Murder?
Sirs:
Regarding your article "Disaster" [TIME, April 7]. To what degree Governor Dwight Green is guilty in this frightful tragedy will remain to be hashed out at the next election. [Or] to what degree Secretary of the Interior J. A. ("Cap") Krug is a murderer. . . .
But what of the owners, the Centralia Coal Co.? Could it be possible that they too are somewhat at fault? After all, who knew better than they the condition and safety of the mine? Who, ultimately, gives the go-ahead signal to the miners to work a certain mine?
FRANCIS J. STRATMAN Milwaukee
Sirs:
John L. Lewis murdered in men in a coal mine in Illinois. He murdered them just as surely as if he had given the order resulting in their deaths.
A labor union has no excuse for existence except to watch out for the safety and welfare of its members. Its primary function is not to get annual wage increases.
The newspapers and radios carried the information that the union had knowledge of the dangerous conditions existing in the mine more than a year ago, but only passed the knowledge on to the state government. If this is true .. . the widows and orphans of the men killed in the mine should take proper court action against Lewis and the union for criminal neglect in failing to call the men out. . . .
MART R. PARKER
Wilmore, Ky.
In Allen's Alley
Sirs:
It is perhaps unnecessary to state what all TIME readers by this time know: that your monograph on Fred Allen [TIME, April 7] is a brilliant job, comparable to the Marian Anderson [TIME, Dec. 20]. Congratulations and keep it up!
HANFOED HENDERSON Chapel Hill, N.C.
Sirs:
Your "tongue-in-cheek" profile of Fred Allen was marvelous. Tell me: What was Allen's retort. . . ?
Ross W. CHRISTENA
Indianapolis
P: He took it big (see below).--ED.
Sirs:
Just a line, and this is a line, to thank you . . . for the text you contrived. ... I think it came out swell. It may interest you to know that a man eight feet tall, who just arrived with the circus, spoke with enthusiasm about your piece. This is high praise indeed. . . .
FRED ALLEN New York City
Sirs:
. . . Let's face it! Allen has been out-clowned by Hope and Berle, bested by Benny in spontaneity and naturalness of wit, and out-Aliened by Benchley. . . .
Admittedly, Allen, with the help of guests, has risen to the heights of humor on occasions. Few things in radio have been better done than, for example, the Gilbert & Sullivan parody of last year with Leo Durocher. It is here that Allen's genius finds its best outlet--that is as a writer, and perhaps a director, rather than as a grater-voiced, not-so-funny funnyman. . . .
The comedian of the decade, if he doesn't outwit himself out of radio, is, of course, Henry Morgan.
JOSEPH L. FLEMING Fort Sill, Okla.
Irony & Cabbage
Sirs:
In his critical evaluation of The Macomber Affair [TIME, April 7], the Cinema editor evidently failed to read the original story very closely. States the editor: "According to Hemingway, [Mrs. Macomber] shoots [her husband] deliberately. ... In the movie, it was just a tragic accident--and the audience is left to make up its own mind." Writes the author: "Mrs. Macomber . . . had shot at the buffalo . . . and had hit her husband."
The "did-she-or-didn't-she" aspect, which TIME'S critic asserts is a Hollywood "improvement" and weakens the picture, is actually the dominant element upon which the original story ends.
CARL LANTOS Austin, Tex.
Sirs:
Scallions and skunk cabbage to whoever reviewed The Macomber Affair. . . .
D. R. CLAXTON Ipswich, Mass.
P: The appropriateness of Reader Claxton's gift is meekly acknowledged by TIME'S Cinema reviewer and researcher.--ED.
The Divine Quest
Sirs:
The LIFE editorial reprinted in TIME [April 7] ... will stir a lively hope in many a heart. For, try as we may, we cannot put off forever the insistence of the soul. Man's destiny is the divine quest. . . .
JOHN G. CLARK
North Stonington, Conn.
Sirs:
. . . Religious propaganda is not news and has no place in a news magazine. . . . This "Road to Religion" editorial in TIME and LIFE is a disgrace. . . .
WEBSTER B. OTIS Pasadena, Calif.
Sirs:
Thank you from the heart for this editorial. . . .
[REV.] BERNARD IDDINGS BELL Chicago
Sirs:
Your "Road to Religion" leads exactly nowhere, and hence, year by year, more & more are leaving it. ...
There is a great impersonal, indefinable Source of All Being which pervades the immeasurable Cosmos of which we are tiny parts.
It has endowed us with great potential powers. We have neglected those powers and mistakenly waited for their Source to act for us. However, we are wholly dependent on ourselves. Ours is not to pray but to act.
We can have the kind of world we want, but we have to make it ourselves. . . . ARTHUR B. HEWSON
Chicago
Adjective Man
Sirs:
Whether she realizes it or not, I am of the decided opinion that Oscar-Winner Olivia de Havilland made her discovery that "It's the adjectives that count" [TIME, March 31] not from "reading a lot of books between scripts," but from her husband, Marcus Aurelius Goodrich, author of the novel Delilah.
Having served under him in the U.S. Navy I am willing to bet that the other 500 men of the former crew of the U.S.S. Pitt will vouch that they have never known of any one person who used adjectives more dramatically or profusely than Lieut. Commander Goodrich, no matter whether he was instructing, explaining, praising or more especially reprimanding with super-adjectival expletives.
J. M. MUGGLEY Corpus Christi, Tex.
The Eyes of Texas . . .
Sirs:
. . . Your reporting has been getting poorer & poorer. ... I refer, in particular, to the article captioned "Texas Comes of Age" in your April 7 issue. . . .
To begin with, you refer to the Lone Star Steel Co.'s blast furnace as the first and only blast furnace in Texas. This is erroneous. Another blast furnace is in operation at Sheffield Steel Co.'s Houston, Texas, rolling mills, though owned by the DPC. You further state that U.S. Steel had made a bid for the Government-owned Oklahoma coal mines which supplied coal to Lone Star, and that U.S. Steel wanted the coal for its Sheffield fabricating plant at Houston. The Sheffield plant at Houston is not a fabricating plant. It is a rolling mill equipped with melting and rolling facilities. Furthermore, it is not owned by U.S. Steel.*
In referring to Houston's growth, you mention that along its 50 miles of Ship Channel shore there are concentrated $6,000,000 worth of plants. $600 million would be more nearly accurate, for one oil company alone has over $100 million invested in refineries and other
You refer to Dallas' Glenn McCarthy. Glenn McCarthy has lived in Houston all his life and continues to live here, maintains his offices here and has extensive holdings in Houston, including several office buildings, and is now constructing an $18,000,000 hotel and community center.
I do not see how it can be possible for any reporter to so inaccurately cover a story. . . .
W. R. CARTER Houston
P: It isn't possible; several accomplices are needed. A posse from TIME'S Texas bureaus is now on the trail of the misinformed New York rustlers.--ED.
Freedom of the Press
Sirs:
It is one of the unfortunate verities that corporate studies such as that of the Commission on the Freedom of the Press [TIME, March 31] lose much of their impact and value therefore by the very objectivity and academic correctness of their compositors. Thus, as TIME points out, the report might have achieved enhanced importance by naming names and citing instances. . . .
Here in Los Angeles ... we have our choice of four newspapers. Two of these are venal and unreliable typical "chain reactionaries" which do not hesitate to suppress news contrary to their avowed policies. The third has been well described as a stand-patter. It is honest enough in its way, but its features and editorials more often than not retain a juvenile small-time flavor as if unable to forget the nostalgic picture of Los Angeles in a more placid past. Finally there is a tabloid which, despite a reasonably intelligent and liberal editorial policy, runs repeatedly to the blatant at the expense of more significant coverage. . . .
It is a depressing commentary on the state of journalistic enterprise in our country when we consider that, despite the freedom our press enjoys, we can point to so very few newspapers of a stature which commands universal trust and respect.
RALPH PARKMAN San Gabriel, Calif.
Wing Flappers
Sirs:
In your article [TIME, April 7] about Mr. Pentecost's Hoppi-copter, you say that gliders are "only half the ticket" in fulfilling man's desire to fly like birds. You may be right-- but there are over 1,000 sailplane and glider pilots in America who, in order to forgive you this grave error, must assume that your Writer (poor man) probably has never experienced the thrill of "motorless flight." These pilots will tell you that there can never be a motor-powered craft that will replace the sailplane and glider as aids in achievement of the mortal's ambition to flap his wings in flight. . . .
Only in a sailplane or a glider does a man actually fly. A sailplane pilot needs and wants only the power that thermals (masses of hot air forming at the earth's surface and rising, to give lift) and air currents provide. With this power, sailplanes have soared to an altitude of almost 23,000 feet, and a Russian woman, who holds the international distance record, sailed non-stop for 465 miles.
We stand ready and willing to prove these statements at the 14th annual National Soaring Meet in Wichita Falls, Texas, July 4-20!
CHARLES KING F. L. HARVEY Co-Directors
14th Annual National Soaring Meet Wichita Falls, Tex.
P: TIME'S Science editor is staying home--ED.
* At no time has U.S. Steel or any of its operating subsidiaries made a bid for the Government-owned coal mines in Oklahoma. Neither U.S. Steel Corp. nor any of its operating subsidiaries have any fabricating plant at Houston. Sheffield Steel' of Texas has a complete steel works with iron and coke producing facilities at Houston; the company is a subsidiary of the American Rolling Mill Co.--ED. plants along this 50-mile Ship Channel, and it is one of many such projects.
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