Amerika for the Russians

To help win the war, the U.S. sent Russia some $10,800,000,000 worth oi Lend-Lease supplies. To help the Russians understand their American allies better the U.S. last year launched two Russian-language magazines, produced by OWI and sold throughout the U.S.S.R. Amerika was pocket-size, crammed with informative, uplifting articles. Appearing in alternate months, as a change of diet, was a handsome, 80-page, slick-paper, LiFE-size magazine called Amerika Illiustrirovannoye (America Illustrated).

Little Amerika left the Russians cold; Amerika Illustrated was hot stuff. They liked its eye-filling pictures of Arizona deserts, TVA dams, the white steeples of a Connecticut town, Radio City, the Blue-grass country, the Senate in session, Manhattan's garment district. The magazine was written and translated in the U.S., sent to Moscow for checking -- and slight censorship -- by the Foreign Office, returned for printing, shipped back as a finished product.

When OWI folded five months ago, the State Department was glad to continue the job. Recently the U.S. Embassy asked Russian permission to up the paid circulation of Amerika Illustrated from 10,000 to 50,000 copies. If circulation goes up, the price may go down : officially it is only 10 rubles (83-c-) a copy, but in the black market Russians have eagerly paid 1,000 rubles ($83) for a look at the Amerika most of them will never see except in pictures.

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