Stalin's Death

Sir: Many thanks for your [section on] "Death in the Kremlin" in the March 16 issue. It was truly a masterpiece of information. As usual, TIME gives its readers what they are asking for.

WILLIAM LINDLEY Chamberlain, S. Dak.

Sir: Stalin's lust for more power, and the praises from the people he had fooled, are meaningless to him now. We read of his mother's tender care for him, her teachings and desires that he should be good for humanity and himself . . . What is there left to say but to quote the Bible: "For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" MRS. W. A. EDLUND Denver

On the Kerosene Range Sir: . . . Your March 2 article on Westinghouse's [Gwilym] Price was interesting. Betty Furness and her sales work intrigued me. One of the new items which causes her to act "as though she never heard of that old-fashioned knickknack she had plugged just the week before." is "a range which will preserve even week the newest bride from cooking disasters." I am getting married out here in June (bride also a missionary), but I'm afraid this newest item would be of little value . . . some of Betty's old, forgotten items would be of more use here. Does she happen to remember that there was ever such a thing as a kerosene range? (Of course, Westinghouse would never recall such!) . . . More power to Westinghouse and Betty, but right now I'll look for the forgotten kerosene range and know that my bride will be very happy if I can get it.

GEORGE D. BEACHAM Zinder, French West Africa

How to Pedal Tricycles Sir: . . . Let me join the many who will notice this sentence: "Then he and curly-headed Barbara Anne peddled their tricycles over a stretch of grass made slightly mangy lately by grandfather golfing divots [TIME, March 23]." TIME forgot to say whether the Eisenhower tykes finally sold their trikes. And what will they be pushing next week? WENDELL SMITH Santa Monica, Calif.

Sir: The Eisenhower grandchildren (poor little things ! ) peddling tricycles . . . it does seem that they are just a wee bit young. Where are our Child Labor laws? . . .

FAVA K. PARKER Ogden, Utah

Sir: Shame on TIME'S proofreader . . . MILDRED B. MUNDAY Lewisburg, Pa. P:TIME's copyreader pleads guilty to a bad brake. -- ED.

Royal Manners Sir: Your March 16 picture of Queen Elizabeth II removing her own wrap was disgusting . . . You called it "a moment of royal informality"; I call it plain old bad manners. Let's hope the American male doesn't take stock in this incident. They are already prone to be lax . . . As for the Duke of Edinburgh, I'm sure he must know better. SALLY HAWKINS Los Angeles

Sir: . . . Any member of our local high-school football squad would have helped the Queen with her wrap, and possibly would have given her a little pat on the back afterwards. We certainly would have slapped the Duke down in the meantime. E. C. McMULLEN Pine Bluff, Ark.

Sir: Sincere thanks for the wonderful story on Paul Rusch and his KEEP* project for Japan's isolated mountain people [TIME, March 9]. No archbishop has been half as effective (in Japan, at least) as Colonel Rusch in making a mixed group . . . work at such speed for the growth of Christianity in that defeated land.

Layman Paul's . . . external tools seemed to consist of shovels, jeeps, telephones, duplicating ink, endless quantities of coffee, and the raucous use of about five words in Japanese-- mingled in unpredictable ways, but always with a wide grin . . . (REV.) WILLIAM J. CHASE Ex-chaplain, Far East Air Forces St. James' Church New York City

The College & Daniel Webster Sir: We at Dartmouth are very proud of Ralph Miller for winning the North American downhill ski championship (TIME, March 16), but we are also quite proud of another Dartmouth man, one Daniel Webster, who fought one of the greatest legal battles in U.S. history to keep us Dartmouth College and prevent us from becoming Dartmouth University, as you so carelessly called us . . . PIERRE B. BALLIETT '56 Dartmouth College Hanover, N.H.

Heavenly Discs Sir: . . . We read with interest your March 9 review of Monsignor Ronald Knox's The Hidden Stream, and were quite amused by the quotation from the book: "All the identity discs in heaven are marked R.C. . . ." Jesus said a good deal about heaven, pointing out, in fact, that it is "within you." Monsignor Knox may be very surprised one fine day, after he leaves this world, to see "publicans and harlots" trooping on into heaven ahead of him. MR. & MRS. FRANCIS M. GARTH Newton Centre, Mass.

Sir: . . . I hope Father Knox won't mind or be disturbed at finding a few non-R.C.s among the Communion of Saints. SHIRLEY HUME Boston

Sir: We are all admirers of the scholarly Monsignor Knox One is grieved, however, at the tone of [that] statement . . . (THE REV.) EDWARD H. COOK St. John's Episcopal Church Essex, Conn.

Sir: I agree. All the "identity discs" in heaven are marked R.C.-- Real Christian. FRANK G. NEDBALEK Bryan, Texas

In Defense of Caldwell Sir: Re your March 9 review of A Good Man: I call to your attention what is, to my mind, the unwarrantedness of the criticism of Erskine Caldwell contained in it. If you will check your Caldwell, rarely will you find the Negro sharecropper treated with anything other than sympathy and compassion and given certain dignity. He has borne down hard on the storekeeper-type and those whose viewpoint they articulate . . .

TIME'S opinions on my husband's books, as a whole, whatever those opinions may be, are beside the point . . .

The man who refuses to honor the dignity and perceptivity of another, for whatever reason, be he a Mississippi storekeeper or TIME Magazine, emanates a certain "sordidness" which should be labeled and condemned. (MRS.) JUNE CALDWELL Tucson, Ariz.

Safety Record Sir: In your March 9 issue . . . you published a short note concerning atomic lesions [suffered in the 1948 Eniwetok atomic tests] . . . The number of patients who received atomic burns was erroneously reported as 40; it should have been four. JAMES BARRETT BROWN, M.D. Saint Louis

Sir: During the existence of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, only five persons connected with the atomic energy program have suffered radiation burns. In 1948 four men at the Eniwetok weapons tests burned their hands when they moved contaminated material without using safety equipment which was provided . . . On June 2, 1952, four persons were exposed to a burst of radiation at Argonne National Laboratory, Lemont, Ill., when a chain reaction experiment became supercritical for an instant. The exposed personnel . . . were given thorough examinations. No ill effects have been observed . . .

The Atomic Energy Commission believes that a noteworthy radiological safety record has been established in its operations, which involve radioactive materials equivalent to millions of pounds of radium . . .

DUNCAN CLARK Acting Chief Public Information Service Atomic Energy Commission Washington, D.C.

The Importance of Being Texan Sir: Congratulations on your March 16 article "Texan Tempest," and for calling Mr. Dorrity's Esquire slam a piece of low humor . . .

As for Texans not knowing how to ride horses, well, that isn't exactly true, but why should a rancher with excess cash ride one anyway when he can ride in a Cadillac? . . . BILL F. BROWN Longview, Tex.

Sir: . . . There is a great host of Texans who say "thank you" to Mr. Dorrity . . . Since the end of World War II, altogether too many Easterners have settled in Texas, and it is high time some loyal Yankees tried to dissuade this growing migration . . . IRENE F. SMITH Waco, Texas

Sir: I want to protest TIME's flippant treatment of "Let's Secede from Texas." Any unbiased observer would agree that it was exquisitely factual. C. M. CHRISTENSEN Los Angeles

Texas Took the General Sir: I should like to swell the almost certain chorus from the state of Texas in protesting your March 9 statement that "the British" captured Von Rundstedt at Bad Toelz. General Von Rundstedt was captured at Bad Toelz, somewhat dramatically, by 2nd Lieut. Joseph E. Burke of St. Petersburg, Fla., then a platoon leader in the 1st Battalion, 141st Infantry Regiment, 36th ("Texas") Infantry Division . . . JOHN F. MORGAN Canton, Ohio

The Junior Senators Sir: In a footnote to your March 9 article on the late Robert La Follette Jr., you state that Senators Henry Clay and Armistead T. Mason served in the U.S. Senate at the ages of 29 and 28 respectively. I should like to know how this was possible, since the Constitution of the United States, in Article I, Section 3, paragraph 3, reads: "No person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained to the age of thirty years . . ." PAUL A. HOFFMAN Chicago P:The only reason Senators Clay and Mason got away with it is that nobody in the Senate objected. The day Clay took his seat (Dec. 29, 1806 ) , a Senator sitting near him asked his age. "I hope," replied Clay, "my colleague will propound that question to my constituents."-- ED.

*The Kiyosato Educational Experimental Project.

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