Word: menckenisms
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Henry Louis Mencken, the veteran volcano from Baltimore, had a wonderful time at the Wallace convention (see PRESS), and nearly became the subject of a resolution. Maryland Wallaceites wanted the convention to censure him for his reporting in the Baltimore Sun ("Whereas he has resorted to un-American slander against the people of this convention . . ."). But the chair refused the motion on the ground that it would start a flood of others. Other Menckenisms filed to the Sun (on Henry Wallace): "If ... he suddenly sprouts wings and begins flapping about the hall, no one will be surprised"; (on Vice Presidential...
...Stooge? Pegler sat down. All the correspondents had agreed to ask only one question apiece. To three others who also put the Gurusome question Wallace snapped: "I never engage in a discussion with a stooge of Westbrook Pegler." Finally a watery-eyed oldster got up. "My name is Mencken, H. L.," he announced. "Will you call me a stooge of Pegler...
John Reed, who later became a Soviet saint, rides on a raid with Pancho Villa (1914) and turns in a story that is half good fast Western, half a discussion of human liberty. In the same manner, H. L. Mencken ignores most of the who, what & when of the courtroom testimony in the Scopes evolution trial (1925) and tells the why of the trial in the mores of the backward, superstition-ridden hill folks...
Many newsmen lifted some of their stories directly from the telescreen (see PRESS) without bothering to stir from the press lounge. After a few minutes at Convention Hall, Correspondent H. L. Mencken wrote: "I began to wilt and go blind, so the rest of my observations had to be made from a distance and through a brown beer bottle." Television showed just about everything that could be seen in Philadelphia, and a lot more than any one man could see on his own. (Example: a LIFE-NBC televiewer could watch Dewey arriving at Convention Hall, leaving the Hall, arriving...
...Henry L. Mencken was very nearly a dead issue, in Baltimore. The daughter of his colored cook fatally stabbed her mother with-an ice pick and then set out for the Menckens'. Presently Mencken's brother August looked out his window and saw the daughter approaching, a bottle in each hand; he talked to her through,, the window, at the same time dialed police, who came on the double, nabbed her, and packed her off to a sanitarium. Mencken slept through everything...