Letters: Jun. 16, 1930

Patterson’s Promotion

Sirs:

Your recent article (TIME, May 26), partly about me, was very friendly, but it had one error which, with your permission, I would like to correct.

I was promoted in France not for gallantry, but for seniority.

J. M. PATTERSON

President Liberty, New York City

Cat, Milk, Goat

Sirs:

In your issue of June 2, W. W. J. Jones wants to know where the milk came from that the President fed the alley cat.

Perhaps the milk came from the President’s goat that Jones wanted to get. Does W. W. J. stand for World’s Worst Joke?

HAL. P. SMITH

Indianapolis, Ind.

Mrs. Smith No Widow

Sirs:

It is like gilding refined gold to correct facts in TIME. It is a great pleasure to be able in a small way to add to the authenticity of our great dependence for facts.

See p. 25 of May 26 issue: “Atlanta’s Mrs. Mazie Smith, widow of Hoke Smith, etc., etc.”

Senator Smith is still alive (being in residence at the Georgian Terrace Hotel in Atlanta) and carries on the business of his law firm in Atlanta. He did not accompany Mrs. Smith on the trip abroad, she going with her sister, but he was greatly interested in having her go. Ambassador Dawes and Senator Smith have been close friends for a long time. Mrs. Clark Howell, wife of Clark Howell, Editor of the Atlanta Constitution was also presented at this drawing room. . . .

MRS. JOHN K. OTTLEY

Atlanta, Ga.

To hale Hoke Smith, felicitations and an apology for prereporting his demise.—ED.

Connecticut’s Merritt Sirs:

The undersigned constituents of the Hon. Schuyler Merritt of Connecticut, request the publication in TIME of one of its characteristic sketches of that member of the House of Representatives.

DAVID DAVENPORT MILDRED R. WEISS JOHN J. CARAHER HELEN L. KILBRIDE VICTORIA B. WELLER WM. A. REDDEN

Bridgeport, Conn.

The record of Representative Schuyler Merritt of the Fourth Congressional District of Connecticut is as follows:

Born: in New York City, Dec. 16, 1853.

Start-in-life: law clerk.

Career: Scion of well-to-do New England Quakers tracing their American lineage back to 1640, he, aged 2, was removed from his birthplace just off “upper sth Avenue” (21st Street) to Stamford, Conn. From private school he went to Yale (A.B. 1873) and Columbia (LL.B. 1876). After a brief clerkship in New York, he returned to Stamford to do legal work for Yale & Towne, famed locksmiths. Today he is Yale & Towne’s board chairman. In 1879 he married Frances Hoyt who bore him two daughters, Louise and Katharine. In 1904 he dropped his corporation law practise long enough to help his Slate rewrite its constitution. As a delegate to the Republican national convention in 1916 he helped nominate Charles Evans Hughes for the Presidency. In 1917 at a special election, as the friend of the late John T. King, he was sent to Congress to succeed the late Ebenezer Hill, has been continuously re-elected ever since.

In Congress: Because of the infrequency of his speeches—he has formally addressed the House only eight times in 13 years—he is no House headliner or well-known floor figure. He has sponsored no big bills. Nevertheless as a long-time member of the Interstate & Foreign Commerce Committee he has made himself felt in major legislation coming from that potent committee. He favors fostering and protecting U. S. industry, opposes all projects to put the Government into business, to extend Federal welfare work.

He voted for: Tax reduction (1924, 1926, 1928, 1929), Farm Relief (1929), the Tariff (1922, 1929), the Navy’s 15-Cruiser bill (1929), Reapportionment (1929), Immigration Restriction (1923). He voted against: The Soldier Bonus (1924), the 18th Amendment (1918), the Volstead Act (1919), the Jones (“Five & Ten”) Law (1929), Farm Relief (1927, 1928), Boulder Dam (1928).

He votes Wet, drinks Dry.

Legislative hobby: Committee drudgery on major economic problems (e.g.: railroad consolidations, motorbus regulation). His business experience makes him ultraconservative. His pet legislation has been a bill establishing a Textile Foundation, to study and advise the textile industry on the Wartime Textile Alliance’s $1,300,000 fund derived from the sale to U. S. concerns of foreign and enemy dyestuffs. He stands stoutly against a U. S. Department of Education, U. S. maternity and infancy aid.

Appearance: Although 76 years old, he appears 15 years younger. His eyes, behind pincenez, are bright, his step is lively, his manner politely alert. He dresses well, usually in light grey. He has a pleasant easy smile, speaks in a low voice, ingratiates strangers. An Episcopalian, he regularly attends St. John’s Church in Washington, St. John’s Church in Stamford. He does not smoke.

Outside Congress: In Washington he rents a comfortable old-fashioned house at 1822 19th Street, K.W. He avoids most social functions, plays golf with such House cronies as New York’s Parker, Massachusetts’ Treadway at fashionable Chevy Chase Club. Sprightly, he drives his own car, a black Buick coupe, also maintains a Cadillac, a Negro chauffeur. From his luxurious Stamford residence, he golfs at the Wee Burn, Suburban, or Woodway country clubs, takes much interest in the town’s Ferguson Library, the Children’s Home. He likes the theatre and concerts.

Impartial House observers rate him thus: no debating legislator, he has specialized in the dull but important committee work behind legislation. A thoroughgoing “regular” Republican, he follows the lead of his State colleague Floor Leader John Quillin Tilson, exerts his quiet influence at every turn for the benefit of reputable well-established Business & Industry. His term expires March 3, 1931.—ED.

Great Avco

Sirs:

Under “Aeronautics” in the issue of June 2, 1930, TIME carried the following statement:

“A fourth very great aviation group took form last week . . .” and a footnote to the effect that the other three were Curtiss-Wright, United Aircraft & Transport and the Detroit Aviation Corporation.

The Aviation Corporation of Delaware was incorporated in March 1929, with an authorized capitalization of 10,000,000 shares which has since been reduced to 5,000,000 shares. Inasmuch as the planes of its transport subsidiaries fly more than 20,000 miles daily in scheduled operations, serving 52 cities in the United States and Canada, and these subsidiaries also hold one foreign and n of the 25 domestic air mail contracts, the corporation can hardly be listed among the lesser groups in the aviation industry.

EDW. H. SHARPE Director of Public Relations The Aviation Corp. New York City

To potent Avco, all credit as a “very great aviation group” and to a staff writer a reprimand for omitting it. He had plane manufacturing units in mind, of which Avco, principally a transport group, has only two (Fairchild, Kreider-Reisners) whereas Curtiss-Wright has seven, United five, Detroit six.—ED.

“St. Gandhi”

Sirs:

I do not consider Mr. Gandhi a saint and strongly object to your use of “St. Gandhi.” If you must dignify the creature, call him “Mahatma Gandhi” or use the literal translation of mahatma.

MARY PIERCE NEWMAN

Philadelphia, Pa.

Atman in Hindustani means soul. With literal accuracy TIME could speak of Mahatma or “Great Soul” Gandhi. But in English such terms produce no clear cut impression. TIME, eschewing the nebulous, uses “St.” for brevity and precision, as the shortest way of indicating that millions of Hindus revere the Mahatma exactly as Christians would a 1930 Saint.—ED.

Old Skate Cato Sirs: My memory exudes testimony supporting your Latin version of the remarks of Senator Cato (TIME, May 19, p. 26), to wit; an item published several years ago in the Paris edition of the Xew York Herald:

Oh, Marcus Portius Cato,

He was a good old skate, oh,

He was a good old skate;

And in the Senate, soon or late,

He never let a day go

Without arising to remark:

“Delcnda est Carthago!”

W. R. WHEELER

Jacksonville, Fla.

Tolstoy’s Definition

Sirs:

Among the definitions of Art given in your issue of May 5th, Tolstoy’s definition, of which Bernard Shaw wrote that: “This is the simple truth: the moment it is uttered, whoever is really conversant with art recognises in it the voice of the master,” finds no place at all.

That definition, given in What is Art? (“World’s Classics” series, Oxford University Press, New York) is that “Art is an activity by means of which one man, having experienced a feeling, intentionally transmits it to others.”

Tolstoy’s objection to definitions such as Mrs. Sloan’s—which rests on the word “beauty”—is that we have as yet found no objective definition of the word “beauty” itself, and a definition that relies on the use of a word which itself needs definition is of no practical use, and is not a working definition.

AYLMER MAUDE

Hon. Organizing Secretary The Tolstoy Society, Great Baddow, Chelmsford, England

Taste Test Tried

Sirs:

Inspired by recent correspondence controversy in TIME I am conducting stunt here … to determine if Chicagoans go to hear renowned soloists because of musical appreciation or lure of great names and social ballyhoo.

Will have nationally known violinist in guise of street fiddler lay bow to Stradivarius on Michigan Avenue in a curbstone concert citizens would pay $5-a-seat for if they knew what they were hearing. Stunt strictly on square with no packed audience. Will he stop the traffic on Michigan Avenue, musical centre of Midwest?

MICHAEL W. STRAUS City Editor Chicago Evening Post Chicago, Ill.

Editor Straus persuaded Violinist Jacques Gordon ($1,000 per concert) of the Chicago Symphony to make the experiment. In smoked glasses, matted grey wig. tattered frock coat, Fiddler Gordon posted himself at a busy Michigan Avenue corner, fiddled for 30 minutes on his $40,000 Stradivarius. Pennies, nickels, dimes from passersby totalled $5.61.

To Subscriber Lyman Richards all credit for a point well taken, if this proves it.—ED.