The other day one of TIME'S top editors was telling me in some embarrassment about a dinner at which he had been the speaker in a big Midwestern city.

"You know," he said, "they all expected me to have a lot of inside dope to tell them--stuff we had never published. The week before they had heard some columnist who positively radiated the impression that he knew all sorts of important things his newspaper had never told. But again and again when they asked me what the real truth was about this or about that, I just had to tell them that all I knew was what I read in TIME--that some of our people had worked for weeks to make sure our story on that subject was right and complete, and I just couldn't add anything to it.

"And then on the train I got to thinking that perhaps I had no reason to be embarrassed at having to admit that TIME had already told its readers everything it knew. In fact, it would be a real black mark against TIME and a real black mark against me as a TIME editor if I did know anything really important (outside of true military secrets) that we had failed to tell our readers--spelling it out clearly and making sure they would not miss its importance."

That story reminded me of a remark made by one of America's top flight newspapermen--Malcolm Bingay, Editorial Director of the Detroit Free Press: "Reading TIME," he said, "is like talking after hours to an extraordinarily well-informed group of newspaper reporters."

Perhaps these two comments-- one from one of TIME'S own editors, one from a famous editor looking in from outside--explain far more clearly than I could ever do it one of the things that makes TIME'S way of reporting the news different.

Most of TIME'S editors and correspondents served long newspaper apprenticeships before they came to TIME. And as old newspapermen ourselves we know that the staffs of America's newspapers are filled with good reporters who know far more than they can tell.

Of course, one big reason why TIME is able to cover the news more outspokenly is that we have no hourly or daily deadlines to meet--we can take up to seven full days instead of one to make sure our facts are right, to fit them all together, figure out their implications and fill in the background.

And another big reason is that TIME is always ready to print news on its own responsibility--whether or not an outside authority or a public figure is willing to let us "attribute it" to him.

TIME and the newspapers really do two different jobs--with TIME following through where the newspapers leave off. And so most people find that the more they read TIME, the more they get out of their papers and the better they understand spot news--while the more newspaper reading they do, the more valuable to them TIME becomes.

But perhaps even better evidence of the way TIME and the newspapers complement each other is this: not long ago the editors of America's leading newspapers voted that they themselves find TIME the most interesting magazine they read--and the magazine most useful in their work.

Cordially,

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