Impartial Information
Sirs: Due to conflicting reports, I beg TIME to give me the impartial information on the following questions.
1) Are foreign papers and magazines containing news and comments unfavorable to Japan allowed to reach Japanese subscribers and to be sold on Japanese newsstands?
2) Has there been any demonstration by Japanese civilians in Japan against the present war in China thus far?
3) What is the most reliable figure of Japanese casualties and wounded in China ince last July?
4) What is the approximate daily cost in Yen of the war to Japan?
5) Is it true that the Japanese battleship Mutsu was sunk off Kiangyin by Chinese aircraft in the last week of November 1937? Is it true that Mutsu's sister ship Nagata was built in the U. S. A.?
6) How many Japanese men-of-war have been destroyed or sunk since last July? Are they all leading a charmed life like Idzumo?
7) Excluding those stationed in Manchuria, how many Japanese soldiers have been sent to China since last July?
In case you should choose to publish my questions and your answers, kindly refrain from giving my full name. I don't mind if you just print my initials. . . .
D.S.K.C.
Hong Kong
1) No. Banned in Japan at one time or another since 1936 have been: N. Y. Times, Current History, American Mercury, TIME. At present Japanese postal authorities maintain a rigid censorship.
2) No. Opposition to the war has been confined pretty exclusively to the small section of the commercial class which once subsisted largely on trade with China. The penalty for a word of criticism of the war is stiff: three years in jail.
3) Two months ago a good guess was 260,000 dead and wounded.
4) Yen 1,000,000--some $290,000.
5) Chinese reports were unconfirmed elsewhere. No; it was built at the Kure naval yard.
6) None that TIME has heard of.
7) About 500,000.--ED.
Super
Sirs:
Your issue TIME, March 28: Proposed specifications for Seversky Super-Clipper among others, 70 toilets for a total of 136 people. . . . Hmm. . . . MILTON D. KAHN
West Palm Beach, Fla.
TIME'S figures came from Major Seversky himself, who has been called a visionary.--ED.
Dimples
Sirs:
. . . Whoever it may be mentioned Nelson Eddy's dimples in the rotten review of The Girl of The Golden West (March 21), I have some 500 odd photos of the "Dimpled Nelson Eddy," all minus the dimples! I would appreciate it if your movie critic would send me a "dimpled" picture of Mr. Eddy.
MARY HELEN BROSIUS
Marion, Va.
Let idolatrous Reader Brosius see cut.--ED.
Wild Horses
Sirs:
In TIME. March 28, you stated that Frank Mechau Jr. won one of the Altman Prizes for his picture, Last of the Wild Horses.
The author was undoubtedly a superb painter of horseflesh but I doubt if he has ever been west of the Mississippi. There are two simple errors that should be obvious to anyone who has ever seen a roundup or for that matter a corral. First mistake committed by Mechau was the constructing of a square corral. Horses cannot be roped or driven successfully in a corral with square corners. The usual shape is round. Next error is the constructing of the corral out of boards of dubious thickness. Any corral, especially one built for driving wild horses, should be made of round native logs. . . .
JOHN F. ANDERSON
Seattle, Wash.
TIME did not build the corrals Artist Mechau painted.--ED.
Kind and Considerate
Sirs:
As your magazine is a responsible publication, I was greatly surprised to find a distorted and entirely false account of my attitude towards Madame Chiang Kai-shek (nee Soong Meiling) in your issue of Jan. 3.
I feel proud to have as my father's wife, and my stepmother, one who has shown during this national crisis the greatest courage and devotion to my country and my father.
I feel I owe to her, who has always been so kind and considerate, that you should be asked to correct the untrue statements in your article under question.
CHIANG CHING-KUO
Headquarters of the Generalissimo
Wuchang, China
To Mr. Chiang, who has a proper filial regard for his stepmother, TIME'S sincere apologies for giving credence to a base report.--ED.
Not Bustling
Sirs:
In your opening article [March 28], under the heading Sport, you speak of the U. S. bustling with the announcement that the summer Olympics will be held during the latter part of September and earlier part of October, thus causing the college athletes to remain out of competition. Since when does a month out of school bother a star performer ? . . . Farther on, for example, you speak of Colorado's basketball team performing in New York. They must have bee gone at least three weeks. . . .
LEONARD L. SCHIFF
Springfield, Ill.
The Colorado basketball team missed one day of class, five of examination, but the last U. S. Olympic team had no members who were undergraduates at the University of Colorado.--ED.
Difference
Sirs:
Would you be so good as to correct a misstatement made in your review of Holy Old Mackinaw (TIME, April 4)? The retail price of the book is not $3, as you had it, but $2.50. Might make a difference to some of the boys.
STEWART H. HOLBROOK
Portland, Ore.
Stern Rebuke
Sirs:
Reader Levitan's satisfaction derived fron cursing TIME'S editor* (TIME, March 28) would be much more complete if he would learn to vary his curses.
CLEVENGER KEHMEIER
Gunnison, Colo.
Ours is Bigger
Sirs :
Chairman Tom Mercer Girdler, like othe smart steel men, knows full well that Republic's new continuous mill does not have "the world's widest roller table -- 98 inches" as TIME says in its March 28 issue.
"The world's widest roller table" undoubtedly is still the 156-inch wide roller table which feeds Lukens Steel Co.'s 206-inch mill here at Coatesville.
This mill, built in 1918, measures 206-inches between housings, still rolls the wides steel plates of any mill in the world. It has made plates as wide as 202 inches. It has rolled from ingots weighing as much as 59 tons. It has rolled plates as thick as 2-inches, many of which support big buildings in New York City.
Come and see us sometime. . . .
GEORGE M. GILLEN
Lukens Steel Co.
Coatesville, Pa.
Mr. Squeers?
Sirs:
In TIME, March 21 I read that Superintendent Wegner [of Roslyn, L. I., whose "progressive" system of education was recently favorably reviewed by the New York State Education Department] says "in making nut bread the pupils learn to add, subtract & multiply." A similar method of education was used in England in the time of Charles Dickens. In Nicholas Nickleby, the schoolmaster, Squeers, gave the verb "weed" to be spelled, defined and conjugated by the class and then sent them out to weed the garden. . . .
A. B. CARTER
Cocoa, Fla.
Maybe
Sirs:
You guys sure go to town with your magazine. . . . If enough people could be induced to read TIME, this cockeyed world would get to be a fit place for civilized people to live in, some day, maybe.
I have made a deal with a neighbor for a subscription between us. He has first crack at it at three bucks, and I get it after he is through with it, for the remaining two bucks. In this drought area a man has to be cagey.
GLEN ALLEN
Oxbow, Sask.
Audience
Sirs:
The reporter who covered the Roosevelt speech in Gainesville on March 23, as reported in your April 4 issue is a liar.
He referred to the audience as a "tobacco chewing crowd." In approximate figures there were 2,000 in uniform and under military command. These could not chew. There were 5,000 or more school children and 2,000 college students. These do not chew.
Of the estimated 25,000 present, at least one-half were women. They do not chew. Only by stretching the imagination could such a mass be described as a "tobacco chewing crowd."
A. F. DEAN
Editor
The Eagle
Gainesville, Ga.
Sirs:
Believing that you would not wilfully misinterpret, may I call [the following] to your attention in this week's TIME: You refer to the "President's curt speech" heard by a "tobacco-chewing crowd," etc. The crowd was NOT tobacco-chewing, and it applauded the speech. The honor of the President's visit was thoroughly appreciated. Many of the 50,000 crowd had motored miles that morning to be present and to see the President. Brenau College students and faculty in the foreground can attest what I say. President Pearce of Brenau College praised the speech without stint in his chapel address the next day, particularly the section to which you refer, and he especially noted the remarkable personality of the President. . . .
As a citizen of Washington, D. C. for many years and a member of the Women's National Press Club of Washington, I am thoroughly familiar with White House occupants for many terms, and quite able to judge the ability of the present incumbent.
G. R. BRIGHAM, PH.D.
Director, Journalism
Brenau College
Gainesville, Ga.
Future
Sirs:
In the edition of April 11, the editor of the Harvard Law Review chides you in pompous style for writing that "The California Supreme Court handed down a verdict . . .", says you should have said that the Court "reached a decision."
The editor of the Harvard Law Review exhibits what is justifiably considered by laymen the worst vice of attorneys--quibbling over the insignificant. The learned editor apparently has a greater future as a pettifogger than as an attorney. . . .
JOHN FRANK
University of Wisconsin Law School
Madison, Wis.
Good Word
Sirs:
TIME April 4: "Itsy-bitchy angel face." Swell. Grand. Great.
WILLIAM D. REYNOLDS
Providence, R. I.
Sirs:
My eyes disbelieved but returned with gusto to the "itsy-bitchy" angle on Betty Philson.
The poisonous antics of these pests of cinema & stage have never been more adequately or rib splittingly described. . . .
M. L. GORDON
Chicago, Ill.
21 Guns
Sirs:
In National Affairs in the April 4 issue you stated that the War Department spent $96,000 over its appropriation in giving salutes to the President and other dignitaries.
In my opinion this is an enormous waste of money. I can't see why the War Department don't make an electrical transcription of one of these salutes and in the future merely attach a huge amplifier. . . .
In the event that a dignitary doesn't merit such an enormous blast as given by a 21-gun salute all that has to be done is to lower the volume on the amplifier and this will give the effect of fewer guns.
RAYMOND PHILIPP
Milwaukee, Wis.
Sirs:
"With cheap (gun) powder, according to War Department officials, noise made by salutes (to the President) will be not 'Boom' but 'Swoosh'. . . ."
Economists will please note that the Roosevelt "Boom" is officially over and we are now in the Roosevelt "Swoosh."
WILLIAM G. TARRANT JR.
Richmond, Va.
No Difference
Sirs:
. . . If Mr. Dohr [April 11] is going to take Mr. Brown [of Johns-Manville] to task because he sold $31 book value stock at $100 when the market was $150, he might ask Mr. Woodruff of the Coca-Cola Co. why his stock is selling at $117 when it has a book value of less than 87. Or he might look into the matter of Brooklyn-Manhattan Transit common which sells around $8 a share despite a book value of $75.12.
Lamentably, Mr. Dohr has not only committed an error of emphasis, but one of accounting. At the end of 1936 the net worth of Johns-Manville was $35,849,663. The preferred stock has prior claim to $9,000,000 of this, leaving $26,849,663 for the common. Mr. Dohr divides this figure by the 850,000 shares now outstanding and gets a book value of $31 a share. He forgets that the common was sold for $100 a share. As the capitalization increased to 850,000 shares, assets increased by $10,000,000. Mr. Dohr should have divided $36,849,663 and gotten $43.35 as his pro-forma book value. But it doesn't make any difference.
CARL APPONYI
Hollywood, Calif.
His Little Best
Sirs:
TIME (April 4) is in error in stating Senator Byrnes of South Carolina "helped conduct the fight against the Court Plan." It was just the other way around. He done his little best to help pass the bill. "South Carolina's Byrnes" is noted for his subserviency to the White House and that is about all he is noted for.
W. Z. DOZIER
Longview, Tex.
South Carolina's Byrnes, whose resistance to President Roosevelt's Court Plan was largely passive, did vote to recommit it to the Judiciary Committee, July 22, 1937.--ED.
* "Go to Hell Editor'' et idem.
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