MANNERS & MORALS: Americana, Sep. 1, 1947

Notes on U.S. customs, habits, manners & morals:

¶ U.S. Army headquarters in Rome announced that pregnancy was no longer a reason for marriage. Reasons: 1) too many "undesirable" Italian girls were using it as a means of getting to the altar with a G.I., and thus to the U.S., 2) too many occupation troops were too young to recognize a scheming woman.

¶Some 2,000 Colorado Shriners dressed up like Arabs and went to the Great Sand Dunes National Monument for an induction ceremony. They penetrated the sandy wastes in tractor-drawn wagons, put up a ceremonial tent, ate barbecued buffalo and applauded dancing girls whom they had brought along to undulate on the sands.

¶In Lincoln, Neb., a state commission was all set to unveil a statue of Democrat William Jennings Bryan when Republicans were seized with a sense of esthetics. The statue of the Great Commoner looked "like an abandoned suitcase," critics declared, and was grossly out of proportion to "the powerful, magnificent splendor" of the Capitol's gold-glazed dome. G.O.P. Governor Val Peterson took a middle course. He ruled that the statue could be unveiled Labor Day as scheduled, but might later be moved to a less controversial spot.