Bing to Bataan

Bing Crosby got a telegram from the office of the Coordinator of Information (Colonel William J. Donovan): "General MacArthur and Brig. Gen. Akin over private circuit have wired us specifically asking for you to broadcast to the men in the Philippines at Bataan Peninsula" -by short wave--"embracing, if possible, in the script that you hope the boys gallantly fighting are listening. . . . You might, if the policy O.K., the sponsor and agency permit, dedicate one of your songs to the soldiers."

So last Thursday at 9 p.m. the crooner with the deceptively loafing air and unsinkable savvy put on the first request show for the U.S. Front. He walked through it as usual, easing around the Hollywood studio in a blue slack suit, looking, without his movie toupee, like a rapid-fire kewpie. For MacArthur's artillerymen he sang Those Caissons Go Rolling Along--and added "those 155s keep dishing it out."

"Here in the Kraft Music Hall" said Bing, a little short of breath, "we consider ourselves honored to be able to get through to you men in the Philippines with a few tunes, a few wheezes and maybe the gen eral feeling of what's going on here in the States." Madeleine Carroll contributed the sweet (but on Bataan, rather unavailing) information that she was reserving all her dates for service men.

The Crosby find of the season, Danish Comedian Victor Borge, produced some delayed-action gags at the piano. Bing got back in the big American groove with a smoky rendering of Blues in the Night ("From Natchez to Mobile, from Memphis to St. Joe, wherever the four winds blow, etc."). It was a pretty good hour and it worked up to "I Pledge Allegiance to the Flag" sung by Igor Gorin. Transcribed, the whole thing went over on KGEI's short wave next morning early. Most homelike part of the program for MacArthur's men were the Kraft commercials, which the sponsors left unchanged. Sample:

"These are days when good nutrition takes on a new importance. It's downright patriotic to know your vitamin alphabet . . . and to see that your three meals . . . are well balanced. America must be strong --Americans must be strong!"

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