A young reporter wants so badly to be a foreign correspondent that he leaves his job in the U.S. and heads for Scandinavia to try his luck. He encounters a weird, white world and quickly finds himself covering the Cold War between Finland and the Soviet Union, for which he is denounced in Pravda. He finds himself writing for a journalistic giant, The New York Herald-Tribune, but which pays a pittance for his stories. He covers events in Sweden, Finland, Norway and Denmark, meeting such people as a Nobel Peace Prize winner, a Norwegian war hero, a singer/movie actress, a Prime Minister and a host of other interesting characters. He also meets and marries the girl of his dreams. Then, just as his money is about to run out, he unexpectedly wins a prestigious and lucrative journalism award that brings him back to the U. S. and recognition as a full-ledged foreign correspondent. Told in letters and rememberances, it is a story of suceeding against the odds in the Land of the Midnight Sun.
Covering the Cold War and Other Shadows in the Land of the Midnight Sun
The adventures and misadventures of an American reporter in Scandinavia - 1954-1956By Harry HeintzenAuthorHouse
Copyright © 2010 Harry Heintzen
All right reserved.ISBN: 978-1-4520-1171-4Contents
Part One — 8/5/54 – 10/23/54......................1Part Two — 10/23/54 - 7/8/55............................21Part Three — 1/3/55 – 7/8/55......................45Part Four — 7/8/55 – 12/29/55.....................91Part Five — 1/14/56 - 4/30/56...........................117Part Six — 5/7/56 - to the future 1.....................39
Chapter One
Part One 8/5/54 – 10/23/54
Wherein I visit to New York, Paris, Frankfurt, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Oslo and Helsinki; see CDN correspondent Bill Stoneman and Anna Dalier in Paris; renew ties with a Swedish singer/movie actress and a Belgian model; turn down a dubious Stockholm apartment for a hotel room office; make contact with Mac Lindahl of the Swedish-American News Bureau and begin writing for the N.Y. Herald Tribune; take an ice-breaker to Finland and a train ride through Russian-controlled Porkkala; learn the meaning of a Russian helmet in Helsinki; struggle with "two eggs" and the Finnish language; discover a distant "relative" in Stockholm and write first article (on Finland) for a national publication;
I begin with this letter from New York where I had gone to catch a boat for Europe.
* * *
New York August 5, 1954
"Dear Mama and Papa; Lilly and Betty; John and David"
Tomorrow I sail and at this writing I have just finished eating a cake baked by Ersie with "Bon Voyage" on it.
This seems to typify the kind of time I have had here. Ersie and Lou could not have been kinder and I seem to have some initial successes.
(Lou and Ersie Cajoleas, he from New Orleans, a Greek American, and she from Greece. Lou had gone to Tulane with me and was then working on a Doctor of Education degree at Columbia University. Ersie was a dress designer.)
First off, all the Scandinavian people (in their New York press offices) have been most encouraging, giving me names of people to see and all sorts of suggestions. Best of all came from the Norwegians. They are going to do the most, it appears. The director of their information service said he would see to it I got free travel in the country and possibly free hotel space. He also said that the other Scandinavian countries can also provide free travel for me and that the reason the others didn't promise it like he was probably because they don't like to make promises for people on the other side.
So it looks like there is a possibility that I will save a lot on travel.
The meeting with the North American Newspaper Alliance went off well. They don't promise to use what I write, but they will look at anything I send and took considerable pains to see that I knew what they wanted. So it seems they think I have possibilities.
I talked by phone with an agent who handles all types of writing and he said he could use all action-type interview stories I could get for men's magazines. This would consist of interviewing people who have had some adventure and writing it in a first person form ... a sort of "as told to" thing.
At the New York Times travel section, I had more luck. The travel editor was travelling in Europe, but the young reporter who came out to talk to me turned out to be married to a girl from New Orleans and was very helpful. He said they were going to run a few paragraphs about a new motel in Sweden but why didn't I do a feature on it send it back to him. He took me in and showed me what they wanted. I think this looks good.
More luck. I bought a good camera today. One of the photographers on The Picayune told me to look up the chief photographer at King Features Syndicate and ask him to help me find an inexpensive camera. I ended up getting a new $73 Kodak for $51 through a good camera shop. This will be a big help to me providing the one or two pictures that necessarily go with an article. Also, I feel like a kid with a new toy, as it is the first camera I've owned. (It was the simplest of cameras, with zone focusing. Yet months later, it would produce a three-column, by-line picture in the N.Y. Herald Tribune of Finnish troops marching in to the naval base at Porkkala, after the Soviets returned it.)
Lastly, I should re-emphasize how nice Lou and Ersie have been. They have no bed for me, but have improvised one for me on the floor with big sofa cushions. It is very comfortable. More so when I think of the savings it represents.
They will be in New Orleans on the 23 or 24 for two weeks and I have offered Lou the use of the Hudson (My 1949 automobile). Would you ask Moots (my brother George) if he would have Mr. Tony (Anthony Bilich, an automobile mechanic) make the needed adjustments before then? I don't think it will cost but a few dollars.
Right now, Ersie is fixing that hole in my suit pocket I forgot to get to before I left.
So in conclusion, I repeat I've had good luck and hope now that it will be habit forming. Will write you when I get to Paris.
Love Harry
Guess what chaps (my nephews, John and David): I saw a stuffed blowfish in a window – a blowfish as big as a football.
* * *
Paris August 12, 1954
Dear Everyone:
This is my second day in Paris and all is well. We landed yesterday morning and I got to Paris about 11 a.m. by train to be met by Arthur and Peggy Pastore, whom I had known in Vienna (during my 1951 tour of Europe) and who booked my room in their little hotel. They have written a book on European restaurants and one on travel in Mexico and Cuba. He is doing promotional work here for NEWSWEEK. They fixed lunch for me and have been showing me my way around. I pay about $1.75 per night for the room.
In the afternoon I went to 23 Rue de la Paix, where William Stoneman, the correspondent for the Chicago Daily News, has his headquarters and where a New Orleans girl, Anna Dalier, works for a travel agency. He was out but she was in, and later she and one of her boy friends and I had supper and a coffee in a sidewalk café.
(Anna Dalier, who also went to Tulane and who spoke fluent French, had consulted me in New Orleans about a trip she was planning to France. I gave her Bill Stoneman's name. Through him, she found a job with a travel agency in the same building.)
I am writing this at 23 Rue de la Paix after meeting Stoneman and making arrangements for lunch with him tomorrow.
Today or tomorrow I will look up Angela Gregory. (A New Orleans sculptress living and working in Paris.)
The weather is fine and cool and varies from sunny to overcast and just right for a winter suit.
Paris is still beautiful and impressive even on this second look. Those hours I spent with the French record were valuable. I cannot speak much, but I can catch the drift of most questions.
The boat ride over was very luxurious. I ate so much that I must have gained five pounds. All you did was eat and the meals were very lavish. It was not like being on a ship, but rather like a hotel.
Got your card, Papa, and I hope this finds you, John, up on your feet again. (nephews John and David had asthma) And what's cooking with you, David?
I expect to be here about a week or two, depending on my Scandinavian plans. More later.
love, Harry
* * *
August 18, 1954 Paris, France
Dear Mama and Papa and Betty and Lilly and David and John: And Frank?
All is well and my luck is still good. I met (sculptress) Angela Gregory and she took me to her studio to see the model of Bienville's statue. She was leaving for another part of France the next day and didn't have much time. However, on the way back, I may do a story on the French phase of the casting. The (Times-Picayune) Sunday magazine (DIXIE) is doing something on her so I can only supplement what they have.
I had lunch with Bill Stoneman and he is going to write letters ahead for me to Scandinavia. His wife is Norwegian and she was once secretary (press) for Trygve Lie, who was secretary general of the United Nations. Lie is Norwegian.
Arthur and Peggy Pastor, and Anna Dalier and her boy friend, Frank Gordon, have made life very easy for me. I've had "home cooked" meals with them which cuts down the expense. Paris is expensive to eat and clothes are so high I don't see how anyone can afford them.
The wad of mail from home at the American Express was most welcome. The weather is cool but today it was too hot for a winter suit. It was real sunny and there is still some filtering down.
I have learned to use my limited French to good advantage, speaking only when I know what to say. Usually, it is key words, like "how much", or "up" or "down" in the elevator or "Twenty five" for the key to my room.
I expect to leave here for a few days for Luxembourg, then to Frankfurt for a few days and then to Copenhagen for a week or two.
Write me in Frankfurt, if you write when you get this, or in Copenhagen. I hope to be there about the first of September.
How is the Hudson? Gas costs 80 cents a gallon here. At home it is 30 cents. You can see how a 30-mile-to-the-gallon car is a must here.
In conclusion, all is well, and prospects look bright. Hope you all have Frank (my brother who lived in San Antonio who taught history at Alamo Heights high school) with you. Maybe he can give the chaps (nephews John and David) a ride.
love Harry
* * *
August 26, 1954 Frankfurt A/M
Dear Mama and Papa and All:
My luck continues to hold. I am in a first class hotel for $2 per night, and I eat at a first class restaurant for about 60 cents a meal. This is because I am accredited as a correspondent and can avail myself to these facilities. So I am available.
Frankfurt is so different from Paris. It is less foreign and much like the United States. The most striking thing is all the construction going on. (All of Germany was rebuilding from the devastation of World War II, which had ended only nine years earlier). They work through the night too. Last night I could hear the shouts of the workmen and the sounds of construction,
I met an Army major (U.S.) who is a friend of Charles Bennett, one of our (The Times-Picayune) photographers, and the one who got me the camera wholesale. The major has invited me to dinner tonight at his home and will send his staff car to my hotel. Nice, huh?
I stayed in Paris longer than I intended to talk with William Stoneman, the Chicago Daily News correspondent, who had to go to Brussels for the EDU (European Democratic Union) conference. I'm glad I waited for him. On his return, he called the Paris correspondent for the Canadian Broadcasting Company and told him he was sending me over – "the friend" of whom he had spoken. He said I might do some free lance broadcasting for the CBC and make a little money. It turns out that if I can do what they want, I will be broadcasting two minutes of news every now and then along with human-interest broadcasts. If I broadcast news, I will begin by saying, "This is Harry Heintzen in Stockholm." It embarrasses me to think of it. The correspondent –who is about my age and owes his success to Stoneman – explained that they even use book and film reviews. Dull, he said, but since CBC is a monopoly, listeners can't do a thing about it.
I went to see the travel editor of the Paris edition of the Herald Tribune and he said he could use a story on winter sports in Norway and maybe a couple more stories on Scandinavia. They pay very little – about $7 per story – but having a byline in the paper is well worth the effort.
Your welcome letter arrived this morning, Papa, and it made me feel pretty good. I'm glad Moots finds the Hudson satisfactory. Did Lou and Ersie Cajoleas get in touch with you about the car? I'll write Mr. Selle.
I'm very interested in the phone call by Patsy Smith. Just what did she say? Last communication I had from her was a wedding invitation. What was she doing in New Orleans?
(You bet I was interested. Patricia Dean Smith was a young lady I once had a crush on. I met her when I covered a story about a visit to New Orleans of students from Texas State College for Women in Denton, Texas. I visited her there and also visited her in Dallas where she found employment with I.B.M after her graduation. She visited me in New Orleans and stayed with us at our home on Dauphine Street. But absence did not make the heart grow fonder and we drifted apart. Last communication from her was a wedding announcement. Two things in particular I remember about Patsy. She was born in Hope, Arkansas, which she said was known as the "watermelon capital" of the country. (This, of course, was before anyone knew it as the birthplace of Bill Clinton.} And second, she went to work for I.B.M at $10 a week more than I was making after two years at The Times-Picayune and two college degrees).
Art and Peggy Pastore are two fine people. Peggy fixed me a lunch for the train ride here and in general both have been very kind. All they want from life is enough money to live and travel. They have written a book on where to eat in Europe and co-authored one on travel in Mexico and Cuba.
Anna Dalier and her boy friend Frank Gordon and I had dinner almost every night that Anna fixed at considerable saving. Now I am in this plush hotel and living like an aristocrat – and Mama, eating like one too.
I found out from this Canadian fellow that Stoneman is one of the kindest men he knows: and also that he is the hardest working and most respected (and feared) correspondent in Europe. I say, "feared," because I'm told he asks the diplomats the most embarrassing questions. He will return to the States in a couple of days for two months. He says to keep in touch with him and he will advise me and make contacts for me by mail. He got Anna Dalier here a job and she, naturally, thinks he is great. She works in the same building.
love Harry
* * *
Copenhagen, Denmark September 1, 1954
Dear Mama and Papa and all:
I'm as busy as a bee in Copenhagen. I arrived here two days ago and had the good fortune to bump into the right people immediately. The tourist office is knocking itself out lining things up for me.
Yesterday – in connection with stories – I visited a furniture factory, a place where they supervise the standards of tourist souvenirs. Today I am scheduled to visit a movie studio and a television studio
The tourist office has given me a free ticket to trains in Denmark, but there is so much to do here I don't expect I'll use it. I have also been very busy visiting the press attaché at our embassy and the same man in the ministry of foreign affairs in Denmark. Both are very helpful
I came here from Frankfurt on a Swedish bus – on a free ticket. The trip took two days and I enjoyed it a lot. These are luxury busses. They don't drive at night. They stop at a good hotel and also for dinner and supper along the way. All is included in the price of the ticket – which I got through Arthur Pastore.
(Continues...)
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