Be-diapered Grandsons
Sirs:
"Down the colonnade that is called the President's Walk . . . there awaited him a highball, . . . two soap-smelling, be-diapered grandsons. . . ." (TIME, Jan. 1).
Is it true that Franklin D. Roosevelt 3rd (aged 1 ½) is still wearing diapers?
A. ELSON
New York City
> Franklin Roosevelt II says Franklin Roosevelt III has "outgrown" diapers. —ED.
Stogie
Sirs:
TIME to apologize. Smoking a pipe for about 50 years has not made me forget the city of my birth. Why, I was raised on Wheeling stogies [TIME, Feb. 12, p. 16], and what could a poor boy do if it had not been for those grand old stogies—the sweetest smoke ever put out?
TODD LUNSFORD
Boy Scouts of America,
St. Petersburg, Fla.
Sirs:
. . . Possibly you will be interested in knowing how it got the name of "stogie" and its association with our pioneering history.
Wheeling, in the days of the great hegira to the West, was considered to be the end of Eastern civilization and the jumping off place into the great Indian country. After their arduous trip over the national pike (now U. S. Route 40) the emigrant New Englanders were ready for a breathing spell and a general overhauling of supplies and equipment. Also it usually took a few days to make arrangements to be ferried over the Ohio River at this point.
The New Englanders, being true devotees of the weed, generally brought with them a supply of the Connecticut leaf which they would take to the cigar maker in Wheeling to be rolled into cigars. . . . The New Englanders mostly traveled in Conestoga wagons which was shortened to "stogie" by the Virginians and the travelers became known as the "stogie fellers" and the product of their tobacco as "stogies."
T. P. PARKER
Wheeling, W. Va.
> Reader Parker could be wronger, but not much. The Conestoga wagon was made in Conestoga, Pa., which had been named for the Conestoga Indians. To Conestoga went teamsters hauling lumber, tooling the team with one hand while they rolled a cigar with the other. Later Conestogas, or stogies, became favorites of the wagon trains freighting from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia, where the drivers would sell the supply they had rolled along the way. Hence, Pittsburgh stogies. Wheeling came in on the freight.—ED.
Sirs:
The writer of the article on Mayor John Hale Levi (TIME, Feb. 19) did not report the name on the box of stogies correctly. It should have been SHARTZ'S HIGH GRADE STOGIES. I might add that these stogies have been manufactured in Gallipolis, Ohio for over 60 years.
JOHN E. HALLIDAY
Gallipolis, Ohio
Wrath
Sirs:
DO TIME'S EDITORS CONSIDER THEIR CINEMA CRITIC AN ACCREDITED JUDGE OF BOOKS AS WELL? AND DOES TIME'S BOOK REVIEWER AGREE WITH HIS ASSOCIATE'S OPINION OF JOHN STEINBECK'S "GRAPES OF WRATH" AS A "SOSO BOOK" OF "PHONY PATHOS"? i DON'T.
GUILD COPELAND
Boston, Mass.