Heroine

French police last week seized four trunks containing 400 Ibs. of heroin and other drugs shipped from Alsace to Paris under seals of the Afghan Legation. The usually immaculate New York Times seized the opportunity to contribute to the anthology of great typographical errors the following subheadline: Police Seized Heroine in Trunks Under Diplomatic Immunity--Amamdlah's Son Suspected.

No Macfaddist

What the New York (porno) Graphic called "an episode of spectacular interest and importance" closed last week. Emile H. Gauvreau, the Graphic's Managing Editor, resigned.

The Graphic explained: "Mr. Gauvreau retires to assure himself of uninterrupted opportunity for an extended rest."

Mr. Gauvreau explained: "It probably won't be long before I'll become editor of another New York newspaper. I hope so, anyway. I have no intention of retiring at the age of 37. I resigned from the Graphic because I disagreed heartily with Mr. Macfadden on vital and essential matters of policies, not only of his newspaper but of his other publications as well. I would never work for Mr. Macfadden again under any circumstances."

Further discourse on what he meant by "vital and essential matters of policies" Mr. Gauvreau would not give. Other newsmen guessed that Editor Gauvreau, a real newspaperman at heart and no Macfaddist, had gotten sick of the daily freak he had created to please Publisher Macfadden. The Graphic, a pink tabloid with the slogan "nothing but the truth," is scarcely newspaper. Torch murders, gang war, divorce cases, scandal, gossip, rumor, crime, are its main contents, dished up for an illiterate public with girl pictures, fan tastic "composographs" and "editorials" by unique Bernarr Macfadden.

As everyone knows, Publisher Bernarr ("Body Love") Macfadden's most famed magazines concern themselves with "confessions" of sex-conscious girls who go wrong, see the light, reform. They are: True Story, True Experiences, True Romances, Dream World. To comply with postal laws, intimate sex details are usually represented by three asterisks (* * *).

Proud as Publisher Macfadden is of his four confessionals, he is most proud of his first brain-child and moneymaker, Physical Culture, which advises seekers of health to go to the gymnasium instead of the doctor, is filled with pictures of full-figured women, brawny near-nuded men with marcelled hair and muscle-bound expressions.*

It was this group of literature that Publisher Macfadden was publishing when Youngman Gauvreau came to him in 1924, asked for a job. While Managing-Editor of The Hartford Courant, Newsman Gauvreau had contributed potboilers to Physical Culture. Publisher Macfadden, about to found the Graphic, hired the Courant's Gauvreau, soon made him Graphic Editor and Publisher.

To succeed Editor Gauvreau is one M. H. Weyrauch, onetime assistant city editor of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, whom Mr. Gauvreau took to the Graphic when it was started.

Press Wireless

Last year, Federal Radio Commission, arbiter in all wireless controversies, thought it had solved a problem. Confronted by many a press demand for the few remaining short-wave-length radio channels not in use, the Commission allocated 20 transcontinental channels for the sole use of newspapers and press associations to transmit news. Under the American Publishers Committee, a number of public utility corporations were to be formed to handle wireless press matter. But the problem was not solved, the Commission soon discovered. Loud were the cries of newspapers and news services charging unequal allotment, curtailment of their radio press facilities, expense of organization.

Federal Radio Commission reconsidered. Month ago, it changed its plans, ordered that one public utility press corporation be formed through which all member news companies might send their news. To the new company would be allocated 30 transoceanic channels immediately, plus 20 transcontinental channels so soon as "need" was shown for them. All newspapers, all press associations could subscribe to the corporation's stock.

Last week, carrying out this Commission order, Press Wireless Inc. was formed, approved by the Commission.! "Charter" members are: Chicago Daily News, Chicago Tribune,* San Francisco Chronicle, Los Angeles Times, Christian Science Monitor. President is the Tribune's Joseph Pierson, trustee for American Publishers Committee. Capitalization was set at $1,000,000, of which $116,000 was paid in. Stock may be purchased by subscribing news-purveyors, minimum $1,000, maximum $25,000. Stockholders are given rights to send news through the ten stations of the company soon to be erected.

Displeased at the Commission's order, at the company's formation, was many a news organ. Representatives of the Gannett chainpapers attended the organization meetings at Washington's Wardman Park Hotel, later declined to participate. "Such a company will not give the service we want," said one of them. Moved to court action was the Hearst-owned Universal Service Wireless, Inc., organized last year following the Commission's first allocation order. Last week it filed notice of appeal in Washington's Court of Appeals asking that the Commission be enjoined from allocating the wavelengths to the new corporation, that the new corporation be enjoined from erecting its transmitting stations. Universal's complaints: 1) It had been given unconditional rights to certain wavelengths last year; 2) The new company would be a "death blow" to U. S. press competition for news.

Big Manhattan dailies--Times, Herald Tribune, World, Sun--with many a news-sending device at their command, last week had not yet signified intent to subscribe nor had the big news services, Associated Press, United Press.

Contempt?

Is it legal for a newspaper editorial to criticize a court order? That question journalists pondered last week. The cause:

Sheriff Edward J. Hanratty threatened to close Thistledown race track, near Cleveland, charging that its "contribution and refund" system was against the law.* Thistledown Owner Edward P. Strong, already under arrest for supposed gambling at his track, appealed to Common Pleas Judge Frederick P. Walther. Judge Walther issued an injunction, restraining Sheriff Hanratty from "interfering" with the system "if the same be not in violation of the law."

The Cleveland Press, Scripps-Howard chainpaper, thereupon editorialized, called it an "and-and-if injunction which is either monstrous or ridiculous ... a bluff." Furthermore, it said: "Walther should know this, if he knows any law at all."

Vexed, Judge Walther issued a petition citing four Executives of the Press for contempt of court, calling the editorial "untrue and false," a "libel." And: "It implies that the acts and order of the court were a farce and an outrage, contrary to law and founded in the fraud, wrong and ignorance of said Judge." Cited were: Editor Louis B. Seltzer, Chief Editorial Writer Carlton K. Matson, Business Manager J. G. Meilink, Circulation Manager Joseph A. Finster.

* Other Macfadden publications: True Detective Mysteries, Your Home, The Dance, Ghost Stories, True Strange Stories, The World's Greatest Stories, Flying Stories, Boy Builder, Talcs of Danger & Daring, Automotive Daily News, New York Investment News, Philadelphia Daily News, Detroit Daily Illustrated, the recently acquired New Haven Times-Union.

/-Three of the five Commissioners were needed for approval. Only two were in hot Washington last week. A third, Chairman Ira Ellsworth Robinson, was called on the long distance telephone at his home in Harbour County, West Virginia. He voted "aye."

* A system used as a subterfuge in states where race-betting is illegal. Betters supposedly "contribute" to the winner's purse--get a "re-fund" if their horse wins. If their horse loses they, of course, get no "refund."