T.R.

Sir:

Your March 3 story has done a tremendous job in displaying the force, power and energy of Theodore Roosevelt.

OSCAR S. STRAUS President

Theodore Roosevelt Association New York City

Sir:

Your article reveals a great but neglected American. Aaron Bohrod's nostalgic cover painting tells the T.R. story in a single picture--proving we still have artists who can communicate. But where are the courageous, uncompromising statesmen?

SAMUEL A. WOOD Baldwin, N.Y.

SIR:

YOU ARE DOING WHAT THIS COMMISSION HAS MOST WANTED TO SEE DONE: TO MAKE THIS GREAT AMERICAN'S SPIRIT AND EXAMPLE AGAIN A FACTOR IN AMERICAN LIFE.

HERMANN HAGEDORN DIRECTOR

THEODORE ROOSEVELT CENTENNIAL COMMISSION NEW YORK CITY

Sir:

T.R. was indeed a great man and President, and it makes me sick to see the pussyfooting that has been going on with our present President. Where is that drive and spirit T.R. was the epitome of? Most of all, where is that decisiveness?

GEORGEANNE ROBERTS New York City

Sir:

Why a cover story on T.R.? Colorful? Yes ! Dynamic ? Yes ! Great ? No !

H. W. HARTMAN

Mount Vernon, N.Y.

Sir:

At the wedding reception for Alice Roosevelt Longworth in 1906, the caterer used the President's fame as a hunter as the theme for his table decorations. He dressed little bears in oudoor togs and placed them in various poses around the banquet tables. When the President said that even he as a bear expert could not name the breed, a guest said, "Well, let's call them Teddy bears." The following year the Steiff factory in Giengen, West Germany sold nearly 1,000,000 Teddy bears in America alone, and prosperity of the tiny hamlet where the factory is situated boomed. Accordingly, this year, the townfolk of Giengen will turn out in a giant Teddy Bear Festival honoring President "Teddy" Roosevelt on the 100th anniversary of his birth.

GEORGE BURKE New York City

P:I But the father of the "Teddy bear" was the Washington Post's Cartoonist Clifford Berryman (1869-1949) who, in 1902, was moved by T.R.'s refusal to shoot a cub during a bear-hunting trip in Mississippi. The wedding reception incident four years later did a lot to popularize Berryman's baby.--ED.

The President's Vacation

Sir:

As a Democrat, I take back all the things I said about TIME. That was a good lead article [Feb. 24] on the President's absenteeism!

MARY P. HOPKINS New York City

Sir:

You criticize the President for vacationing when he should be dealing with the business recession. In other sections of the same issue you state, in effect, that the recession is not helped by gloomy talk. Is it not reassuring that the President feels that he can be away?

HAROLD J. HARRIS Westport, N.Y.

Sir:

Glad as we are to have had the President visit Georgia, it is extremely gratifying to see TIME acknowledge the realization that a President cannot run this country from a vacation spot.

W. ELLIOTT CAMP Rome, Ga.

Sir:

While the world smolders in a dozen places --including our own economy--our President is either playing golf or bridge. When is he going to learn to fiddle? Is he waiting for the world to be on fire?

ELEANOR ROBINOW Plymouth, Mass.

Sir:

Re your article on the President's vacation with ex-Treasury Secretary Humphrey: What a difference in point of view! To me, it seems that our President chose one of our country's financial wizards with whom to study leisurely and analyze--thus giving tremendous meaning to his message.

MRS. GEORGE H. WISTING Santa Monica, Calif.

Sir:

You ran a realistic appraisal of the President's health; please help our country by urging healthy and industrious Mr. Nixon to take this high office now.

AUGUSTA HIGGINSON

San Francisco

Little Brother

Sir:

Seeing The Brothers Karamazov [Feb. 24] strengthens my long-held suspicion that TIME'S motion picture critic should be banished to some desert island reserved for misguided sophisticates.

JOHN H. MORAWITZ Yuma, Ariz.

Sir:

In trying to reason out your reviewer's frame of mind, I concluded that he saw the film in the company of your Books and Art editors.

R. A. LEE Los Angeles

Japan Revisited

Sir:

Your Feb. 24 Art section is masterful in every sense. The layout and the black-and-white reproductions are the best I've seen, and the color photos of Japanese gardens are superb. I was swept with sentimentality when I saw the reproduction of the moss garden of Kyoto's Saihoji monastery. While stationed at Johnson Air Base, near Tokyo, I used to know a patch of wood that resembled this garden. G.I.s living in my barracks walked through it to reach the service club. On the rainy, magic-like mornings of spring and summer, the spot was like another world. Most of us will never see Japan again, and many thousands of veterans, I'll wager, felt a lump in the throat while looking at your Art section.

BILL B. FRYDAY Norman, Okla.

Sir:

The writer and his company were the first to undertake the rebuilding of the Japanese stainless flatware industry, even though at the time we employed 1,700 workers producing similar products in America. Seldom have I encountered what I consider to be such editorial leadership and civic accomplishment, as well as courage, as was shown by TIME in its March 3 Business section. My congratulations on your broad point of view and your atriotism in thinking of all America and its verseas relationships--rather than a small area of self-interest.

NORMAN J. MERCER

New York City

The Dog in the House

Sir:

The boy or girl that gave the sarcastic account of the dog show in your Feb. 24 issue should be barred from all dog shows for life.

RUSSELL L. PARKER 3rosse Pointe Farms, Mich.

Sir:

If the painstaking, studied breeding of these magnificent specimens of dogdom was practiced by mankind, the world wouldn't be in the mess it is today.

MARTHA MELEKOV Harbor City, Calif.

The Cat in the Convent

Sir:

I appreciated your Feb. 24 review of my jook The Cat with Two Faces. You may like to know the sequel. Ex-Bad Cat Mathilde Carre, who was all your reviewer said, has, I have since learned from a French priest, entered a convent and is writing an account of her spiritual conversion.

GORDON YOUNG

Paris

The Billionaire

Sir:

Your Feb. 24 article about Oilman J. Paul Getty was very enlightening. Before reading the article I never heard of Getty. How this scrooge can live with himself is a miracle.

ABRAHAM SCHNEIDER The Bronx, N.Y.

Sir:

Poor, poor man.

ETHEL KURLAND Carmel, Calif.

Sir:

The brooding expression of this man, so cleverly depicted by Artist Koerner, speaks volumes as to his character.

LESTER C. MARSHALL Los Angeles

Sir:

Your cover painting of Getty made him appear as though he had been boiled in his own oil. After reading about him I think he had it coming. I am not enough of a philosopher to pity petty Getty; as an artist I just loathe him and his ilk.

JOHN W. GREGORY

Provincetown, Mass.

Sir:

Oh, to have a "free-spending" lover with dyed hair, "lifted" face, and vigorous (?) at 65 ! He's the most "unsuccessful" person I know of.

MRS. R. PECH Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.

Sir:

"How many others are there like me?" he wants to know. Let us hope damn few.

MICHAEL BRAND North Hollywood, Calif.

Sir:

Millions of Americans have dreamed of the blessings of tremendous wealth. Your account of the life of Billionaire Oilman Getty is to us a revelation. How fruitless, how barren, how loveless, how frustrating this existence must be to Mr. Getty!

FRANK B. SELF

Fort Worth

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