Fix Is the Word

Soon after the two dailies in Portland, Ore. started cash-prize crossword-puzzle contests last November, the entries were pouring in at a tidal rate--57,000 a week to the afternoon Oregon Journal (circ. 182,956), about 60.000 a week to the morning Oregonian (circ. 233.856). Few entrants knew of the prohibitive odds against winning such circulation-promotion contests: usually more than 100.000 to one.*Last week both Portland papers took to their front pages with embarrassed confessions that some of the winners had somehow reduced the odds against winning to zero.

"We have become convinced," said the Oregonian, "that certain persons have had access to advance information regarding answers to some of the puzzles." The Journal's apology, which ran under a six-column head, offered more details: "Our investigations have shown beyond any doubt that at least one of our winning contestants was able to win $2,600 in prize money because of information supplied, through several Portland intermediaries, from persons operating in Detroit."

Winning by Phone. The Journal began to worry after it got a tip that the next prizewinner would be a chiropractor's wife. Sure enough. Mrs. Josephine Hill, a Portland chiropractor's wife, won $2,600, and finally told how she did it. Approached by a friend. Mrs. Hill agreed to have an entry submitted in her name--she did not even have to make it out. When it won. she banked $300 of the take and. as agreed, surrendered $2.300 to the friend--who turned it over to the fixer after subtracting $150 as an arranger's fee.

Mrs. Hill was not the only fixed winner in the Journal contest. Another was Robert Alvich, 53, a hotel desk clerk. A chronic puzzle contestant. Alvich bit on an anonymous telephone caller's proposal to make him a cinch winner. Following orders, Alvich phoned Detroit, where another anonymous voice gave him the answer to the Journal's current Cashword Puzzle. Sure enough, Alvich won $2,950 and. still following instructions, wired $2,000 to one "Harry Valk'' in Detroit. Meantime, a Portland disk jockey. Fitzgerald ("Eager") Beaver, admitted that he had been similarly set up to win $1,700 from the Oregonian, had also sent the lion's share of the loot to Detroit.

After reporters clearly established that the fix was on. the Portland papers called in the police and the FBI. In Detroit authorities learned that "Harry Valk" was Harry H. Balk, a shadowy freelance booking agent who had not only collected the prize money wired from Portland but had won $4,400 on his own last December in a puzzle contest in the Chicago American. Last week Balk was hibernating in Brooklyn. The probability that the fix was bigger than Balk arose when Robert F. Kennedy, counsel for the U.S. Senate rackets committee, disclosed that racketeers had attempted to bribe a committee witness by guaranteeing to fix a win for him in a newspaper puzzle contest.

One Guilty Defendant. As the Portland story clattered over the press wires, many another newspaper began to turn a wary eye on puzzle contests. President Bernard Ridder of the St. Paul Pioneer Press made a worried call to Portland, then canceled his contest and turned its records over to the FBI.*At week's end the FBI was joined in its investigation by the U.S. Postal Service.

The big question was: How did the Detroit puzzle-breaking ring get advance solutions? Suspicions naturally focused on the sources, i.e., the distributing syndicates--principally Bell Syndicate, General Features and Superior Features Syndicate --which sell puzzle contests to newspapers. In New York. Andre F. L'Eveque, who runs Superior Features, announced that he had found and plugged a leak and had given full details to the FBI. The other syndicates insisted that the precautions they take against leaks are foolproof. But what happened in Portland presented undeniable evidence that more than a leak at Superior was involved, since another syndicate's puzzle was fixed.

As the evidence of fix accumulated, one defendant already stood accused and convicted. That is the newspaper-puzzle gimmick itself, which, in its hot pursuit of quick circulation, has always been a highly questionable journalistic practice.

*In / years, the Seattle Times' s Prize Cross word contest has pulled 19,845,000 entries, has paid off fewer than 200 winners. Circulation gain, not necessarily attributable to the contest: 10,000. *Another kind of fix has plagued the Pionc.fr Press. A few years ago some winning contest entries came from two postal clerks who. working independently of each other, waited until solutions were printed, then submitted entries with phony, before-the-deadline postmarks.

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