More Gannettisms

Can't resist a few more Frank Gannett-isms from the booklet I wrote about yesterday that founder of the newspaper chain penned after flying around the world in 1947.

In India, after describing the horrors of the Calcutta slums, he says, "Britain has done much for this great country but it is an almost unsolvable problem and the people don't seem to appreciate the blessings they enjoyed under British rule.'' He went on to say that "real democracy in India is impossible.'' India is now, of course, the world's largest democracy.

Contrast that bad attutide with the Phillipines. "Flilpinos are fine people in every respect,'' Gannett said. "They appreciate what America has done for them and are our real friends.''

Guess he didn't hear about our water-boarding of rebels when we took over the place around the turn of the 20th Century.

The stewardness on the plane, Alice Lemieux, "was both beautiful and efficient.'' When the plane arrived in Tokyo. When she appeared at the doorway of the plane, "every GI whistled. It was such a whistle as I have never heard before. It was the soldiers' stamp of approval for this lovely American girl, for she epitomized their ideas of beauty and charm.''

There were non Betty Friedans to put the boys back on their heels. The whole experience of reading the booklet was something like watching the hit show 'Mad Men,'' about the people who worked in an advertising agency in the late '50s and early '60s and seemed to spend most of their time smoking, drinking and hitting on or insulting women. Gannett doesn't talk about smoking, but the attitude about women would fit on that show.

It seems that while demeaning women was the fashion fifty years ago, 62 years ago it was no ingrained that many people hardly noticed.

Gannett was relieved to get to to Bangkok, Thailand, after Calcutta.

"The people are a great contrast to the people we saw in Calcutta,'' he wrote. "They are well dressed, clean and intelligent.''

It would be interesting to think of Gannett coming back in his next life working in a call center in Bangalore or some other Indian boom town.

It would also be fun to fast-forward ahead 60 years to see how silly we look to someone living in that era.