Cowardly Slur Sirs:

As one of those obscure citizens who believes the minority is often right, permit me to thank you for your clear, fair and newsworthy article on the William Jennings Bryan University and its first graduating class [TIME, June 25]. Mr. Bryan was an ordained elder in our Presbyterian Church U.S.A. and although he was hopelessly outvoted by a church which is fast slipping into Modernism and Apostasy, he was never afraid to inform the church of her danger, and in the face of ridicule and hostility, his superb moral courage showed that he feared God more than he feared man. The last cowardly slur with which an ungrateful America besmirched his memory was the canard that he died from overeating. Mr. Bryan was crucified by a loose-moraled Christian citizenship and a false religious leadership.

JOHN R. STEVENSON

Pastor

Grace Presbyterian Church San Francisco, Calif.

Rolling Chapels

Sirs:

I have read with interest your article entitled, "ST. PETER" under the head of Religion in the issue of TIME, June 25. In this article you say that ST. PETER and ST. PAUL ... are the only two chapel cars in U. S. railroading. I may say that The American Baptist Publication Society has been doing business with chapel cars on the railroad manned by a good preacher and his wife with well-equipped pulpit and auditorium and living quarters for 44 years.

Our first chapel car called "Chapel Car Evangel" was built in 1891 and used in new towns along the railroads in the West. In 1892 we built our second chapel car, "Emmanuel," and sent it to the Pacific Coast. It was later brought back to Colorado for service. In 1894 we built our third chapel car, "Glad Tidings," with money given by Mr. William Hills, of New York, in honor of his wife, and it operated in the Southwest. In 1895 we built our fourth chapel car, "Good-will," given by Baptists in general who were inspired by the generosity of Mr. Hills and the effective work of the other cars. In 1898 we built our fifth chapel car, "Messenger of Peace," and it has operated in Oregon for many years. In 1900 we built our sixth chapel car, "Herald of Hope," the gift of Baptist young men of the country.

In 1917 we built our seventh chapel car, "Grace," given by Mr. and Mrs. Conaway of Los Angeles, Calif., in memory of a departed daughter and it was set at work in Wyoming. This last car was built at a cost of $25,000. The other cars cost somewhat less. . . .

Our chapel cars are not as active now as they were in the years of rapidly developing frontiers. New towns are not now springing up along new railroads, hence some of our cars have been given to churches and built into permanent meeting houses. . . .

OWEN C. BROWN

Executive Secretary

The American Baptist Publication Society

Philadelphia, Pa.

Sirs:

I have been wondering whether many alumni and students of the University of Notre Dame: (Notre Dame, Ind.) will not write to correct your statement in the June 25 issue under Religion, article "ST. PETER.". . .

They will know that the University has maintained a chapel car for the use of its football teams on their travels for many years, to the best of my knowledge since 1923. . . .

WILLIAM C. REILLY

Orange, N. J.

TIME erred. Of the American Baptist Publication Society's chapel cars, four are currently in use--"Grace" in Wyoming, "Messenger of Peace" in Oregon, "Emmanuel" in Colorado, "Good-Will" in California. Reader Reilly also errs. Notre Dame's chapel car is not maintained by the university, but chartered from the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, which owns two for Catholic services. These are fitted with altar and rail at one end, with collapsible chairs seating 60 or 70. Nearly every year (but not this year) a wealthy Philadelphia contractor named Joseph Mack assembles about 75 friends, including several priests, hires one of the B. & O. chapel cars and rolls to the Kentucky Derby.--ED.

Death Advertisement

Sirs:

Referring to your article, "Advertisement of Death," in the June 11 issue.

The first paragraph of the advertisement in question was quoted only last Friday, June 15, in one of the London newspapers (either the Daily Express or the Evening Standard; sorry I can't recall which one), with the shocked editorial comment and facetious reference to the way they do things in pacifistic (?) United States that might be expected. No date was given, of course, and the same false impression was conveyed to readers. . . .

GALE THOMAS

Paris, France

Decency's Boycott

Sirs:

A scenario-writer who during the past 17 years has not written a censored scene or word would like TIME to inform its readers whether the Legion of Decency (whose creation, necessary or needless, he deplores) proposes to extend its boycott of all motion pictures as a punishment for the few admittedly objectionable ones to further fields in which decency is involved, e.g.:

The boycott of all theatres for similar reasons; the boycott of all daily newspapers, weeklies and monthly magazines for like causes; the boycott of all drugstores because of the frank display of contraceptives in the windows of a few; the boycott of all picture galleries and museums because of the nudes in some; and of all department stores on account of exciting underwear and wax models. If the statement of the producers is true that salacious motion pictures do attract the public, isn't it the fault of the churches in not stiffening the adolescent minds to automatically reject such stuff in boredom in the same way that we automatically ignore the excreta canis in our walks down the street?

CHAS. E. WHITTAKER

Hollywood, Calif.

Thaw Protest

Sirs:

It seems beside the point and decidedly counter to TIME'S aims and standing ... to repeat and enlarge on a thing like this--"Thaw Perennial" [TIME, June 18]--when so many more interesting and profitable incidents are passed over or forgotten entirely. Why--oh why--should decent people be reminded continually of this shameful affair? . . .

As a granddaughter of William Thaw--the child of his eldest daughter by his first wife-- I protest. There are able and conscientious members of this family whose lives have been frustrated if not blighted by this affair and its continual notoriety.

Harry's father tried to protect him in his will, knowing he was not normal (as all his brothers and sisters also knew). His mother could not bear to realize the fact and broke the will to give him his money and freedom from restraint. With what consequences! His marriage with Evelyn Nesbit was a sacrilege. While --How, When, Where and by Whom that child was conceived and born--No one knows! He-- the boy--is an able and clever aviator. And why he wants to keep the name seems incomprehensible. Ten million dollars divided among ten children and a widow 45 years ago may sound like a lot of money, but no amount even if the Thaw family had it would ever buy off a woman of Evelyn Nesbit's calibre. You admit in this article that the Press keeps pandering the subject--for a price--to an evil-minded Public.

Among other reforms of the "New Deal" (if there is anything in it) don't you think we who Have to live with this thing and live it down might be considered at least in the non-Hearst-controlled publications?

K. M. EDWARDS

Pittsburgh, Pa.

Germs v. Toxin

Sirs:

. . . On p. 51 of TIME for June 25, in speaking of the Shwartzman antitoxin, you give him credit for a new discovery and make the utterly erroneous statement that the standard method of preparing diphtheria antitoxin is to put "whole diphtheria germs" into a horse's blood, etc. Where you obtained such an absolutely incorrect idea is more than I can understand. Of all diseases, the manufacture of antitoxin against diphtheria was the worst possible example you could have picked, as it is one of the two typical toxic diseases--tetanus being the other. Roux and Yersin, of the Pasteur Institute, demonstrated the toxin in 1888, and von Behring, in 1890, demonstrated that an antitoxin could be made which was curative and protective. Roux produced an antitoxin about the same time, and both read papers on the subject at a congress in Budapest some two years later. Both von Behring and Roux used the toxin and not the germs, and this has continued to be the practice down to the present day. If Dr. Shwartzman has made any great and new discovery, it is certainly not shown in your report of the meeting. . . . MAZYCK P. RAVENEL, M.D.

Editor in Chief

American Journal of Public Health and the

Nation's Health

The American Public Health Ass'n.

Columbia, Mo.

Dr. Shwartzman's contribution was the demonstration that from certain bacteria (notably typhoid) can be obtained filterable toxins such as were already known to exist in relation to other bacteria. His discovery made possible the manufacture of antitoxic sera for typhoid, cerebro-spinal meningitis, et al., by the toxic filtrate method, which has long been used (as Dr. Ravenel points out) for diphtheria, tetanus, scarlet fever.--ED.

Kudos

Sirs:

. . . Under "Kudos" (p. 39, June 25) you mention two recipients at the University of Pennsylvania. More or less accurate newspapers mention seven others. .

M. H. GANSER

Norristown, Pa.

Sirs:

PAGE 39 TIME JUNE 25 LISTS UNDER KUDOS HONORARY DEGREES CONFERRED AT DARTMOUTH THIS YEAR BUT OMITS JOSE PADIN . . . PUERTO RICO'S COMMISSIONER OF EDUCATION.

R. ARRILLAGA TORRENS

New Haven, Conn. Sirs: Doesn't the "kudization" of Samuel Seabury [at Rutgers] deserve mention in TIME along with that of Presidents Dodds and Thomas Watson? [TIME, June 18]. . . .

S. K. FENICHEL

Newark, N. J.

In three weeks of "Kudos" TIME made no attempt to record all honorary degrees --some 1,900--awarded throughout the U. S. last month.--ED. Exchange

Sirs:

As a Harvard man, I just loved the nice long "timely" essay on Princeton in the June 18 issue of TIME. Indeed I liked it so much that if you do not mind, I should be glad to have exchanged my subscription to TIME for one to the Princeton Alumni Weekly.

OSCAR JAMES CAMPBELL

San Marino, Calif.

Let Harvardman Campbell see TIME, Feb. 5, delight himself further with a "nice long timely' essay" on Harvard's new president, Dr. James Bryant Conant.--ED.

Traveling Hamburgers Sirs: I think that was a perfectly fine piece in TIME [June 11] about Thomas Mann, but you unfortunately picked up in it one rather annoying--to Mann--misstatement when you quoted him as saying: "I am from Hamburg, and people from Hamburg are not given to traveling." Of course Mann never said any such thing. He never came from Hamburg and, of course, Hamburgers as a matter of fact travel a great deal. The whole thing isn't, of course, of overwhelming importance, but. . .

ALFRED A. KNOPF

New York City

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