THE ROANOKE RAPIDS
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ROANOKE RAPIDS, NORTH CAROLINA
THE LARGEST NEWSPAPER IN HALIFAX COUNTY
CARROLL WILSON, Owner and Editor
Entered as Second Class matter April 3rd, 1914, at the post office
at Roanoke Rapids, North Carolina, under Act of March 3rd, 1879.
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THE HOME FRONT
• • We are now on the offensive. For the first
time in this war American forces have moved a
gainst the enemy with the objective of expelling
him. The theater of action is the Solomons. The
Solomons are a chain of islands, the islands are
steaming jungle and abrupt peak and the home of
head hunting savages who doubtless have learned
new lessons in savagery, lately, from the Japanese.
For Japan’s line of communication runs through
the Solomons, and in the Solomons Japan flanks
Australia.
From its very start this first American of
fensive indicated to the Home Front the need for
redoubling our production effort. Admiral King,
Commander in Chief of the U. S. Fleet, said it ap
pears we have lost at least one cruiser and that
other warships had been damaged and he said—
“Considerable losses, such as are inherent in any
offensive operation, must be expected.”
Must Prepare For Losses
We must go on from offensive to offensive if
we are to win this war, we can win this war only by
driving the Japs out from the territory they have
seized, by driving the Nazis from Europe and the
Near East. To do this we must accept losses on a
great scale, and we must prepare for these losses.
I We cannot sit smugly back on past perform
ance.
Last Sunday Elmer Davis, Director of the
Office of War Information, spoke of the front line
of production and said of it that “Generally speak
ing this line is holding firm.” But Davis went on
to say that this front line could break unless new
lines swiftly are established behind it. “We cer
tainly shall fail,” he said, “unless we increase the
production of raw materials.” He said we must
develop new processes; and waste, and—something
in which everyone can help—“Press for full salvage
by every citizen in the land.”
Materials and more materials—that is the des
perate need. This is a war in which tanks are de
stroyed by hundreds in a single action on a single
sector of one front. And yet into a tank of the Gen
eral Grant type go about 26 tons of steel, some six
hundred pounds of copper, more than five hundred
pounds of chromium and more than six hundred
pounds of manganese, aluminum, lead and zinc.
Salvage Is Paramount
More than ever today the emphasis must be on
salvage and on such further restrictions of an al
ready restricted civilian industry as may be pos
sible. It is possible to tighten up on the civilian
economy here and there, and wherever it is possible
it must be done. One of our most critical shortages
is the shortage of steel and last week the War Pro
duction Board ordered the makers of wooden up
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holstered furniture to stop using iron or steel in
springs. WPB launched a drive for metal salvage
embracing 37,000 dairy plants throughout the
country and appealed to wholesale and retail mer
chants to “make a clean sweep” of store rooms and
shops for critically needed material. There are
almost two million retail merchants in the U. S. A.
and more than 100,000 wholesalers. And the com
bined Production and Resources Board, the agency
through which Great Britain and the United States
attack their joint production problems, says an
American Steel Mission is going to England to
work out plans for a more efficient method of using
steel, and to study British methods of collecting
scrap.
wemusi torget mat we are me ricnest country
in the world, until the war is won we must live as
though the U. S. A. were a poor country, without
resources. Last week WPB ordered that men’s
work clothes must have fewer pockets, fewer but
tons and buckles and must consume less cloth.
Another order cut use of rubber in manufacture of
products intended not for civilian use, but for the
armed forces. The order prohibited use of rubber
in a long list of military products, including car
tridge clip boxes and gun grips. WPB called on the
wood furniture industry to help relieve civilian
shortages by using wood to make articles normally
made of metal such as lockers, ice boxes, wash tubs,
pails, lamps, trailers, truck and bus bodies, but
WPB warned that the highest quality lumber must
be used primarily for military purposes and that
only lower grades would be available for these sub
stitutes.
A LESSON FROM GERMANY
• • A vivid light on the role of railroads in war is
found in comments by some of the American cor
respondents recently exchanged at Lisbon for Ger
man correspondents and diplomats.
Louis Lochner, chief of the former Berlin Bu
reau of the Associated Press, said:
“Adolph Hitler’s widely advertised super high
ways may yet prove an important factor in the un
doing of the German war machine. The longer the
war lasts, the more evident it becomes that Hitler
bet on the wrong horse in solving the nation’s
transportation problem chiefly through the con
struction of super-highways rather than the im
provement, or even the upkeep of Germany’s exten
sive railway system. A majority of Germany’s
600,000 freight cars were obsolete by 1938. Even
in the first winter of the war the transportation
system proved inadequate.”
Edwin Shanke, another member of the Berlin
AP bureau, wrote:
“Railways have been in a tangle virtually from
the start of the war. The lack of rolling stock
replacements and the repair of aging facilities are
the principal headaches
. . . The super-highways
now lie virtually idle
while railways are clog
ged with war traffic they
can’t handle.”
In this country, where
the railroads are private
ly-owned, not state-own
ed as in Germany—the
rails were ready for war.
They had spent twenty
years preparing for war,
and for demands for ser
vice which would sur
pass a 1 1 precedents.
When the defense drive
started, the greatest
mass-transportation sys
tem the world had ever
seen was at this coun
try’s beck and call. That
system has confounded
its critics, and done a job
which is literally miracu
lous.
That system will be
called upon to do a big
ger job still in the future.
And it will do that job if
permitted to buy the ma
terials it needs for main
taining and expanding
its plant. When Hitler
finally collapses, the
breakdown in transport
ation will be one of the
causes—movement is the
heart and soul of modern
war. The lesson we can
read from Germany’s ex
perience is clear: Our
American railroads, with
their far-sighted man
agements, expert crews
and magnificent physical
facilities, must be kept
rolling at all costs.
—The Southern Farmer
JLne Well-Dressed Wave
• Lieut. Comdr. Mildred
H. McAfee of the Wo
men’s Naval Reserve
Corps has revealed a deft
touch in surrounding the
new uniforms of the A
merican Waves with
some part of the sus
pense that once attached
to the Paris openings.
Beyond the fact that
Mainbocher has designed
the outfit, including the
hat, summer and winter
uniforms, raincoats,
overcoats, have
locks, blouses and sweat
ers, very little is known.
Commander McAfee has
added spice by observing
the costumes were de
signed to be becoming to.
women and not merely to
copy the men’s uniforms.
And she has hinted the
whole outfit will be rath
er pretty by disclosing
that the “opening” is de
layed because they
haven’t yet found just
the right shade for the
hosiery.
We have heard so much feminine
criticism of men’s costumes, mili
tary and civilian, that it will be in
teresting to see what the girls can
do when turned loose with a Paris
couturier, Navy blue, some gold
braid and brass buttons. But, after
all, they’ll have to go some to beat
the Admirals’ “foye-and-afters.”
—The Christian Science Monitor