Acid Fails to Bare Figures on Gun in Scrivener Killing
The Evening Star's front page of October 15, 1926 led with a dispatch from Indianapolis in which G. Gould Lincoln reported that corruption charges involving the imprisoned former Klan leader D. C. Stephenson, together with the prospect of a visit by Senator James Reed's Senate investigating committee, had stirred an otherwise apathetic Indiana Senate campaign; he also weighed the World Court issue, the Klan's shrinking strength and the muted prohibition question. The page previewed that night's First International Oratorical Contest at the Washington Auditorium, where schoolboys from the United States, Canada, Britain, Mexico and France would speak after President Coolidge. It also reported that acid tests at the Bureau of Standards had failed to restore the filed-off serial number of the pistol left at the murder of Detective Sergeant Arthur B. Scrivener, as new leads emerged.
LABOR FEDERATION IS PLANNING PROBE OF MEX CONDITIONS
COMMUNITY ACTION GIVES CONFIDENCE TO COTTON GROWER
The Montgomery Advertiser's front page of October 15, 1926 led with three Associated Press reports on conventions and federal policy. In Philadelphia the American Legion voted down a resolution renewing the World Court endorsement it had made at Omaha the previous year after speakers argued the issue had turned partisan; it also put off a unified air service, picked San Antonio for 1928 and called for a regular army of 12,000 officers and 125,000 men. In Detroit the American Federation of Labor told its executive council to look into relations between the Mexican government and Mexican labor, praised religious tolerance while keeping to labor questions, reaffirmed nonpartisanship and its child-labor amendment campaign, and referred an anti-World Court resolution to its council. From Washington and Memphis came official reassurance for cotton growers facing low prices: Hoover praised Southern community action, the farm loan board reported $33,500,000 in cooperative loans, and a Memphis committee began plans to stabilize the market and reduce acreage.
Fairlie Sets Even Million as L.S.R. Purchase Price
Fidelity Co. Is Sold for $145,000
Coolidge Cuts Tariff on Paint Brush Handles
The London Evening Advertiser of October 15, 1926, led its front page with the city's long-running streetcar question. T. U. Fairlie, the expert hired by London council, put a tentative purchase price of $1,060,000 on the London Street Railway, below the $1,112,000 the city had been working from, and urged $600,000 in immediate rehabilitation, including 17 new cars, as aldermen hurried to get the question ready for a ratepayers' vote. The page also reported that the Fidelity Trusts Company, one of London's oldest financial houses, had been sold to a Toronto group headed by J. A. C. Cameron, K.C., for about $145,000, and that President Coolidge had halved the U.S. duty on paint brush handles after a Tariff Commission comparison of American and Canadian production costs.
The Vossische Zeitung's front page of 15 October 1926 led with foreign reports. From Brussels it announced a major foreign-policy speech by Belgian Foreign Minister Vandervelde to the foreign press association, headlined with war guilt, Thoiry and the Dawes Plan, though the legible text stops before his arguments. From Budapest it reported that Prime Minister Count Bethlen had handed the Regent the resignation of his whole cabinet, a formality meant to clear the way for a reshuffle due since the franc-forgery trial. From Paris, Leo Stahl previewed the Bordeaux congress of France's crisis-stricken Radical Party, whose decisions he thought could shape French domestic politics for years.
The Vienna Neue Freie Presse of 15 October 1926 reported from Budapest that Count Stephan Bethlen had handed the resignation of the entire Hungarian cabinet to the Regent after an extraordinary council of ministers. The Regent reserved his decision and kept the government in office, and informed circles expected Bethlen to be reappointed and to reshuffle his cabinet modestly. A London telegram gave the British miners' district vote confirming the recall of safety men, 450,150 to 184,336, while stressing that the decision mattered little. An editorial called for a 'Locarno' of Austrian domestic politics, arguing that a mortgaged, hungry country could afford only internal peace, and welcomed Louis Loucheur's plan for a large economic conference around April.
Prague's German-language daily devoted its front page of 15 October 1926 to the debut of the third Švehla cabinet, which had presented itself to both chambers the day before. The editorial "Shamefaced Friendship" noted that the government declaration made no grand or concrete point of the cabinet's Czech-German make-up, and called the coalition a "miniature Locarno" without the great Locarno's fanfare. The parliamentary report described a packed house, with deputies present almost to a man and overflowing diplomatic and public galleries. A further report warned that Slovak demands put the new government's majority in question ahead of a vote expected the following Tuesday. A caption introduced Zierhut as the new Vice-President of the Chamber.
The Journal de Genève's front page of 15 October 1926 covered international labour, Swiss public finance and the French mandate in Syria. A column signed W. M. previewed a session of the International Labour Office. It expected the eight-hour day to be the main political issue again and cited Albert Thomas's gloomy August article on the setbacks: a ninth working hour in Italy, longer hours in British mines and worrying rumours from France and Poland. Alfred Georg reminded readers that the federal civil servants' fund and the Federal Railways pension fund together had a deficit of 643 million. He argued that the interest on that sum alone, over 32 million francs a year, plus 40 million for social insurance, threatened to keep the federal budget out of balance. An unsigned report from Syria described a drive from Beirut to Damascus and Baalbek and an unescorted afternoon tour of the Meidan quarter with General Vallier, presented as proof that calm had returned.
“Mr. Radić's Telegram Postpones the Decision on the Resignation”
The Old Government Remains, With One Reconstruction
Politika's front page of 15 October 1926 followed a cabinet crisis in Belgrade that was moving unexpectedly slowly. Prime Minister Nikola Uzunović had handed in his resignation two days earlier, yet the King had neither accepted it nor opened consultations at Court, and the party clubs had stopped work while they waited to see which way the crisis would turn. The paper reported that a telegram from Stjepan Radić had held up the decision. It quoted Uzunović telling reporters after a royal audience that a government goes on conducting state business while in resignation, and even after the resignation is accepted. Its headings predicted that the old cabinet would probably survive with a reconstruction, while ministers said no decision would come before the next day.
Chief Director Rygg's testimony before the Court of Impeachment.
Helan går — sing hopp falleralla la la la!
Director Colban.
The page was dominated by the second half of Norges Bank chief director Rygg's testimony to the Court of Impeachment. Rygg defended the secret 1923 rescue of Den norske Handelsbank as a measure to stop rumour-driven panic from spreading through the whole Norwegian banking system. He listed the package, including a 25-million-krone state deposit and 15 million taken over by the private banks, and described how Bratlie and Throne Holst were placed on the bank's board. Alongside it, the physician Harald Natvig mocked prohibition in a column about small children singing drinking songs, farm families pouring home-distilled spirits and Black and White whisky delivered to the door. A short item, cut off on this page, marked the diplomat Erik Colban's 50th birthday.
This Leiden paper of 15 October 1926 mixed municipal business with a busy autumn lecture season. Beneath a mayoral notice adjourning a dairy cooperative's request to extend its plant, a walking-parks foundation whose board included Mayor De Gijselaar printed an appeal headed 'De Leidsche Hout', evoking the old wooded Holland along the dunes. The Indies Week closed with a lantern-slide lecture by the letters student J. F. E. Einaar on Suriname's material and spiritual development since slavery was abolished on 1 July 1863. Separately, the Delft geologist G. A. F. Molengraaff told Leiden students about the Bushveld in Transvaal, opening with a warning that consumption of raw materials was rising at an alarming rate.
Supplementary Account of How the Allied Army Retook Nanchang
Military News from All Quarters
This page of Shibao from 15 October 1926 followed the Northern Expedition's war in Jiangxi and Hubei. Jiujiang dispatches dated the 13th reported renewed clashes at Tianjiazhen on the Yangtze bank, with warships rushed in as reinforcements, and fierce but undecided fighting around Nanchang since the 12th. A Reuters line said Jiang Zhenchen's troops in the Ji'an sector had been pushed back toward Linjiang. A long-delayed correspondent's letter, carried by the Toho News Agency, described how Sun Chuanfang's allied army fought back after the Party Army entered Nanchang on the evening of the 19th, nearly forcing a river crossing on the 21st as Deng Ruzhuo's brigades converged. A fragmentary column of military news described a besieged city opening its gates and Northern soldiers laying down their arms, and listed headquarters business, including a telegram from Wu Peifu and orders on garrison officials.
Urgent Notice from the Beijing–Hankou Railway Administration
This Beijing page is dominated by a notice from the Fengtian joint army command of Zhang Xueliang and Han Linchun. It says order in the capital is returning, promises to move the troops quartered in the city elsewhere, and invites residents harmed by undisciplined soldiers to file complaints naming the unit, while guaranteeing informants secrecy and warning against false charges. A new evening paper, the Zhengyan Evening News, announces its launch on October 17, claims a sheet twice the size of its Beijing rivals, lists prices, and offers generous fees for news and short pieces. The Beijing–Hankou Railway replaces its Beijing–Shijiazhuang express trains with ordinary mixed passenger-and-freight trains, citing the need to reallocate rolling stock. Fragments of telephone-bureau and printing advertisements fill out the excerpts.
This partial reading of the Santiago daily La Nación for 15 October 1926 covers three pieces. A cable item from Athens reported that General Condylis, heading the government under Admiral Condouriotis, had barred the former dictator Pangalos and 34 men who sat in his dictatorship's cabinets from standing in the coming Greek elections. Julio Camba's signed column mocked a Spanish public inquiry into which goods count as necessities and which as luxuries, proposing titles of nobility and every "ex-" title as the first luxuries. A fiction fragment by Pierre Valdagne followed young Germán Haubert, who had a profitable shop and pretty Miss Luisa before him but dreamed of distant lands and explorers.
“We Will Win the South American Football Championship” —Says Captain Vaccaro
THE EUROPEAN TRUST ALARMS THE ITALIANS
Johnny Dundee Will Challenge Tod Morgan for the Championship Title in California
Crítica's page of 15 October 1926 gave prominent space to dispatches from Santiago de Chile, where Argentina's national team was about to open its South American Championship campaign against Bolivia. Captain Vaccaro described a squad that had lost weight but trained comfortably, split practice between nine married men and eight bachelors, praised the Rosario players and predicted the title while conceding Uruguay's strength; Chilean opinion took an Argentine win for granted and cared only about the margin. A Rome dispatch reported Italian industrialists' alarm at a German-British industrial conference, quoting Il Popolo d'Italia's charge that rich nations were combining to monopolize raw materials. An AP item from San Francisco announced Tod Morgan's ten-round junior lightweight title defense against Johnny Dundee.
Trieste's Il Piccolo for Friday 15 October 1926 carried a Rome dispatch saying that some provincial Fascist directorates had misread the new P.N.F. statute and resigned, and that party secretary Augusto Turati had reaffirmed a circular ordering them to stay in office until the implementing rules came out; the statute itself would take effect at the end of the year. Alongside ran the close of Umberto Guglielminotti's appeal for a disciplined corps of modest, camera-shy propagandists to replace empty Fascist rhetoric, and a line announcing that the head of government had officially taken command of the Militia. From Berlin, the paper reported that turbulent incidents during the Prussian Landtag's debate on the agreement with the Hohenzollerns had put the building under gendarme guard, with the galleries strictly controlled for fear communists would bring in comrades.