Apprehensive Marshal
Sirs:
If the firing stance as executed by Marshal Pietro Badoglio, pictured in your Nov. 18 issue [see cut], is typical of Italian military technique, I wonder less at the apparent success of Greece in their present resistance to invasion.
As anyone who is familiar with firearms and their handling may readily discern, the following items are incorrect: 1) twisted posture, from jutting neck to probable poor foot position; 2) thumb is bent downward, grasping the pistol butt instead of being straight alongside the receiver -- and acting as a brace; 3) wrist is not straight; 4) entire arm is crooked, which will cause the recoil to be directed off his body at an angle; 5) left arm is tensely drawn across his body, instead of being in one of the three approved positions -- at side, bent with palm flat on hip, or hand relaxed in pocket.
Judging by his facial distortion ... he seems quite apprehensive that perhaps the damn thing is loaded after all, and might go off. . . .
P. H. DANIELS JR.
Civil Aeronautics Authority
Lovelock, Nev.
Unity
Sirs:
Your article under "Unity," TIME, Nov. 18, was right over the middle of the plate. -- The pistol's frame behind and beneath the barrel.
Much is being said about it, though nothing may be done about it until Congress passes a law legislating unity into existence! . . .
E. V. BURT
Arlington, Va.
Sirs:
What's all this talk that fills TIME and the press about President Roosevelt's great task to achieve national unity? Isn't it rather the other way around -- that the losers must yield to permit that unity? Does TIME imply that unless the President now satisfies them, there will be, among Republican leaders and industrialists, open defiance to the authority of government . . .?
MILTON PROPPER
Philadelphia, Pa.
-- TIME did not imply it. TIME did imply that if the President wants confidence as well as loyalty he must inspire it. -- ED.
Sirs:
Any minority with an exalted, holier-than-thou opinion of itself, as implied by use of the slogan "Crusade," is very apt to be worse than nonproductive. Remember the Prohibition Crusade? . . .
HOWARD W. McCALL
New York City
Sirs:
Election results were disheartening but the most discouraging thing to me was the quotation printed in TIME from Mr. Roosevelt's talk to the villagers: "I think you will find me in the future just exactly the same Franklin Roosevelt that you have known for a great many years."
Personally, I was afraid such would be the case.
JEANNETTE DAVY
Orlando, Fla.
Sirs:
. . . Businessmen have turned the other cheek so many times, that they are now out of cheeks to turn. . . .
RAYMOND W. HOLT
Niagara Falls, N. Y.
Sirs:
I have never before written a letter to an editor but I feel compelled to do so as I listen to Mr. Willkie speak of "unity" on the radio. . .
Mr. Willkie's speech seems to me to be the action of a frustrated, ambitious man who would rather be President than right.
If this be unity I've never seen a demagogue.
RUTH HOPKINS
San Francisco, Calif.
Men of the Year
Sirs:
Not Man of the Year, but Men of the Year: England's Churchill and America's Roosevelt.
KINGDON HARVEY
Editor
Fort Fairfield Review
Fort Fairfield, Me.
Sirs:
I nominate King George VI of the British
Commonwealth of Nations as the Man of the Year. . . .
A. E. EARDLEY
Fredericton, N. B.
Sirs:
For Man of the Year . . . Wendell L. Willkie.
REV. W. Y. WILLS
First Presbyterian Church
Jerome, Idaho
Sirs:
I nominate for manikin of the year -- Pierre Laval.
C. K. IMBRIE, D.D.
First Presbyterian
Church Newburgh, N. Y.
-- In reader nominations for Man of the Year, Winston Churchill is leading, with Franklin Roosevelt and Wendell Willkie close behind and about neck & neck. -- ED.
Synthetic Peat
Sirs:
AS AN AMERICAN OF IRISH DESCENT I DEPLORE THE LACK OF LOGIC AND REALISM DISPLAYED IN THE LETTER OF HIS EXCELLENCY THE IRISH MINISTER TO THE U. S. (TIME, DEC. 2). THAT IRISH PORTS WOULD BE USEFUL TO GERMANY IS SELF-EVIDENT TO AVERAGE INTELLIGENCE AND IF MR. BRENNAN SUPPOSES EIRE'S POLICY OF NEUTRALITY WILL PREVENT NAZIS OCCUPYING IT WHEN AND IF POSSIBLE HE HAS QUICKLY FORGOTTEN DENMARK, NORWAY, HOLLAND, BELGIUM. CERTAINLY GERMANY WOULD NOT BE JUSTIFIED IN DEMANDING IRISH PORTS ON GROUND OF USEFULNESS BUT WHEN HAS GERMANY EVER FELT NEED FOR JUSTIFYING HER GRABS EXCEPT WITH TONGUE IN CHEEK? . . . SHE TAKES WHAT SHE WANTS WITH NO INTENTION OF RETURNING THE LOOT IF SHE IS VICTOR WHEN HOSTILITIES CEASE. IRELAND WOULD HAVE NOTHING TO FEAR FROM BRITAIN IN LIKE CIRCUMSTANCES, AS MR. BRENNAN AND HIS GOVERNMENT WELL KNOW. . . . IF AS RESULT OF IRELAND'S STAND BRITAIN IS OVERCOME BY SUBMARINE AND SEA BOMBING ATTACKS OF NAZIS, EIRE WILL SEE HOW GRATEFUL THE NAZIS WILL BE. OR DOES THE RAREFIED AIR OF EIRE'S PARTICULAR CLOUD CUCKOO LAND CAUSE HER TO BELIEVE OTHERWISE? . . .
WE HAVE LONG LOST PATIENCE WITH THE SMALL VOCIFEROUS GROUP OF FANATICS AND PROFESSIONAL IRISHMEN WITH THE SMELL OF SYNTHETIC PEAT ABOUT THEM WHO HAVE WORKED FOR SO LONG AND SO VICIOUSLY AGAINST BETTER UNDERSTANDING BETWEEN THIS COUNTRY AND GREAT BRITAIN.
NORMAN REILLY RAINE
Warner Bros. Studios
Burbank, Calif.
Buckshaw Materialized
Sirs:
As a former ordinary and non-union seaman of the City of Rayville, along with being a longtime TIME reader ... I was slightly disappointed over the fact that you people didn't make more of it than what you did [TIME, Nov. 18], Aside from the fact that the City of Rayville was my home for over a year and a half, I still think that she earned more descriptive notoriety than what you allowed since she is the first ship under an American flag to be sunk, in this war. . . .
The Rayville having been sunk so close to shore finally materializes the fears that some of us treated as so much buckshaw before entering the outer harbor at Hong Kong this last summer. Among the usual untraceable rumors that spread around the ship, was one about mine fields that were supposed to have been all over that particular area of the China Sea. . . .
There were those aboard who felt that the British simply hung a lot of mines to submerged moorings and got to hell away from them as fast as they could, hoping that nothing but an Axis vessel bumped into them. Before sighting the harbor, we had been in a brief "blow" and it was during this time that it was feared that some of the mines might easily have broke away from their moorings. ... I never did find out whether the harbor was actually mined.
I take this opportunity to put in a couple of plugs for John E. Green, the second mate, and Captain Cronin. They were the two most popular officers that I have ever seen on a ship. . . . An example of how Captain Cronin is capable of quelling trouble and solving problems without creating unnecessary ill feeling: One day a troublesome sailor, who hated the cook seemingly for no other reason than the cook was a Greek, swept into the captain's office and wanted to know how much it would cost to bust up the galley. Much to the troublemaker's amazement, the "Old Man" sat down and seriously began quoting various prices, tried to show the bargain value of some of them. The sailor left for his room back aft in a fog and forgot the whole thing while the captain still sat around and pulled at a wheezing corncob pipe.
STANLEY E. ALLEN
Jamaica Plain, Mass.
Enigma
Sirs:
As far as I am concerned, TIME can go to hell. In the words of the hero of The Man Who Came to Dinner, "I am about to vomit" every time I read your super-emotionalism, your putrid cliches. . . . I do not consider any money being so wasted as my subscription to your literary and intellectual enigma.
ERNEST LONDON
University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, Mich.
Flesh & Blood
Sirs:
You are to be commended and congratulated upon the excellent reporting on the career and death of Senator Key Pittman, of Nevada [TIME, Nov. 18]. In comparatively few words you managed to make a real flesh-&-blood personality, a true picture, of Nevada's most famous citizen. . . .
JOHN BEVILLE
Las Vegas, Nev.
Acquittal
Sirs:
Under Medicine ("Fatal Tonsillectomy") in the Aug. 26 issue of TIME, you reported the death of Walter P. E. Freiwald Jr., "from too much ether in his lungs and brain," after the administration of an anesthesia by Dr. Charles T. Markert, osteopathic physician.
I call your attention to the fact that a jury in the Bergen County (N. J.) Court of Quarter Sessions fully exonerated Dr. Markert of responsibility for this fatality. The director of anesthesia for Kings County Hospital, Brooklyn, and the assistant medical examiner of New York City both testified at the trial that Freiwald's death was caused by status lymphaticus, and that the patient did not die from the cause stated in your article.
Qualified expert witness testified that Dr. Markert not only used correct procedures in the case but that both he and the surgeon were properly cautious. Dr. Markert was not charged or accused of being unqualified to administer the anesthesia under the circumstances. Statement by the prosecutor and the judge's charge to the jury show that the case hinged wholly on whether he was guilty of negligence or carelessness. The jury held that he was not and brought in a verdict of not guilty. . . .
THOMAS R. THORBURN, D.O., M.D.
Chairman, Division of Public
and Professional Welfare
American Osteopathic Association
New York City
-- TIME is glad to place on the record the exoneration of Osteopath Markert. -ED.
Roberts Without Cream Sirs:
A THOUSAND THANKS FOR KIND TREATMENT [TIME, NOV. 25] AT A TIME WHEN I CONFIDENTLY EXPECTED TO HAVE MY BLOCK KNOCKED OFF, BUT CANNOT HELP FEELING A LITTLE UNHAPPY THAT YOU FELT THE URGE TO USE A PICTURE TAKEN ON THE ONE DAY THAT I'D MISLAID MY HINDS HONEY & ALMOND CREAM.
KENNETH ROBERTS
Kennebunkport, Me.
Swing Tempo
Sirs:
As an original subscriber and cover-to-cover reader of TIME, I was naturally much pleased to see your interestingly written article (Nov. 18) telling about my work at Field Museum in dramatizing the natural sciences for the layman in swing tempo. . . .
It might be of interest for you to know that your excellent Science section has often helped me in humanizing otherwise dry scientific facts. The swing tempo and pungent phrases I give to these lectures, I must confess, are frequently inspired by TIME. And so, in addition to expressing my present appreciation, I wish also to thank you for the inspirations and many, many interesting hours . . . since the "very beginning of TIME."
P. G. DALLWIG
Chicago, Ill.
-- To Reader Dallwig, the Field Museum's sprightly "Layman Lecturer," a low bow from the waist. -- ED.
Jewish Brains
Sirs:
Reader Walter Richert in a letter to TIME, Nov. 18, satirized the suggestion made by Mrs. Foster in the Oct. 28 issue, that every German should be sterilized. Among others, he mentioned sardonically such men as Einstein and his Relativity Theory and Ehrlich and his ''Magic Bullet." For Reader Richert's edification, Einstein and Ehrlich and other great Jews are not considered Germans according to Nazi standards. They are "non-Aryan" and possess inferior blood. Their names should nob be mentioned in Nazi circles except for shame and degradation and their achievements are meaningless because they are ''contaminated" with Jewish brains. . . .
RABBI JOSEPH GITIN
Butte, Mont.
Bleeding Marines
Sirs:
In your issue of Nov. 11, regarding the Marines, I quote:
"He (the young Marine) is first repelled, then fascinated by the shout of a sweating sergeant to his bleeding, hesitant platoon at
Chateau-Thierry: 'Come on, you
, do you want to live forever?'"
Somebody must be kidding your editor and the young Marine since there could be no bleeding Marines at Chateau-Thierry because there were no Marines present at the taking of Chateau-Thierry. . . .
L. M. KEARNS
Los Angeles, Calif.
-- TIME will not vouch for the authenticity of the story (the Marines are full of stories). After the Germans reached Chateau-Thierry in May 1918, the Marines did fight on the Marne in the Chateau-Thierry region, although they were not engaged in the town itself. -- ED.
Sirs:
The remark you attributed to that sergeant of Marines ... is evidently not original with him. Carlyle, in his French Revolution (part II, book I, ch. IV), quotes Frederick the Great: "There were certain runaways whom Fritz the Great bullied back into the battle with a 'R--, wollt ihr ewig leben?' (Unprintable Offscouring of scoundrels, would ye live forever?)."
ALFRED A. KOSBERG
Schenectady, N. Y.
"Sweetness of Freedom"
Sirs:
I had read "Ruby in the Swamp," by Mr. Florentino Abrea Yorong [arguing against Philippine independence as too dangerous -- TIME, Nov. 11], with relish and I wish to thank you for publishing it. It gave me the impression that in the Philippines, independence is only a classroom theory. . . .
Probably, he intended to represent sentiments and politics for reality. Undoubtedly, he has not been to Bulacan, to Cavite, and around Manila to discuss the matter. Presumably, he has not lived in the United States and tasted some sweetness of freedom. I just came back from the Philippines on a vacation and found out that the biggest majority of my acquaintances, friends and their friends are for independence and are preparing for it. On the contrary, we propose and aspire to be free.
Does Mr. Yorong wish to depict freedom as a positive entity without conflict and remorse? You know, freedom is not worth having without its concomitant responsibilities. . . .
NICANOR MOJICA PORTILLA
New York City
Sirs:
... It is a splendid portrayal of facts. Am glad you are voicing the sentiment of a great majority of Filipinos. . . .
CRISPULO V. AGDAMAG
United States Naval Station
Guantanamo Bay, Cuba
-- With the Philippines approaching the last five years of their preparatory period for independence (scheduled under present law for July 4, 1946), they face the pinch of quotas and duties on sugar, coconut oil and other exports to the U. S., and they face a Japan considerably more menacing than five years ago. Though perhaps still a minority, the outspoken Filipino "re-examinationists" who dislike and fear the present independence act have lately grown in number by leaps and bounds. Even President Manuel Quezon, who had got his people all hopped up for independence, is now having his doubts. This autumn he authorized his Secretary of Finance to make a speech pleading for an extension of the preparation period to 1956. -- ED.
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