Letters, Dec. 1, 1941

Major Glubb’s Tasbih

Sirs:

In TIME, Nov. 3, under World War,”D.S.O. to a Legend,” article about Major John Bagot Glubb [Commander of Britain’s Arab Legion in Trans-Jordan].

Major Glubb’s many years in the East seem to have given him more than Arabic nicknames. He seems to have acquired the Mohammedan practice of fingering the Tasbih. The Tasbih could be called the Mohammedan Rosary. Composed of 33, 66 or 99 beads, it is used by the faithful in the repetition of the 99 names which express the attributes of Allah. These beads are generally fingered during meditation and moments of stress. . . .

V. H. BORSODI JR. New York City

Men of the Year

Sirs:

There need be but one nominee for the Man of the Year. He is a composite of the American Taxpayer. . . .

LEONARD ORMEROD

Hartford, Mich.

Sirs:

… I nominate Joseph Stalin—the only man to date who has been able to hold Hitler and, I believe, change the tide.

RICHARD J. KATZ

Rochester, N.Y.

Sirs:

If there must be a Man of the Year once again, put me down for Adolf Hitler. What a noble service he is rendering the world by striking at the dual-headed monster of English greed and Russian Communism. . . .

L. P. BOYLE Philadelphia, Pa.

Pregnant Rule

Sirs:

“In analyzing an argument you feel to be specious, always look for the hidden major premise.” Never, since he began popularizing it in his classes at Yale 70 years ago, has William Graham Sumner’s pregnant rule of thumb been more essential to straight national thinking than at the present moment.

The speciousness in the argument of our Senatorial and other America Firsters (e.g., TIME, Letters, Nov. 10) is that the American electorate still has a choice. “Your money or your life!” hardly offers a genuine alternative when you feel the gun barrel in your guts, as we already do here in Camden, where the Reuben James was built. . . .

RALPH W. WESCOTT

Camden, NJ.

Thomas & Son

Sirs:

In your issue of Nov. 3 under heading People you write: “The day that Socialist Norman Thomas made an anti-war talk outside the University of California, his son, Evan, 21, quit Princeton to drive an ambulance for the British in the Near East.” . . .

I should let that pass . . . except for the plain implication that my son and I are in disagreement on this important decision of his. This is incorrect. My son made up his own mind on his own initiative. This was as it should have been, but I warmly approved his act. Nothing in it implied disagreement with my general views on American foreign policy, with which he is in accord. I have always applauded men who risk their lives for something in which they believe. I have wanted more, not less, American participation in services of human helpfulness.

My quarrel has never been with young mera who enlist in such services, but with older and more ambitious men who would send our youth, under compulsion, to war in the service of an Anglo-American imperialism. . . .

NORMAN THOMAS

New York City

>TIME’S one-sentence report did not intend to imply that pacific Socialist Thomas and his son were at odds, simply that their reactions to the war were in striking contrast.—ED.

East & South

Sirs:

“The Editors of TIME present THE MARCH OF TIME”—

—but are they producing it where it will do the most good ? Of course this TIME reader is most grateful that you have brought the good old MARCH OF TIME back to the air here in the U.S.

But to the millions in Europe who have been living on ersatz news since May 1940 it would be meat and wine

Could do?

HARRY K. ASCH

Philadelphia, Pa.

> Could do and are doing. . . . TIME shortwaves the MARCH OF TIME to Europe every Friday at 21 o’clock Greenwich Meridian Time over Station WGEO in Schenectady. Typical opening announcement:

“This program is addressed to 3,997 men and women on the continent of Europe who were readers of TIME, the Weekly Newsmagazine, until the war came. . . . And all other men of good will—from Norway to Crete, from Belgium to the occupied Ukraine—are also invited to listen.”

TIME also shortwaves the MARCH OF TIME to Latin America every Saturday at 6:30 p.m. E.S.T. from WGEO, Schenectady; from KGEI, San Francisco.—ED.

Extreme Instances

Sirs:

The fact that you chose to remark upon my talk in Boston recently was very flattering. But at the same time I fear that what you chose to quote from this talk may prove misleading not only to North Americans but surely will make my South American friends feel that their hospitality has been answered with ridicule.

Therefore, I should like to point out that the anecdotes printed were merely extreme instances, indicating the difficulties encountered in doing business in South America. But these anecdotes certainly did not reflect the appreciation that I have for the cordial and astute qualities which I met with most often.

EDWARD S. MARCUS

Dallas, Tex.

> Anecdotes told by Merchant Marcus at the Boston Distribution Conference (TIME, Oct. 20): A silversmith refused to make 40 tea sets because, while making one set was fun, making 40 sets would be hard work; 2) a lard seller in a village market refused to sell her whole pail of lard at once until she had had her fill of gossip.—ED.

DC-2½

Sirs:

May I call your attention to the article in your issue of Sept. 1, “Space Machine Patched.”

The China National Aviation Corp. has never carried breech blocks for Chungking anti-aircraft guns, or any other cargo which would jeopardize its position as a purely commercial line. This position has the complete support of the Chinese Government.

For your further information, the DC2 wing, secured to the bottom of another DC-2, was flown to Suifu by Captain Harold A. Sweet, a most difficult flight. Captain Sweet also flew the DC-2½ back to Hong Kong after it had been repaired.

I might add also that we are not “wild and woolly” but very staid and home-loving.

W. L. BOND

China National Aviation Corp.

Hong Kong

> Thanks to C.N.A.C.’s Bond for corrections on carrying war materials and on the name of the pilot who flew a spare DC2 wing (no other being available) to the hiding place of a crippled DC-3. But for staid and home-loving people iron-tough Operative Bond and his mates certainly do run a wild & woolly airline.—ED.

That Hayworth-Petty Cover

Sirs:

What a relief to get away from all the Russians on TIME’S cover. We need more pictures like Rita’s to keep the American people thinking as they should.

J. H. BENSON

Brawley, Calif.

Sirs:

Do you think that the majority of your subscribers will not be offended by the frontispiece on TIME, Nov. 10, displaying the almost nude body of Rita Hayworth? If you do, I think that you fail to sense the desire of many intelligent readers of TIME to stand for a high standard of morals. . . .

MRS. W. H. FORD

Philadelphia, Pa.

Sirs:

The writer, a subscriber, and everybody in this shop (actually only three people) exclaimed loudly at your cover—and we’re in the advertising calendar business—but you’re not. It’s just no good for this magazine.

. . . My ten-year-old daughter just arrived and said, “Oh, how pretty, may I have the cover, mother?” I tried to be tolerant but it was surely difficult.

E. WHIFFLE

Laguna Beach, Calif.

Sirs:

On the cover of your Nov. 10 issue you portray Rita Hayworth. Our nation is facing its gravest hour, and you put Rita Hayworth on the cover. Men, women and children are dying by the thousands of martial violence, and you give your Number One spot to Rita (in a Petty drawing, at that). Half the world is in flames, and you go for glamor girls.

Please renew my subscription immediately.

WORTHEN BRADLEY

San Francisco, Calif.

Sirs:

. . . . WOW!

ROBERT K. SHINBAUM

Station WNOX

Knoxville, Tenn.

Sirs:

WOW!!!

EMIL A. ERICKSON PAUL F. CUNDY

Virginia, Minn.

Sirs:

WOW!!!!!!!!

PAUL K. ZIMMERMAN

West Lafayette, Ind.