Judgments & Prophecies

Sir:

In your Aug. 23 issue you devoted a page to "Judgments & Prophecies." It is a fine section and should be continued. With TIME'S standoffish style, it is refreshing to read the change-of-pace editorials that make the viewer sharpen up for the rest of the magazine.

OTIS BRYAN JR.

Merriam, Kans.

Sir:

I think Judgments & Prophecies is great-terrific--worth almost the price of the magazine alone . . .

GLENN C. VICKERY

Newark, N.J.

Journey into the Interior

Sir:

Congratulations to TIME Aug. 23 on the wonderful cover story on Secretary McKay. It's about time the sprawling Interior Department was brought to public attention and that its new leader received a pat on the back.

PHIL SHEA

Buhl, Idaho

Sir:

Must you support Doug McKay with such complete single-mindedness? Must you always run down the recent 20-year Democratic Administration ? . . . We are trying to save the last true and only rain forest in the U.S., in the lower Hoh and Quinault River valleys, from the woodsman's ax. (It will be lost if reapportionment of the Olympic National Park is allowed.) . . . Being a young and never-say-die Democrat, I go along wholeheartedly with Doug McKay's ideas concerning public power [but] there are some lands which should be held by the Government for the benefit of all forever!

CYRIL E. HART

Seattle, Wash.

Sir:

All honor to TIME for the fine . . . article . . . Most of all, you have pictured a real homespun American with the rare quality of good horse sense. It is really refreshing to know we have a man like Secretary McKay in Government service . . . Such a contrast to the goggle-eyed intellectuals we have had to bear with. Sort of gives a body hope again that our country may yet return to the good old private-enterprise system that made America great.

(THE REV.) W. C. DAVIS

Salem Lutheran Church

Parrottsville, Tenn.

Sir:

. . . McKay is credited with having told Alaskans off. Aside from the fact that no one likes to be told that he is not a gentleman, what McKay did was to write off the Republican Party in the Territory in the coming fall elections . . . Stateside, McKay may be a great man, but his treatment of Alaskan statehood and his recent visit here left a great deal to be desired . . .

V. MAURICE SMITH

Fairbanks, Alaska

Sir:

... I see that the notions of orderly development of resources and maintenance of national parks as a public heritage were the misbegotten brain children of "long-haired New Dealers." Conservation through use--that's the ticket. By the way, whom do I see to enter a claim on Old Faithful? I've got a nifty idea for a private-enterprise laundry.

WILLIAM B. ROBERTSON

Urbana, Ill.

Sir:

. . . Your entertaining report ... is vivid and accurate, except for one paragraph. Opposition to Echo Park Dam, which would flood most of Dinosaur National Monument, has been led by all of the national conservation organizations of the nation; the protests have come from millions of people of every state, who see their national park system endangered . . .

Echo Park Dam would ruin the extraordinary canyons in the monument, and it is not necessary in order to provide the desired water and power benefits, since there are alternative methods . . .

FRED M. PACKARD

Executive Secretary

National Parks Association

Washington, D.C.

Sir:

. . . Your remarks, "Professional nature lovers like Bernard DeVoto, Richard Neuberger and Wallace Stegner, all of whom wear shoes and live in houses while writing about the great outdoors, etc., etc.," are quite ridiculous. If your Art Editor writes a story about one of Titian's nudes, do you insist that he work in his office naked?

JOERN GERDTS

Salt Lake City, Utah

P: Photographer Gerdts is invited to visit TIME'S offices at any time.--ED.

Jumping on the Yankee Dollar

Sir:

Re your Aug. 16 notice concerning a parachute jump from a biplane by a Russian parachutist equipped with stopwatches, portable altimeters, warning buzzers and political tutors, etc.: I am not impressed. I am an Air Force parachutist with ... a large unit, and we jump regularly from all types of aircraft . . . Leaping . . . with a full fieldpack, a rifle, extra equipment plus a large, 75-lb. general-purpose container, makes the stoic little Russian's feat appear rather tame by comparison. But . . . this big tough Russian murmuring "Eto Nichevo," as he [disen tangled himself from] his warning buzzers and portable political tutors after landing "near the white chalk cross," is what prompted me to write . . . All my friends here in Combat Control would like to extend a formal invitation to the U.S.S.R. parachute-jumping team to a spot jumping contest. We don't think chalk crosses (so many feet wide) are quite sporting; we'd rather a silver dollar, thumbtack or playing card were used for a mark.

A/ 1C AL HANSEN

Donaldson Air Force Base

Greenville, S.C.

How to Figure

Sir:

Will you please accept a warm word of appreciation for the excellent item ["Facts & Figures"] you carried in your issue of Aug. 9 on the need for adequate Government statistics . . . Having had a hand in the recent report of the Intensive Review Committee for the Secretary of Commerce I am pleased to see the increasing recognition by the magazine press of the important role of Government statistics

RALPH J. WATKINS

Director of Research Dun & Bradstreet, Inc.

New York City

Making the Grades

Sir:

The classic understatement of the year was made by Miss Binde, the German student at the University of Illinois [TIME, Aug. 23]. She the probably was too polite to elaborate. Her ability to lap up a four-year college course in little more than a year, she states, was because "the general level [of education] is a little more advanced in Germany." Ha! I say it's a great deal more advanced all over Europe. Why? Because European children are not coddled, nor is their precious earning time wasted in hours of drawing, gym, music, crafts, etc. . . .

PAT FISCHER MITTELSTEAD

Corcoran, Calif.

Sir:

. . . The German secondary school and the American secondary school are based on different educational philosophies. We try to offer secondary education to all, and shove through many stupid and disinterested pupils to graduation, along with the hardworking and talented who benefit from the availability of opportunity to learn . . .

The German secondary school is not available to all. The majority of kids go to work, not to the secondary school .

ROBERT GREAVES. M.D.

Collinsville, Ill.

Sir:

One difference between American and German schools which might be a reason for the apparent difference in the scientific level is the Quiz system, which is totally unknown in Germany. The American students write a test asking, for instance: Christopher Columbus has 1) invented gunpowder; 2) discovered America; 3) won the Battle of Trafalgar. In a German school the questions would be: Who discovered America? When did this happen? What was the country's name at that time? Obviously, the students have to work harder in Germany, but when it comes to a comparison, they are noticeably ahead. As to Miss Binde, she is certainly far above average in Germany, too.

EGON E. MUEHLNER

Holloman, N.Mex.

The French in Africa

Sir:

Your Aug. 23 account of the ratissage in Morocco . . . turned my stomach . . . How can we criticize death marches and concentration camps when a nation like France allows such things to take place!

ISABEL BLOOM

Davenport, Iowa

Sir:

TIME'S story of the killing of 20 Arabs in a ratissage will doubtless stir the warm American heart and justify it still further in its campaign against so-called colonialism. But what have you to put in colonialism's place? Independence -- which is a fiction in this H-bomb age? And to achieve this, do you suggest that the teeming European populations which depend on trade with their colonies for their bread commit suicide? You will replace order with chaos. The American's sentiment for the native is indeed hypocritical . . .

HARRY GREGSON

West Vancouver, B.C.

In the Prairie Doghouse

Sir:

Where did you find the reviewer who covered and reported upon Disney's The Vanishing Prairie [Aug. 23]? What kind of bilious or splenic disease does he have? The premiere of the picture was shown here, on the borders of the prairie where a good portion of the film was taken. The ducks, the prairie chicken, the buffalo, the coyotes and the rattlesnakes, the prairie dogs and badgers and deer-- all are near neighbors of ours ... I suppose there are still people around whose sole brush with outdoor America is an occasional glance at an apartment-house dog on a leash. But by golly, they shouldn't be writing critical accounts of Disney ... A pox on your Cinema Editor.

C. DEXTER LUFKIN, M.D

Hot Springs, S. Dak.

Sir:

I feel you exercised considerable restraint in reviewing Walt Disney's The Vanishing Prairie . . . Why does Disney insist on antagonizing his audience by making wild creatures puppets, mimicking the ways of man: square-dancing scorpions, ballet-dancing snakes, anvil-pounding rams? Such antics rum what could be good and original films.

GEORGE PERDICARIS

Edmonton, Alberta

The New Tax Law

Sir:

No doubt you will hear from many of my associates in connection with your Aug. 16 article. Could TIME have been confused when it stated: "They [the lawmakers] restored the rule prevailing before the early 1940s and exempted life insurance from estate taxes"? . . .

STANLEY S. TROTMAN

New Haven, Conn.

Sir:

. . . The new law restores the previous doctrine that insurance payable to named beneficiaries need not be included in the gross estate if the insured retains no incidents of ownership, and that premium payment is no longer considered an incident of ownership.

R. C. SHORT

Pittsburgh

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