Ugh!
Sir:
Your June 2 Billy Rose cover . . . ended up in the garbage can. I could stand Lena the Hyena, but that cover--ugh! TIME must be getting hard up. . . .
RAY W. BRACHER
Cleveland
Sir:
My husband and I agree that your article on Billy Rose is far too biased to be a true picture. Like so many others who have never met Mr. Rose, we enjoy his columns and appreciate the personality that is formed by them. We feel he deserves all that he has attained.
LENDA PERSIKO
Dobbs Ferry, N.Y.
Sir:
Not that I have any objections to Billy Rose's avowed quest in life of acquiring money for its mere possession, but I do not see why such a pursuit warrants his picture as a cover for your illustrious publication.
Surely there are worthy deeds being performed in the world by men & women whose object is the betterment of mankind and whose achievements could be understandably and deservedly glorified.
H. G. STROBEL
Philadelphia
P: TIME brings all things.--ED.
Myopia
Sir:
There is considerable self-indictment in Mr. Phil Wasserman's letter [TIME, June 2] in which he claims to have discovered that nearsighted women have the most easily excitable passions.
Had I found, through a . . . career such as Mr. Wasserman's seems to have been, that only nearsighted men would go for me, I'm sure I'd be the last to admit it in public.
(MRS.) P. BRACKEN SMITH
Portland, Ore.
Sir:
. . . Is Wasserman positive?
W. M. KROGMAN
Chicago
Sweat, Work, Tears, Determination
Sir:
I know that your book "critic" will be happy to know that his venomous personal attack upon me [TIME, May 19] was read by me while I was sitting by my gravely ill husband's bedside in Geneva. . . . My only hope, expressed out of my utmost bitterness and despair, is that this alleged critic will find himself one day, alone in a strange city, without friends or family to comfort or sustain, at the bedside of a loved one. . . .
I have no objection to criticism honestly offered about any of my books. But I object to attacks made upon me personally, with the whole object to belittle, humiliate and hurt me as a person. . . . I do not know how this "gentleman" obtained his garbled information about me, but I intend to find out. . . .
You mark the horrible . . . photograph of me with the smart caption: "Anticipation!" You might better have used that caption on a mass photograph of the starving Italian children, to whom I have turned over the entire huge bulk of my Italian royalties. Or on a group of flood-wrecked British farmers, to whom I gave a great portion of my Brit ish royalties, or on a photograph of French blind veterans, who are happier today for my contribution. Or on many sections of the American unfortunate, to whom I give over 20% of my gross earnings as a writer every year. . . . In 1946, I gave nearly $20,000 to American charities, all practically without any publicity whatsoever. . . .
I am not "vacationing" in Europe. I came here to see for myself what can be done for the wretched and hopeless. . . . The ruin and death and agony might move even your "critic's" mean little heart. I have been here two months, and am sick with compassion and my own impotence. . .
Whatever "success" I have obtained, I obtained it by sweat, work, tears and hard determination. I can only believe that your "critic" is a disappointed would-be writer, whose "delicate" prose has not been appreciated by the American people, and so he is consumed with envy and spite. . . .
Where did you get that dreadful photograph? It shows me to be snaggletoothed, whereas my teeth are white and even and small. . . .
In your "critic's" remark about my books appealing to only the "stunted" in intelligence, he insults the vast body of American book-buyers and readers who, by the evidence of their letters to me, have bought and read my books. Your "critic," too, will amuse and please only the few of my personal enemies who resent my "success," and envy me, as does this gentle gentleman. . . .
TAYLOR CALDWELL
Geneva, Switzerland
P: TIME'S alleged "critic" does envy Author Caldwell's ability to dish it out.--ED.
Tar Heeler
Sir:
In your June 2 edition, you mention "South Carolina's Harold Cooley." Senator Claghorn won't like this, but U.S. Representative Harold Dunbar Cooley hails from North Carolina's Fourth Congressional District.
HENRY STONER
Groton, Conn.
P: Representative Cooley, famed for his wartime disclosure that wooden guns guarded the U.S. Capitol, can now have his say on TIME'S woodenheads.--ED.
Social (& Political) Note
Sir:
TIME, MAY 26, SAYS: "AT THE SAVOY HOTEL HE [PREMIER DREW] GAVE A PARTY FOR ABOUT 400 OF THE UNITED KINGDOM'S BIGGEST BIGWIGS." PREMIER DREW DID NOT GIVE PARTY. TORONTO "GLOBE AND MAIL" . . . QUOTES PREMIER DREW AS SAYING: "i DID ATTEND A RECEPTION AT THE SAVOY WHICH WAS ARRANGED BY A GROUP OF CANADIANS IN LONDON. . . . THE ENTIRE EXPENSE OF THIS AFFAIR WAS BORNE BY THIS GROUP OF CANADIANS AND IT DIDN'T COST ME OR THE ONTARIO GOVERNMENT ONE COPPER."
G. W. HOGARTH
Press Secretary
Prime Minister's Department
Toronto
P: That should please Ontario taxpayers. And the London Times should be pleased that it did not print the social notice drafted at Ontario House, beginning: "The Hon. George Drew, Prime Minister of Ontario, gave a reception. . . ."--ED.
Commendation
Sir:
Please let me commend TIME for the fairness and accuracy of its reporting of the Greenville lynching case and trial [TIME, June 2 et ante).
JUDSON W. CHAPMAN
Editor
Greenville Piedmont Greenville, S. C.
No Parson, He
Sir:
RE MAY 26TH ISSUE: A LITTLE HISTORICAL RESEARCH WILL REVEAL THAT PARSON WEEMS IS A PROFESSOR OF HISTORY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF IOWA.
GEORGE D. STODDARD Urbana, Ill.
P: The research has been done by an expert (see below]--ED.
Sir:
Readers . . . may indeed find it difficult to recognize George Stoddard as the model for Grant Wood's Parson Weems. The man who really served as model bears little resemblance to Mr. Stoddard, and the painting is an excellent likeness. . . .
Professor John E. Briggs of the University of Iowa was the model, . . . I believe that I am especially qualified to give you this information . . . since I was studying painting under Wood at the time . . . and watched it progress. Also, Professor Briggs is my father.
SHIRLEY BRIGGS
Washington, D. C.
Civic Pride
Sir:
In your review of John Gunther's Inside U.S.A., you presented almost all of the author's in-a-word judgments on U.S. cities, i.e., Phoenix, "the cleanest"; Knoxville, "the ugliest."
However, you skip Mr. Gunther's impression of Seattle as a city with more spectacular beauty than any other U.S. city. . . .
JOE MILLER
Seattle
Sir:
. . . I was properly indignant about [John Gunther] calling Butte the bawdiest city in the U.S. That is, I was indignant until I remembered what Thomas J. Davis, past president of Rotary International, said in a speech in our "fair" city.
He said: "I can always tell what a person has done in Butte by the way he talks about it after he leaves."
Shame on you, Author Gunther.
RAY H. LEE
Butte, Mont.
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