What a Man!

Sirs:

Your "At Sea, They Shot an Albatross" (TIME, March 23) is the most magnificent piece of writing of the decade. It should be placed verbatim in every schoolbook; it should be bound in every library. It should be hung on the walls of U.S.O. "huts," and recruiting centers. It makes my eyes smart with pride that I have nationality in common with Pilot Dixon. . . . My god, what a man!

MRS. ROBERT JAMISON Los Angeles, Calif.

Sirs:

... If Captain Bligh wished to shake hands with the one that "really" was responsible for pulling [the three Navy flyers] thru, I fear it would not be "Dixon." . . . "Aldrich" was not a gabby sort, in fact, he was, and is, very quiet. . . . Another thing, he never addressed or spoke of his father as his "old man." And I do not care for anyone else to address his father in that manner either. ... It was Aldrich, even tho a "lad" that provided the most of the food on that voyage. It was he who sighted the islet. . . . You see, I received a telegram from headquarters, saying that my son would recount his experience adrift in a rubber life raft in an interview over NBC Blue network. . . . And it was the "Aldrich lad," that led that little band in the Lord's Prayer (even tho Dixon was old enough to be his father), and every evening thereafter they held prayer services. . . . I am very proud of my son and he is the first I have read about who gives God credit and first place, and that's news. . . .

MRS. ADA ALDRICH Sikeston, Mo.

> Proud Mother Aldrich has a worthy son.-ED.

Senior Lawrence

Sirs:

In the March 30 issue of TIME . . . you speak of the Finch School as having become a junior college "like Sarah Lawrence and Stephens." Sarah Lawrence College opened in 1928 as a junior college but was chartered in 1931 as a senior college and has granted A.B. degrees ever since 1933. The College gives a diploma to mark the completion of the first two years but it is definitely a four-year college. . . .

CONSTANCE WARREN President

Sarah Lawrence College Bronxville, N.Y.

Spring at Harvard

Sirs:

The way you refer to the Harvard student, touched by the first soft breath of spring, throwing open his window with the cry, "Oh, Rinehart!" (TIME, March 30), you would have your readers believe that was some obscure Harvardism for "Pshaw!" or "Alack-aday!" Actually, it is nothing of the kind.

First, the word is "Rheinhardt" without the "Oh." Second, it is never called from the open window of a building, but rather from the yard outside, and is meant as a rallying cry to riot.

If successful, it may result in a few cracked heads and the appearance of the oafish Cambridge police who glory in any opportunity to use a stick on a Harvardman. If unsuccessful, it may merely result in a parade of visits to the Dean's office.

JULIAN E. AGOOS

Wilmington, Del. --Oh; thanks.-ED.

Desensationalization

Sirs:

. . . By its desensationalization of the 40-hour-week brawl [TIME, March 30], and the Standard Oil "treason" case [TIME, April 6], TIME definitely qualifies for the honor of presenting the facts in proper balance.

War pressure can have one of two effects. It can shatter a nation into violent factions whose simple noise and passion give them fleeting leadership over the uniformed mass, till the state is like a tightrope walker who stands still and violently waves his arms until he falls. Or war can increase the depth of vision and willingness of a people to compromise so that they move forward poised and alert, responding (as a whole) slightly but sufficiently to each threat against their balance. . . .

JAMES B. CONNER Argos, Ind.

Answers to Providence

Sirs:

Apparently it did not occur to your letter writer from Providence, R.I. [TIME, March 30] that, had everybody been as "foresighted" as he in stocking up on tires, those whom he now accuses of lack of planning might have found it difficult to accumulate even as much as one year's supply of rubber so necessary for the military effort of the U.S. . . .

Your correspondent would be paid for his tires if they were requisitioned for fighting tools for our soldiers, and he then could gorge himself on expensive foods and go to the theater. . . .

Your correspondent hardly need trouble about "raising a stink" by writing to Congress; his mental attitude "smells to high heaven" without further effort.

CARL CNOBLOCH Bedford, N.Y.

Sirs:

. . . My husband is a salesman and depends upon our car to earn our daily bread, but if Mr. Henderson needs our tires (we bought two new ones in September) he certainly may have them. We can always find another way to make a living. . . .

MRS. JOHN WOODROUGH South Bend, Ind.

Sirs:

. . . The writer in his own words is a self-styled "Stinker. . . ."

Ninety-nine percent of your subscribers and readers are red-blooded Americans. . . .

WM. J. MARTIN Potsdam, N.Y.

Sound Effects

The following is an excerpt from a letter written on Feb. 14 during the heroic defense of Bataan Peninsula by Lieut. Colonel James E. Macklin, U.S. Quartermaster Corps, to his wife in San Francisco. She followed the instruction given in the last sentence.-ED.

I have a short-wave battery radio set which has been a Godsend here in the woods. For the past four or five evenings KGEI has been booming through. I have heard Bing Crosby, THE MARCH OF TIME, Charlie McCarthy and Jack Benny. A funny thing happened the other evening while I was listening to THE MARCH OF TIME. One of the episodes purported to depict an incident in the front lines here in Bataan. There was a sound effect of firing and one of the characters said: "Here they come!" Just at that minute a flight of dive-bombers opened up on an airfield and our AAs opened up on them. The noise of that little brush completely drowned the sound effects on the radio. There was a gang around listening to the program and we were all very much amused at the coincidence. If you can get around to it, please drop a note to KGEI and tell them how grateful all of us out here are for their programs. . . .

Rawlings' Hogs

Sirs:

I read your enjoyable review of Cross Creek by Marjorie Rawlings [TIME, March 23]. And ... I wish to state that Miss Rawlings clearly does not know her hogs. . . . She states on p. 263 that a sow was suckling pigs and at the same time being serviced by a boar. A sow will refuse to take a boar until her previous litter are weaned. However in three days after the pigs are weaned she is willing to take. In this respect hogs are smarter than men and women as they thereby gain strength to support adequately the new litter. I have raised many hogs and . . . know for a fact as any informed hog raiser also does that what I state is true and what Miss Rawlings writes is only interesting . . . reading for the uninformed. . . .

CLARENCE DARLINGTON

Pasadena, Calif.

Uprooted Japs

Sirs:

Can there be any greater atrocity in the annals of American history than the uprooting of the Japanese families from their homes on the Pacific coast [TIME, April 6] ? If these people were allowed to go about their business as honorable, law-abiding Americans, no doubt the majority would behave as such. Treat them as enemy aliens and you may expect anything.

Why not transport all the native-born Italians and Germans and their American-born children to concentration camps in the Midwest? There are probably more saboteurs to the square yard among these groups than there are among the Japanese.

JOHN L. ULMER, D.O. Toledo, Ohio

Sirs:

The very interesting account of "Moving Day for Mr. Nisei" (TIME, April 6), stated in part: "Thus, last week, the first compulsory migration in U.S. history set out for Manzanar, in California's desolate Owens Valley." I recalled a historical marker that I photographed near Pea Ridge Battlefield some years ago. Apparently Mr. Nisei was not the first. . . .

The Cherokee were driven by the U.S. Army along the "Trail of Tears" from their mountain hunting paradise to the desolation of Indian territory. History repeats itself.

LYNN H. SKEAN Ary, Ky.

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