's gamble with the ocean began along a two-mile stretch from the foot of Ocean Parkway to the beginning of Sea Gate. He planned an 80-foot boardwalk, plus 100 feet of free sand, making a total of 180 feet of "made" beach.

To accomplish this purpose he made a series of huge, three-sided sandboxes and allowed the ocean to trim to taste. Two sides of each box were jetties, the third was the shore. The jetties 16 of them stetched 600 feet seaward from the boardwalk line, their tips being 600 feet apart, according to the theory of squares concerning this type of beach protection. They were not so tall, these jetties, their tops being only two feet above high water, but they were made to stay. Shoreward they were made of wood sheet piling like that of bulkheads, seaward their outer 200 feet was rip-rap stone, ranging from 100 pound pieces to chunks weighing 5 tons each.

The top of each Jetty was made 5 feet across. Each side sloped outward from the top at a 1-to-l angle, so that in 16 feet of surf at the sea end of a jetty, the breakwater would be no less than 40 feet wide at the bottom. Approved by Law gether. Touchy over shrinking sand ownership, they were trying to protect themselves with makeshift breakwaters and Jetties which only temporarily deflected the gnawing of the sea to adjoining parcels of land. Those who still had beach set up 10-foot-high wire fences at the ends to prevent the public from rushing in from next door.

Free access to the beach was then only a slogan which the citizens took regularly and usually in vain to the courts. Swiss to Revamp Army; Military Service Lengthened rvURING the last 12 years, Mr. Gould- told us, he has given around 300 pints of blood to folks who needed it. He happens to have the most common variety of blood, and so he is in great demand. Has worked, he says, not without for literally every hospital In Brooklyn and many in Manhattan.

On the side, Mr. Gould plays golf, shoots a little pool. Says: "I used to drink just a little bit. But The next development was a modified semicircular molding of the sand in each box, or bay. When that was done, the new beach held, on the whole.

The critics had to stop shouting. So much for the western part of Coney Island, including Sea Gate, which unexpectedly began to build up after the jetties were In place to the east of it. In 1925 Farley Degan work on a stretch from Ocean Parkway to Coney Island Ave. Five jetties were in place there a year later. No less than 800,000 cubic yards of sand were pumped in between them at a cost of an additional $1,000,000, including the boardwalk.

Water Reached Buildings The problem was not new in 1918, either. Back in 1912, prizes were being offered for the best scheme to reclaim former beach extending Before anything else, an act of the Legislature was needed to get command of the situation. This took several years. Two or three bills tried weren't satisfactory. Finally in 1921 one went through which did the trick.

It gave the city right to lay out and acquire beaches from Norton's Point in Sea Gate to the east end of Rockaway the Rockaway part being to enable Queens to save its most famous stretch of beach by similar methods to those adopted at Coney Island. The bill set the interior mark of the proposed artificial Coney Island beach at the then high water mark, and the outer line 1,500 feet offshore. This last was to ensure that the city would pick up necessary underwater rights. The law allowed the city to build its own boardwalk, construct Jetties and fill in what was then sheer ocean. It also gave rights so far not exercised to alter existing piers and build various esplanades.

Restrictions put on the city ln- east from the foot of Ocean Parkway and the costly avenue behind The Firtt it, which had been washed away. By 1915, the waves were licking BERNE, March 26 (T) Switzerland, alarmed at the rapidly increasing armaments race of the nations around her, is planning a large scale reorganization of her army to insure her traditional neutrality. The Federal Council, with a victory in its fight to increase the length of military service, is prepared to appoint a supreme commander for the army. Much criticism has arisen because the Minister of War, a politician, heads the armed forces and it is probable that President Minger, despite the fact he holds the war portfolio, will sponsor a project putting control ef the troops into the hands of a professional soldier. at the foundations of the municipal bath house despite jetties supposed to have checked them.

Repair Cost Low It was Mayor LaGuardla who called New Dealer McGrady up to settle the New York City elevator strike. LaGuardla is constantly playing closer and closer to the White House. Anyway, by 1918, there "really was When the cldes of the sandboxes were ready, dredges got busy and pumped in 1,700.000 cubic yards of sand, most of it yellowish, from the ocean. This western section was barely finished, in 1923, at a cost of $2,000,000. including the boardwalk, when the first scare came.

when I got into this business 15 years ago they said maybe it might do some harm to other folks to have alcohol in my system. So I cut it out. By the way, I hear the bock beer's a little heavy this year." Mr. Gould geUs on an average of nine hours sleep a night. About that he says: "I could really get along on six.

But, you see. In this business you're not living your own life, you're living a lot of otler people's. So you've got to be careful no beach at Coney Island, says Engineer Farley. Mr. Farley expected to spend $100,000 a year to retain the two new artificial beaches, which joined at Ocean Parkway.

Instead he has not spent that much in the last "There were isolated spots for The relief diet may not encourage gout, but FERA reports indicate it is curing pellagra in certain sections of the South because it is a change fro mthe customary menu. i uruaue. ouine sireicnes ueitin are bathing, but in general the water at high tide came up to the buildings. Each owner had his own little structure to catch a little sand- The beach was going, was the cry. i actually wider now than when In a few it would be gone.

1 pumped In..