[Ocd News Letter. No. 24]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

Block Leaders to
Wage Meat Campaign
As war cuts deeper into .the American kitchen, food becomes an even more potent weapon. On November 30 Defense Councils will launch through their Nutrition Committees and Block Leaders (and through Neighborhood Leaders in rural areas) a national voluntary meat rationing campaign made necessary by the needs of our Army and Navy and fighting Allies. The objective is voluntary limitation of meat consumption to 2^ pounds a week by each adult or adolescent 12 years or older, to 1% pounds by children 6 years to 12 years, and % pound by children under 6.
The Nation’s 11,000 Defense Councils have been entrusted with reaching every home with this urgent message. In entrusting this responsibility, the Federal Government recognizes the effectiveness of thé Block Leaders organization as a means of uniting the efforts of every family.
Block Leaders and Neighborhood Leaders will visit each family assigned to them, explain the reasons for the campaign, leave a leaflet prepared by the Nutrition Division of the Office of Defense Health and Welfare Services which contains information concerning voluntary meat rationing and alternate foods for well-balanced diets, and a chart for keeping a record of the family’s meat consumption. Block Leaders will also find out the extent of interest of women in war food demonstrations.
It is not only fair, wise, and patriotic to share the meat nowadays, but absolutely necessary if we are to strike a direct blow at the Axis. Meanwhile, Americans must protest their health with a balanced diet of alternative foods.
New Enemy Bombs!
Revised instructions for fighting newer and deadlier types of enemy fire bombs were recently announced. One of the new types used by the Germans is the usual small magnesium incendiary to which has been added a more powerful and dangerous explosive charge set off by a time fuze. The enemy has also used new types of large incendiaries which explode on impact.
“These new small explosive incendiaries are a good deal more dangerous than the type previously used,” Director Landis explained. “In spite of the increased personal risk, they must be attacked promptly by civilians when they fall in congested districts or where there is little fireproof construction.”
A jet of water is the best method to fight these bombs. Because of the increased danger from explosion in attacking the bomb with a time fuze, the use of sand, a spray of water, and other short-range methods of attack should be clearly avoided. A stream of water should be directed into the room or area where a bomb has fallen. The firefighter should take cover behind a solid wall, the equivalent of brickwork 4% inches thick.
When bombs fall where they can do no harm, they should be left to burn themselves out. Water need not be directed af. the bomb itself. Direct a stream of water on the surrounding area, exposing no more than one hand. This will serve to halt the spread of fire until the explosive charge has gone off, and the fire may be attacked more effectively.
(See British story on page
Italian Aliens Mag Join Defense Corps
Freed from the “enemy alien” stigma, Italian aliens are now eligible for membership in the United States Citizens* Defense Corps without any special action on the part of local or State Defense Councils. This new OCD move is in conformity with Attorney General Biddle’s announcement that Italian aliens are no longer to be classified as enemy aliens.
Italian aliens are now in the same category as aliens of any friendly or nonbelligerent country so far as membership in the Citizens’ Defense Corps is concerned. They are eligible to join civilian defense protective units unless their applications are specifically rejected by Local Defense Councils acting on individual cases.
“Enemy aliens,” on the other hand, tare ineligible for membership in the Citizens’ Defense Corps unless they are individually recommended for membership by the local Defense Council and approved by the State Defense Council.
Commenting on a personal letter from “an old flying friend” now in the CAP, Al Williams recently wrote in the Scripps-Howard newspapers:
“This is a grand picture of volunteer America—the strongest America.
“Whether it is generally realized or not, one of our greatest troubles in this war today is found in the suppression of the ‘volunteer spirit? Why can’t more of this spirit of the CAP prevail—the volunteer pilots of America who reported for antisubmarine duty with their own planes, just as their forefathers joined Washington’s army with their own rifles?
“If this spirit could be spread all over the country—and it can and will—the complexion of our war effort would change overnight.
“God bless the 1942 Flying Continental Army!”
In a swamp near the Illinois line, Group 521, Gary, Indi, has uncovered 25 miles of abandoned railroad tracks and an ancient junkyard.
A son in the Army Air Forces recently wrote his father, George L. Stevens, Squadron 514-4, Cleveland: “I wish you were here to see the fine job the CAP is doing on the seacoast. You should feel very proud of being a member of that organization. In fact, I am very proud of you myself.”
Men and women driving rivets in planes for others to fly can be flyers themselves. At the Vultee Aircraft Plant in Nashville, Tenn., 125 workers formed a new CAP Squadron and are planning to set up their own airport and hangar.
Shortly before they were scheduled to report for work at a nearby aircraft plant, two San Diego CAP members were strolling on the beach.- Suddenly an Army pursuit ship streaked down and plunged into the water 150 feet from shore. The CAP members, James Fitzhugh and Marion Bowler, swam to the sinking plane and, Against a strong current, rescued the pilot, parachute, and all. When the salvage crew came, Fitzhugh returned to the oily waters in a diving helmet and put the first line around the sunken plane.
The Ohio Wing has launched a plan with the State health department whereby blood plasma will be rushed by plane to any area stricken by disaster.
To the Minnesota Wing goes credit for .being the first to report formation of a CAP Cadet Squadron. Within a week, 39 students of the Minneapolis Central High School were signed up.
At least 30 clergymen, most of them pilots, are active in CAP, according to Father Donald M. Cleary, Ithaca, N. Y., Squadron.
A Nazi made the mistake of getting drunk and heiling ■ Hitler while wearing unauthorized CAP insignia. Alert CAP members spotted him. Result: The Nazi will be sitting this war out.
Profile
(This is the fourth of a series of biographical sketches of your regional OCD directors)
Charles Holton Murchison was no stranger to Government when he became Director of Civilian Defense, Region 4, on February 1, 1942. For a year before journeying to Atlanta, from where he directs civilian defense activities in Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Tennessee, he was a consultant to the War Department.	<
Jacksonville, Fla., is still his home. He has been president of the city’s Traveler’s Aid Society, a trustee of the public library board, and an outstanding attorney. In fact, his civic affiliations were so numerous and useful that one wonders how Jacksonville ever permitted him to leave.
Born in Greensboro, N. C., on January 13, 1899, energetic Mr. Murchison served as a private during World War I. After the war, he elected to ^continue his education above the Mason and Dixon line, receiving his B. A. from the University of Michigan in 1921 and his LL. B. 3 years later from the Harvard Law School. He is now a member of the Jacksonville, Fla., State, and American Bar Associations, the American Judicature Society, and the American Law Institute.
A Democrat, Baptist, and a Delta Kappa Epsilon, Mr. Murchison is married to the former Helen Spratt and has two daughters.
Food Booklet Issued
An exciting, new full-colored booklet which doubtless will be useful to the nutrition committees of defense councils has just been issued by Swift and Cdpapany as a contribution to the National Nutrition Program. Entitled “Eat Right To Work and Win,” it depicts such popular comic strip characters as Tillie the Toiler, The Little King, Maggie and Jiggs, Dagwood, Henry, Flash Gordon, Toots and Casper as workers on the food front.
Designed as a guide for American housewives unable to attend nutrition classes, the booklet contains folksy food information. A joint foreword by OCD Director James M. Landis and Paul V. McNutt, Director of the Office of Defense Health and Welfare Services, states that the booklet’s purpose is to bring to Americans “A greater understanding of correct eating habits to meet the demands of war.” Copies can be obtained by writing directly to Swift and Company, Department A, Chicago, Ill.
At its recent Kansas City convention, the American Legion pledged its support to the United States Citizens’ Servie^ Corps. Among other resolutions, the Legion offered its cooperation to appropriate committees of State and local defense councils for planning and coordinating essential services for children as a result of war-tiipe conditions.
What Your Councils Are Doing
The Wisconsin State Defense Council is promoting the recruitment of 50,000 women volunteers, one for each block in the State to make every home a unit in the war effort. A Block Plan Committee representing every statewide women’s organization has been appointed. Comparable in size and significance to the air raid wardens’ organization, which it will supplement, the block organization will recruit block leaders from women who reside, in the community to which they are assigned.
A statewide plan for employing Negroes (for which the Indiana State Defense Council received an award from the Region 5 OCD office) operates through the Council and the Fair Employment Practices Committee. The United States Employment Service, AFL and CIO cooperate. Local bi-racial committees are formed to survey employment possibilities in their communities, to formulate plans for overcoming prejudices against the hiring of Negro workers and to secure additional work for them. These committees also promote vocational training to qualify Negro workers for available employment. Within a few months several thousand were placed.
Training institutes for their civilian mobilization field representatives are being held by the State defense councils of Ohio, Indiana, and West Virginia. The Indiana Institute included representatives of all State public agencies, who participated in a discussion of agency relationships with defense councils.
A gala National Day pageant, in which the members of 24 nationality groups representing over 100,-000 foreign-born American citizens participated, was sponsored by the Foreign Language Division of the Illinois Council of Defense. The pageant showed significant events in the history of Czech, Dutch, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Yugoslav, Norwegian, Polish, Russian, Slovak, Swedish, and Syrian nationality groups.
A resolution requesting the Governor to appoint an economic planning board to plan the State’s postwar economic readjustment was passed by the Iowa Industrial and Defense Commission (defense council). Emphasis was placed on developing public works to absorb unemployment caused by the closirig of war plants.
Carson City, Nev., now has hospital facilities for victims of accidents who formerly had to be rushed to Reno by ambulance. Thanks to the local civilian defense organization, the old United States Mint has been converted into an emergency hospital. Renovation was done by Ormsby County volunteers who gave time, labor, and material.
Vitamin B complex will be added to the diet of many war workers under a program announced by the Office of War Nutrition Services of the New York State War Coun-cih Where canteens or restaurants are not maintained by an industry, compressed yeast wafers will be served, with the cost of $1 a year per worker borne by employers.
“No, no, Healy—just say, ‘Enemy aircraft sighted’—not ‘here come the dirty so and so’s’!”
Reprinted through courtesy of Esquire Magazine.
, A service reaching every Grand Rapids home is sponsored by the Nutrition Committee of the Kent County, Mich., Defense Council. Home economists will instruct neighborhood groups recruited through the PT A, neighborhood leaders taking information from weekly lectures baqk to their respective localities.
Over 3,000 volunteers, 1,000 of whom are being trained as auxiliary police, have been recruited by the Negro defense organization under the Jacksonville, Fla., Defense Council. A CDVO for Negroes is being set up.
A/$75,000 emergency air raid relief station to be used during the day as a nursery for children whose mothers aye doing war work has been presented to the city of Revere, Mass., by the Revere Racing Association. Equipped with 200 beds, a large dormitory, a diet kitchen, and a modern inhalator, the unit also includes an ambulance which can be driven inside the building.
Some 15 envelopes were scattered throughout the town by the East Providence, R. I., Defense Council to help residents learn what they should do during a raid. Each envelope bore instructions on the outside for the finder to deliver it at once to the nearest air raid warden. Inside the envelopes were cards stating that fortunately this “calling card” dropped from an airplane was make-believe. Wardens reported receipt of the envelopes to the control center.
9 “No longer does one army fight another army, one navy fight another navy, but all of the people, soldiers, sailors, and civilians of a nation at war must fight all the people of the other nation.”—Maj. Gen. Walter K. Wilson, commanding Northern California Sector, Western Defense Command.
•	“I know there must be something I can do. I am 84 years old. . , . My sight is going fast. . . . Do you think I am too old to have my blood given for future use?”—Mrs. Mary S. Dodge, Home for Aged Women, Boston, Mass.
•	“Anything that can create uncertainty or doubt among our people is a powerful weapon for the enemy.”—Col. Lemuel Bolles, Washington, D. C., Civilian Defense.
•	“Everywhere, throughout the United States, the touchstone to the quality of any community performance in civilian defense is the organization and quality of the local defense council.”—Director James M. Landis at Chicago, October 21, 1942.
OCD Press Releases
Christmas Lighting.
This season the OCD discourages the use of elaborate or potentially dangerous types of Christmas decorations and of any extra outdoor lighting in all coastal areas. Reasons: (1) danger of enemy attack (2) materials and electric power are needed elsewhere (3) fire hazard (at a time when any waste is sabotage). Individual homes and stores, however, may decorate provided the lighting used conforms to dimout regulations in the locality and that such lights burn only when the occupants can put them out promptly in event of an air-raid alarm.
Pumps.
All three types of auxiliary fire pumps under the OCD protective equipment program are now in production and deliveries to municipalities have begun. Contracts have been signed for 9,000 trailer pumps, 6,000 skid mounts, and 3,000 front-end pumps. They will be loaned by the OCD to supplement regular fire engines in several hundred communities in target areas, allocation being based on vulnerability, likelihood of attack and need for equipment. In addition, distribution of 2,258,000 hand-operated pump tank extinguishers has begun.
Fire Schools.
A series of regional schools to train Fire Department instructors how to teach the combatting of fires which might result from enemy bombing is now under way. The students—regular Fire Department instructors—will in turn conduct schools under the auspices of State and local governments for other Fire Department instructors. Schools have been conducted at State College, Pennsylvania, Purdue University, and at the Oklahoma Agricultural and Mechanical College. A fourth school may be held later on the West Coast.
Staff Units and First Aid.
The requirement that members of staff units of the Citizens’ Defense Corps have 10 hours of first-aid training has been removed. Nevertheless, air raid wardens, auxiliary police, and auxiliary firemen, decontamination squads, messengers, and members of the drivers’ corps each are still required to have at least 10 hours of first-aid training. Nurses’ aides must not only take the regular first-aid instruction, but the course of 80 hours American Red Cross training given in connection with approved hospitals.
British Give Advice
On Incendiary Bombs
The October Bulletin of the Women’s Voluntary Services for Civil Defence, published in London, summarizes fire bomb instructions as follows:
“Remain calm. Keep your head. Take a second to think. If more than one incendiary bomb has fallen in your house, deal first with the one most likely to cause serious damage. Search the house from the top before, dealing with any incendiary bombs which have fallen outside.
“Bombs falling where they will do no harm should be left to bum themselves out. On no account treat by sandmats, although if you have to pass a bomb burning in the open, do so at the double,' taking the best cover available. The fire, not the bomb, should be attacked with a stirrap pump if one is available. The leader of the stirrap-pump team should tackle the fire with the jet from behind the best available cover. The cover should be substantial, if possible a brick wall (4^ inches is sufficient). When an incendiary bomb penetrates to the ground floor it will then be safer to attack it through a window from the outside in order to get the cover of the wall of the house. Wherever possible the jet should be operated from the prone position in order that the risk of being hit by fragments may be reduced. Where there is no stirrup pump handy or where you have to act alone, throw water through the door in the direction of the bomb. You must take cover just as though you were using the stirrup pump. The water should be thrown from a pint pot, tin can, or a saucepan with a handle to hold it by, filled from a bucket of water. After 1 minutes, or when the bomb has exploded, you should enter the room and extinguish any remaining fire.”
Social Error	,
Dean James M. Landis (was) talking to mayors from cities in 34 States at the American. Municipal Association meeting. ... A lady at the meeting said later: “Oh, I did so love meeting Judge Landis this morning. He looks so much younger than his pi^ures. And isn't it just wonderful how he is able to run all those baseball teams and still take time off to manage civilian defense!"—From the Chicago Sun.