Hitler and the Versailles Treaty

Sirs:

Blaming all the unpleasant happenings of international life on the Versailles Treaty (TIME, Sept. 4, p. 19) certainly is much easier than trying to unravel and understand its complexities, but it simplifies history a little too much. It also seems rather foolish to keep harping on a treaty which is now practically nonexistent. Given his choice between the territory possessed by Germany in 1914 and the territory possessed by Germany now, Hitler would very probably choose the latter. Napoleon would have been Napoleon regardless of circumstances. The Versailles Treaty did not make Hitler, it merely gave him a pretext. . . .

Most of us know nothing of history except what goes on during our own lifetime and the Versailles Treaty happens to be the only one we know and hear about. So it does not occur to us that if we blame the present war on the Versailles Treaty we must be logical and go farther back: for that treaty we must blame the Frankfurt Treaty of 1871 which must be blamed on some previous treaty which should be blamed on some other treaty which ought to be blamed on some other treaty which certainly must be blamed on some other treaty; and so on, ad infinitum in reverse, until the only thing left for us to blame is the wind which blew the Spanish ships in the path of Francis Drake. So that in the end, here we are, all up in the air, gone with the wind!

Yours for impartiality, in love for Germany and hatred for Hitler.

MARGOT ANDRADE

Greencastle, Ind.

No Bigamist, No Ketch

Sirs:

It has long been supposed that sailors have a wife in every port, but I am sorry to see TIME support this fiction by placing my salty uncle, Paul Hammond, in the difficult position of a bigamist (TIME, Aug. 28, photo "Professor and Mrs. Morison," accompanying article "After Columbus"). Actually, the photograph is of Skipper Hammond and Mrs. Morison.

I am sending you the true facts of the case, and a friendly warning to avoid running afoul of the other interested parties in this quadrilateral: namely, Professor Morison himself, and Mrs. Paul Hammond, a good sailor, too, who planned the larder for the expedition, and accompanies it.

And by the way, Capitana is now a barkentine, not a ketch.

Hoping that, in spite of all, TIME will live to tell another tale.

ADELAIDE HAMMOND JOHNSON (MRS. EDWIN G.)

Harvard University

Cambridge, Mass.

P: For unwittingly placing Reader Johnson's salty uncle in such a difficult position, TIME apologizes to all hands, fines the news service which supplied a wrongly captioned photograph one tot of grog, herewith prints the picture (and the real Professor Morison) in full. Of TIME'S many boatmen, no small number have made it clear that Capitana is indeed a barkentine and not a ketch.--ED.

Anti-War-Conditioning

Sirs:

. . . Air-conditioning is a new industry. Yet War-Conditioning is newer still--and older. I wasn't exposed to the 1914--17 program, but I'm already plenty sick of current efforts to condition our minds to the idea that "our part is inevitable" etc. . . . Would Hi Johnson accept the honorary chairmanship of an Anti-War-Conditioning Club?

BURTON SCHELLENBACH

Providence, R. I.

"World War"

Sirs:

The new regular section "World War" will compel the preservation of the weekly TIME until it is apparent that a unique contemporary history of the present incidents will result. Can you assure your readers that a comprehensive index to this section will be available after the cessation of hostilities?

FIRMIN MICHEL

Counsellor at Law

Camden, N. J.

P:References to TIME'S current new section will be incorporated in TIME'S regular index, available quarterly to all subscribers.--ED.

Carillonneur Musculature

Sirs:

To be regretted, I think, is the levity with which TIME [Sept. 11] reported the doings of the North American Guild of Carillonneurs: "After three days of it, the 18 peal-drunk Guildsmen shook hands and staggered home to their own belfries. . . ."

Aside from the too-frequent use of words such as "bellwhanger," "din," "tintinnabulation," your account infers some thoroughgoing errors of fact. Emphasis on the musculature of the carillonneurs was such an error. No great strength is necessary for carillon playing. I have known some good carillonneurs who couldn't punch their way out of a wet paper bag. Mr. Lefevere himself is certainly no Tarzan. The phrase "punching with . . . clenched fists" is thoroughly erroneous. The keys of a carillon's clavier are depressed, not struck, with the under surface of the crooked little finger, the hand held with a completely loose wrist. There is no other way to do it.

Explanation of the fact that carillon bells bear about the same relationship to the ordinary type as a Strad bears to a mouth organ, that the best of present-day metalists cannot duplicate the bells of the great 17th-Century brothers Hemony, that during the concerts on Belgian carillons it is forbidden to so much as strike a match lest some delicate overtone escape a listener, might well have been in order. . . .

KEN W. PURDY

New York City

P: If they can do all that by simply crooking their little fingers, it seems to TIME just as well that carillonneurs are no huskier than Reader Purdy avers. --ED.

Armistice Day

Sirs:

I'm going to feel a little sick at my stomach if something isn't done about "Armistice Day" this year. Our respected President shows rare facility at rearranging holidays, so here's a suggestion that we just skip Armistice Day this year.

DON MURRAY

Los Angeles, Calif.

Sirs:

Looking at my calendar this morning, I realized that in exactly two months we shall be called upon to "celebrate" Armistice Day. Having just read completely your last issue concerning the international situation as it is today, my memory goes back several years to a November 11th when my young son (then four years old) asked, "Daddy, what is Our Mistake Day?"

Doubtless the calendar manufacturers would again resent it--perhaps the football authorities would go completely haywire this time and, undoubtedly some of our friends in Washington would feel that a prerogative has been usurped, but I make the suggestion that the calendar manufacturers "black out" completely that little red numeral "11" in November!

Based upon no other authority than the fact I was an officer in the American Air Service in France for 20 months during World War I, I propose that all who feel similarly inclined buy a pair of knitting needles to commemorate appropriately the forthcoming "Armistake Day."

HERBERT E. BICKEL

Richmond, Va.

House at Doorn

Sirs:

If I were Hitler--I'd lease a house at Doorn, put in a good supply of logs, a couple of left-handed saws (in case Benito visits) and commence writing a sequel to Mein Kampj entitled--you can fool some of the people all the time, all the people some of the time but Mr. Chamberlain--only once.

MILTON H. DAXE

New York City

P.S. Should he (Hitler) pull the wool (a yard wide and somewhat shoddy) over his (Chamberlain's) eyes again--I'll lease the house for myself.

Jay-Walking Galahad

Sirs:

As TIME, Sept. 4, reports, Thomas Edmund Dewey "rigorously followed Rules 5, 6, 7 of How To Become President," but what about Owosso's traffic rules? See cut, "Dewey in Owosso," p. 13, which pictures Manhattan's Galahad of law and order apparently walking through a red light.

KERMIT OVERBY Washington, D. C.

P:Technically, but not actually, Mr. Dewey was indeed jaywalking. Cameramen had asked him to walk across Owosso's Main Street; Mr. Dewey obliged; Owosso citizens goggled and traffic just naturally stopped.--ED.

War Head

Sirs:

I strenuously object to the head "World War" which TIME is using. Do you imply that you anticipate the breakdown of the present ideal of the great majority of the American people, namely, to keep our country out of this war?

ELEANOR M. HANNIG New York City

Sirs:

... It is not a "World War" yet, and with the grace of God and the common sense (I hope) of the now neutral large nations, it will never be a World War. . . .

ROBERT BRUCE BLUM Chicago, Ill.

Sirs:

I OBJECT TO YOUR CALLING A EUROPEAN WAR A WORLD WAR. CONSIDER THIS FIRST STEP TOWARD A REAL WORLD WAR. LET'S CONFINE IT TO EUROPEAN NATIONS.

MRS. R. H. REYNOLDS

Raleigh, N. C.

Sirs:

You should be soundly condemned. . . . R. I. HASKELL

Girard College Philadelphia, Pa.

-- Nobody ever kept out of a riot by calling it an altercation.--ED.

Sirs:

Your World War section is fine! How about an article pointing out what an equitable solution to the European situation would be--given an Allied victory? How to prevent a World War III? It stumps me.

SAMUEL J. GORLITZ Milwaukee, Wis.

-- It stumps TIME.--ED.

Last Frenchman

Sirs:

In a broadcast . . . from Germany, the announcer stated that a fight had occurred in New York City between the crew members of the Queen Mary and those of the Normandie, because the Frenchmen said words to the effect that "England will fight this war to the last Frenchman." The fight (so the German announcer said) required the intervention of New York City police.

I have seen nothing of this trouble in our newspapers. Did it occur? Did we have a voluntary censorship in this case, or is German propaganda so unbelievably crude as to broadcast domestic items to us which are untrue and which can be easily checked up on?

J. S. CHAMPLIN Lieut. U. S. N. U. S. Naval Academy Annapolis, Md.

P:The statement was Goring's (TIME, Sept. 18), the broadcast propaganda.--ED.

Cowardly Insults

Sirs:

Italy neutral on the spot (TIME, Sept. 11) is the most stupid, idiotic and false statement of the Italian Strength, Italy alone is able to beat to a pulp both France and England; 8 millions of the best soldiers in the world, armed with the best and most modern weapons ever been dreamed, guided by expert and experienced commanders, are more than a match for Marianne and John Bull. Italy is neutral because Germany alone is more than able to administer to the two thieves of Versailles the defeat of their histories. . . . You, Mr. Editor, are a low down scoundrel, as are all the Jews, you did for years arrogate the right to offend the honor of one of the most noble nation in the world, Italy, the nation which gave the civilization to the whole world; who authorize you to do it? Because you publish a magazine you think you have the right to insulting right and left all the world which are not Jew or British.

In every words of your sheet of Sept. n you show your low down hatred for Italy, can you stop this cowardly insults? . . .

ANTONIO FUNARI

Butte, Mont.

P:Can Reader Funari? -- ED.

Tschewksbry

Sirs:

The Hon. M. P. for Epping (now, happily, First Lord of the Admiralty) may well rejoice that he represented a constituency which TIME did not "mispronounce" (TIME, Sept. 4). The "Tight Little Islanders" from Torquay to Tynemouth pronounce Tewkesbury "Tschewksbry" -- but never "Tooksbroo" as TIME'S esteemed Editors point out.

Life is sufficiently difficult, what with every shoe, grocery, and room clerk calling us everything from Tukberg to Tweeksberry without TIME'S adding to the confusion!

THELMA F. TEWKESBURY

Euclid, Ohio

Etsch to Belt

Sirs:

Yesterday I heard the Field Marshal's impassioned speech to the munition workers at Tegel. ... At the end of the speech the workers sang Deutschland ueber Alles. To my astonishment I heard them sing the old, unchanged words: "Von der Etsch bis an den Belt!" How about that? The Etsch (called Adige by the Italians) is at present and has been for 20 years held by the countrymen of Mussolini, who a few months ago had completed his plans for driving out of the Adige territory (southern Tyrol) everybody who dared speak the German language. And the Belt is held by Denmark,* whose integrity has only a few days ago been formally guaranteed by the Fuehrer. What has become of the traditional German exactness? The song ought to read "from the Brenner to Flensburg."

MAX F. MEYER

Coral Gables, Fla.

Blount Plan

Sirs:

Will you please suggest how I can induce the Congressional big shots to lend their attention for a few moments to the Blount plan? . . .

The plan is simply a double compromise between the present embargo on munitions to warring nations, the so-called "Cash & Carry" idea, and the Johnson Act. Let any nation that can pay cash for them buy munitions in the United States and carry them away in its own vessels, provided that the nation makes a cash payment of equal amount on its war debt at the same time. . . .

Some of the nations will doubtless balk at the debt payments and refuse to buy. Well, let them! So much the less danger of our getting into the mess. It's high time we quit being a sucker for any clever European with outstretched palm and a sad story. EARL E. BLOUNT

Pacific Palisades, Calif.

* Wrong. The Great Belt is the passage between the Danish islands of Fiinen and Zealand, is owned by nobody, mined by the German Navy. -- ED.

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