(3 of 6)
We have been taught for generations that any descriptive term such as Man of the Year which you use, should imply an outstanding and noble character. Whatever you may say about Ivan the Terrible inside the covers does not alter the fact that many other humans who look up to Stalin will get great aid and comfort from your giving him the cover on millions of copies of TIME, displayed prominently all over our country and other countries. As "clear, curt, concise" and cold as TIME is in giving the news, which I have read for many years from cover to cover, I cannot help but feel that you should display some grain of sympathy for the thousands of humans whose deaths are the direct results of the man you term Man of the Year.
W. S. WHITTLESEY
New York City
Sirs:
Enclosed your picture of Man ?????? of the Year. The balance of this week's edition of TIME is in the furnace. . . . .
Joey may be the Man of the Year to you. To me he is not even human, to say nothing of being a man. Referring to my request of several weeks ago, which to date has not been granted, keep your STINKING PUBLICATION OUT OF MY HOME.
GOD SAVE THE CZAR and I don't mean maybe.
HAROLD E. COOPER
Burlington, Iowa.
Sirs:
Stalin is not the Man of the Year. Instead, TIME should have published the picture of a private Finnish soldier on snowshoes or skis, with a bayoneted rifle in his hand.
RICHARD F. BURGES El Paso, Texas
Sirs :
Here is at least one letter of approval for your choice of Man of the Year, and especially for the reasons supporting your choice of the only obvious possibility, much as we dislike him.
No doubt a flood of letters protesting your selection will come to you, sent by D.A.R.'s, fearful divines, sabled, twittering, triple-chinned dowagers, the ostrich-minded city council of Cambridge, Mass., and similar groups of in-the-closet-and-under-the-bed-peepers who believe that enforced ignorance and a moratorium on thinking is "Americanism."
Congratulations too for doing what seems to be an unbiased job of reporting, whether it is distasteful to us or not.
HERBERT CRAWFORD
Grand Rapids, Mich.
Pressagent's Pressagent
Sirs:
Re: "Portrait of a Press Agent" (TIME Jan. 8): "He [Maney] ushered without pay in a Seattle theatre." Well, Dick Maney may have ushered without pay for some short period in the Moore Theater in Seattle, but my definite recollections—as an usher without pay—was that Dick was a very hard-boiled head usher who unmercifully ordered us school boys up into the balcony if we arrived too late to don one of the purple faced tuxedos and starched dickies required for first floor ushering. And his was a pay job—part salary and a portion of the take in the check room. . . .
One of Maney's principal problems was to collect enough ushers for ordinary road shows, while he was overrun with ushering talent during the weeks when we would have The Chocolate Soldier, Merry Widow and like extravaganzas of the day. Marie Dressier and even highbrows like Geraldine Farrar packed 'em in, including dozens of unneeded ushers. . . .
Your story about Maney was good but what he really needs is a good press agent.
ALFRED R. ROCHESTER Seattle, Wash.
Sheean & Hart