The Pittsburgh Press from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania • Page 15

MARCH Moneymaker in Need othman FEBRUARY 2 3 ft 6 ft 9 II 12 13 14 IS 16 17 IS 19 21 22 23 24 25 2T 28 2 The Press I Wit 2US 4 5 6 7 8 9(10jll 12 13 14 15 16fW 18 19 20 21 22 WASHINGTON Last time I wrote a piece about Nellie Tayloe Ross, economical housewife and manufacturer of money, she was handing Congress back $1,000,000 she couldn't APRIL. IMS 3 4 5 7 9 10 11 12 13 11 IS 16 IT 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 36 71 38 2 30 PAGE 15 MONDAY, MA11CH 10, 1952 SECTION TWO use In ner nicKei-ana-aime factories. This, at the time, was big news. No other bureaucrat, in memory of the oldest man ever had returned 'any part of any appropriation, even if he had to sit up nights figuring out new ways to spend it. The Congressmen were amazed at the way Mrs.

Ross had pinched the pennies of her own manufacture. That im a i i i i i i i -l-i-'N III fill "We have been led' to believe that the chief offenders in the withholding of coins have been the children of America," he said. "Reference has been made repeatedly to coins being cached in piggy banks." Now it turns out, according to the superintendent of the Philadelphia money factory, that the banks are to blame, he said. When they ship back a sack of beaten-up old coins for redemption, they include up to 30 per cent of perfectly good, spendable money. This looked mighty slipshod to him.

Dr. Howard didn't believe It, but said he'd investigate. The gentlemen wondered how come he had such a whopping surplus of silver dollars. The answer was simple. Until 1942 there had to be an actual silver dollar for every paper one in circulation.

It was against the law to melt down one of these cartwheels. Made an awful shambles, too, Dr. H. said. Cartwheels All Over He stored 'em in canvas bags, and after 25 years or so of sitting in one place, the sacks would disintegrate.

Then you'd move a few and spew dollars all over the floor. He knows about thjs. He "used to have to sweep 'em up and count 'em. Since 1942 it has- been legal to back the currency with silver dollars In bars. Dr.

Howard and Co. melted down 60,000,000 silver dollars, but he still has 300,000,000 of them left No telling when he'll ever have to make another, despite a steady demand from the West. The gentlemen wondered why Westerners liked cartwheels. Dr. Howard said he guessed he might as well be frank.

"These dollars make very good poker chips because you cannot counterfeit them very easily," he said. "They are used extensively throughout the Rocky Mountain region." There's no doubt that he and Mrs. Ross will get their penny-making money. In case they don't need it all, Congress has every confidence that Mrs. R.

will return the change. was two years ago. Now I regret to report that our economical director of the mint, through no fault of her own, has had to ask the lawgivers for an extra $463,000. Mostly to make more of those pennies she likes to squeeze. This has saddened her.

It also made her slck When time came for her to appear before her congressional admirers, the bright-eyed Mrs. R. was home in bed. She sent up her assistant. Dr.

Leland Howard, who reported she feared she'd better not show up because she'd be doing more sniffling than talking. Dr. Howard, one of the world's leading authorities on coinage, carried on. Odd Figures Pull Pennies Everything was going fine down at the mint, he said, until suddenly there developed this amazing demand for pennies. He figured this was on account of sales taxes, six-cent soda pop, and 13-cent street car fares.

Whatever the reason, he had to put the one-cent department on double shift and still, as of now, he's got to manufacture 240,000,000 extra coins in a hurry, mostly pennies. Rep. Gordon Canfield, "New Jersey Republican, a recent caller at the Philadelphia mint, had an idea. 1 Navy Pinches Dollars By ert c. Rum This Is Henry1 Magic Voice NEW YORK You see where they got the Navy on the fire again for spoiling 23 grand worth of meat in a supply depot, and between the meat and the oyster forks you'd think the old senior service had already blown World To Democrat or Republican War III.

On the non-hysterical side, I would like to stick the neck out a touch for my alma mater, who is not the worst old girl in the world when you get to know her. She moves slow, but she generally gets there, and one thing you can always say for the Navy: She always has her worst foot forward from a standpoint of public rela Congress and a Federal Grand Jury are investigating the fabulous Henry William Grunewtdd, mystery man of the tax fraud hearings. Twice in 13 months, he has been cited for contempt of Congress. But he operates as usual. Who is he? How does he pull wires? This first of a series by a Washington Post reporter gives the answers.

By F. RYAN Henry William Grunewald made himself Washington's best connected wire puller by practicing on Congress. His friends he has them in all corners of Washington got the laugh of their lives when Congress WIREPULLING CIRCUITS ran to all branches of Covern-from the swank apartment of Henry William Grunewald, Washington's champion puller'of wires. His gravel-voiced "this is Henry" got results every time he spoke to bureau-, crots or Congressmen over his unlisted telephone. trial survey division, under Rear A dm.

Jack Pearson. This is a task force composed heavily of experts drafted from private industry whose whole duty is to conduct surveys of naval installations, techniques, and physical properties, with a hard eye to cutting the fat off manpower and materiel. The men who farm out from the big corporations, the big manufacturers and oil companies, don't know anything at all about naval procedure or time-wasting formalities. Their reports are as unbiased as reports can be, and their authority comes direct from the Secretary of the Navy. They have found faults and wastages, and their recommendations have largely been adopted.

Savings into the millions have been effected. I believe that the military deserves a pretty steady rap on the knuckles, to keep it in its place as the peoples' servant rather than the peoples' master. Flaws in Consolidation I think that their stupidities and wastages should be deplored and checked whenever possible. But there is always the thing we overlook; generally speaking, they do a hopelessly intricate chore pretty well, on the effort of sincere men who are in a sense dedicated, since they do not work for heavy profit and there is no more old-fashioned peacetime security and solid sinecure. We have been screaming, too, about consolidating all the purchasing power for all the services, and that, too, has some flaws which haven't been thoroughly exposed to public view.

Right now the Navy buys all the paint for all the services, for instance. That can be pretty silly, say, when the Navy has to buy it in' maybe Philadelphia and then pay shipping rates to send it to the Army in East Texas. called him a "mystery man." tions. She is, and has been, her own worst enemy in the public view. They holler about a few piddling dollars' worth of meat going bad in a Navy deepfreeze I say "piddling" not from my vantage, but from a standard of purchases so vast that they dwarf the imagination and, somebody makes a big thing in Congress about oyster forks.

Economy Task Force I will bet you that you didn't know the Navy has been practicing an over-all economy step that measures up to anything in big business. The Navy, for instance, is a 40-billion-dollar business that peddles its portion of future security to nation. Its enterprises combined more than outweigh the working operation of General Motors, General Electric, and American Telephone Telegraph. Sears Roebuck stocks 100,000 items there are 2,200,000 separate items on the Navy inventory. One of the things the Navy has practiced successfully since Jim Forrestal instigated it is a hardheaded efficiency effort called the Indus- World of Shells ST.

PETERSBURG BEACH, Fla. On the floors of the ocean there is a world of creatures wearing shells. It is a cosmopolitan world, with thousands of different inhabitants. Some of the shell crea to shutting up. Whenever Congress gets curious, Grunewald shows beyond question that no Dutchman since William the Silent knows better the virtue of keeping a secret.

Navy Nickname His nickname, "The Dutchman," was given Grunewald by American Navy shipmates when he was in his 'teens. He was born in Port Elizabeth, South Africa of German parents, Heinrich and. Anna Grunewald, on May 19, 1892. He finished school through the level of Junior High, including five years in Schles-wig, Germany, and at 16 came to the United States. His father, a house and sign painter, paid the fare.

He worked several months, as cashier in his uncle's restaurant, then enlisted in the Navy. He told the Navy he was born in New York City in 1890 and was a U. S. citizen, a collection of errors left for his naturalization to clear up years later. -He went to sea on the U.

S. S. Connecticut, flagship- of the Atlantic Fleet. Athletics was his He boxed, trained other fighters. He liked to fight.

His Idea was "get knocked out right away or knock out the other guy, don't prolong the agony He pitched a 1 to 0 shut-out in a game at the Brooklyn Navy yard and a girl on the sidelines told him "you pitched a good game." Her name was Miss Christine Marie Schumacher, and they started going together. Left Nary if 19 1 4 Grunewald left the Navv with an honorable discharge on Dec. 26, 1914. Capt. W.

R. Rush of the Navy yard wrote him "I shall be glad to give you the good character you deserve." He worked first as desk clerk in the Brooklyn Navy YMCA, then as a bookkeeper for Western Electric. He and Christine Schumacher were married in 1916. In March, 1917, with an assist from Congressman Mur- 6 Gilbert Love ray Hulbert of New York, Grunewald was hired at $3.50 a day as a Justice Department agent for work in the New York office of the Bureau of investigation. Grunewald's fluency In German quickly became a major asset in tracking down German spies just as World War I began.

For his most important exploit, Grunewald and other agents resigned from the Bureau and operated privately as volunteers. They performed a patriotic burglary meriting the highest thanks of the nation. But the act was so charged with diplomatic dynamite they were forever disbarred from official publie gratitude. Grunewald and his associates spirited away two tons of secret German Embassy papers from their hiding place in the Swiss Consulate in New York, turned the lot over to the U. S.

Government. Blueprint of Spying The haul gave the Federal agents a complete blueprint of German espionage and sabotage operations in this country. The operation was a sen-" satlonal spy thriller. Grunewald's participation In it Is verified by FBI sources, men who served with and over him pay tribute to him as a wonderfully clever agent, while he played no commanding roles, he played many important ones. Grunewald and the others cased the place.

They brought in a locksmith to make a door key. They arranged a vacation for the night watchman. They took over an office on another floor for homebase. In the consulate they found two huge safes and some 20 filing cabinets. The locksmith opened one safe with the combination 1870, the year of the Franco-Prussian War, and the other with 1871.

Even Replaced Dust To get Into the filing cabinets, Grunewald and the others used keys made by their locksmith. The agents made it their business each night to take what they could, and to replace everything as they found It, down to the last grains of dust on the furniture. It took them several weeks to get all the material out, but their work remained undetected. A gold German medal, one of a number of decorations found In the safes, was given to President Wilson for a souvenir. For Grunewald, the feat meant a full-time career ox spy chasing through the rest of the war.

(CopTrtfht. 19S2. br United Peattir Syndicate, inc. and Th Wuhlntton Pott Co.) NEXT G-Man Grunewald Miami Beach, mansion to pay a $51,000 Federal tax lien. His base of business operations is in the big downtown hotels near the Treasury.

He still is in business at the old stand, he says. He wears a dual title, private investigator and public relations man. In these conflicts, he steers by the lights of his fighting little attorney, William Power Maloney a former special assistant to the attorney general. They hold some kind of record: Congressional committees voted two contempt citations for Grunewald and one for Maloney in 13 months. 1 For all Grunewald's cloak and dagger tactics, his job is to get things done simply, by pulling the right wires.

He makes It his business to know who's who and what's what. He gets the word and spreads the word. He wires the vast mazes of Washington, bureaucracy for sound and makes himself master of the switchboard. He gets on the Inside of almost everything important in Washington, except the District Jail. He has ample proof it will take more than a Congressional committee vote to put them there.

His first contempt citation was killed. Youthfully Ruddy Now nearing 60, Grunewald Is bald, with a grey fringe of hair, but his heavy features are youthfully ruddy. 'He is light on his feet, vigorous in his actions. He has the facial control of an actor one moment he can look as blank as a punch-drunk pug and the next moment break the haze with a magnetic smile. He is 5 feet 8, weighs about 180, and dresses nattily in ready-made suits.

Friends find him comfortable company, a good host, an easy spender. While talk is his trade, Grunewald owes his notoriety Half the population of the U. S. Capitol are reputed to know him, from Senators to doormen, from Representatives to pages. From his unlisted telephone in the Capital's swank Westchester Apartment, Grunewald's wirepulling circuits run to all the echelons of Government.

His gravel-voiced "this is Henry" is the unmistakeable badge of his business, ever since his trunk line Into the Bureau of Internal Revenue has been exposed. Vice President Barkley knows Grunewald and says he always thought well of him. The same goes for Republican Senator Styles Bridges of New Hampshire, the Senate minority floor leader. Democrat Grunewald gets favorable notice from Republican Senator Owen Brewster of Maine, who says Henry always "seemed simply interested in doing good and never in asking for anything." Few Democrats can claim such praise from Senator Brewster. Gruenwald prizes a thank-you note from President Truman for $1600 he gave the Democrats In 1943, but he is not above dropping a G-note into a.

GOP campaign kitty. How many G's are in Grunewald's own kitty is unknown. His apartment, where he lives with his wife and daughter, Erna. is luxuriously but not lavishly furnished. He owns two Fords and a Lincoln.

His wife owns a Ford. Wears Two Titles He visits frequently with his other daughter, Mrs. Christine Hartzell, who lives with her husband and two small daughters, in nearby Chevy Chase, Md. He has a big Summer home in Spring Lake, N. J.

He recently sold his $100,000 I tures are smaller than the head of a pin, while others are too large for a man to lift. They wear all the colors of the rainbow in all sorts of patterns, including a Scotch plaid and flower designs. Each has a distinctive shape. Some look like cones, urns, screws, lady-bugs, platters, fruits, worms, cans, wings. Others look like nothing else on the earth.

Food Bills to Come Down As Big Crops Are Harvested But High Marketing Costs, Profit Margin Could Offset Decline for Consumers WASHINGTON, March 10 (UP) Agriculture Department at dawn, especially after a storm, to see what the waves have brought in. They wade In the where the big shell creatures go to- spawn. After a bay trip they must laboriously remove the live critters from the shells. Some make annual pilgrimages to Sanibel Island, a hundred miles south of here and a ferry ride out into the Gulf of Mexico, where shell collecting is supposed to be at its best. The lobby of the hotel there is decorated with prize finds.

At least a half a dozen shops in the St. Petersburg area sell shells to collectors who can't find exactly what they want. They also sell equipment for making the aforementioned shell decorations. Near Bradenton, such a shop has developed into a "Shell As Colorful as Country Fair The Shell Club of St. Petersburg has an annual show in which collectors exhibit their best.

The shells are polished like the exhibits of fruit at a county fair, and they're just as colorful. Many of the shells in this year's show origi-. nated in foreign seas. For example, the Bulla Bulla, the shell that lays an egg; and the famed chambered Nautilus; and the great shells in pastel colors, covered with spikes or dainty fluting. Most Interesting, however, is the Sand Dollar.

Chalky white and shaped like a small pancake, it is pierced by five holes and bears the faint outline of flower petals. Break it open and little objects resembling doves "fly" out of its center. Legend says it tells the story of Christianity. experts say that seasonal increases in food supplies should bring a drop in grocery prices during the next two months. But they refused to guess how much prices will dip.

Although the abundant farm products are almost sure to result in lower farm prices, de- partment officials said high mar Milk, butter and cheese should be more plentiful soon, too. You have no doubt seen the discarded shells of many of these creatures while walking along a beach. If your walking was done on this West Coast of Florida, you know that the shells are especially numerous and varied here. Man Collectors of Shells Nearly everyone who visits this region fills his pockets with the colorful small shells that he finds at the water's edge. Many go farther than that.

They collect shells as others collect stamps, match folders, etc. Some of them seek only rare shells. Others collect one shell in as many sizes and colors as possible. Still others make ornaments such as birds, flowers and wall plaques by using special shells. The serious collectors are out on the beaches keting costs and bigger profit margins by distributors might offset the decline before it is passed on to the bargain-hungry Although dairy products nor mally drop in price as cattle move into spring pasture, de housewife.

Secretary of Agriculture partment experts said amount Charles F. Brannon told the Sen ate recently that marketing costs of the decrease is open to question. They pointed out that some milk producers have been lobbying for rigid federal marketing orders which would set milk prices without regard to and middleman profits were responsible for 80 per cent of a $37 rise in the' average family's SIDE GLANCES By Calbraith Hilt JW 1 rtl annual grocery bilL Gibraltar of Pacific REAUSTATEl k. By Douglas Larsen NEA Staff i ii iii i'. i One official noted that market Meat production Is already 9 per cent above last year and beef ing costs are likely rise even more sharply in 1952, especially if a railroad request for a 15 per cent boost in freight rates is approved by the Interstate Commerce Commission.

prices are almost certain to come down. OKINAWA This vitally strategic island in the heart of the Far East has a new name. They are calling it America's Gibraltar of the Pacific. Tremendous construction and a miehty mu- OFF THE RECORD By Ed Reed Poultry and eggs will continue in abundance, and should decline in price. Sketches muons siocKpuing program are transforming Okinawa in-one of the nation's strongest key outposts.

Up until now, this work has been obscured by security restrictions and the Korean War. However, the full story of the new strategic role which the Joint Chiefs of Staff has assigned to the island as a major bombing base and crime statin area fnr the other islands In the Ryukyu group is amazing. Modern shops sell the latest In Stateside styles and gadgets. You can buy most any make of brand new car right off the salesroom floor. Housing projects of modern California-type bungalows dot the island.

Construction of new, native-type housing and buildings in the villages is booming. Almost everyone will tell you that if one moe giant bulldozer is brought here the island will sink beneath the sea. More than 2000 pieces of heavy construction, equipment are being operated seven days a week, cutting giant swaths through hills and mountains for roads, new housing areas and bomb storage sites. Strip for Korea-Bound B-36s At Kadena Air Force base, headquarters for the 20th Air Force which daily sends swarms of B-29s to Korea, a huge new strip is being completed which will handle B-36s and any type of jet bomber. Other fields on the island are also being improved.

In Naha, biggest city of the island, a modern steam power plant, which will be the center of an island-wide high voltage transmission system, is well on its way to completion. The city's water suddIv svstem is By BEN BURROUGHS For Every Smile In the few short years I spent on earth and breathe the breath of life I want to know real happiness and detour pain and strife I want to find the rainbow's end where stands the pot of gold and too I want real peace of mind to have and always hold want a love to comfort me when everything goes wrong a true and tender dream girl who will sing love's old sweet song but to gain all these I realize I must be worthy of each and every little thing that's good and high above and that for every happy day I spend throughout the years I must pay for them with bitterness with heartache and with tears. hi 11 1, f-n-r- riffiiiiii-ii rni- iTii. i lii mmm i ft airborne and ground troops can now be told here for the first time. By the start of the Summer there will be more than $200,000,000 worth of permanent construction under way roads, barracks, typhoon-proof storage areas, dock facilities and other defense projects.

Although the major part of this work was begun only recently and has not yet reached its peak, it is being rushed through at the rate of $2,000,000 worth per month. Typhoon Scenes Recalled I last visited Okinawa in 1947, just after a devastating typhoon had wrecked what few ramshackle, rustling installations were left over from World War IL Living conditions were deplorable. S'mce then, the change on" Okinawa and on being renovated by the addition of the latest in nitration plants. Modern office buildings are going up. And always you can see.

dotting th Wpv hills and peaks, the business-like snouts of ann-aircrart guns. They are manned 24 hours a day. A NEXT Okinawa's Boss. "Maybe I ought to go in clone price the house you look like a lot of dough in thct new fur coat!" "Boy! This is the scariest picture I've ever teenP i.