Thousands of Fellows

Sirs:

There are thousands of fellows like me. They left school in the early '30s. A lot of them, like myself, couldn't finish college because of the depression. We couldn't get a job at that time because there weren't any .. . and if there were, older and more experienced men got them. However, we kept looking until we got something--anything. A lot of us offered to work for nothing, like I did, to get started....

Anyway, we worked hard as hell to keep our jobs . . . harder still to climb the ladder. Today a lot of us have advanced and are getting along pretty well, considering everything. A lot of us, like myself, are making between $2,000 and $4,000 a year.

Then came the draft! A lot of us were called. Frankly, we weren't enthusiastic about going, but we're patriotic Americans and we went . . . and smiled while we did it, too. Our $2,000 to $4,000 a year dwindled to $21 a month--$252 a year, but we're still not kicking.

Now the newspapers tell us that because a few of the boys working for some of the steel companies want a 5-c- or 10-c- raise, and/or A. F. of L. doesn't like C. I. O., they declare a strike, tie up production for national defense and crack a lot of heads to prove that they mean to get what they're after ... or else.

Yep . . . there are thousands of us who have worked like hell since '31 and '32 trying to lick a depression, get experience, get established, to climb the ladder . . . yet we gladly chuck it all to serve our country. Now, some of the boys are declaring strikes over petty arguments or small wage increases and in so doing bottleneck industry which makes possible a well-equipped Army.

We haven't got the answer. . . .

ROBERT F. KEMPER

St. Louis, Mo.

"Most Noble Message"

Sirs:

TIME for March 24 ended brilliantly with a long review of a book with a most noble message--that of sterilizing the German race as a whole. If TIME is suffering from a paucity of reviewing matter that it gives such important space to the mephitic work of a man whose whole book is evidently based on one fatuous idea, let TIME's book reviewers look around for something which might contribute more to American letters or at least be newsworthy.

MRS. WALTER BOERGER

Sheboygan, Wis.

>Theodore N. Kaufman's book, Germany Must Perish!, contributed nothing to U. S. letters but it was newsworthy. TIME definitely pronounced his plan "grisly."--ED.

Gallant Fegan

Sirs:

Why has TIME never published a picture of Fogarty Fegan, master of the Jervis Bay? His gallant conduct aroused great interest and, so far as I know, his photograph has never been published.

JOHN T. HACKETT

Montreal, Que.

>When the Jervis Bay, an unarmored merchant cruiser, went down after a heroic and hopeless engagement with a big German surface raider (TIME, Nov. 25), no picture was available in the U.S. of gallant Captain Edward Stephen Fogarty Fegan, who, with one arm shot away, stayed on the sinking wreck after ordering survivors to abandon ship. In response to Reader Hackett's inquiry, TIME gladly prints the best likeness of brave Fegan now obtainable.--ED.

Reader Wright's Holy Man

Sirs:

. . . Patrick Wright says he believes Hitler is a holy man.

I agree with him. In fact he does not go far enough. He should have said Hitler is a god. It does not matter whether he is a good or bad god, because he got into the wrong sphere. He does not know it yet, but he will know it, when he--some day in the not far future--sits sucking his thumb on some lonely island. . . .

KELSO HUGHES

Champaign, Ill.

Sirs:

California is the leading State in the production of English walnuts. Alabama and Mississippi produce pecans. But now South Dakota gets into the race and proceeds to show us what a real nut is. I quote from the March 24 issue of TIME: "Adolph Hitler is a German heman and the greatest warrior that this world ever produced since history was first written and to be candid I believe he is a holy man." This letter was written from Custer, S. Dak.

California, here we come. Can you raise bigger nuts than South Dakota?

L. LEE LAYTON JR.

Dover, Del.

For or Against

Sirs:

Allow me to congratulate you on your fine editorial attitude in respect to your reporting of the present war. You are deserving of a nation's thanks for keeping with its citizens an awareness of the dangers to it from totalitarianism.

Being an alert reader of your columns, I regret to find an overdose of letters written to you expressing blatantly a pro-Nazi, or at best a pre-war type of Irish, hate for Britain and its defenders. Let there be no mistake about it, such attitudes are contrary to America's best interests, and carry with them the seeds of distrust and discord concerning our Government. A person is either for democracy or he isn't--there is no compromise stand. . . .

RONALD MACKENSIE

Hudson, Ohio

Sirs:

... In my wife's and my opinion TIME has ceased to be a genuine reporter of world events and become a propaganda sheet for the subversive forces which are wrecking civilization throughout the world, our own country included. It was these same forces whose work your magazine is doing which were responsible for the Red hell in Russia, the breakdown in Italy, the collapse in France, the Red horror in Spain, now happily crushed but at fearful cost, for the present plight of England, for Hitler's regime in Germany as a counteroffensive and for the economic misery, confusion and breakdown in our own country. Hitlerism, which you profess to hate, was created as a defense mechanism against your hidden bosses. . . .

G. ANDREWS MORIARTY

Ogunquit, Me.

"For All His Faults"

Sirs:

Congratulations on your splendid article on Henry Ford and his present-day plight [TIME, March 17]. It is the first open-minded, clear and comprehensive picture presented in many a day of a man who for all his faults has done this country more good than all the unions, Perkinses and Wagners can ever hope to accomplish.

ROBERT O. SCHULZE

University of Michigan

Ann Arbor, Mich.

Sirs:

I read with much interest your story on Henry Ford. Regret to find it shot through with the poison of factionalism. Are you making a bid for more readers among labor? Naturally, that will increase your profits. Let's be sincere. Cut out your attitude of cynicism and knife throwing. . .

H. STAUVROS

Los Angeles, Calif.

Sirs:

I wish to protest against your article on Henry Ford. ... I believe TIME's policy is to state the facts as it sees them. ... In the Ford article, however, you did not give complete information where you could have. The impression you gave me was that because Ford is working on defense orders, labor should bow down in quiet submission. . . . I know only a few of the facts on the Ford situation, but I do know that his labor policy is incompatible with the trend of modern, intelligent and humane relations between employer and employe. . . .

ROBERT H. ORCHARD '42

Harvard University

Cambridge, Mass.

Food in World War I

Sirs:

... You can realize my astonishment when in your issue of March 17 I find, in a footnote, a quotation from the recent book of Lars Moen--Under the Iron Heel--to the effect that " 'perhaps the major' share of food sent from the United States to Belgium during World War I was diverted to feed the Germans."

To put it mildly, I can assure you that this statement is an absolute reverse of truth. During the first World War I spent a year in Belgium as a member of the American Commission which was in charge of complete food distribution in Belgium. If there was 1% of truth in the statement quoted by Mr. Moen, certainly both Mr. Hoover and the British Government . . . would have stopped it immediately. . . .

To the millions of Americans who at the time were interested in the work in Belgium the above statement would not be necessary. They know. But it would be a great misfortune to have Mr. Moen's misstatement taken at its face value by a new generation which has grown up since that time. I need only quote comment of the British Premier Asquith that the Commission for Relief in Belgium was "a miracle of scientific organization" and that "we are convinced that this relief food reaches the Belgians and the French and reaches them alone. . . . It is one of the finest achievements in the history of humanitarian and philanthropic organizations."

CLARE M. TORREY

New York City

TIME Gets Across

Sirs:

I am an A. A. gunner in the Royal Regiment of Artillery (Territorial Army) now serving in the west of England, and have been for several years past an enthusiastic reader of your most interesting journal. . .

It may interest you to know how I receive your magazine. A friend of my Mother's in Canada sends it to her, and I may add that every copy has come through safely since the beginning of the war, despite the efforts of the U-boats and long-range bombers. My Mother, Father and Sister read it from cover to cover, it is then sent to me, and after I have finished with it, my friends in the Battery all devour it eagerly. It is then passed on to the Red Cross Society, so you see this copy has a particularly large circulation. . . .

ROBERT A. PAGE

Gunner

Somewhere in England

The Work Goes On

Sirs:

The directors of The American Friends of France all have asked me to call your attention to a misstatement about our president, Miss Anne Morgan, which was published in your issue of March 10.

Far from discontinuing our work, we still have a French personnel, working under French authorities in the Aisne, the same region where for 25 years we have continuously given aid to the civilian population. Also, we recently have helped to establish a center to care for little lost children, in the Ardennes. Both these places are in the north, in the occupied zone.

Your article speaks of the Coordinating Council for French Relief. You are probably unaware of the fact that we were among its first members. In fact, far from "neglecting" our work, we have extended our license to include aid to French refugees wherever they are, and special aid to children and French prisoners of war.

We are not committed to any political policy but simply desire to help the French, men, women, and children, who so greatly need all possible friendship in these tragic days.

MARGARET HUGHES

Director

American Friends of France

New York City

>Misled by Miss Morgan's reticent secretary, who was scanty and cryptic in giving information, TIME is glad to set the record straight.--ED.

No Difficulty

Sirs:

I disagree with the results of the Garand v. Springfield test, as made by the U. S. Marine Corps and published in TIME, March 24. I am a member of the regular Army and am armed with the Garand. I was with the 1st Division Task Force when we made beach landings on the Island of Culebra from Jan. 27 to Feb. 13, 1941. We too had to make landings in small boats and the rifles did become wet with salt spray and were dragged in the sandy beach. Many were dropped into the water also. But in the entire company, I did not see or hear of a case where the rifle refused to fire.

We were on the range prior to our trip to Culebra and during the week it rained every day. We fired during the rain and had no difficulty, provided the rifles had been oiled, as they should be.

PRIVATE GEORGE N. ALPER

Fort Devens, Mass.

>After thorough tests, the Marine Corps found the Garand unreliable under tough conditions, but TIME is relieved to learn that an Army outfit got faithful performance from this controversial weapon.--ED.

Sense of Humor

Sirs:

Ohmigawd! Think what I've been missing these 30-odd years that I've read TIME and roasted it and hated its style, and still read it.

Now comes Harold L. Gibeaut (TIME, March 17) and says, says he, that it would be fatal if TIME lost its sense of humor. . . .

Now that I know that TIME is funny I'll not have to affront my family with profanity as I read it. I'll laugh if it kills me. I'd like, however, to recommend the Book of Revelation to Reader Gibeaut as a humorous story if TIME is funny. How he must laugh over the subtle humor in the small print in an insurance contract.

But in spite of it all, here's to TIME. May you live another 37 years--damyerhide.

J. I. McINTOSH

Oakland, Calif.

>Date of TIME's founding: 1923.--ED.

Tender Phrases

Sirs:

With few exceptions those who air views on the American people's state of mind in regard to our foreign policy seem to be of the opinion that our nation is bent on fostering ideals of democracy for the whole world, or defending the world from Hitlerism.

Let us be frank. We merely received a bad scare and are going to protect ourselves. When we help Britain and when (not if) we go to war, we will be engaged in the age-old pastime of looking out for our own welfare. And why shouldn't we?

But rather than balm ourselves with tender, inspirational phrases, let's be truthful . . .

R. G. FlTZPATRICK

Stockton, Calif.

Sophisticated Father

Sirs:

Apropos of the story in TIME, March 10, about the diapers of the infant son of the John Roosevelts, there is a story making the rounds that even before that time the President's son knew his onions, when it came to diapers.

The father, so the story goes, went to a store that dealt in infants' haberdashery to buy the necessary articles. After doing up the bundle the young lady clerk said, "The dozen dydees are a dollar, and three cents for the tax."

"But we aren't going to use tacks," said the sophisticated father, "we're going to use safety pins."

RILEY P. MARTIN

Pasadena, Calif.

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