Sir:
In your Sept. 8 issue you state: "No city in the U.S. has a more rattletrap public transportation system than Chicago." San Francisco is in the U.S.
HELEN KILBOURNE HAYSLETTE
Stanford University
Palo Alto, California
A Big Lift
Sir:
Great Britain is broke.
Cannot understand my sadness when I read it in TIME, Sept. 1. Always thought I had a "to hell with the British" feeling. . . .
Now, I wish we could give them a big lift fast--without any strings or political oratory or pressure concerning their dominions and colonies. . . . Ten billion (her own choice of medium) and the lending (only if invited) of our ex-"dollar-a-year" men is this ex-isolationist's plea.
JIM CHAMBERS
Long Beach, Calif.
Sir:
. . . We object to being taxed to furnish loans for Britain ... so that the British can compete with us in our markets and raise the already soaring prices still higher.
Let Britain get its loans by popular subscription from those in this country who for some reason think that such loans are a good investment.
HARLAN HOUPT
Terre Haute, Ind.
Misinformation
Sir:
... In your Sept. 1 issue . . . you set down that the editor of the official Soviet publication Pravda in effect received his information (regarding the American press) from me. This is untrue. . . . You state that the editor's name is Zaslavsky. I do not know him, do not believe I have ever even met him, and no communications of any kind have ever passed between us. ...
RALPH INGERSOLL
Lakeville, Conn.
P: TIME retracts the statement that Comrade Zaslavsky had contacts with Ralph Ingersoll because TIME'S only authority for the statement was Comrade Zaslavsky himself.--ED.
A Secret
Sir:
... In your Sept. 1 issue is a write-up about one Edith Halpert who raids farmhouses for old paintings.
I hate to be an old bastard, but I want you to line up Lady Halpert and your Art section editor long enough for me to whisper something in their shell-pink ears. The reproduction of Knight's Farmhouse Gossip is a very poor copy of an original painting called A Secret. . . . The original was photographic in style and a hell of a lot better than the foul copy "originated" by Mr. Knight. . . .
BANDEL LINN
Sarasota, Fla.
Sir:
... I have a book called Art and Artists of All Nations. In this is a copy of A Secret by O. Goldman, a German artist. I am sure Knight did a very poor copy job. . . .
C. JOHN EDHOLM
Newark
P: Shame on Dealer Halpert and on TIME'S Art editor for not recognizing a secret when they saw one.--ED.
Golden Gary
Sir:
When you write of the "ugly strike" at Gary [TIME, Sept. 15], must you assume that the strike took place in an "ugly steel-mill town?" Isn't this carrying the literary unities a bit too far?
Granting that the school strike was not pretty, we must take exception to the word "ugly" as applied to the only city of more than 100,000 that has been planned and built entirely within the 20th Century. . . . The mills . . . are quite separate from the rest of the city. The residential areas have lawns and shady trees. There are five golf courses in and around the city. Within the city limits are dunes and beaches so attractive that people from several states come to spend the summer on them.
Gary is properly called "the city of steel with a heart of gold."
FRANK REED
Gary, Ind.
Bride's Defense
Sir:
I am writing you from the deep South to challenge you to a duel for insulting womanhood, as I consider you did in printing the candid-camera picture of my young and charming wife [TIME, Sept. 1].
Having been married only two months, I assure you it is a shock to pick up TIME magazine and find one's bride pictured apparently as she was about to become nauseated from an overdose of hashish. . . .
With righteous indignation I demand that you show your chivalry, Suh, by printing an attractive picture of my lovely wife. . . .
EDWARD B. PAINE
New Orleans
P: Let Reader Paine stay his hand.--ED.
A to Zzyzz
Sir:
I appreciate TIME'S witty footnotes to the complex life in modern society appearing regularly in the "Manners & Morals" section. In the Sept. 8 issue you noted that a company by the dubious name of "A" was the shortest listing in the new Manhattan telephone directory. . . . You failed to point out, however, that both "A" and the very last listing of the book, namely "Zzyzz, Inc.," show the same address and telephone number.
Unfortunately, the telephone number concerned, BR 9-7755 fails to respond. . . . Would TIME'S editor kindly explain if BR 9-7755 connects one with the land of the leprechauns or the office of the vice president in charge of humor and confusion of the New York Telephone Company ?
WERNER LIEBERT
Great Neck, N.Y.
P: A is a trade name belonging to A, Inc., a firm which deals in the development of ideas, which it sells to businesses. Zzyzz (pronounced zee-zee) is a corporation which manufactures and markets "useful patented articles" such as non-tippable stepladders and removable toilet seats. Had Reader Liebert looked further he might have discovered two other listings for the same number: National Musical Benefit Society, "to help talented young musicians"; and the man behind all three of BR 9-7755's enterprises--Claremont Robert Morris, a real-estate broker ("I have to make money somehow").--ED.
Historical Resemblance
Sir:
Your picture of Princess Ashraf of Persia [TIME, Sept. 8] sent me scurrying to my former ancient-history textbook. ... A profile of ... Queen Nefertiti of Egypt, wife of Ikhnaton, bears an amazing resemblance to the modern Persian--even the hat.
LILLIAN N. SCHULTZ
Worcester, Mass.
P: Five other bright-eyed readers were similarly sent by Persia's Princess.--ED.
More Illumination
Sir:
In TIME for Sept. 8 you take great pains to charge me with "obscurantism." That charge rests on two items, both of which are falsely attributed to me.
1) The directive requiring people to "terminate the illumination" was issued by the Public Buildings Administration and not by the Office of Civilian Defense of which I was then the director. I had never seen it prior to the publicity given to it by Mr. Roosevelt. Incidentally, when apprised of the facts, he took pains to apologize in a gracious manner for his error.
2) The so-called ski order of the CAB was issued over my dissent. If you will trace the records, you will find my objection against setting those massive bureaucratic measures into operation to deal with what was at best a tempest in a teacup. . . .
JAMES M. LANDIS
Chairman
Civil Aeronautics Board
Washington
P: TIME, apprised of the illuminating facts, regrets its obscuration.--ED.
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