Word: kestler
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...ramrod-stiff soldier-Lieut. General John C. H. ("Courthouse") Lee -it was a rank case of insubordination. Last week, to show the Rome Stars and Stripes who was boss, he up & fired its publications officer, 35-year-old Major Hal Kestler. No Army regular but a country editor who had worked up from buck private, Major Kestler had talked back when the General called for censorship on the paper's. "Mail Call" column. And he had put his foot right in it by going over Lee's head to protest to Washington...
When they heard about his dismissal, Kestler's entire staff (51 enlisted men, three officers) forthwith entered requests for transfer. To correspondents, Kestler poured out a bitter account of Lee's heavy-handed interference with G.I. journalism. The General's attitude toward enlisted men, said he, was like that "of an old Southern plantation owner toward his slaves...
...situation called for a court-martial -or a mediator. At week's end, a peacemaker stepped in. Lieut. Colonel A. Delbert Clark, Mediterranean theater public-relations officer and a former New York Timesman, became "senior officer" of Stars and Stripes. The censorship was called off, Major Kestler would stay. Colonel Clark promised that the newspaper would operate "in consonance with the highest standards of American journalism and the Army. . . ." Whether their war with the brass was over or not, staffers figured they had won a skirmish...