Through the streets of Manhattan's dusky Harlem last week trundled a procession of black noise and magnificence, led by a sleek touring car on whose back perched a fattish, blinking, middle-aged Negro in a brown tweed suit whose peculiarity is that he recognizes himself as God. Behind Major J. ("Father") Divine rode a squadron of his women cultists straddling big brewery horses. Humbler worshipers followed in cars, trucks and afoot, in a line that stretched back through the hot streets almost a mile. "PEACE IS WONDERFUL!" shouted bright placards. "PEACE! PEACE!" Occasion for this celebration was a real-estate deal.
Father Divine's cultists live in noisy, overcrowded "Heavens" which the Father has lately been moving, away from Harlem and its rival evangelists, to farms, where working "Angels" can feed and support themselves. Pardonably proud was Father Divine to announce last week that he had bought a new Heaven, an estate in an exclusive neighborhood. The estate: 500-acre "Krum Elbow" near Highland-on-the-Hudson, N. Y. Most exclusive neighbor (1,800 ft. directly across the river): Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The seller: eccentric, Roosevelt-hating Socialite Howland Spencer, 48.*
Squire Spencer's quarrel with his neighbor dates from the 1932 campaign, when Squire Roosevelt began publicly calling his mother's house "Krum Elbow." After election the U. S. Geodetic Survey hastily named it so on official maps. Mr. Spencer insisted that his family place had always borne that name, a claim which the President's mother supported. The real name of the Roosevelt estate, says Mr. Spencer grimly, is "Crooks' Delight," after a British merchant who once owned it.
The Krum Elbow Heaven will accommodate some 3,000 angels in its 27 buildings (Mr. Spencer is reserving one small house for himself), and be marked by a sign with letters 40 ft. high for the edification of excursion boat passengers.
Chattered Howland Spencer: "I like Divine's ideas. He is a great constitutionalist. ... I thought of the steamboats that will bring thousands of colored people from New York to swim in the Hudson here and have picnics on the hills, and it sort of amused me. . . . Whether we meant it or not, this really will annoy Franklin a great deal, won't it?"
Said Columnist Eleanor Roosevelt: "It must ... be pleasant to feel that in the future this place will be 'heaven' to some people, even if it cannot be to its former owner."
Said Father Divine: "We believe in improving all things and advancing all things."
Said one of the placards carried in his parade:
F D R a i e t v i h i g e n n r e s
* Irascible Mr. Spencer was divorced last spring by his third wife, 76-year-old Emeline Harriman Olin Spencer, sister of Mrs. William Kissam Vanderbilt. Said Mrs. Spencer: ''He never hit me, he just exploded. He would yell so the whole of Palm Beach could hear."