Professor Hamilton's Diary: Feb. 25, 1935

'Baby seemed better'; Smedley Butler alleges congressional coup coverup

Things were settling down on the home front. Mary Elizabeth had “a better night,” Gwennie stayed home from school but was well enough to go walking with her father in the afternoon, and only one doctor made a house call. “Baby seemed better, but she had very little appetite,” her worried father wrote.

An Associated Press story on the front page of the Reading Times focused on Major General Smedley D. Butler, one of the most highly decorated — and controversial — members of the U.S. Marine Corps. Among the many stops on his career was serving for two years as director of public safety in Philadelphia, where he was brought in to clean up police and Prohibition corruption. The Wikimedia Commons photo here, taken in 1924, shows him being sworn in by Philadelphia Mayor Freeland Kendrick.

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