Columnist Bill Gold, of the Washington Post and Times Herald, recently reported that he had discovered an unusual system of reading TIME which is used by Charles E. Randall of McLean, Va.:

ONE of the many periodicals Charlie reads is TIME . . . Charlie is practically a charter subscriber and has been a devoted reader for many years. Unfortunately, however, he has difficulty keeping current. There are too many things to read, and not enough hours in the day . . . When a new issue of TIME arrives, he doesn't even crack it open for a peek. No sir. He just puts it in its proper place with the other unread issues that have piled up. and keeps right on plodding along with the copy he was engrossed in at the moment. In short, he's going to read his TIME chronologically, or not at all.

Currently, Charlie has a closet full of issues that he hasn't caught up with yet. He's just started reading August of 1944, from which he learns that Allied forces are making a daring thrust for Paris. Hitler, at this point, is in a fury over the plot to assassinate him, and has begun a purge of top-rank Nazis.

Charlie no doubt wonders how all this is going to turn out. Little does he know that in the next issue the Allies will land in the south of France to launch a pincer movement against the retreating Germans . . . My advice to Charlie is to take heart. I predict that by the end of the month we'll be in complete control of Paris, Marseille will capitulate. Bulgaria will petition for an armistice, and Rumania will surrender and switch to the Allied side. As Verdun. Saint-Mihiel and Dieppe fall, the Russians will take over the entire Ploesti oilfields.

Here at home, the War Production Board will erupt as Charles E. (Electric Charlie) Wilson and Donald M. Nelson bring their long-standing feud to a head. And Sidney J. Weinberg, WPB vice-chairman assigned to the job of making peace between them, will also quit in disgust. Charlie will be pleased to know that Governor Thomas E. Dewey will conduct a stirring campaign as the Republican nominee for President.

Randall might also be interested to know that on Aug. 16, TIME took a full-page ad in the Washington Post to advertise a statement by Leon Henderson: "Cut down on corporation taxes after the war?" asked Leon. "I'd cut 'em out."

But I'm not going to be a killjoy and spoil your reading, Subscriber Randall. You just go right ahead with what you were doing. And if you come across any clues as to what happened to that "lasting peace" we were working on during '44, please let me hear from you at once.

According to Columnist Gold, TIME Reader Randall did get in touch with him a few days later, not to report discovery of the "lasting peace," but to say that after the column appeared, so many of his friends had kidded him about his reading habits of TIME that he actually peeked at the current issue. His reaction: What a wonderful preview of the future!

Cordially yours,

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