pleasant to take this opportunity to hail the Grand Old Man of the Old Right H.R. Gross of Iowa, a marvelous and flinty character almost out of the storybooks" Independence Gross was also known for his independence, so much so that then-House Minority Leader Gerald Ford remarked that "there are three parties in the House: Democrats, Republicans, and H.R. Gross." Shaking off the Eisenhower Administration's pressure to support a foreign-aid economic-development measure, Gross quipped, "I took my last marching orders in 1916–19." Gross's personal lifestyle reflected his fiscally conservative views. He lived frugally and rarely attended any parties or social functions common to the life of a congressman. Gross was remembered as an outsider who preferred to sit in his townhouse and watch professional wrestling on TV. In 1966, at the height of the Vietnam War, with many American soldiers dying, an extravagant White House ball ran on until 3 A.M. Disgusted by this callousness, Gross recited Alfred Noyes' poem The Victory Ball in Congress in protest; the poem condemns the hedonism of a British Armistice ball and contains the line "under the dancing feet are the graves". He was also among the few who opposed the Uniform Monday Holiday Act in 1968, moving all federal holidays (other than Independence Day, Veterans Day, Christmas Day, and New Year's Day) to the nearest Monday. He argued that it would rob retail workers of their holidays because retail stores would remain open. However, even his targets could speak warmly of Gross. Longtime House Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Vinson, whose defense spending bills often incurred Gross's criticisms, said of Gross that "there is really no good debate unless the gentleman from Iowa is in it." Gross voted in favor of the Civil Rights Acts of 1960 and 1968, as well as the 24th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, but voted against the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1964, as well as the Voting Rights Act of 1965. H.R. 144 When Gross was in Congress, a special exception was made to the practice that bills offered in the House were numbered consecutively. The number H.R. 144 was reserved each session for one of Representative Gross's bills (because 144 equals one gross, making its title the arithmetical equivalent to his name). Death He was a resident of Arlington, Virginia, until his death in a Washington, D.C. Veterans Hospital on September 22, 1987, due