Letters, Jun. 28, 1937

Half Black Geese

Sirs:

Relative your article TIME, June 7 on the word “jalopy” and Webster R. Kent’s comments (TIME, June 21), I think you are both in error. Approximately ten years ago while in a Los Angeles café with the late Herbert Somborn, ex-husband of Gloria Swanson, approximately eight mulatto dancing girls appeared. Mr. Somborn exclaimed: “What beautiful jalopies!” Pressing him for information, he stated that a jalopy was anything half black and that the word originated in a certain part of Africa, where plurals are unknown, and a jalopy is a African half black geese.

WEBSTER R. VAUGHAN

Darien, Conn.

Shark Policy

Sirs:

I enjoyed your article concerning the book by Shark Expert Colonel Hugh D. Wise [TIME, May 24], and was interested to learn that, on the end of a line, a shark has slightly less pulling power than a man swimming.

However, I have always imagined a contest with a shark as not so much a tug of war, as a free-for-all catch-as-catch-can, with no holds barred. And while we humans may have the ability to outpull a shark, the soft, creamy foods we eat have resulted in our being somewhat less than a match for him, dentally.

As one who has twice had the absorbing experience (once on the Pacific and once on the Atlantic) of standing on the beach and seeing that certain big black fin cut the water out where, but a few minutes before, I myself had been swimming, I’d like very much to know the preferred procedure when the third-time-that-charms comes along. I have heard all about how you subdue such tough customers as lions, alligators, rattlesnakes and such—you pull their jaws apart till they snap, or holding them by the tail, you crack them like a whip and their head flies off. But what to do when suddenly confronted by a shark, or barracuda ? Should one set up a tremendous splashing and threshing about, and thus attempt to frighten him off, or should one lie log-still, in the hope that he will merely sniff and go on about his business? One of such opposite courses must be considerably healthier than the other. Seriously, TIME, which is it?

PRESTON JUSTICE

New York City

Says Sharksman Wise in Tigers of the Sea: “Do sharks attack and kill men? . . . It is my opinion that a shark, except when surprised, attacked or greatly excited, rarely attacks a man whom he does not believe to be dead or helpless. . . . The discussion of all this with experienced fishermen in Nassau led naturally to the old question of what a man should do if he found himself in the water with sharks nearby. All of us agreed that he should kick, splash, yell, and raise all possible commotion but none of us would wish to be held responsible for giving such advice. Frankly, I should be willing to let the shark have the swimming hole, and I would raise no question of riparian privilege.”—ED.

Candidate O’Conor

Sirs:

In the June 7 issue of TIME under Religion, you state that Al Smith was “the only Roman Catholic ever nominated for President by a major party.”

Charles O’Conor was nominated in 1872 by the “Bourbon” Democrats who could not stomach Horace Greeley and his well-remembered anti-slavery editorials. I am not sure O’Conor was a Roman Catholic but his name sounds as if he were. . . .

LEE CALHOUN

Kansas City, Mo.

Charles O’Conor, nominee of the “Straight Out” or “Bourbon” Democrats, was indeed a Catholic. But the major candidates in 1872 were Ulysses Simpson Grant (Republican—3,597,132 votes) and Horace Greeley (supported by Democrats and Liberal Republicans—2,834,125 votes). Count received by Candidate O’Conor: 29,489.—ED.

Telephone Cats

Sirs:

In your June 7 issue, you publish a letter from Mr. Arthur Tuckerman, of Gstaad, Switzerland, about a master-ratsman dog Bippo, referring to Standard Oil’s cat Minnie (TIME, April 12). As the subject appears to possess so much public interest, may I not contribute the following additional information re animal rat-slayers on corporate payrolls:

For many years—nine, to my personal knowledge—the United River Plate Telephone Co., Argentine operating associate company of the International Telephone & Telegraph Corp., has maintained a staff of cats on its payroll in Buenos Aires. I don’t know just how many there now are, but there are 36 telephone exchanges in Buenos Aires, and there are a few feline employes around the Stores Department.

Then there is Tomas, a big pot-bellied black fellow at headquarters, who is a sort of chief operator, or section chief. Officially Tomas belongs to the Avenida automatic exchange, quartered in the same building; but through seniority and an especially winning personality which he has, he really works his daylight shift in the public business office. Can’t say how he spends his nights, but there’s a night club next door. Tomas sometimes sits in the doorway to the Commercial office, facing the elevators; other times, he perches on the counter under the sign reading “Complaints.” When an irate subscriber comes up to the counter to raise the devil about something, Tomas arches his back and rubs up against the fellow’s shoulder, purring amiably. He knows by experience that it goes far to take the edge off the subscriber’s mad. . . .

Cats used to get 50 centavos a day “liver money.” When the late Depression—remember the Depression ?—was at its worst, a reduction was ordered in the foreign technical staff, and salary cuts for those that remained. Now, cats are foreign staff, in that they do not come under any of the Argentine labor laws or the contract with the labor federation. And if a cat’s a good mouser, he sure has to be a technician. It was unanimously decided not to fire any of the feline personnel, but they did have to stand a salary cut. . . .

Stables? Yes, horses still have a hoof in the telephone business. Especially in the transoceanic radio-telephone service. . . . Automobiles are not allowed within a mile of the Platanos receiving station antenna, lest the magnetos might cause interference. So the technical staff who live all the time at the radio station have horses to bring in supplies and to get in and out to the highway themselves. . . . Horses cause no radio interference. . . . The most profitable aspect of transatlantic telephony for the I. T. & T. up to now has been the sale of the children of these horses. . . .

KENNETH McKIM

Assistant Vice President

International Telephone &Telegraph Corp.

New York City

Real Shock

Sirs:

I have always considered TIME as a magazine devoted to accurately informing the public on matters affecting our everyday economic, social and political life. Close reading of your publication is responsible for the impression.

Therefore, the article in your issue of May 31, entitled “Protection v. Investment” was a real shock. I can only assume that its definiteinaccuracies and unfortunate implications were due to failure to make the proper research upon which to base a critical article. Certainly, it is not in character with your editorial policy, as I have sensed it, to make damaging statements about a financial institution unless those statements have a provable factual basis.

You speak of life insurance as being “foisted” on the public. You place the words “economic, moral and social values of life insurance to the individual and the nation” in quotation marks. Do you not believe in those values? Do you not recognize life insurance as being what it is to millions of Americans—a century-proved way of making adequate provision for dependents and for one’s old age?

You speak of “criticism” caused by the “terrific lapse and surrender rate that followed the 1929 Crash.” The life insurance companies were not responsible for the Depression nor for its consequences. On the contrary, life insurance saved many a family from distress and want during the Depression years through payments to beneficiaries and through cash and loan values which were often the only good asset remaining, when everything else had failed.

The reference to “the forfeit of near $750,000,000” is not only unsupported but incorrect, as is the comment that “the insurance companies took advantage of the 1933 bar moratorium to declare a moratorium of their own.” This moratorium was in no sense “theoretical,” but was actually imposed on the various regulatory authorities of the states—and was, in fact, opposed by many life insurance companies. In this connection one can scarcely question that no business in the U. S. is subjected to more rigorous inspection and regulation than the life insurance companies.

The statement that “it was not precisely true that life insurance had weathered the depression without damage” would seem to imply that a contrary claim has been made by the companies. No such claim has been made. At the same time, you fail to point out that the percentage of total life insurance which became involved was exceedingly small—nor do you call attention to the fact that in most, if not all, cases the business of companies which failed was taken over by solvent companies. . . .

THEODORE M. RIEHLE

President

The National Association of Life Underwriters

New York City

The criticisms of life insurance published in TIME, May 31, did not originate with TIME but, as indicated, were summarized from the works of David Gilbert & James P. Sullivan, two of the life insurance business’ severest and most vociferous critics. TIME has no ax sharpened against the great U. S institution of life insurance; it insures itself against the death of its own executives.

An able, lucid rebuttal to Gilbert & Sullivan was published recently in Life Insurance Speaks For Itself by M. Albert Linton, head of Provident Mutual Life and president of the Actuarial Society of America (Harper: $1.50)—ED.