TROPIC OF DANCERS

Something about the Caribbean just makes you want to cut loose.

The uncredited front cover of Tropical Spitfire features good girl art more rudimentary than most efforts of the type, but the book’s title spoke to us, with its promise of island action, so we bought it. It turned out to be a find-the-real-killer novel in which a producer for fictional Sonic Records heads to San Juan, Puerto Rico to record an island legend but ends up framed. The motive, ultimately, revolves around drug smuggling. It’s amusing the way Kramer mangles Spanish in this, making up spellings like “marriviosso” and referring to women as “chico,” however the island flavor is pretty well done, which is half the battle in tropical thrillers. His protagonist Mac Tyler, in classic form, mostly stumbles around town clueless, but manages to puzzle out the mystery just in time for a jungle climax. Not bad, but not special. It’s from 1964.

Puerto Rico, San Juan, Carousel Books, Arthur Kramer, cover art, literature

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

December 2

1954—Joseph McCarthy Disciplined by Senate

In the United States, after standing idly by during years of communist witch hunts in Hollywood and beyond, the U.S. Senate votes 65 to 22 to condemn Joseph McCarthy for conduct bringing the Senate into dishonor and disrepute. The vote ruined McCarthy’s career.

December 1

1955—Rosa Parks Sparks Bus Boycott

In the U.S., in Montgomery, Alabama, seamstress Rosa Parks refuses to give her bus seat to a white man and is arrested for violating the city’s racial segregation laws, an incident which leads to the Montgomery Bus Boycott. The boycott resulted in a crippling financial deficit for the Montgomery public transit system, because the city’s African-American population were the bulk of the system’s ridership.

November 30

1936—Crystal Palace Gutted by Fire

In London, the landmark structure Crystal Palace, a 900,000 square foot glass and steel exhibition hall erected in 1851, is destroyed by fire. The Palace had been moved once and fallen into disrepair, and at the time of the fire was not in use. Two water towers survived the blaze, but these were later demolished, leaving no remnants of the original structure.

November 29

1963—Warren Commission Formed

U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson establishes the Warren Commission to investigate the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. However the long report that is finally issued does little to settle questions about the assassination, and today surveys show that only a small minority of Americans agree with the Commission’s conclusions.