Letters: Apr. 26, 1963

Hold Back the Flood

Sir:

It’s no wonder the U.S. won’t give a cent to help save the 3,000-year-old Temple of Abu Simbel [April 12]. Right now Colorado River water caught by Glen Canyon Dam is rushing toward Rainbow Bridge—the most beautiful and largest of all known natural stone arches, a natural wonder of the world carved by nature long before Egyptian Pharaoh Ramses II thought of praising himself with a temple carved by slaves. Congress vowed to save the bridge in the 1956 Colorado River Storage Act. But the promised protection facilities have never been built. Maybe the nations that have so generously contributed to help save Abu Simbel could give the U.S. some money to help Congress keep its promises before miles of water put Rainbow Bridge to sleep.

DONALD J. DE LA PENA San Jose, Calif.

^The Department of the Interior now says that there is no physical threat to Rainbow. Engineers and geologists have promised that the water level will never reach it.—ED.

Sir:

My husband suggests making a plaster cast of the temple, raising the cast by steel cables to the top of the cliff, and there casting a replica.

I would use the universal answer to all packaging problems—the plastic bag—to wrap the temple in.

(MRS.) NANCY TERZINO Washington, D.C.

Sir:

Why not simply raise the four Ramses II statues 200 ft. to ground level, and then seal the present “front door” of the temple.

A tunnel could be cut through from the surface to make the temple interior accessible from above. All that would be lost would be the original facade, which could be reconstructed 200 ft. higher, using the original statues and other movable exterior work. This plan would cost much less.

P. L. FORSTALL Evanston, 111.

Sir:

My proposition, of course, is the ultimate in economic feasibility. Use the Italian principle. But don’t jack the temple up; simply float it up on buoyant tanks. For nothing more than the hell of it I’d be prepared to work out the physical concepts involved. JOHN R. BOWLES Chicago

Sir:

Your article fails to mention a very interesting solution presented by Polish architects, which has received a favorable opinion from the Egyptian government.

The solution consists of the construction of a semicircular concrete amphitheater embracing the temple on both sides. The project is similar to the French one, with the exception that water seepage will be avoided, and in its cost, which has been estimated at $30 million.

ADAM POLAKIEWICZ Sao Paulo, Brazil

Sir:

It will be one of the ironies of history if the culture-conscious Kennedy Administration allows the destruction of the Temple of Abu Simbel through failure to provide the money needed to supplement funds pledged by the U.N.

The money is readily available in Egypt in the form of counterpart funds: money the U.A.R. paid to the U.S. but which cannot be used anywhere but in Egypt. Thus this wonder of the ancient world might easily be saved without the cost of one cent to U.S. taxpayers.

BARBARA J. SWITALSKI Chicago

^There are sufficient counterpart funds in Egypt to save Abu Simbel, and they could be made available if the White House and Congress agreed that the money should be used for that purpose.—ED.

Spirits That Take a Side

Sir:

TIME (April sth) says “U.S. distillers are at a disadvantage because federal law limits the amount of neutral spirits they may use in blends, while distillers of Scotch and Canadian have no limits.”

Scotch whisky contains no neutral spirits. Blended Scotch whisky is made only from malt and grain whiskies. Scotch grain whisky was described in a 1940 report by Peter Va-laer, a chemist with the U.S. Bureau of Internal Revenue, as follows: “Scotch grain whiskies, although distilled at a high proof, are not the same as neutral spirits but are light-bodied, single whiskies distilled from corn and matured in the same manner as Scotch malt whisky.”

These facts were reiterated by Dwight E. Avis, director of the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax Division of the IRS in a 1960 address to the National Conference of State Liquor Administrators.

P. J. WOODHOUSE Scotch Whisky Association Edinburgh

I Remember

Sir:

Your article on the Armory show re-created [April 5] was excellent and gave me quite a touch of nostalgia. You showed the sculpture section of the 1913 show—where I spent part of every day while the exhibition was on. I also enjoyed, on the same page, the photos of Arthur B. Davies and Walt Kuhn, both good friends of mine.

I remember the kick I got the first time I saw Lehmbruck’s work—especially his Kneeling Woman, one of the finest examples of modern sculpture. That and Paul Gauguin’s bois sculptė were among my favorites and were so marked in my 1913 catalogue.

I have enjoyed TIME for many years—and look forward every week to the Art section.

ROBERT LAURENT-Indiana University Bloomington, Ind.

Inside the Insiders

Sir:

In referring to your story on the school of young Mexican painters who take their name from the title of my book, The Insiders, William D. Gorman, whose letter was published in the Apiil 12 issue, misses the point.

Painters like Wyeth and Shahn, he asserts, evoke “tenderness, pity, humanism and dignity,” whereas the young Mexicans show man as “misshapen” and “stripped of all dignity.” The assumption is that the humanist artist, unless he be an optimist, caters to the “current sickness fad.”

Most of the Mexican Insiders, while not wholly pessimistic, do tend to see modern man as afflicted by indecision, doubt and guilt, often isolated, and sometimes disfigured by the failure to achieve love in a brutalizing social environment. The same is true of the imagery of such American humanist artists as Lebrun, Baskin and Kearns. And it is certainly true of such humanist masters as Brueghel and Bosch, Goya and Rouault.

Wyeth and Shahn, incidentally, are discussed sympathetically in my book. And I share Mr. Gorman’s admiration for the not-so-optimistic Hopper and Broderson.

SELDEN RODMAN Oakland, NJ.

The Oldest Profession

Sir:

Prostitution will continue to exist as long as there is a demand. Few sociologists would support the statement that the abolition of unemployment would, ipso facto, eliminate prostitution [April 12]. Only with the elimination of demand, through a changed social climate, will prostitution be fully abolished. Eradication of unemployment and the occasional big-city “cleanups” have proved, and will continue to prove, of little value in combating the continuance of this “industry.” When, then, will prostitution cease to exist? The answer will probably be forthcoming from radiation physicists rather than sociologists.

ALAN E. BAYER Tallahassee, Fla.

Daley & Arvey

Sir:

In order that your excellent profile of Mayor Daley [Mar. 15] be factually correct, be advised that Richard J. Daley’s ambition to be mayor was not “unthinkable” to me, and his candidacy in 1955 was not in defiance of my wishes.

J. M. ARVEY Chicago

> Good Democrat Arvey did indeed support Daley, on the record, and has warmed to him since.—ED.

The Right Climate

Sir:

In the Education article on Shimer [April 19], you list that college as “one of eleven U.S. campuses that have an ideal ‘intellectual climate’ in the opinion of Syracuse University Psychologist George G. Stern.”

Which are the other ten campuses possessing Dr. Stern’s ideal?

JERRY WESTIN New York City

>Antioch (Ohio), Bennington (Vt.), Bryn Mawr (Pa.), Goddard (Vt.), Oberlin (Ohio), Reed (Ore.), Sarah Lawrence (N.Y.), Swarthmore (Pa.), Vassar (N.Y.) and Wesleyan University (Conn.).—ED.

Tomato Surprise

Sir:

What a difference a few pages can make. In the Show Business section of your April 19 issue, you credited me with helping Joan Crawford become the most photographed star at the Oscar presentations. My cup of pride ran over until I turned to Cinema, where your movie reviewer put me in the tomato-stuffing business as the result of a red chiffon dress Judy Garland wore in i Could Go on Singing.

Of course, since I was credited as costume designer, your critic would have no way of knowing this, but please, just for the record, I designed all of Judy’s costumes for the picture with the exception of one. Uh-huh. You’re right. I don’t know how that red number slipped in. I plead innocent. Hollywood gremlins, I imagine.

It’s always a pleasure to appear in TIME, but please, not as a tomato specialist.

EDITH HEAD Los Angeles

*Sculptor Laurent is Professor Emeritus of Indiana’s Fine Arts Dept.