Newspapers / The Waynesville Mountaineer (Waynesville, … / June 13, 1947, edition 1 / Page 9
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PAGE ONE (Second Section? THE WAYNES VILLE MOUNTAINEER pace Thai Death llav Cost taxpayers Ijjh Carolina $2,000 IngleyHad M Chair rimes The following n leading to the unlley. who was 'J county about J" The following Z b M Jefinhs Sed m the R' isaver. K K man racing Bdsofadocklosavf tHBthe electric chair ling a 1932 Ford If Virginia moun 0f a bleak win ;pectally when hejuw in his possession absolute proof I hat the brother is innocent. D. R. Langley of 606 S. 15th street and his sister won such a race and today the brother they saved from electrocution in Cen tral Prison in Raleigh is asking the state for $2,000 because he was pardoned. Paroles Commis sioner Hathaway Cross now has the request under advisement. He is making the request under a 1947 law authorizing payment of $500 a year for sentences served for those who prove they were wrongfully convicted. The kid brother was Gus Colon Langley, a Randolph county paint er who was sentenced to die for the robbery-slaying of Lonnie G. Russell in Asheville In 1932. Three times Langley was reprieved hours RK THEATER ffavnesville, North Carolina 'SATURDAY 2 and 3:30 SUNDAY 2 and 4 P.M. SHOWS 7 and 9 Daily SUNDAY 9:00 Only ADMISSION PRICES: hits, All Scats 33c Including Federal Tax Thursday. Friday, June 12-13 Til Be Yours" Starring DEANNA DI KBIN and TOM DRAKE News. Comedy and Short be II , Saturday, June 14 "Heading West Starring LESSTARRETT and "SMILEY" BURNETTE Serial and Comedy Late Show s "The Trap" Starring Jitl TOLLR and MANTON MOREHEAD ii Sunday, June 15 Undercover Maisie Starring PN S0THERN and BARRY NELSON Comedy Monday, Tuesday, June 16-17 3 Rue Madeleine" Starring 'AMES CAGNEY and ANNABELLA News and Comedy before he was scheduled to strapped in the electric chair. That wild, dangerous trip over the slippery mountain roads of Vir ginia was only one episode in one of the strangest and most publi cized cases in the history of North Carolina justice. The news of his brother's suit against the state re minded D. R. Langley of the de tails of the case. "I was returning from a trip to New York with my sister, Juanita Matthews of Jersey City," D. R. said. "Gus had won one reprieve already but he was to be electro cuted in 24 hours and I was told the execution would lake place un less I reached Raleigh by a certain time. "My sister and I got in that Ford and started across Virginia. Sleet had fallen over about four inches of snow on those mountains and frozen solid. We found the road blocked, and about a hundred cars stranded. Officers said it was too dangerous. "I told them I had to get through. One officer said he'd sec about it, but he'd have to call someone to get authority. While he was calling, we pushed the car around the road block. For a long way, we pushed the car. We couldn't hold our foot ing, so we took our shoes off. Our socks froze, so we took them off." "We got to Raleigh in time." That was a desperate measure. Those were desperate days. Curled up on a sofa at his home. D. R. was able to laugh about it now. But in proving his brother s innocence he mortgaged one business, sold an other one, spent half of his World War I bonus money and most of the money he was able to earn as a painter. The story began, D. R. said, when Gus, who married a girl from the Asheville area, had a spat with his wife at their New Jersey home and decided to visit his father, John W. Langley and D. R. in Wilmington. He decided to travel via Asheville. In Asheville, he and a pal named Shorty Johnson got together and started to Wilmington. Meanwhile, Gus' wife wrote to her brother in Asheville about the spat and his departure from New Jersey. And meanwhile. Lonnie Russell had been killed. Asheville police posted a $300 reward for in formation leading to the arrest of the killer. The brother then went to police and said he knew the identity of the slayer. "The brother got a $100 advance on the reward," D. R. said. "He listed my name and address, the name and address of my father, and told Police Gus was the killer. But Gus was in Wilmington the night of the murder, picking a guitar and singing at a neighborhood party at my father'." John Morris was sheriff of New Hanover county, D. R. said, and he called Sheriff Lawrence Brown of Buncombe county and asked Brown if he'd be willing to retrace the route traveled by Gus and Shorty In the trip from Asheville to Wilmington. Brown said yes, D. R. said, but he didn't check the route. D. R., however, was checking. The first piece of evidence which established the fact that Gus and Johnson had not been in Asheville when the murder was committed turned up at Fort Bragg. Gus had picked up two soldiers en route and carried them to their base there. A guard at the gate had taken the license number, names, and stamped the time on his rec ords when he admitted the car to the reservation. That stamped time said Gus was innocent. There was a toll bridge over the Northeast river outside of Wil mington then. Gus and Shorty did not have the 25 cents toll charge, so Gus had gone to Hinson's place, TOY DRUM BEATS FOR DEAD DADDY ilvrvr? S trf MARCHING BESIDE the big bass drum in a New York parade rammers rating the 52nd annual memorial services of the Jewish War Vetera. of America, tiny Stephen Fried, 3, beats on his little tot cirin n Slephar. ; father, Pvt. Harold Fried, was killed in the war. Foui thousand JrwV-i war veterans participated in the ceremonies (hiuriiaiij! AMAZING- SENSATIONAL etfooit HOME COLD WAVE easier than ever before.. WITH A9 Plui Ton I I Compltt with 50 I PLASTIC CURLERS So easy . . . easy . . . easy ! In only 2 to 3 hours you'll have a Portrait perfect cold wave permanent right in your own home. So soft and easy to style. Never dry, kinky or fuzzy. No guesswork! No professional skill required. Portraits easy -to -wind Plastic L-uriers can uc um-u - over again. Refill kits (everything but curlers) SI. Portrait Guarantees: Soft natural-looking wavesl Easy-to-manage waves! Waves that last r , a long as $20 beautv salon oer- mancnts! Tour money back, tax and '3 " 'J not completely satisfied. mm i til! Smith's Drug Store on the other side of the river, and borrowed fare. The llinsons told D. R. that they recalled the time, because Mrs. Hinson berated her husband for being such an easy touch. The date and time the Hin son's agreed Gus had stopped to borrow the quarter said he wasj innocent of the Asheville murder., D. R. paid back the 25 cents and retraced the route. At every stop.i he got new evidence that his broth-j er was innocent. He was after thei sort of evidence mac wouiu num in court. He and about 50 guests had seen Gus picking that guitar and yodeling at the parly when the murder occurred 300 miles away. He didn't have to be con vinced: a jury did. So O. H. col lected affidavits and waited for the trial. "Gus is one of these jokers." I). R. said. "While they had him in jail before his trial, he wrote a letter to Al Capone in Chicago. The jailer, of course, took the let ter to the sheriff. 11 had some sort of foolishness in it. Gut told Ca pone he had met a girl friend of his, thta he needed help in this little hick town'." During the trial in Asheville, Solicitor Zeb Nettles "told that jury at least a hundred limes, Our lit tle hick town," I) H. said with a smile. "The trial started at 10 a.m and at 2:30 p.m. the judge was sentencing Gus to death. "Yes, we had the soldiers sum moned, hut when they got to Ashe ville they were told that the only place they could stay was in the jail. Their commanding officer or dered them hack to Bragg. "The witnesses along the route?'.' Well, in Asheville they told us affidavits were all that would be necessary, wnen we proouceu mu affidavits, we were told they were not any good." D. R snapped his fingers. "They sentenced Gus to die." j Actually. Gus was sentenced to die twice. Through an error in pro ceedings, he was taken back to I Asheville and the death verdict was pronounced anew. ! The party goers in Wilmington. I many of whom had never seen Gus before he strummed the guitar lliat night, began to speak up. Louis T. Moore got busy, along with Harris? Newman, David Sinclair. John J. Burney and Hoyee S. McClelland, attorneys. "Those people worked like they were working for Ihcir own sons." I). H. said, "and I hey wouldn't take a nickel for their services." At Central Prison, Gus Langley had his head shaved for the second time. D. R. visited him four days before the execution date. "I knew he was shaky." D. R. said, "because he joked so much to cover up his feelings. The warden and I were at his death row cell and Gus said, 'Warden. I understand I get a last request.' " 'That's right.' said the warden, what do you want. Gus1?' " 'When you put me in the chair": . R. quoted Gus as replying. " 'please let me have hold of Sher iff Brown's hand when they turn on the juice ." Less than 48 hours before Gus was slated to die, New York offices of the Civil Liberties Union and the Legal Aid Society increased pressure on Edwin Gill, then parole commissioner, to halt the execu tion. Letters poured in from all over the United States one came in from a lawyer in Australia protesting the execution. D. R. went to Raleigh and asked Gill to hold a hearing in Wilming ton on the case. Such a hearing, outside the county where the crime was committed, was unprecedent ed. So was D. R.'s energy. Gill gave in. The execution hour then was 24 hours in the future. The courtroom, scene of the hear ing, was full. Stressing the fact that the hearing was not official, that no oaths would be taken and no witnesses forced to testify, Gill began hearing the evidence. "I don't know what I'll do in Gear Shifting On The Way Out In Auto Design By DAVID J. WILKIF. Associated Press Automotive Kditor F11ENCH LICK, lnd (D The gradual elimination of all manual gear shifting on passenger auto mobiles and its replacement by au tomatic controls and transmissions was predicted at a session of the Society of Automotive Kngineers. The discussions disclosed, how ever, thai theie sull is a wide di vergence of opinion among the en gineers as to the exact form of the mechanism that should replace manual shifting. Advocates of aiilomatie controls and transmissions apparently are agreed that eventually even a con tinuously variable ration transmis sion will be developed for gasoline propcllod vehicles But some of them prefer fluid coupling, others like transmissions with hydraulic control and governor, while still others favor different methods and mechanisms to accommodate vary ing conditions in automobile con struction. There uas agreemeiil. too, that the change lo all automatic gear shifting in passenger vehicles will be achieved onl b. stages. Most of the vehicles produced in 1948 and probably in 194! still will have manually-operated gear shifts. The nation's automobile industry has spent millions of dollars in the development of automatic trans missions and controls and it is ex pected in most automotive circles that for competitive reasons these devices will be offered as optional equipment on a number of addi tional vehicles nexl year. Missing Paintings Are Returned To Dutch BLIILIN 'Al'i Hicbanl F. Howard said thai Dutch thorough ness in keeping art records had en abled Allied investigators In I race !o American Military Government Headquarters six paintings which the Nazis took from Holland during the occupation. Mr. Howard luad' w.'s Moniiincnls. Inn Archives seel ion. The six panil int! . $(i.f40, the wa cius Gen ings were replaced by four small land scapes from a secretary's office. "They aren't even originals, so there can he no mistake this time." an American official said The six paintings, which belong to the Netherlands, will he turned over to the Netherlands restitution authorities attached to the Dutch military mission here City Of 15,000 Free Of Crime; Jails Are Idle RICHLAND, Wash. Experts on crime are amazed at the situation in this war-created community of 15.000 persons. Here is the record for the past three years: There has never been a murder or a major crime of violence. There has been only one traffic fatality. Juvenile delinquency is 70 per cent below the national average for a city of Richland's size. The city's two jail cells have never held a prisoner. The relief roll is zero. Everybody is employed There are no vagrants. Only two suicides have occurred The reason for this startling record are several. In the -first place, the community is government-owned, controlled by the Atomic Energy Commission which also controls the Richland and Hanford plants factories working on atomic research. The community is part of a gov ernment reservation and persons moving in are carefully screened Everybody works or doesn't move to Kichland. Another important factor in Hichland's record Is the high aver age education level. Workers con nected with atomic research and production are for the most part highly skilled. Most citizens have high school or college educations Richland's service department head, former FBI agent F,. I.. Kichmond. who is responsible for law enforcement, has tackled the juvenile delinquency problem by warning parents rather than the youngsters. The parents are re sponsible and if the children don't behave, the family must move from Richland. However, threats are not the real story behind juvenile good behavior here. The iiicbland Junior Chamber of Commerce has sponsored the HI Spot Teen Age Club. The club is open three nights a We're Slated To Eat An Egg A Day In 1947 WASHINGTON iAP) The Agriculture Department expects the 140,000,000-odd people in this country to use up an av erae of 350 eggs apiece during the year which week, drawing an average attend ance of 500 per night The young people dance, play games and meet their friends in the attractively decorated club rooms Hi Spot is governed by the mem bers with adult supervision, lnci deutl.v . the sponsoring organiza tion won second place in a na tional youth activities contest for organizing the club. starts July 1. If they use only 349, it's going to cost the Government an extra $5,000,000 to keep egg prices from cracking. N. E. Dodd, Vice-Chairman of the Board of Commodity Credit. Corporation, made the estimate to a House Appropriations subcommit tee during hearings on the 1948 Agriculture Department supply bill. He said the CCC figures egg pro duction in the next year at 4,800. 000.000 dozen. In the late 15th Century. Peter, tsar of Russia, went to England and worked in shipyards to learn how to build a navy. HAYWOOD FLOOR SURFACING CO. KlTBBKIt, PLASTIC AND ASPHALT TILE Owned and Operated by B. It. HUNDLEY IMiciH s 2:? iiml 3l!l-V Box 134 HIGH VALLEY GAMP ANNOUNCES Special (wo -weeks' ramp sessions for BOYS AND GIRLS Beginning June 28th through August overnight hikrs, swimming, all Music, dramatics. Kcursie-s, horseback rldinft held sports . . Healthful, educational camp life under super vision of trained staff, l ee: $37.50 per week, all Inclusive, except laundry Writr: lti hard T. Alexander, director, K. F. I). director or Sol B. Cohen, No. 2, Canton, N. C. music Ihe ArC M and valued al were removed May 2 from Is in the offices of Gen. I.u- l). Clay and his Deputy. Maj. Frank A. Keating. The paint in General Heating's room LARGE EAGLE SHOT SANKORD What is thought lo be the largest eagle shot in Lee county in many years has been brought to Sanford by L. D. Shaw of the White Hill community, who killed the eagle on the farm of J. W. Yow. Shaw said the eagle, which, with a wing spread of six feet eight inches, was after a flock of chickens, when killed. hearing was half completed, "but I can promise you your brother won't die tomorrow morning." The next day. Gill recommended commutation of Gus' sentence and later he arranged a parole. Finally, in 1936. then-Gov. J. C. B. Ehring haus pardoned Gus Colon Langley. "I had made 37 round trips to New York City. Buncombe county had spent $49,000 in obtaining the first death sentence for a white man in 13 years, and then they al most Miieu uie wrong man, u. n. Captain of Industry Meet Butch-Pres., Treas.. and liclc) Force of the One Man Odd Jobs (.., Uninc. Take a good look at him for Butch is America. Butch wants a bicycle. Lots of lawn and lemonade and baby-sitting lie be tween Butch and that bike, but we're betting on the boy. He has energy, vision, and our national habit of working hard for what he wants. He's American busi nessin miniature. There are many names for Butch's philosophy. You can call it Free Enter prise, Opportunity, Democracy, or Capitalism, if you want. But, whatever the name, America on c s it much. For our most valuable natural resource lie in the ambition and initia tive of Americans like Butch. As great publications have grown from the dreams of young men with old hand presses and great industries from the products of grubby little cellar work shopsthe electric industry had small beginnings, too. Like our own company. A few men with vision strung the first small lines. People with faith risked their savings. Better and better service, at low er and low er cost, created more and more jobs and carried the benefits of electric living to more and more people. Free enterprise and hard work will bring Butch and his bike together. They are w hat built America and the American way of life, which is the highest standard of living in the world. No nation on earth has found a satisfactory substiruta for that combination. Uttu H Ntv. B.tr Hot - tb. H"' Of CHARM. S.xtoj. 1J0 f. M.a T. CM. (CAROLINA powsn g EIGHT compaky) this case," GUI told D. R when the said.
The Waynesville Mountaineer (Waynesville, N.C.)
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June 13, 1947, edition 1
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