"TIME brings all things"

Cannibal

When Fisherman Eli Kelly drifted to the beach of Santa Catalina Island (TIME, Jan. 3) with the half-eaten body of his partner, James McKinley, in the stern-sheets of his yawl, a coroner's jury began to investigate. Cannibal Kelly, his clothes hanging in folds on his body (he had shrunk from 210 to 120 pounds), last week gave details. The yawl had been a life boat on board the yacht of Novelist Zane Grey. They had food and drink for 24 hours. On the first day after the storm that crippled them, Fisherman McKinley drank all but a pint of the water in a gallon jar. On the third day he began to drink salt water, went mad, was twice washed overboard. Mr. Kelly pulled him back. On the fourth day they made a compact that the man who died first should give his flesh to the other. In the little cabin of the yawl the two huge, gaunt, enfeebled and delirious men shook hands on it. "Yes," said Mr. Kelly, "I carried out our agreement. . . ." The jury absolved him of all blame.

Twig

Near Napa, Calif., one Paul Phelan and one Kenneth Reynolds, University of California students, hunted together through heavy underbrush on a mountainside.

Student Phelan cried out with pain, clawed at his throat, struggled for breath. A manzanita twig had pierced his gullet, breaking off short under the skin. Unable to extract the twig with his fingers, Mr. Reynolds forced his strangling, frenzied friend to the ground, pinioned him, bit into his throat, pulled out the twig with his teeth, lugged him miles to a ranch.

Bone

At Uniontown, Pa., three-year-old Betty Coughanour's eyes popped; her face flamed apoplectically; her mouth gaped. She was choking to death. A bone from a turkey dinner had stuck in her throat. Her father saved her life, for on the dash to the hospital he, frantic, ran the family motor car into another machine. Betty Coughanour, thrown from her seat, coughed up the bone.

Hands

One Redmond Rogers of Middletown, N. Y., obliged a press photographer by holding his palms, lumpy with callouses, in front of the camera; soon saw his picture in newspapers accompanied by a statement that he is never burned while handling red hot metal in a factory without tongs, gloves or other protection. Kitchen workers capable of delving in boiling suds without gloves or pain understood.

Leg

At Waterloo, Iowa, one Mrs. Marlow Tharp found that her wooden leg did not fit becomingly. She refused to pay the salesman, whereupon he boldly unstrapped the leg from her body and ran. Petulant, frustrated, she wept, called the police.

Shock

In Denver, Col., Mr. and Mrs. J. W. Cox lay in bed. Mr. Cox was snoring. Mrs. Cox woke up. She nudged her husband sharply. "Stop snoring," she said. Instantly, he stopped snoring. The two lay side by side in silence. Mrs. Cox did not sleep again. She could not hear the breathing of Mr. Cox, and the absence of this familiar sound alarmed her. She wished that he would snore. She nudged him. "Snore," she said. Mr. Cox made no reply. ... A police surgeon, answering her frantic telephone call, pronounced him dead of heart failure.

Kefter

At White Plains, N. Y., one Richard Kefter loaded his automobile last week with apples and hay. He started. A deer bolted from the woods, gave chase. Retarded by snow Mr. Kefter could not distance the beast, was chased for five miles. At last he threw out five apples and an armful of hay. The deer stopped, content.

Bletch

In Manhattan, hapless Jeremiah Bletch dropped the $5 gold piece, office Christmas gift, that he was telephoning Mrs. Bletch about, into the pay station box. Mrs. Bletch grieved.*

Dobbin

In Philadelphia, one George F. Dobbin, contractor, was told by a maid that two gentlemen wished to see him on business. Going to the front door he faced two pistols. The gentlemen told him not to make a noise. While they were going through his pockets Contractor Dobbin's baby toddled into the vestibule. Mr. Dobbin told the baby to go upsairs. "Then," says Mr. Dobbin, "in order not to alarm my wife, I told the men to talk about business. The smaller of the two, who seemed to have a pretty good education, said:

'Well, Mr. Dobbin, are the papers on that job ready yet?'

"I replied very audibly, 'They're coming along.'

"While carrying on the conversation, they took three wallets, $75 in money, my watch and a signet ring."

Soak

In Milwaukee, Drs. J. L. Yates and William Thalhimer made use of an old soak who had pernicious anemia. He was 65, had wretched teeth and would get drunk between blood transfusions. Altogether he received 52 litres (54.95 quarts) of blood. Some of it was fresh from the donors; some had been kept in cold storage; some was modified, some unmodified. The man soaked up anything the doctors thought good for him. When he died he was living on blood three-fourths of which was not his own and had undergone 113 transfusions. "No other patient has received, so far as is known, the number of transfusions here recorded," commented the doctors in their report to the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Slime

At Geneva, Switzerland, Bacteriologist Henry Spahlinger heard a sudden explosion and felt himself splashed with slime. The container in which he was culturing virulent tuberculosis germs had burst. Knowing well the danger of infection the scientist stripped off his clothes and for two hours scrubbed his equipment and laboratory with germ-killing lysol. What germs he had involuntarily inhaled he hoped would die off be fore they could harm him.

*Honest money counters of the New York Telephone Co. found 68 more gold pieces in the Christmas collections brought them, in sealed boxes, from pay station booths.