Red Ink
Sir:
I consider it a bad error in judgment to feature a string of Communists on the cover of TIME.
We have had Zhdanov, Togliatti, Gromyko and Vishinsky in a matter of a few months. This demonstrates the naive, non-political sense that makes Americans the joke of Europe's poLticos. . . .
There are plenty of men & women fighting the good fight of truth and democracy to feature on TIME covers. . . . Why publicize those who are pledged to destroy us?
BERN DIBNER New York City Fiat Lux
Sir:
The story on the University [TIME, Oct. 6] catches its real flavor, and I share, with most of those who have spoken and written to me, appreciation of TIME'S friendly and discerning comments upon our efforts to provide mass education of high quality. I agree, also, with the unanimous verdict concerning the alleged representation of me which appears upon the cover. ... I don't believe that even my worst enemies would say that today I resemble the wrinkled, grey-haired old man to whom TIME'S artist signed my name.
The pleasantest thing . . . has been the contact with the representatives of TIME who conducted the interviews and took the photographs. ... I was astonished at their youth, and delighted by their intelligence, their understanding, and their perspicuity.. ..
ROBERT GORDON SPROUL President
University of California Berkeley, Calif.
Sir:
The motto on the seal of the University
of California is "Let There Be Light." Twenty years ago a campus gag was: Question: What is the difference between God and the University of California?
Answer: When God said "Let there be light," there was light.
TIME indicates there have been some changes made. . . .
INEZ SACHS COLBY
Berkeley, Calif.
Topsy-Turvy
Sir:
It should be obvious that you are reporting on the state of the world in picture as well as in type. ... In your . . . letters to the editor [TIME, Oct. 6] you note the sorry plight of Britain's Prime Minister, who is going in one direction while his hat travels in another.
I call your attention to ... Foreign News (same issue). ... In order to make sense out of the map he is studying, Mr. Jan Masaryk is forced to put his spectacles on upsidedown. What a topsy-turvy world we live in.
THERON H. RICE Grand Haven, Mich.
Sir:
... I have been wondering if Minister Jan Masaryk can see farther "into the future" with his glasses on upsidedown? ... It would be interesting [to know] the actual number of people who commented. . . .
R. A. BARBER
Philadelphia
P: Eighty-four.--ED.
On Location
Sir:
As far as the students are concerned, the University of California and its Memorial Stadium are still in Berkeley, not in San Francisco as your sports editor would have it [TIME, Oct. 6].
RUTH HELEN PAPE Berkeley, Calif.
Sir:
Although I was quite far out in the stadium at the L.S.U.-Rice game, I wasn't quite within the New Orleans city limits.
MARK ASPLIN Baton Rouge, La.
Sir:
. What would happen if you said Harvard was in New Haven ?
HARVEY LAING
Jennings, La. P: We'd eat crow out of the Yale Bowl.--ED.
Help for Europe Sir: I would like to make two vital suggestions to improve . . . the present economic state of Europe, especially with relation to the program of American aid.
1) Americans complain that the aid given Europe (and other regions) puts funds into hands which later bid up American prices. . . . Why not counteract the bidding-up of your prices by substantially reducing your tariffs and other import restrictions and letting us pay for your goods with ours. . . .
2) Make European countries clean house before giving them any aid. Your dollars are never going to do us any permanent good as long as we are saddled with thousands upon thousands of parasitic government employees and . . . wasteful . . . expenditures of all kinds by the Government. ... In addition, the American Government might do well to make it clear that no European country can have . . . dollars unless it can prove that it is doing everything humanly possible to encourage its own acquisition of trade dollars. . . .
If you think the story of Cesare Covre [TIME, Sept. 22] is sorry, you ought to try exporting from France. In the guise of "controlled economy," there exists a series of ingenious regulations whose final result is the throttling of all export initiative.
ALEXANDRE L. BOURGEOIS Paris
Sir:
. . . Why is it so unthinkable that the U.S. should give to Europe the food, the coal, the steel that she requires for her recovery [TIME, Oct. 6]? Are we hungry? Are we freezing? Are our natural resources exhausted or would this program exhaust them?
Why can we not mobilize for the work of peace as we did for the work of war? . . .
What more can we ask of the European countries than they have given? They have promised to unify as never before--as we asked them to do. They can give us no money, no food, nothing now except the one thing that we cannot afford to ignore--a unified front, a partnership against the danger of another war.
Who are those who say that the Paris Plan should be ignored because it is not a "sound banking proposition?" Are we a nation of Shylocks, or are we human enough to take a risk of present comfort to insure our own lives and those of our children?
. . . For the love of peace and the future of our children, for the love of God Himself, give us rationing (with ceiling prices, please) ; give us three shifts a day (for gears and turbines, not guns and tanks, please); put upon us whatever is necessary to do the job. But, if we love life and our way of life, let us agree to the Paris Plan and save not only Europe but the Americas!
BERYL IVY MAYO
Meridian, Miss.
Terra Firma
Sir:
It is most interesting to note from your article "Mountains Under Water," in the Oct. 6 issue, that North and South America have drifted away from Africa and Europe during the past several million years.
However, I gather from your sketch that Trinidad has drifted very rapidly in the last few days.
MICHAEL SNOW Edmonton, Alta.
Sir:
... I was amazed to find that Trinidad had somehow traveled some 3,000 miles southeast since my last visit there. . . .
KENNETH D. SMITH Staten Island, N.Y.
P:Let Readers Snow and Smith be reassured; the Trinidad they know is still where it belongs, in the Lesser Antilles. But it is not a part of the
Atlantic Divide, which TIME mapped. The other Trinidad, off the coast of Brazil, is.--ED.
Seeing Double
Sir:
. . . Just take a look at your issue of Oct. 6. On one page is given the information that the anti-Communist International Peasant Union includes "Bulgarian Opposition Leader Georgi M. Dimitroff" while on the preceding page you present a picture of Marshal Tito & Comrade--Bulgaria's Communist Dictator Georgi Dimitroff.
OLE G. CLAUSEN
Montreal
P:Balkan politics are complicated. Like
the islands of Trinidad, there are two
Bulgarian politicos with the same name --one Communist, the other anti-Communist.--ED.
The Wayward Shirttail
Sir:
Apropos of all the many words written .. . lately, attempting to understand the nature of our Russian neighbors, may I call your attention to what Rudyard Kipling said [in] The Man Who Was:
"Let it be clearly understood that the Russian is a delightful person till he tucks his shirt in. As an Oriental he is charming. It is only when he insists upon being treated as the most easterly of Western people, instead of the most westerly of Easterns, that he becomes a racial anomaly extremely difficult to handle. The host never knows which side of his nature is going to turn up next."
MARJORIE FOLLMER
New York City
Wrong Address
Sir:
There has come to my attention derogatory comment regarding Postmaster Bernard F. Dickmann of St. Louis, Mo., appearing in your issue of Sept. 22.
In this, Mr. Dickmann was done an injustice. His advice to a St. Louis newspaper regarding a story of race discrimination, growing out of a lottery, was the result of instructions issued in my name to him to that effect. In accordance with regulations, Mr. Dickmann had . . . merely passed on to the newspapers the advice given him. . . .
As you know, the ruling originally made was reversed by me after full consideration. . . . Responsibility for the original ruling rests here, not on Postmaster Dickmann. FRANK J. DELANY Solicitor
Washington, D.C.
P:TIME congratulates Reader Delany for a manful confession.--ED.
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