St. Louis Post-Dispatch from St. Louis, Missouri • Page 13

rz rn Published Lvk Oa.v Week-dw JTindq- in the SILQUiSPflST-DISPATCH PART TWO ST. LOUIS, SATURDAY, JULY 15, 1950 PAGES 1 4B rv EAST SIDE REFINERY BLAZE Bridge Blasting-ln Peace and War Radio in Review The Fun's Gone for 'Femme Fatale1 Type By John Crosby NEW YORK, July 15. I THINK I detect the distant rumbling of a small trend in adventure stuff. The girls art- be ginning to get Into the act and the possibilities, as any fool can plainly see, are limitless. C.B.S.

CIS i -1 T5 Ay- 'Mi 11.1 -M i television is trying out a new series called "The Detective's Wife," in which the emphasis, as the title states, is clearly on the feminine side of the household. And on N.B.C. you'll find "Top Secret" with Ilona Massey going through hell and high water on behalf of the" Allies in the last war. I haven't caught "The Detective's Wife," but I'm growing very fond of "Top Secret" ILONA MASSEY WITS COUNT NOW. -f (on KSD at 9:30 p.m.

Mondays). Miss Massey, a bundle of blonde allure 0 'j 1 1 A with a Hungarian accent, is cast in the role of a spy of the femme fatale type which has not been seen in these parts since "Three Faces East." Of course, things have changed a good deal in the femme fatale racket since I was a boy. Back in those days, the girls used to wrest most of the enemies' secrets from them in the boudoir, exercising their feminine equipment in the traditional way. NOWADAYS, IF Miss Massey is any criterion, a girl's looks Just get in the way. In "Top Secret." Miss Massey, who plays the part of Baroness Karen Something-Or-Other, is forced to employ her wits rather than her face; her arms are used to slug it out with the German espionage agents rather than for embraces, and her legs come in handy for that good old-fashioned, though not very romantic, purpose of running as fast as possible from the Gestapo.

All the fun is gone out of the femme fatale business. It's just plain hard work. And dangerous, too. Dynamite ripping out the center span of an old high level bridge between Akron and Cuyahoga, in a spectacular blast yesterday. A flying chunk of concrete injured a spectator, Clarence Bartlett, 30 years old, as he took snapshots a quarter of a mile away.

The old bridge is seen through the arch of its replacement, built a year ago across a ravine of the Cuyahoga river. i i a. WW? AS A PRELIMINARY to several of her recent adventures. Miss Massey wormed her way into the Hermann Goering household as personal maid to Frau Goering. The use of real names in adventure series is a new one on me.

The program portrays Frau Goering as a querulous, decidedly unpleasant lady, and Hermann as a stupid, though sinister, lout. (Hermann was a lot of things, but he wasn't tupid.) During her stay with the Goerings, Miss Massey succeeded in plugging a leak in Allied intelligence In Tangiers, personally bumping off the Nazi counterspy with a monkey-wrench, and In discovering the plans and dates of A-day when the Germans planned to invade England. (That stopped the invasion cold.) That last adventure cost her her job with the Goerings, which seemed rather a pity. I had begun to enjoy the Goerings as comedy characters. Hermann, for example, blew in one morning with the Mona Lisa as an anniversary present for his wife.

Frau Goering was furious. Said she wanted a sable coat instead. Flames sweeping giant cracking unit at the Wood River Oil Refinery at Hartford, on the East Side, Just after a violent explosion last night. No one was injured, although the blast was felt four miles away and a red glow was visible from a distance of 30 miles. The blaze, resulting from a break in an oil vapor line, was quickly controlled.

The plant was acquired two weeks ago by the Sinclair Refining Co. Bypo-Diptchstff rbrtMp.vr. 1 4 Mi II 1- -4 wi- She was right, too. The Mona Lisa turned out to be a fake. THOUGH SHE IS described as a woman of surpassing beauty, Miss Massey gets belted around almost as much as Sam Spade.

In the last one, her leg was broken. Later, the cast was broken eff her still-unhealed leg with a cane, an excruciating operation designed to save her from even worse torments at the hands of the Gestapo. She tood up under it nobly. Next week, I'm told, he's off to Rome, where she'll probably turn up as Mussolini's private secretary, beautiful as ever, though conceivably limping a bit. Still, if you can overlook the essential malarkey, "Top Secret" is pretty good thriller stuff, tightly and competently written by Harry Junkin, and very well produced.

My only objection to Miss Massey and her Hungarian accent is that, in moments of great stress, she sounds more like Peter Lorre than a beautiful blonde spy. This difficulty would be erased if they just put Miss Massey on television. Unless my instinct for trends has gone hopelessly to pot. Miss Massey, or someone very much like her, will be on television eventually. It as they say in the trade can't miss.

9 In far-off Korea, United States Army demolition squads go Into action for another reason, blasting the last bridge across the Kum driver in their retreat before North Korean Communists. Dynamiting of spans across the shallow Kum Jias failed to check the enemy, which swept across in strength in savage fighting. rar -I. 4 7 Try and Stop Me f- jh -r' (3 CELEBRATING BASTILLE DAY Officers of La Soc'ete Francaise de St. Louis and guests join In a toast at a dinner dance marking Bastille day, held at the Edgewater Club, 5500 South Broadway, last night.

From left: Mrs. Robert Give Roach, wife of the club president: Charles W. Godefroy, honorary consul for Belgium; Gustave V. Grevenig, St. Louis University; Mrs.

Yvette Huggett, society secretary; Roach; Mexican Consul Luis" Cejudo and Mrs. Cejudo; C. A. Feld, vice president, and Mrs. Josephine Bureau, treasurer.

On stage Is Miss Jean Schmitr, 56IA Skinker boulevard, who sang the Marseillaise. i pott-rit(ch stff phorpir. By Bennett Cerf AT one end of Billy Rose's residence in Mount Kisco there is a rumpus room a modest structure barely larger than the arena of Madison Square Garden and the most conspicuous -object In the room is a- huge wheel of chance, one of those affairs decorated with strips of mirror and glass beads, with iron pegs around the perimeter, and a leather thong that slows up the wheel's motion and finally stops it at one of 71 dumber combinations printed between the pegs. Mr. Rose's particular wheel of chance won honorable retirement at the Fort Worth Exposition, where hundreds of thousands of eager Texans produced thin dimes the tenth part of a dollar for chances to win boxes of bacon.

"The odds against them," said Billy with a reminiscent gleam, "were Tl to one, and since the prize boxes of bacon for which they competed cost me 10 cents apiece, they virtually were playing that 70-to-l chance to get their money back." "The scheme sounds reasonably safe." I said. "Yes," agreed Billy, patting the wheel fondly, "it was almost as good as the slot machines. But the machines spun faster, and there were more of them. In fact, they were all over the park. I'll never forget the day one sucker hit the jackpot" "Were the authorities surprised?" I asked.

"I think so," said Billy. "They called out tht Texas Bangers." aTlrflr- rf i- American G.l.s manning defense positions along a 'levee on the south bank of the Kum. river here is 200 yards wide. The invaders suffered heavy casualties in breaching the river lire and several crossing attempts were turned back. .11 I 1 .1.1.1.., Ijlll lllll, III I MILL I.

I. I. if ADVERTISEMENT nimrtr, IN Andhcwllow Ab that FALSTAFF BEEK! tJf i 'rzZM i a Rrfl3.vor,nothmg'eJst will do. jtsmwzJwuiatumr.tcof f4 1 1 Pitr: POLICE SUGGESTION BOX Patrolman George KeSm of the Central District drops an envelope in a "suggestion box" of the type' that "is beinq installed in ell Police Deparhrent offices. The Beard of Police Commissioners said it was hoped that increased efficiency will result from the program and that a numbering plan to preserve the anonymity cf these making suggestions has been worked out.

Fat-DliMicft Buff notaensbw. An American crew chief ed his assistants check-a Boeing B-29 Superfortress en Its return to a Twentieth Air Force base in the Far East after a mission egsinst tre North Korean invaders. In foreground 5C0-pcun bembs ewaifirg celrvery to Red targets. matt tutmt torn 4 2..