Los Angeles
When Henry Davis Jr., 24, died at Georgia Street Receiving Hospital yesterday, it seemed from his deathbed remarks that he’d been shot for having an empty wallet, after a trigger-happy pair of robbers hadn’t bothered to look for cash in his pockets.
But when a Mrs. Henry Davis Jr. called the hospital asking about her husband, who had just expired, police became suspicious. If Davis had been kidnapped, robbed and dumped at the hospital, how would the wife have the slightest idea where he was?
Det. Sgts. L.O. Burton and J.G. Cotch had a talk with Mrs. Davis at her home at 2228 E. 98th Street, and soon learned that Ervie Smith, 21, of 9697 E. 98th Street had informed her that after holding up some gamblers for $700 in Santa Monica, Henry shot himself in the gut while putting his gun away. As a dying thanks to his partner for not stripping his pockets, Henry came up with the robbery story… and he would have gotten away with it, too, if it wasn’t for his meddling wife (who, presumably, will not be getting the $250 Henry died with).
At royal weddings in these crowded ways,
This air has trembled to the iron tongue;
The same hope stirs as in those yesterdays.
Only, today, beside the human hope
That two young lovers, taking hand in hand,
May tread the dark in which we mortals grope
The surer for two hearts that understand.
Beside that hope, mankind, in its distress,
Turns to the crown today as something fair,
Something divinely bright for men to bless,
A gleam, a star, to point men from despair.
An order and a beauty from of old,
Set by virtue above greed and hate,
A loveliness of living crowned with gold
In all life’s storm a standard to the State;
To such a crown all broken spirits turn;
And we, who see this young face passing by,
See her as symbol of a power eterne,
And pray that heaven bless her till she die.
British Poet Laureate John Masefield on the marriage of Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip.
Quote of the day: “Don’t keep fooling around with race cars, nightclubs and continue wasting your life.â€Â
Judge Roy V. Rhodes, lecturing Joel Thorne, who sneaked out of Cedars of Lebanon Hospital after being badly injured in a motorcycle crash to avoid paying his alimony to his ex-wife.
Thorne apparently ignored the warning and on Oct. 17, 1955, the millionaire playboy race-car driver plunged his Beachcraft Bonanza into an apartment building at 11948 Magnolia in North Hollywood, where a baptismal party was underway for Sheryll Camiel Preston, who was 7 weeks old. Thorne and eight other people were killed in the crash and fire from the flaming wreckage. Investigators said he had 90 arrests for traffic violations and got driver’s licenses in Arizona and Michigan after his California and Nevada driver’s licenses were revoked. What was left of him was further cremated and his ashes were buried at Woodlawn Cemetery in New York.
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