Letters, May 15, 1939

“Background for War”

Sirs:

CONGRATULATIONS ON “BACKGROUND FOR WAR” IN THE MAY I ISSUE OF TIME. IT IS MAGNIFICENTLY CONCEIVED, MAGNIFICENTLY PRESENTED AND MAGNIFICENTLY WRITTEN. IT MAKES ME ASHAMED OF BELONGING TO THE AGGREGATION OF HUMAN BEINGS NOW ALIVE. I WISH IT WERE POSSIBLE TO CRAM IT DOWN THE THROATS OF EVERY MAN, WOMAN AND CHILD DRAWING BREATH TODAY, AND MAKE THEM MEMORIZE IT UNTIL THEY COULD REPEAT IT BACKWARD.

CHARLES G. NORRIS Palo Alto, Calif.

Hold-Tight

Sirs:

In my copy of this week’s TIME [April 24], Radio section, you record the NBC ban on performance of Hold-Tight because the lyrics approximate Harlem’s slang for sexual perversion.

Inasmuch as I originally copyrighted the version as sung by the Andrews Sisters on the Decca record and later turned it over to Exclusive Music, I believe you may be interested in knowing of several of the numerous complications about the song. . . .

First of all, none of the words used in the song . . . were intended to have any particular meaning. Last October, Jerry Brandow and Larry Kent, two comedian-dancers, played a “lick” for me to which the words “Hold-tight, hold-tight, hold-tight, hold-tight —want some seafood mama ! Shrimpers and rice, they’re very nice” went. The two boys explained that they had heard the words and music either in a New York or Philadelphia night club where a colored band was playing. . . . We made a recording of the words and music to that point in a Broadway automaton shop for which we paid 25¢. Nothing further was done about the song until last November when the Andrews Sisters, whom I manage . . . were in Philadelphia playing a theatre engagement. . . . The Andrews, Kent, Brandow, Vic Shoen (their arranger) and myself fooled around with the song. In “foo to Nagasaki,” Pattie rolled the words to sound like “foo-aya-racka-sacki.” Arranger Vic Shoen changed the tempo and melody of the song much differently. Pattie suggested “don’t get icky with the 1-2-3” for the verse. Kent created “life is just so fine on the solid side of the line.” Pattie, Kent, Shoen and myself worked out the lines “I like my tasty butterfish, when I come home from work at night, I get my favorite dish—fish!” The “fish” break, worked out by Shoen, is one of the most important punches to the song. . . .

Soon after, the song reached its stride, and with it came complaints from Si Oliver, arranger for Jimmy Lunceford, who claimed it came from his arrangement of Dear Old Southland, from Gene Krupa who said he made it up in one of his earlier Brunswick records, from Count Basic who has used the lick in numerous of his arrangements. Jerry Kreuger, a 52nd Street singer, said she has used the line “Don’t get icky with the 1-2-3” in New York since last summer after hearing it in the Catskills.

As a result of the ban on the song, new lyrics were written, with the new writers now being cut in on the royalties. With the song a hit—and because so many people were connected with its composition —the various people are billed “writer of Hold-Tight” in the numerous places they work. . . .

Lou LEVY New York City

Albania’s Oil

Sirs:

Tsk! Tsk!

I didn’t much care how important Albania’s oil is to Mussolini until I noticed widely divergent estimates expressed in TIME and in TIME’S sister magazine, LIFE. Now I’m really curious.

TIME, April 17: “Albanian oil is at best of second-rate importance, probably not capable of supplying more than a tenth of Italy’s peacetime needs.”

LIFE, April 17: “Albania’s oil wells have been developed nearly to the point of satisfying Italy’s oil requirements.”

C. W. SMITH

Detroit, Mich.

-Tsk! Tsk! Reader Smith ought to know better than interfere in a family quarrel. Italy’s present imports of oil are around 2,000,000 tons a year. This does not include imports for naval and military use (estimated at another 1,000,000 tons) which do not pass through the customs. The Italian oil company which has the exploitation of Albania’s oil resources produced 120,-ooo tons last year, and hopes (perhaps over-sanguinely) to produce 300,000 tons in 1940.—ED.

Younger Brother

Sirs:

When you call me the “younger brother of Author Christopher Morley” [TIME, April 24] I feel somewhat the same way that your editors might if TIME were called the younger brother of The Literary Digest.

I might also add that it is not in accord with TIME’S reputation for accuracy to refer to “Republican Publisher Eugene Meyer.” The Post calls itself an independent newspaper and those who work for it, as well as most of its readers, believe that it fully merits the adjective.

FELIX MORLEY

Editor

Washington Post Washington, D. C.

Not Even a Bus

Sirs:

Years ago, in the old Savile Club in London, I heard the late Poet Laureate Dr. Bridges quote your limerick [TIME, March 27, April 24] in what seems a more perfect form —as a spoof on Berkeley, which of course it was.

There was a young man who said, “God, You must find it exceedingly odd That a tree, as a tree, Simply ceases to be When there’s no one about in the Quad.”

And do your readers know Oxford’s other metaphysical classic?

There was a young man who said, “Damn! I have recently learned that I am But a creature that moves In predestinate grooves. I’m not even a bus. I’m a tram.”

JOHN L. BALDERSTON Beverly Hills, Calif.

Average Golfer

Sirs:

In re: article on p. 58, TIME, April 24, on proposal of professional golfers to reduce the standard golf par, why not give some thought to the Average Golfer ?

The Average Golfer shoots 85 to 100; is tickled pink if he pars two or three holes in an afternoon; he is the mainstay of all golf (Continued on p. 8) clubs and courses; he is generally a sucker for some professional, and without his support the professional golfer would disappear like the famous snowball in Hades.

If it is desired to set a new lower par for the sharpshooters, well and good, but do not take all the joy away from the Average Golfer.

H. C. DODGE, M.D. Veterans Administration Fort Bayard, N. Mex.

Suggestion Sirs:

Since Franklin Roosevelt cannot be reached personally by the Postal System of his great and good friend, Jim Farley, let TIME’S Letter department carry this suggestion in the hope that it be scanned by the Presidential eyes—to wit, that in order i) to quiet nasty rumors that he is busily building up a stream in order not to change horses in the middle of it—through his intervention in European headaches, 2) to assist Democratic leaders in knowing where they stand in the matter of 1940 and 3) to reassure a justifiably jittery business world, Franklin Roosevelt should come out with a clear and candid statement of his decision not to occupy the White House for a third term.

HOWARD I. LEDDEN Sandy Creek, N. Y.

Disgruntled Sirs:

Why don’t you wake up. Look at the report of U. S. Steel. The stockholders got not a nickel in dividends, the company lost $7,717,454, they had to pay to this stinking Government $48,842,131 in taxes, in other words $5.61 per share to the damn politicians and the rotten New Deal. He is now trying to force us into war in Europe, and I have not forgotten the late unpleasantness.

I am renewing my subscription, but I am sore as hell, and am making you wait until July for the $8. I repeat, your magazine is a top liner, but you are just an Editor, and they as a rule don’t make a dent.

In the future, let’s have less of New Deal boosting, try do something to make the economic situation better, and I am sure you will get letters galore praising your efforts. . . .

T. C. BROWNE

Kennewick, Wash. P. S. I went to the Yukon 1897.

Hey Sirs:

From FORTUNE for January 1938 (p. 24) I quote:

“Charlie [McCarthy] was a stock model in the catalogues of the Macks, early dummy makers for whom Marshall worked as chief carver. Bergen bought his first one in 1923 for $23.75, a head and a pair of hands, since he already had a body from an earlier dummy.”

TIME, March 20 has other ideas on the subject, and (on p. 28) says:

“. . . Edgar Bergen, who 20 years ago, at 16, sketched Charlie’s features after those of a ragamuffin Chicago newsboy, paid $35 to have them whittled in wood by a woodcarving barkeep named Mack, and since then has made a tidy fortune speaking his nimble mind through Charlie’s lips.” . . .

WM. EVERETT BURBANK Westfield, N. J.

Sirs:

We who have given up looking for straight news in our free daily press expect TIME to parry the press agent’s succulent blah, as well as the more deadly types of news distortion and falsification.

I am therefore pained by the press photographer’s alleged snide in re Bergen. . . .

“Hey,” he growled, “get that lug out of there.” Please tell me you slipped. . . .

R. CHANDLER Riverside, Calif.

-TIME asked Mr. Bergen for the rights of the story, received the following letter.—ED.

Sirs:

Some time ago an article on Charlie and myself appeared in your magazine. I wish to repeat your statement made in that article that Charlie McCarthy was carved by Theodore Mack of Chicago. If I remember correctly he sold his wood carving shop to a Mr. Cameron, who in turn sold it to Frank Marshall. I did not meet Frank Marshall until about six years after the original head was made.

About five years ago I asked Frank Marshall to make a duplicate of Charlie. This figure I still have in my possession, but it has never been used. . . .

In your article you also made mention of the incident that occurred at the Grand Central Station upon our arrival in New York, March 9. The photographers were taking pictures of the group when one of the photographers called to me, “Hey, Buddy, would you mind stepping out of the picture.” . . .

EDGAR BERGEN Hollywood, Calif.

Ear-Appealing Nan

Sirs:

In selecting as the vocalist record of the month Nan Wynn’s record Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man, you erroneously described her as a “rising Negro chanteuse” [TIME, May 8].

For your record, Nan is white, 20 and still free. Ear-appealing Nan can be heard Tuesday nights on “Time to Shine” with Hal Kemp’s orchestra at 10 o’clock, EDST, over

WABC-CBS. As evidence that she also is eye-appealing, I enclose two of her latest photos. Probably the error occurred because Miss Wynn and the mellow-voiced Maxine Sullivan, “risen” Negro chanteuse, are both under the management of Columbia Artists, Inc. LOUIS RUPPEL Director of Publicity Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc. New York City

>To TIME’S Music experts a well-earned, resounding rebuke for failing to catch an egregious slip.—ED.