Holt's Documents
Sirs:
YOUR IMPLICATIONS IN TIME [March 23] AS TO MY LETTERS AND DOCUMENTS ABOUT WPA BEING FRAUDULENT. ANY OF YOUR STAFF MAY SEE THESE ORIGINAL LETTERS AND DOCUMENTS AT MY OFFICE IN THE SENATE BUILDING.
RUSH D. HOLT
Washington, D. C.
When West Virginia's young Senator Holt rose to declare that he had letters proving that the WPA organization in his State was fraught with fraud, not TIME but WPAdministrator Harry Hopkins implied that Senator Holt's evidence was false.--ED.
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War Babies' Guns
Sirs:
A thousand gun salute to that brilliant Princeton brain which conceived the idea of organizing the Veterans of Future Wars, and the short-lived sister organization, the Gold Star Mothers of the Veterans of Future Wars (TIME, March 30).
It's a 20th Century "Don Quixote" packed with the dynamite of "war babies" turning the guns of ridicule on the goosestepping, gun-toting generation which splashed through the biggest bloodbath in history--and emerged crying for more!
When the Ford Peace Ship sailed to end that orgy of destruction through a Neutral Conference for Continuous Mediation, the "international anarchists" (to improvise on a phrase from G. Lowes Dickinson) presented the peace pilgrimage as the great comic interlude of their four years' spectacle. Militarism had won. The Ford Expedition will serve future generations as a study in magnificent failure.
Twenty years later militarism, triumphantly astride a prostrate world, is again threatened in its security. A handful of potential cannon fodder, organized as Future War Veterans, has laid hands on a deadly weapon which threatens to engulf the hitherto invincible strongholds of the professional murderers and their patrioteer subsidiaries.
But the Veterans of This and That, the Sons of Such and Such, and the Daughters and Mothers of So and So can't take it! They know that when they go down, theirs, unlike that of the Ship of Peace, will be ignoble defeat.
They realize that stripped by merciless satire and ridicule of their tinsel, their flag-waving, and their lip-service to the tenets of human liberty and progress, men and women everywhere will see them and their cohorts for what they are--dealers in death and destruction. . . .
EDITH WYNNER
New York City
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Princeton Punks
Sirs:
We listened with mild amusement tonight to your re-enactment of the Princeton Punks' idea of something funny.
We Vets have learned to be tolerant, to a large extent, by this time and therefore will not lose many nights' sleep over this momentous event but we believe it fitting to challenge their unfairness.
We were particularly annoyed by the Vassar Virgins' ridicule of our Gold Star Mothers.
We only wish to register our objection to what we consider half-baked ideas originated by half-baked minds. We would point out, however, that when we fought in France we offered our lives for what we then thought the welfare of the Princeton Punks and others. Said Princeton Punks' sires in many cases at that time were busy profiteering and their profits now enable their brilliant offspring to attend dear old Princeton.
Dear old Princeton!
CHAS. J. CAMPBELL
PAUL REVELLE
Seattle, Wash.
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Suckers
Sirs:
The letter of H. K. Philips, American Legion publicity man, regarding your cooperation with World Peaceways, unintelligently censored your commendable efforts (TIME, March 23).
TIME Inc. need not worry that "good U. S. citizens" are condemning it for giving space to World Peaceways advertisements, even the "HELLO SUCKER" ad which prompted that tinhorn outburst from the Legion's ballyhoo director. Rather, "good U. S. citizens stand . . . united" in applauding the timely courage and vision that has prompted World Peaceways, assisted by FORTUNE et al., to picture the stark horror of war and what it does to those who fall its victims.
I can appreciate the Legion's defense of crippled veterans in the face of unjust ridicule. Who would not rise to their defense? But "HELLO SUCKER" certainly does not ridicule. It deplores the tragedy of the veteran so maimed. It presents only the truth, harsh and startling. In war times, words are never minced. Why mince them now when peace is a great nation's wish? . . .
And shame on a National Director of Publicity for not knowing that all World Peaceways ads appear in donated space.
How noble of Mr. Philips to remind TIME Inc. that it "would be performing a real public service" if it "would refuse to stoop again to such profit-taking." He must have overlooked that very nifty bit of American Legion profit-taking achieved this year over a Presidential veto in Washington. For that superpatriotic boosting of the national debt, the Legion makes all of us, as taxpayers, even greater "suckers." . . .
SEWARD A. COVERT
Tryon. N. C.
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Sirs:
Regarding the controversy about World Peaceways publicity, what do disabled veterans think? Their opinions are more important than Mr. Philips'.
JOHN A. BENNETT
Indianapolis, Ind.
TIME, too, would like to know what disabled veterans think of the Peaceways "Suckers" ad.--ED.
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Investment Trusts
Sirs:
Unjust and misleading is TIME'S slapstick article in the March 9 issue under caption "Investment Trusts.". . .
Having thoroughly studied U. S. investment trusts and being a stockholder in some, I consider the flippant, finger-snapping attitude of TIME in reporting so unintelligently on this broad and complex subject to be inexcusable effrontery.
Your unqualified statement: ". . . An investment trust's only justification is a record better than the market averages"--is inaccurate in my opinion. . . . Your assumption that capital appreciation is the only objective of investment trust managers again shows ignorance of the subject. . . .
In conclusion let me say that I know, and all readers of your article are entitled to know, that it is based on a report published by a statistical service agency. . . .
If TIME wishes to abide by its slogan, "Curt, Clear, Complete" it will refrain from publishing second-hand information of superficial nature culled from unreliable sources.
WILLIAM F. SHELLEY
Boston. Mass.
TIME will continue to regard Standard Statistics. Inc., world's largest statistical organization, as a source of thoroughly reliable financial information. No assumption, but a generally accepted fact is that, while capital appreciation need not be an investment manager's sole concern, preservation of assets should be his first concern.--ED.
sbsbsb
Sirs:
Your article on Investment Trusts (TIME, March 9) boils down to this: Since investment trusts in general showed no greater appreciation than the Standard Statistics Average of 90 stocks, the investor who bought shares of investment trusts would have done just as well if he blindfolded himself and picked his stocks by sticking a pin in the stock tables. . . .
IVAN C. PATTERSON
President
The Parker Corporation
General Distributors of Incorporated Investors
Boston, Mass.
An obvious exaggeration was TIME'S implication that any investor would have done better than many an investment trust manager by picking his stocks blindfold. Mythical indeed is the investor with enough capital to obtain the full benefits of the law of averages.--ED.
Sirs:
When my favorite magazine omits my favorite investment trust, I feel an explanation is indicated. Why not mention Massachusetts Investors Trust when listing outstanding investment trusts?
G. R. KlNGHAM
Faribault. Minn.
In surveying U. S. investment trusts, of which many are ably directed, TIME played no favorites.--ED.
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Royal Thought
Sirs:
I read your magazine TIME with great amusement whenever I can. I entertain the highest regard for your staff, who not only write at great length on foreign affairs, but who can, it seems, state with authority the private thoughts of monarchs.
Let me quote from TIME, Feb. 10, the passage, dealing with Great Britain, which especially caught my eye: ''His late Majesty (King George V of England) privately considered members of the Soviet Government the 'bloody murderers' of his first cousin Tsar Nicholas II and the Tsar's family." It would be very interesting to know how your reporter, who, I feel sure, had never even seen the late King of England, found out his private, therefore unpublished, opinion.
AUDRIE AUSTIN Wildey, Barbados, B. W. I.
The particular royal opinion which Reader Austin impugns was voiced to the foreign minister of a European Republic who is now its' President. It is not necessary to grill a king to learn his thoughts.
--ED.
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Cruel Irony
Sirs:
What cruel irony of fate was it that prompted the ad on p. 69 of TIME, March 16, to read, "When trouble comes fast," to show a flood, in all its unleashed fury, advertising a Hartford, Conn, company?
My sincerest sympathy to them, and a stricken New England people.
K. J. KURZ, M. D.
Germantown, Pa.
The offices of Hartford Steam Boiler Inspection and Insurance Co., whose ad showed a destructive torrent rolling through a city street, remained undamaged on the fringe of Hartford's flood waters. --Ed
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Steel & Steal
Sirs:
We notice in TIME, March 16, in connection with Russia, Stalin and Roy Howard that "Stalin is the Russian word for steel."
Seriously we have always understood it was the Russian word for steal.
Will you check your information again and correct us if we are wrong.
CHELSEA BAILEY
Manager
The Union Central Life Insurance Co. Agency Zanesville, Ohio
His aptitude for cracking Capitalist safes before the 1917 Revolution was but one reason that his colleagues in the Bolshevist underground organization called tough, resilient Joseph Vissarionovich Djugashvili "Stalin" (Steel).--ED,
Chaldean Catholics
Sirs:
Your account of the arrival of Rev. Francis Thomay in Chicago (TIME, March 23) was TIME-worthy, but the statement that ''Father Thomay was laying plans to build the first Chaldean Rite church in the U. S." may be subject to qualification.
At New Britain, Conn, is the Chaldean Mission attended by Rev. Sergius Sarmas, a Chaldean priest, resident of St. Thomas' Preparatory Seminary of Hartford.
Whether or not that mission has its own church I do not know, but in appreciation of your factual correctness I am sending this information for your files.
PAUL DAGGETT
Executive Secretary Cemetery Office The Diocese of St. Paul St. Paul, Minn.
New Britain's 2,000 Chaldean Catholics, whose mission was founded in 1917, hold services in St. Mary's Roman Catholic Church, have no definite plans for a church of their own.--ED.
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Sirs:
... I must take this occasion to observe that a great cross section of the American people read the very estimable publication TIME. I have heard from many Roman Catholics who saw the article in TIME who expressed a wish to do something toward the building of my church. I am told that Roman Catholics all over the country are very favorably disposed toward your magazine because of the fair manner in which you treat their religious news. Please accept my very best wishes for the continued success of your very interesting and valuable publication. May God bless you and the staff of TIME.
REV. FRANCIS THOMAY
Roman Catholic Chaldean Church Chicago, Ill.
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Pickers
Sirs:
In your March 23 issue, there appeared an article headed ''Program for Picker" which will undoubtedly create the impression among your readers that the cotton-producing South faces a chaotic labor problem due to the inventive genius of the Rust Brothers of Memphis, Term., who have invented a mechanical cotton picker.
This would be a fact if at this time there had been perfected a thoroughly practical cotton picker and production of same in the first season was sufficient to harvest an appreciable part of the cotton crop together with a distributing organization capable of throwing the machine on the market to skeptical farmers over night, but such is certainly not the case. . . .
Your article states that John Rust hit upon the idea of using a smooth spindle and moistening same to make the cotton adhere. Almost every inventor who attempted to build a spindle-type cotton picker used this method, and study will disclose that the patent on same expired many years ago. The reason for using a smooth needle is to facilitate the stripping of cotton from it, but the amount of cotton dropped on the ground due to smooth needles has made most inventors discard it in favor of an aggressive barbed needle. . . .
I believe that a large proportion of the cotton in the South will be harvested mechanically within the next five years. . . . This should be welcomed by the Negro who is a slave to this most menial of tasks. . .
. . . No labor-saving machine has yet been introduced which did not eventually raise the standard of living of that labor which it replaced. . . .
CHARLES R. BERRY
Greenville, Miss.
Last week Brothers John D. & Mack Rust of Memphis, who feared their mechanical cotton picker would do social damage, announced they had become trustees in a cooperative, 2,100-acre plantation near Hillhouse, Miss, where 20 families will plant cotton, harvest it with the Rust picker, market it collectively. Backer: Pious Publicist Sherwood Eddy, 65, who quit the Y. M. C. A. to preach Socialism.--ED.
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