Letters, Feb. 21, 1938

On the Hip

Sirs:

Gad gentlemen, I have you on the hip! As a cover-to-cover reader of both TIME and LIFE, please inform me: is The Goldwyn Follies worth seeing or isn’t it?

LIFE, Feb. 7: “… Many will call it the greatest musical movie ever made . . . stands out in stunning relief . . . never loses pace. Its dancing is expert. Its comedy is really funny. . . .”

TIME, Feb. 7: “… Sometimes dull . . . banal. . . . Net result—a choppy extravaganza with many features to suit all tastes and not enough of any of them to suit anybody’s.” . . .

KINGSLEY R. SMITH

Weston, W. Va.

TIME is unable to account for LIFE’S enthusiasm.—ED.

Leviathan’s 301st

Sirs:

In TIME for Jan. 31 you say the Leviathan has started on her 301st voyage. Sloppy work, fellows. I saw the same computation in newspaper dispatches, but I thought TIME was alert enough not to fall for such an obvious example of muddleheaded mathematics. The Leviathan was built in Germany, wasn’t she?

FRANK PARKER STOCKBRIDGE

Jacksonville, Fla.

To correct TIME’S sloppy work on the Leviathan’s obituary: in sea jargon a voyage is a round trip, and Leviathan, as far as available records show, made 161 round trips as an American ship. Before that, as the Vaterland, she went across the Atlantic seven times. Last fortnight she completed her 330th crossing, which will be no round trip. —En.

Death of Michael Collins

Sirs:

TIME, Jan. 24, states that “even the chairman of the Provisional Government of the Irish Free State, Michael Collins, was assassinated. . . .”

I was in the Irish National Army at the time of Michael Collins’ death and remember the facts of the case clearly.

General Michael Collins was on a tour of inspection of Army barracks in the South of Ireland. He rode in an open touring car and was accompanied by a Rolls-Royce whippet armored car as escort. At Beal-Na-Blath, County Cork, he was ambushed. He immediately ordered his men to return the fire and led the attack on the ambushers personally. During the melee he was fatally wounded and died before he could be removed from the scene. His body was taken to Shanakil Hospital and a guard placed around it. It afterwards came to light that he was killed by his own armored car machine gunner, a man named McPike who was a native of Scotland. . . . DERMOT K. FOLEY Bakersfield, Calif.

No Sluggard

Sirs:

But why “sluggish Thames” in your article, Dec. 13, on the London Times?

Now if you had said muddy!

For the past eight years I have crossed this river almost twice daily, and have seen it sometimes as mudflats, sometimes brimming to the base of Cleopatra’s Needle. The Thames is tidal to above London, and suicides’ bodies are generally recovered miles downstream. . . .

C. W. STOKES

London, England

A reproof to TIME’S Press Editor for a sluggish description of the muddy Thames.—ED.

Offer

Sirs:

. . . With the power your pages carry, I should think you could do something about the . . . troublers of the world—make them feel like a storm that’s spent.

If your pen doesn’t work, I have a supply of living fountain points that have a faculty of injecting formic acid which has a soothing property. I offer you 8,000,000 ants to distribute in troublemaking pants.

HELEN WASKI

Ant Colony Farms

Warren, Mass.

Let Reader Waski distribute her own ants.—ED.

Perhaps

Sirs:

Perhaps TIME editors err in failing to translate telegrams into lower case. Reader Grant’s LIFETIME (TIME, Jan. 31) may have meant LifeTime, not lifetime. . . .

IRVIN BORDERS

Los Angeles, Calif.

Unusual Weather

Sirs:

I noticed your interesting article about the aurora borealis [TIME, Feb. 7]. On the same night that it startled Europe, the great aurora was plainly visible at Brenau College in Gainesville, Ga., which is considerably farther south than Baltimore.

Extending far up into the sky was a vivid red, which later faded to a milky way effect. The sight had a peculiar reaction on our student body, which, two years ago, endured a double tornado with mingled excitement and horror. Without a doubt, Gainesville, Ga. is the city for unusual weather. ANNE BARBARA GLENN

Gainesville, Ga.

All Man

Sirs:

As I just had lunch with Andre Muzet I was very much amused at his title “Mme” in TIME, Jan. 31.

Let me assure you he is man—all man. PARKER GIBBS

Pittsburgh, Pa.

To All-Man Muzet, Mrs. Roosevelt’s hairdresser, TIME’S apologies.—ED.

Press Agents’ Figures

Sirs:

On seeing TIME’S photo, I took out a ruler and measured the heights of Mr. and Mrs. Bill Curtis [Jan. 31], finding that she is only 38% taller than he. Hence if he is “3½ ft.,” she must be a mere 4 ft. 10 in.—not “6 ft. 4 in.”

Please help the nation’s tall girls and short men by telling us how the photographer made Lois appear 12 1/2 inches shorter than she really is. Or could there be one or two press agents’ errors in the official heights?

ALBERT K. KURTZ Hartford, Conn.

Reader Kurtz should know that it is as tactless to question a midget’s published size as it is an actress’s published age.—ED.

Diplomats

Sirs:

TIME scored again in the issue of Jan. 24. . . . The consideration that you gave Walter White, by placing his picture on the front page cover and the favorable comment made on his life and work, was in every way deserved. . . . Irvin H. McDuffie, the Negro valet, is no ordinary man. He is a diplomat. If he belonged to any other race he would probably belong to the U. S. Diplomatic Corps.

DR. DENNIS A. BETHEA Hammond, Ind.

On one particular TIME was wrong. It reported that Presidential Valet Mc-Duffie introduced Walter White to Mr. Roosevelt. After Walter White had been put off for weeks by Secretary Marvin Mclntyre, Mrs. Roosevelt invited him to Sunday tea.—ED.

Close Friend

Sirs:

Gerard F. Vultee (“Jerry”), not Gerald, my close friend and business associate for many years, was killed when the cabin monoplane he was flying with Mrs. Vultee crashed on the flat top of Wilson Mountain [TIME, Feb. 7]. … Caught in a local snow-storm and blizzard with no training in blind or instrument flying, he was unable to find his way out. The fire occurred after the crash, not before. .

DON P. SMITH Vice President

Vultee Aircraft Los Angeles, Calif.

Loyal Rumanian

Sirs:

Since you leave little doubt of how lightly you are concerned about the niceties of nomenclature of the Central-European races, and since I, too, fully appreciate the intrinsic lack of importance of the matter, I must request your forbearance for making some further remarks about M. Goga’s nationality (TIME, Jan. 10 and 31). . . .

Calling someone Hungarian-born because he was born on the present or past territory of Hungary may seem justifiable by dictionary logic but is conspicuously contrary to the usage of the term by those who are at all familiar with the racial peculiarities of Central Europe. . . .

I wish to call your attention to the following facts: Son of a priest (symbol of racial consciousness among the Rumanians of pre-war Hungary), M. Goga is descended from a Rumanian family as thoroughbred and ancient … as you can find in the county of Sibiu, which boasts the purest and oldest Rumanian stock. (In this respect he has a decided advantage over his rival, M. Zelea Codreanu, whose grandfather was a Polish immigrant with the un-Rumanian name of Zelinsky.) His years under the Hungarian rule, in Hungarian schools and in the Hungarian Parliament, were spent in a fervent if sometimes ungracious struggle for the realization of Romania Mare by the division of Hungary. . . .

D. EMERICK SZILAGYI, M.D.

Ann Arbor, Mich.

Reader Szilagyi’s persistence forces TIME to acquiesce.—ED.

Wright & Imperial Hotel

Sirs:

Vas you der, Sharlee? would have been a good caption for the letters in your Jan. 31 issue poking fun at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Imperial Hotel in Tokyo, Japan.

I happen to have been there and can enjoy this good old American humor although it might otherwise be misleading.

There is good common sense however in the line that says, “So you’d better sic Friend Wright onto mausoleums or something where looks are everything and human comfort negligible.”

Please advise your readers that Friend Wright is already working on mausoleums for 1938. They are going to be good looking and damned uncomfortable for the demise of all National and International Functionalists. . . . JOHN LLOYD WRIGHT

Michigan City, Ind.

John Lloyd Wright is Frank Lloyd Wright’s second son, is also an architect.—ED.

Sirs:

… It is obvious that the management of the hotel has not been as discriminating in its selection of guests as the more self-respecting cockroaches have every right to expect. . . .

D! G. W. McRAE

Toronto, Ont.

No Spittoons

Sirs:

Because TIME readers represent so many potential users of the Rialto Theatre . . . your sense of fairness should permit us to answer your reporter’s attack on the theatre (TIME, Feb. 7].

. . . You say that Constitution Hall is the only auditorium in Washington big enough for the convention. That statement is false. Not only is the Rialto big enough, but all the delegates were seated in the orchestra. The entire mezzanine was used for visitors and the band. Also, we placed 90 large club chairs on the stage for officials and committees.

. . . You say that possibly D. A. R. refused the convention because the spittoon equipment of Constitution Hall was entirely inadequate. Most emphatically, we furnished no spittoons, and NONE WERE NEEDED. . . .Further . . . your choice of adjectives is at least 50% harmfully wrong when you refer to “the dingy entrance of the old Rialto.” Being under 20 years old, the Rialto is a babe as theatres go. As to the proper use of “dingy,” it is purely a matter of personal opinion. . . .

A. M. TOLKINS

Washington, D. C.

TIME admires the Rialto Theatre for 1) being as big as an auditorium, 2) furnishing no spittoons, 3) not needing any.—ED.

Short A

Sirs:

. . . The report of the suit between the United Electrical Companies and the Progressive Miners of America [TIME, Jan. 24] . . . seems to be accurate. If I were not used to it, I might complain of the liberties taken with my name. As a matter of fact, my name is not properly pronounced with a broad A sound, but with a broad A sound as in what. You may be sure that I rarely hear my name pronounced properly. . . .

FRED L. WHAM

U. S. District Judge East St. Louis, Ill.

No Redundancy

Sirs:

You characterize (TIME, Feb. 7) the attack of Australian Tennist Jack Bromwich as “ambidextrous and two handed.” Please, now, isn’t that a “redundant superfluity?”

W. T. DOOR

U. S. Naval Academy Annapolis, Md.

TIME’S characterization was peculiarly painstaking. Let Reader Door put his mind to the following: Tennist Bromwich serves with his right hand, plays shots on his left with his left hand, shots on his right with both hands. — ED. Sharp Sirs:

… In TIME Feb. 14 Toscanini is referred to as sharp-eyed. I imagine you meant “sharp-eared?”

SAMUEL BAILEY

Philadelphia, Pa.

TIME meant sharp-eyed. Maestro Toscanini’s eyes are bright as a piece of coal, sharp as a needle. — ED.

Prints Sirs:

Your reference to the prints of the National Committee for Art Appreciation (TiME, Feb. 14) is so unjustifiable as to force us to make some reply.

TIME’S two quotations in disparagement of the prints show a misapprehension of the primary purpose of the Committee and give an unbalanced and biased impression. . . . Among those who recognize the merits of the series are: Forest Grant, director of art, New York public schools; Dr. Walter W. S. Cook, chairman, graduate department of fine arts, New York University; Professor Karl Weston, Williams College; Professor Joseph Cummings Chase, Hunter College; Professor George William Eggers, College of the City of New York; J. Redding Kelly, Brooklyn College; Editor Audrey McMahon, Parnassus; and Austin Purves, director of art, Cooper Union. . . .

In publishing the enormous number of prints necessary to make them available to the general public at a price within its means, it is natural to expect that some of the prints may not measure up to the very highest standards. However, by the testimony of many prominent educators, the prints in general meet well the purpose for which they were intended and some, at least, are of really fine quality. If any further evidence of this is needed, such artists as Rockwell Kent, Jon Corbino and Thomas Benton have expressed themselves as pleased with the reproductions of their own paintings. Mr. Benton, in fact, used our copies of his pictures for his own Christmas presents.

That prints of such quality should be made available to the public at a price of less than ten cents apiece is no mean achievement in itself. And their educational effect can be measured in the cities where they have appeared by increased attendance at art museums and generally greater appreciation of the art of painting.

As a final injustice, TIME quotes one critic as saying the paper upon which they are printed is cheap—an error of fact.

MILDRED CONSTANTINE National Committee for Art Appreciation New York City

N.C.A.A.’s purpose was indeed to produce prints of educational value, and a number of its prints are worthwhile reproductions. In an effort to give representative selection of painters some pictures were included which apparently could not be reproduced with artistic fidelity by this particular process in its present stage; others whose reproduction required a meticulousness not feasible in the circumstances. Not cheap is the paper used but of good quality, chosen after tests to find the best paper for the purpose.—ED.