Mussolini Strips To The Waist - Helps In Wheat Harvest -- A striking picture of Mussolini, stripped to the waist, making his bitter speech against his critics. Stripped to the waist, and standing on a threshing machine in the wheat fields of the Pontine Marshes, Mussolini on Monday made his bitterest, fieroest attack against democracies since the days of Sanctions. He spoke at Aprilia, a village that has been built in the reclaimed marshes. He made scathing replies to reporters that Italy is short of Grain. July 6, 1938. (Photo by Keystone).