Carl Crow - A Tough Old China Hand: The Life, Times, and Adventures of an American in Shanghai

21. War Service and Being Proved Right

21 War Service and Being Proved Right ' A Change of Scenery In 1940 Crow, not 10ng back from China, started to p1an an extensive trip through Latin America. The 1atler ha1f of 1939 had been spent writing and finishing new manuscripts in America as well as a round of fund-raising events for China, including pub1ic speaking and attending such events as a “Bow1 of Rice Party" at the Worcester C1ub where Crow addressed the members on China's plight and raised money for medica1 supplies to be sent to Chongqing.1 His 10ng-time 1ecture ag叫 Harris “Ha叮" Merton Lyons, in co吋unction with the Reader's Digest, arranged the trip whi1e the State Department he1ped out by providing a range of introductions for him. He spent the autumn months of 1940 traveling throughout the region on an extended 1ecture tour and typically his 仕ave1s yie1ded him another book, Meet the South Americans, and a series of newspaper articles recounting the trip called Carl Crowings. Crow trave1ed south on the Moore-McCormack liner the SS Argentina. He took the Argentina from New York, stopping at Rio de Janeiro, Santos, Montevideo and Buenos Aires. Onboard he was initiated into the Kingdom of 250 CARL CROW - A TOUGH OLD CHINA HAND N巳ptun巳 as is th巳 custom wh巳n crossing th巳 180th m巳ridian in th巳 Pacific.On th巳 voyage Crow refl巳cted that “In the course of my joumeyings I have both added and dropped days and a carefu1 calcu1ation shows that I have actually 10st thr巳e who1e days out ofmy 1ife which I can n巳ver regain except by trave1ing three times round the world from east to west."2 The Argentina 's Captain Simmons gave him a certificate to mark the occasion and a1so threw a cocktai1 party in his cabin for Crow's 58th birthday on Septemb巳r 26. At th巳 partya fellow passenger, a particu1arly at1ractive brunet1e who Crow had been convinced was the archetypa1 Latin woman ofhis imagination, tumed out to be 100 percent American, and a fan ofFour Hundred Million Customers who 1ived near Crow's temporary home in Pe1ham Manor. During the voyag巳 he becam巳 friend1y with Captain Simmons who had b巳en bom of Dutch anc巳stry on Saba Is1and in the West Indies and was a 10ng time captain with Moor巳-McCormack. Crow was just one ofthe ce1ebrities that sai1ed with Simmons; the Duke of Windsor, C1ark Gab1e and Bing Crosby w巳re all guests of Simmons and Moore-McCormack during his career Ostensib1y, Crow's trip had 1arge1y be巳n prompted by the success of Four Hundred Million Customers, which was bringing him considerab1e notoriety and recognition. How巳ver， a major reason for visiting Latin America was to 100k at the state of Nazi propaganda; hence the invo1vement of the State Department. Despite exhaustive research, Crow found little evidence of succ巳ssfu1 Axis agitation in the region. First he had to ascertain if the genera1 belief that the Nazis were winning the propaganda war in Latin America was an accurate one. He had been to1d that Brazil was the center of German operations. With an assistant, h巳 bought 巳very n巳wspap巳r in Rio de Janeiro he cou1d find and marked every news item supplied by an American wire service with a b1ue pencil, ev巳rything from British agencies in red，巳verything from the German-influenced Trans-Ocean service in green and everything from the Japanese or Italian ag巳ncies in yellow. Crow then factored in the circu1ation figures of all the newspapers and mu1tiplied th巳 co1umn inches each nation had got by their r巳ad巳rship. What this rev巳a1ed was a slightly different picture of th巳 effectiven巳ss ofNazi propaganda than he had been 1ed to believe. According to Crow's figures, 82 percent of news coverage in Brazi1 emanated from America, 11 p巳rcent from Brita WAR SERVICE AND BEING PROVED RIGHT 251 When Crow did another comparison of the Brazilian press, this time counting the number of photographs supplied by each count哼， he found that Hitl仗， Tojo and Mussolini came in a poor second to Loretta Young, Norrna Shearer, Bette Davis, Clark Gable and Shirley Temple in terrns ofpublic interest. He was also pleased to note that,“In Latin America the newspapers and illustrated weeklies publishedjust about as many pictures ofthe author ofFour Hundred Million Customers as of Hitler and Mussolini and without...