Category: Kim Cooper

October 19, 1947
Los Angeles

Emboldened by the attentions of fellow bus riders and the media, Chuck Harader (see yesterday’s post) displayed a photograph which he said depicted the mysterious Susan, object of his affections.

But the photo was soon identified as being that of Lynn Allen, radio actress (and ex-Marine) of 802 S. Norton Ave. She expressed bewilderment at how Harader got her photo, but wished the romantic fool luck in his quest.

When taken off the bus to be introduced to Miss Allen by journalists, Harader broke down and cried “That’s not Susan!” Well, she never claimed she was.

Harader, who is giving up his quest after six days riding the Vermont Avenue bus, says Susan knows where he lives should she wish to see him.

October 18, 1947
Los Angeles

For the past five days, ten hours at a stretch, Chuck Harader, 28, pianist/composer of 2208 Cahuenga Street, has been riding a Vermont Avenue bus, trying to match female riders to his ideal, a gal called Susan Simpson who, he says, he “dated” last summer on numerous evening bus trips into Griffith Park. She never told him where she lived or let him escort her off the conveyance, but he adores her all the same.

She’s even sent him letters, asking him to meet her at their usual place (that would be the Monroe St. bus stop just south of City College), and later asking why he had failed to make the date, and suggesting a mysterious “Steve” would be incensed by her actions. He must have missed her when he got off the bus to grab a bite. He won’t make that mistake again. And so Chuck rides, with his weekly pass, sandwiches and coffee thermos by his side, ready to protect his lady… if he can just find her again.

October 17, 1947
Los Angeles

Sitting in Edward R. Brand’s Superior Courtroom, movie actor/ boilermaker Gerald D. O’Neill, 50, heard his sentence of 10 to 20 years read.

There was no wife there to comfort him–not Mrs. Stella Frank O’Neill (720 S. Bonnie Brae, wedding date 2/7/42), nor any of his subsequent bigamous brides: Mrs. Margaret Beeler Williams (156 Coolidge Ave.), Mrs. Julia Twitchell (826 W. 49th St), Mrs. Anna Gwendolyn Ashley (221. Columbia Street).

Even his special lady friend and financier of his legal expenses, Mrs. Myrtle Riley (4532 Willowbrook Ave., “the sweetest girl in all the world”), sat out the special day.

Attorney Richard Erwin intends to appeal. As for O’Neill, let’s hope he stays out of the dance halls, which it seems he can’t visit without proposing marriage.

October 16, 1947
Compton

Mayo Elementary School nutrition supervisor Helen Peal of 1316 N. Edgemont Street and butcher J. Berman, whose shop is at 1006 Monroe Street, Hymes, are facing misdemeanor charges after school cook Ruth Mills blew the whistle on them.

Seems Berman delivered 25 pounds of foul-smelling hamburger to the school cafeteria, and when Mills told Peal that she thought it was spoiled, Peal advised she spice it up good and serve it to the children.

The city health department seized the meat before anyone ate it.

October 14, 1947
San Fernando Valley

Lester Henry has been losing beehives and honey during the night, so he called in two Glendale hunters, Jim Stevenson and H.A. Mathieson, along with six of their hounds. The dogs swiftly treed a six-foot bear about 100 yards from the intersection of Balboa Blvd. and Rinaldi Street. The men used bows and arrows to drop their quarry.

The bear, estimated to have been 14 years old, is the first seen in the area in several years, and is believed to have come into the valley from the Wilson Ranch.

October 13, 1947
Salt Lake City

The three boys from Altadena just planned to see their lady friend off at the Pasadena bus terminal for a trip to Philly. But as the bus pulled out of the station, they jumped back into their coupe and sped after it, waving (one assumes less frantically as the hours passed). When the bus alit in Las Vegas, they called home asking that cash be wired to Salt Lake.

But instead of money, it was the Man who awaited the romantic fools. The cops held the youths until their parents could collect them, while the lady’s bus, freed of its gallant shadow, sped off for the East.

October 12, 1947
Hollywood

Mrs. and Mrs. Leonard Wood of 416 N. Avenue 57 were shocked last night by the violent chiding given by Sheppard W. King III, 22, to his 2-year-old son and namesake.

The male Kings, of 1811 N. Whitley Ave., had sat separately from the boy’s mother inside the lobby of the Pantages Theater because of crowding. When the baby talked during the show, the Woods allege, his father took him into the lobby and hit him multiple times in the face, causing blood to spurt from the child’s nose. The Woods then followed the young family home, and called police to report the abuse.

Sheppard Senior was booked into Hollywood Jail, where he denies striking the child with undue force. Sheppard Junior, meanwhile, was treated at Georgia Street Receiving Hospital for two black eyes, facial and cranial bruises, and a cut lip, before being returned to his mother’s care.

(I will leave it to our staff detective, Larry Harnisch, to tell us if this is the same Shep King III who–under the monicker Abdullah and described as a Texas playboy–was divorced by world renowned belly dancer Samia Gamal in 1953 under mysterious charges of ill-treatment.)

October 11. 1947
Los Angeles

For the second time in two weeks, pint-sized miscreant Thomas George Redhead, 14, has busted out of Juvenile Hall. This time the boy, whose initial offense was stealing a Pacific Electric bus, which he drove to San Diego, shimmied up to the second story of the detention center and dropped more than 16 feet to make a fresh escape. I guess it’s true what they say about Redheads…

October 9, 1947
Huntington Park

Soon after the employees of the cooperatively-owned women’s fashion workshop Glamour Gauge Manufacturing Co, 2514 E. Gage Ave., voted not to join the A.F.L. International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union, the threats began. Ventura Fashions of California, for which Glamour Gauge makes clothing, complained to Superior Court last week that a union agent had threatened to destroy their business, possibly with bloodshed.

But it was by stink-]shed that the attack came, by way of a half-brick tied to a fruit jar packed with noxious acids, hurled through Glamour Gauge’s transom last night. The smell was so foul that the adjacent market, novelty shop and typewriter shop were rendered unfit for use, and passersby on the sidewalk also held their noses and ran. Police and the D.A.’s office are investigating.