Refreshing Break

Sir / In spite of myself. I felt great sympathy for the "Con Man of the Year" [Feb. 21] when I read your report that he faces a jail sentence for fraud and perjury. Not since the heyday of P.T. Barnum has one man entertained the American public so long and so well.

Even if Clifford Irving did commit fraud and perjury on the road to becoming a folk hero, he also provided us all with a refreshing break from the atrocities of Bangladesh and the bombings in Ireland. And just incidentally he helped sell a few newspapers and magazines.

Every one of us owes him something for all the fun we've had tracking trim down.

JIM CASTAGNER

Lakewood, Ohio

Sir / "The Fabulous Hoax of Clifford Irving" gets my vote as the best adventure-mystery-suspense story of the year, but I do think your naming Irving the "Con Man of the Year" is a bit premature.

Before this glorious election year is over there may be several other strong contenders for that title.

(MRS.) NANCY T. KROEGER

El Toro, Calif.

Sir / It would not be surprising to hear that McGraw-Hill and LIFE had purchased the Statue of Liberty as a promising joint investment. Perhaps, at least, the money would stay in this country.

W.M. WOOD

Grand Junction, Colo.

Sir / The amount of coverage your magazine has given the Howard Hughes-Clifford Irving intrigue is ludicrous. When the American people need information on so many important domestic and international issues, you have shortchanged them by centering attention on an insignificant account of Clifford Irving, his friends, and his exploits. You need to re-examine your priorities.

RICHARD A. COOPER

Minneapolis

Sir /1 think you overreacted in picturing Clifford Irving on your cover as "Con Man of the Year." For one thing, this man should be entitled to his day in court before he is labeled as a fraud.

JOSEPH G. CARLETON JR.

Brookline, Mass.

Sir / Of all the words, That make the news, The dullest of these, Is Howard Hughes.

RAYMOND A. MAXWELL

North Cape May, N.J.

Sir/Could it be that I detect a bit of venom in your choice of Clifford Irving as "Con Man of the Year"? Come on boys, be good sports. Put yourselves on next week's cover under the title--you guessed it--"Suckers of the Year."

JAMES BURCH POWELL

Eugene, Ore.

The Farmer's Price

Sir / Thank God for the land of the free and the home of the brave! Re "House wives Protest High Prices of Meat" [Feb 21]: the solution--grow it yourselves! You take friend husband in tow and go to the friendly finance company. 'Look, I have a sure thing! Those dumb farmers are making a pot of gold out of us city people by raising meat. Here's just the thing--200 acres at only $400 per acre, potential of 1,000 hogs per year. The house needs some work, but we could remodel it for gracious country living. I could get $40,000 for my house in town now. It only cost us $20,000 back in 1952, remember? So we'd only have to borrow $40,000. Oh, yes, I'll need another $20,000 for machinery. And I don't have any feed, so I'll need about $30,000 to tide those 1,000 pigs over this year. We won't need much for our living expenses since we will be living off the land. Stock? Gee, the farm magazine I get says eight pigs per sow isn't too bad. 125 sows? $100 a head? $12,500--humph--interest? 8%."

So you take the leap. You work, your partner works, your kids work--vaccinating, castrating, sorting, farrowing, feeding, cleaning . . .

At last the big day arrives. You have 1,000 hogs ready to go. Cost: $4 per hundredweight for feed. Exactly $32,000 worth of feed for 1,000 200-lb. hogs.

The friendly buyer looks them over. "I'll give you 160 per pound for them --after all, your city cousins can't pay too much for meat."

$32,000! You walk out dazed. What about the taxes, the interest, your work, the medical bills, the car expense . . .

EDWARD J. FERGUSON

Mt. Hope, Wis.

Trumpeters of Doom

Sir / If the Roman Catholic Church in the United States has any cause for concern, it is primarily due to the professional trumpeters of doom within the church, of whom the Rev. Andrew Greeley [Feb. 21] appears to be an example.

As a Catholic priest, he knows that the authority of the Pope and the bishops is divinely instituted. Possibly, had Father Greeley lived in biblical times, he would have felt the Apostles should have nominated their own Redeemer rather than have Jesus imposed on them by God.

OTTO H. PNIOWER

Pacifica, Calif.

The Uglies

Sir / "Equality for Uglies" [Feb. 21]: blacks denied their blackness, but then developed pride in it. It is not too ridiculous to expect that ugly women may land together to fight job discrimination and other indignities under a slogan such as "Ugly is beautiful."

MIKE JACOBS

San Rafael, Calif.

Sir / Any woman who has ever applied for a job knows that her appearance is just as all-important here as in every other aspect of life where she's obliged to deal with men. The problem is not how to get the "uglies" to band together, but how to get men to realize that a woman's value--as an employee, a companion, a wife or lover--has very little to do with how pretty she is.

MS. MARY B. MCCARTHY

Los Angeles

A Haven for Winners

Sir / Regarding Joseph Kane's distorted article "Grumpy Mood of Florida Voters" [Feb. 14], let it be known that the Daytona Beach resort area boasts 120,000 permanent residents and hosts 3,000,000 tourists annually who reside and visit here by choice not just chance. With so many "winners" enjoying the good life, it's bewildering that Mr. Kane considers Daytona Beach a haven for the "losers of life." He should be so lucky.

ROBERT L. KAYS

Executive Manager Chamber of Commerce Daytona Beach, Fla.

Staged Events

Sir / The presentation to the public of staged or electronically manipulated events under the guise of bona fide television news is an issue that merits everyone's concern and careful consideration. Recent evidence suggests that an increased sensitivity to this problem has arisen within the industry itself; for this the public can be grateful.

Aside from the implication of questionable personal motivation inherent in your story's title, "Staggers' Revenge" [Feb. 14], I think the article served a useful purpose in focusing public attention on this important subject.

HARLEY O. STAGGERS

Chairman Special Subcommittee on Investigations House of Representatives

Washington, D.C.

Other Issues

Sir / Your story on young candidates for school boards [Feb. 14] was an encouragement for all of us who have in the past doubted the public's concern with youthful ideas.

With all due respect I would, however, like to try to clarify the reason I had for becoming a candidate, which I feel may have been misrepresented in your magazine. You wrote "Judith Pierson . . . hopes to get herself elected ... so that she can try to change the rule that got her suspended last year for refusing to salute the flag."

In reality, the laws about saluting the flag were not a major plank in my platform. Included in my platform were the more important issues of drug education, revision of the negative discipline code, rearrangement of the educational priorities (from administrator back to teacher), creation of an enhanced parent-teacher partnership, utilization of the schools for recreational purposes, and the instigation of a program to eliminate racial tension.

I hope that I can impress upon the readers the fact that my campaign was not based on revenge but on the presentation of constructive ideas for the improvement of the school system.

JUDITH PIERSON

Willingboro, N.J.

Prison for Ginzburg

Sir/The irony of Ralph Ginzburg's going to prison [Feb. 21] in 1972 for sending something as mild as Eros through the mail is obvious.

The more interesting question is this: How does a man whose conviction was upheld by the Supreme Court in 1966 still manage to carry on stays and appeals for six years?

ROBERT NORDVALL

Bloomington, Ind.

Sir / Who in this world can authoritatively distinguish between prurient interests and normal, healthy, sexual interests? Is not the sexual pleasure that pornography brings to some people in itself of "redeeming social value"?

To send to prison a man whose crime was innocuously catering to the appetite of the public is both arbitrary and unjust.

ROBERT M. SHERIN

Miami

Sir / It is poetic justice that Ralph Ginzburg should eventually be sent to jail by the peers he so repeatedly offended.

MORRIS B. RUSACK

Philadelphia

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