TIIE NOME NUGGET
Published Monday, Wednesday, Friday, by The Nome
Publishing Company, Nome, Alaska.
Telephone Main 114 P. O. Box 518
Subscription Rates Payable In Advance
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By mail, postage paid, outside of Nome & vicinity, SI.50 per month.
Entered in the Post Office in Nome as 2nd Class Matter
MEMBER OF ASSOCIATED PRESS
Federal Grip On
Supplies Tightenes
By W. H. LAWRENCE
WASHINGTON — President
Roosevelt filled what has been
regarded generally here as a
long-felt need for centralized
planning when he established a
Supply Priorities and Allocation;
Board. This “Supreme Court of
the American Economy’’ has the
task of reconciling the maximum
demands of all-out military pre
paredness and defense aid pro
grams, and the minimum require
ments for keeping the civilian
economy functioning on an even
keel.
Upon SPAB was placed the re
sponsibility for sizing up the to
tal supply picture, considering
not only what d mestic sources
now produce but the advisability
of expanding them for future in
creased production. It must look
for means of further coordinat
ing the supplies and facilities of
the United States and Canada,
and it must try to increase im
ports of important raw material .
No Easy Road for Board
This is a tough job, and the
men who handle it will not be
popular in the next few months,
because the closed doors of civ
ilian factories—figuratively bear
ing the sign “Closed by Order of
the OPM’’ — and the expected
temporary unemployment of as
many as 2,000,000 civilian goods
workers vvi 1 create a certain
amount of unrest.
At SPAB's head the President
put Vice President Henry A. Wal
lace, and the difficulties of the
task confronting him serve as a
partial answer, at least, to those
who ascribe political motives to
every move and who think that
the President is placing Mr. Wal
lace in the limelight with the
1944 Presidential election in
mind. But those who see politics
in it can assert easily that if Mr.
Wallace can do this job. and do it
Well, he will go into the 1941
Presidential race with enormous
prestige, and the good-will of
bu ines.smen and workers.
Mr. Wallace has a board of
thoroughly cosmopolitan charac
ter, including a representative
from industry, William S. Knud
sen, OPM Director General and
former head of General Motors
Corporation; a labor leader,
Sidney Hillman, OPM Associate
Director General; the Secretary
of War, Henry L. Stimson; the
Secretary of the Navy, Frank
Knox; Leon Henderson, Federal
Price Administrator and OPM
Civilian Allocations Director,
and Harry L. Hopkins, special as
sistant to President Roosevelt
and supervisor of the defense-aid
programs.
Nelson Is Key Man
Key man in the new organiza
tion is Donald M. Nelson, a busi
ness man who is popular with
the New Dealers. He is to be ex
ecutive director of the board,
will preside in the Vice Presi
dent’s absence, and will carry
put its decisions as OPM prior
ities director, succeeding Edward
R. Stettinius Jr., who moved in
to Harry L. Hopkins’s old job of
Lease-Lend Admiinstrator, while
Mr. Hopkons took on the general
supervision of all defense-aid.
John D. Biggers stepped out as
director of the OPM Production
Division, to fill a Presidential
assignment as American Minister
to London in charge of synchron
izing British and American pro
duction for defense.
The move was pleasing to both
New Dealers and business men,
although it established for the
first time since the defense pro
gram was set up a board in
■which the New Dealers were
dominant four to three with Mr.
Wallace, Mr. Henderson, Mr.
Hillman and Mr. Hopkins able to
outvote the other three.
I
This brought from R preserva
tive Eugene Cox, anti-Ncw Deal
Democrat of Georgia, the angry
declaration that SPAB’s creation
was “tragic-’ since it was design
ed “to tie the hands of Knudsen
and make a flunky out of Stet
tinius.’’ But Mr. Knudsen
thought htat the effecj of the
new agency on the defense pro
gram would be good, and Mr.
Stettinius was most pleased with
his new assignment.
Of prime importance to Mr.
Knudsen and to other defense of
ficials was the fact that the new
agency promised an end to fac
tional feuding between defense
agencies, a cessation of jurisdic
tional strife which has damag
ed morale, confused business,
and slowed up defense.
OPM and OPACS at Odds j
The best example of these con
flicts was the quarrel between
the Office of Production Manage-,
merit and Mr. Henderson’s old
Oflice of Price Administration
and Civilian Supply over the ex
tent and speed with which auto
mobile production would be cur
tailed to free men, matcria's,
managerial skill and plant facil
ities for armament making.
Mr. Knud - m, as former head
of General Motors, quietly call
ed a group of his old colleagues
in the automobile industry to a
meeting early in April and ob
tained from them an agreement!
for an “initial” cut in production,
of 20 percent under the 1940i 1
level, effective Aug. 1.
In a few weeks it became ap
parent that this cut was not
enough. Both the Army and
Navy asked for greater cuts, but
Mr. Knudsen gave no outward in I
dilation that any further reduc
tion was planned immediately.
Mr. Henderson, exercising his
civilian al ocatian powers, step-;
ped out with a “tentative” or-1
der that production for the 1942,
model year, which began Aug. 1,;
be cut 50 percent, with the pro-;
duction rate in August Septem-!
ber and October to be about 80
percent of last year's levels and j
from then on to be only 50 per
cent or less.
There was at.once a quarrel!
which raged publicly and private
!y and was carried to the Presi
dents de-k for a showdown. Each 1
agency asserted its right to de-1
c!de the size of the automobile I
cut.
The quarrel continued into
August. The automobile makers
did not know which agency’s in
structions to follow.
Sharp Rise in Auto Schedules
The automobile manufacturers
in August ’ apparently forgot
their agreement with Mr. Knud
sen to cut down production 20
per cent to save materials, for
the official estimates of August
automobile production offered
by Mr. Knudsen were 109,000, an
increase of 51,000 over the same
month last year.
In other words instead of re
ducing production 20 per cent
the automobile companies in
creased their output by 88 per
cent, and thereby consumed
great quantities of steel, copper,
aluminum and other metals need
ed for defense. Of course, now
that OPM and OPACS have ag
reed upon a 26.6 percent cut for
the four-month period, the auto
mobile companies will be requir
ed to reduce their operations to
a greater extent in September,
October and November than
would have been necqssary if
they had accepted the 20 percent
cut agreed upon with Mr. Knud
sen earlier.
But the incident has had an im
portant effect. It more than any
other single thing was respon
sible for the creation of SPAB.
Newspaper advertising
ivill develop new business
for you.
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DEFENSE ALPHABET SOUP
For eight years, the country
has struggled to master the New
Deal's alphabet soup. And now
just as most people had become
accu-tomod to SEC. FHA, KERB
ard AAA. along comes a new
and advanced lesson in the alpha
bet—OPM, OEM, OPACS. And
the last is the worst of all.
Not one person in a thousand
in Washington can toil you what
those five letters stand for. They
call it “O Packs” and let it go
ai that. Actually OPACS stands
for Office of Price Administra
tion and Civilian Supply.
So to help the struggling stu
dent of the new defense alpha
bet, here is a primer in the de
fense agencies:
The defense commission which
was set up in May of last year is
now an empty shell. Reorganiza
tion has left it merely a name.
The major defense agency is now
the “OEM,” or Office for Emer
gency Management.
Under the OEM are six impor
tant agencies, of which the most
important is the CPM (Office of
Production Management).
Next in importance under OEM
is OPACS, headed by Leon Hen
derson. Created only a few
weeks ago, this price regulating
agency has been on the front
pages ever since.
The other four agencies under
OEM are the National Defense
Mediation Board, the Division of
Housing Coordination, the Office
of Civilian Defense (LaGuradia)
and the Office of Coordination of
Commercial and Cultural Rela
tion Between the American Re
publics (Rockefeller).
The last one has such an un
wieldy title it has come to be
known simply as the Rockefeller
Office. Nobody knows quite why
this office is part of the defense
setup.
For a complete picture, you
have to go one step further and
break down the OPM into four
divisions — Production under
John Biggers, Priorities under
Edward Stettinius, Purchases un
der Donald Nelson, and Labor
under Sidney Hillman.
This takes care of everybody
except one big man Williaifi
Knudsen. His name belongs high
on the chart, for he and Hillman
run the OPM. But high as he is,
if you want to embarrass him,
ask him to give you a complete
description of the structural set
up of the defense agencies.
•
WHITTIER, NEW
ALASKA LUMINARY
Draw a big red circle around
the word “Whittier,” on the map
of Alaska, at the newly d^’tgnat
ed spot for the future southern
terminus of the Alaska Railroad.
The secretary of the interior
has decreed it. Whittier will be
the name of the new port. If plans
of Ickcs et al. carry on per sched
ule, Whittier within a year or so
will be the big transfer point of
traffic between ocean and rail]
lines serving Interior Alaska.
And that traffic promises to be
come heavier making Whittier
permanently conspicious in fu
ture Alaska activities.
Suggested by proximity to
Whittier Glacier, named after
the beloved American poet, the
town of Whittier, if it endures
like the writings of its namesake
long will be a bright luminary to
the country.
But that is not to say that Whit
tier will deprive Seward, Alaska
—named after another great Am
erican—of its luster. It is gratify
ing to Alaskans to know that the
town on Resurrection Bay is car
rying on strong, more blessed
with activities today than for
many a year. Defense and other
activities have brought new life
to Seward and the promise it
will not vanish from the map,
but also become a base of vast
importance in the development
of the marvelously resourceful
Kenai peninsula and the vital
I strategic region of western Al
aska.
Now that the powers that be at
Washignton have seen fit to give
a fitting title to the new Alaskan
town, may they also find time to
go another step and eliminate
the multiple names designating
various Alaskan towns and phys
| ical features.
The Moose creeks, Caribou
! creeks, Sawmill bays, Willow
creeks, Eldorado creeks—one or
more in every portion of the vast
territory—are a constant aggra
vation. Many complaints are
heard of mail for the places go
ing awry, being sent to the
wrong place. Why continue the
endless aggravation and the an
cient abuse.
There’s plenty of names emi
nent in American history — or
beautiful Indian names—deserv
ing of perpetuation on the map
of Alaska. Let’s have them.
— Fairbanks News-Miner
PASSENGERS AND EXPRESS TO *
ALL PARTS OF ALASKA i
!
i Approximately One Dollar of Each Fare
Is Spent for Passenger Insurance
; WIEN ALASKA AIRLINES
I NOME FAIRBANKS
Irving McK. Reed
MINERAL SURVEYOR, G. L. O.
Surveying for Patent
Office on Second Street, back of Polets
Will be in town until about October 15
RAINBOW SKYWAYS
Flying Instruction . . . Piper Aircraft Dealer
LEARN TO FLY
Farthest West Flying School
Eight-hour Dual Instruction Flight Course—$105
See: FRANK WHALEY, Certified Instructor
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