Ice Crystals & Arguments

Sir:

. . . Your cover story about Dr. Albert Schweitzer [TIME, July 11] seems to me a new high.

Two years ago I waded through the story of his life . . . but the adulation got a bit thick . . . Congratulations to TIME, which has the proper amount of respect for a really great man but also the restraint to keep "hero worship" out of the article . . .

MRS. F. MARTIN WEIR Texarkana, Ark.

Sir:

. . . Although Schweitzer can certainly be considered a man of character ... his "rev-erence-for-life" theme is decidedly and unfortunately neurotic . . . The tearing of leaves from a tree, the shattering of ice crystals and the cutting of flowers . . . the avoidance of unwittingly damaging weeds at a roadside --all of these are most neurotic . . . The fact that men like Schweitzer and Gandhi have been lauded and idealized for their "ethics" in such matters is a striking indication of what part neurotic trends can play in religion and ethics in our still quite primitive civilization . . .

CLARENCE A. TRIPP

Research Psychoanalyst New York City

Sir:

. . . The highest praise I can give this article is that I think it is entirely worthy of its subject. Schweitzer's life is a knockdown argument for Christian missions . . .

FRED FIELD GOODSELL American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions Boston, Mass.

Sir:

After reading the interesting account of the work of Albert Schweitzer, my wife and I felt that we should like to send his hospital at Lambarene a small contribution . . .

CARL AND MARION SHETZLEY

Sir:

TIME'S cover of Albert Schweitzer is a masterpiece. Ernest Hamlin Baker is to be highly commended . . .

DAN WOOD Beaver Dam, Wis.

Favorites

Sir:

I was glad to see your balanced comments on Wimbledon [TIME, July 4] ... There has never been a grander set of Americans than those who came over this year--good sportsmen, good players and good lookers, and all great favorites of the crowd. Ted Schroeder won our hearts in one short fortnight, and Louise Brough's courage and Gussie's panties kept the female flag flying high.

Yet a section of the press in both countries chose to fasten on the only exception, Bob Falkenburg. They magnified the regrettable incident in which he was booed by a small section of the crowd and printed his statement that the Wimbledon crowd is anti-American. It is enough to make a confirmed fan gnaw the net. The Wimbledon crowd is not anti-anybody. They queue for hours to study tennis and personalities, in that order. And they ask not if you won or lost, but how you played the game.

A. STEWARD London, England

Texas Trailer

Sir:

"Some 9,000 tribesmen of the 100,000 Bamangwatos traveled hundreds of miles along the dusty trails of their Texaslike land" [TIME, July 11].

I can understand that TIME knows little of Bechuanaland, but I cannot understand how so great a journal can know so little of so great a state.

BEN S. MORRIS San Antonio, Tex.

Whose Depression?

Sir:

In your story "Watching the Ball Game" [TIME, July 11], it looks like some people have free tickets to the game and are not even contributing when the hat is passed.

The Boyles, Horns and Howes may stabilize the economy at a reasonable level if they don't wait too long to release their buying power, though they are certainly going to cause some sort of a depression, the degree of which is up to them. Waiting may get to be a game to see which can hold out the longer . . . Let's hope they don't hold their money until they are buying bankrupt goods, or set on it until it hatches into a real "depression"--Dog Patch or Lower Slobbovian style . . .

H. W. CLAYBAUGH

Little Rock, Ark.

Postgraduate Shmoo

Sir:

... I should think that for something as phenomenal as "wingless chickens" [TIME, July 11], you would include a few pictures . . .

TONY DEIULIO

Syracuse, N.Y.

P: They still look like chickens (see cut)--ED.

Sir:

. . . There have never been enough drumsticks to go 'round. Let pseudo-geneticist Baumann complete the work so nobly begun --give us a bird with four drumsticks. For postgraduate exercise, let's have two wishbones--veritably a super shmoo.

WILLIAM NOYES Manchester, N.H.

Help Wanted

Sir:

Re "To Improve the Breed" [TIME, July 41 ...

Among our small group of professional friends [many] are in the same boat as us; we deeply desire to have children, but have none. My Ph.D.-candidate husband and I have had assurances . . . after complete scientific investigation into our case, that we would have children . . . and still I have never been pregnant.

It is one thing for statisticians to report that professional couples do not reproduce themselves as readily as the lower-income group, but saying "tsk, tsk" to us isn't the answer. What we and our friends need are scientists who can tell us why we don't reproduce and help us to do so. I can assure your eugenic statisticians that it isn't because we don't want them that we "better educateds" don't have children.

ELIZABETH G. WALLICK

Edinburgh, Scotland

Definition

Sir:

You refer to ... "Redbook's lag" [TIME, July 11] in comparison with Cosmopolitan [circ. 2,101,842] and American [circ. 2,602,873] . . . You correctly give Redbook's circulation, for the first quarter of this year, as 1,969,172. You failed to state that 22 years ago, just before I became editor of Redbook, the total circulation of the magazine was 752,211, so Redbook's gain in 22 years is 1,216,961 copies, more than three times that of American and not far from three times that of Cosmopolitan.

In my dictionary the definition of the noun lag is "retardation of movement for any cause." Now which of the three magazines has been the most retarded? . . .

EDWIN BALMER New York City

P: All credit to Reader Balmer for nearly tripling Redbook's circulation in his 22 years as editor. But Redbook is still third in a field of three. -- ED.

Fast Stops

Sir:

. . . Your article "Motor Monopoly" [TIME, June 13] makes quite an issue about the excellence of Lou Moore's pit technique in refueling and changing tires on Bill Holland's racing car in 52 seconds . . .

Pit stops of 25 to 35 seconds were the rule to take on fuel and change tires for the truly great racing teams of Mercedes-Benz, Auto Unio and Alfa-Romeo. The Indianapolis boys are trying but they have a long way to go before they approach the perfection in racing that made Mercedes-Benz famous during 1934-39. Competition in the Grand Prix events during that period was such that an extra 15 seconds for a pit stop meant losing the race.

MIKE M. KOVACEVICH

Edmonton, Alta., Canada

High Dollar Sign

Sir:

. . . The difficulties of British trade with dollar countries are not unfairly stated in TIME, June 27, but why is the American tariff an unmentionable subject? The troubles of our trading with dollar areas, arising possibly from overvaluation of the pound and our own costs of manufacture, are quite overshadowed by the effect of the tariff. There are many more products which are competitive in cost and which we could sell in the U.S. but for completely prohibitive tariffs.

P. C. ALLEN

Hertfordshire, England

Newfoundland Nod

Sir:

In my opinion, your interesting story on Newfoundland, "Tourist Outpost" [TIME, July 4], could be made even more so with one slight addition.

In those outports with atmosphere of Irish brogue and Scottish burr where the toast is likely to be, "I bows taward ye," the response, equally charming, is "I nods accordin'."

RICHARD HARRISON Milwaukee, Wis.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.