Capric Candidate

In a half-dozen little Kansas towns, just before each sundown last week, a great melancholy voice was heard wailing sad cowboy songs through the ochre twilight. Citizens investigating the cause of this portent, successively at Liberal, Coldwater, Salina, Herington, discovered a strange motorcade called "Ammunition Train No. I." The sides of a motor van had been let down to form a speaking platform. Generators supplied current for a battery of lights and enough power to send the cowboy songster's voice twanging out over a quarter-mile radius. Parked nearby was a golden brown, 16-cylinder Cadillac. Kansans whose first guess was that a new medicine show had come to town were not entirely wrong. John Richard ("Goat Gland") Brinkley, 47, nostrum peddler, was stumping every county in the State, conducting his independent gubernatorial campaign.

Candidate Brinkley's show seldom varied. First a preacher from his home town of Mil ford stepped forth to praise the aspirant's piety and generosity. Then other independent office-seekers spoke. Then John Brinkley, preceded by his wife and accompanied by his son "Johnny Boy," made his way to the rostrum. Lights were lowered. Only one bright glow overhead illuminated the soft straw hat, the linen suit, the medical goatee of Candidate Brinkley as he took a seat before his loudspeaker and, widely gesturing, began his speech. The Brinkley platform: free school books, cheaper automobile licenses. The Brinkley pledge: that if he gets in office the State is bound to save money because he belongs to no political machine.

The American Medical Association regards Candidate Brinkley as a dangerous rascal. Back in the days of headphones, rural radio listeners of Kansas and the entire Corn Belt listened attentively to the persuasive Brinkley voice over his station KFKB ("Kansas First, Kansas Best"). Although he has not been permitted to practice medicine in Kansas for the past two years, thousands have had their illnesses diagnosed over the air by Dr. Brinkley, who referred them to certain drug stores where his prescriptions were sold. He also conducted a rejuvenation clinic where he pretended to revive oldsters' potency by the injection of what the A. M. A. has called "some giblet-like mixture of glands." The A. M. A. further claims that Candidate Brinkley has been arrested for bootlegging, indicted in California for medical malpractice, that the license under which he was permitted to practice first in Arkansas, then in Kansas, was gotten through diplomas from a defunct, unrecognized school and a notorious "mill." But the State Attorney General's office was flooded with letters of protest when Dr. Brinkley's license was revoked in 1930. In 1930 the Federal Radio Com- mission refused to renew his license to operate KFKB on the grounds of "obscenity," Dr. Brinkley built a $350,000 station (XER) over the Texas border at Villa Acuna. Mexico. By remote control he is still able to sit in Kansas, "pipe" his voice to Mexico, have it broadcast back again.

Not only does the American Medical Association view Candidate Brinkley with alarm but so do the regular Kansas gubernatorial nominees, Republican Alf M. Landon and Democrat Harry Woodring, who is trying to succeed himself. Both have devoted considerable effort to chocking what appears to be a steadily oncoming Brinkley steamroller. Two years ago Governor Woodring squeezed into office with a majority of 319 votes. John Brinkley, his name not on the ballot, polled close to the leaders with 188,000 votes.

Bearing in mind the example of Iowa's Republican Senatorial nominee, independent Henry ("Himself") Field, both of Kansas' regular gubernatorial candidates are unpleasantly aware of the potency of a freak campaign equipped with a private radio station. Another who dreaded that capric Candidate Brinkley might win was Editor William Allen White of the Emporia Gazette. Fearfully he editorialized:

"Are we going to bow our heads after the election; bow in shame that the intelligent, patriotic people of this State did not have the sense or the courage to avert this disgrace? Shall Kansans be greeted by a gibing baaa, the cry of the billy goat, when they walk the streets of other States?"

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