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Shaughnessy,
Vancouver,
Canada
Dear Father:
So, nothing much has changed in that I am back in glamorous London. (Joke! Rose Dolores is in the news. It turns out that Dolores Del Rios also used the "most beautiful girl in the world" tagline, though.) The letter is a bit different in that I am finally reunited with my magazines. I hope that you don't mind that I'm a bit shorter with Aviation Week than I have been in the past, but two things have changed. The first is that Aviation Week's editor since 1945 has just disappeared. Robert H. Wood's departure from the publisher's chair was announced by his deputy in the 21 January issue, effective 2 February, but Wood did not contribute an editorial for the next issues and I have no idea what became of him. I have no idea why this matters to me, but I feel sad. Second, I am very tired of treating advertising-disguised-as-editorial content seriously.
I've continued to read to James-James before bed, since it was such a hit at Christmas. After some experimenting I've hit on a book he likes, a wartime fantasy in which some siblings romp around on a flying bed. It's marketed above his age, but he seems to be enjoying it, and I am thinking about The Hobbit when we are done. Best to get him started on fantasy and science fiction early considering the work his mother is doing. (And by that I mean patent law, and not helping out around the studio.) Too bad about the old job. I know if I were at the desk I'd make sure those Australians buy the Avro Vulcan!
Your Loving Daughter,
Ronnie
PS: I guess we know how the world ends now: With clouds of Cobalt-60.
The Periscope reports that Congress is going to be upset when it "starts investigating the Army list of who promoted Peress." That's Major Irving Peress, the former Communist dentist who was automatically promoted like all the other dentists, but, says McCarthy shouldn't have been, because sometimes majors are told super-duper-secret stuff, and he's an ex-communist, so there. (No-one tell Senator Joe that laughing gas makes you a blabbermouth, too!) The President wants to institute an American version of the Legion of Honour. General Ridgeway warns that the proposed 23% cut in American forces in Europe might lead a new Bataan. The new Pratt and Whitney J-75 will be a 20,000lb engine. Nautilus' nuclear engine has just gone "critical," which means "ready" in atomic-speak. Sea trials will begin shortly, two months ahead of schedule. The State of the Union address was written by the cabinet, edited into shape by Bryce Harlow, and sprinkled with some "philosophical touches" by the "President himself." I really like that phrasing. Imagine the President condescending to put his pen to a mere State of the Union Address? Julius Holmes is to be the new ambassador to Iran. Donald Heith is shifting from Vietnam to Lebanon. The Eisenhower Administration proposes to ask for only $55 million for civil defence. Dulles will press the French and British for their pre-approval of an American decision to use atomic weapons if "the Reds in Indo China invade South Vietnam." The super hush-hush CIA budget is hidden under various covers such as Indian claims and Air Force flight pay, but be assured that it is being cut under the economy drive, too. The National Press Club is making Louis Lautier its first Coloured member. The key story at the 30-nation Afro-Asian conference in Jakarta in April will be the behind-the-scenes struggle between India's Nehru and China's Chou En-lai. Signs are that the Reds are going to take over Thailand by internal subversion. Labour is going to ask Churchill (who is separately in trouble for drunk dialling the President) nasty questions about delays in civil-defence measures and anti-aircraft weapons. A secret year-end report to SHAPE says NATO air power build up isn't building up fast enough. La Surete has discovered that the Reds are embezzling public funds to support their propaganda campaigns Turkey is quietly moving to start depth charging suspected Soviet submarines in Turkish coastal waters. Japan and Russia will sign a peace treaty soon. Where are They Now catches up with Jimmy Fox, baseball player turned wholesale salesman, and John Held, Jr., cartoonist turned semi-retired putterer.
The Periscope Washington Trends reports that
Once you've written one puff piece,you just can't quit. Next up is Mona Sheppard, the Federal government's "top expert" in "Correspondence management," then freshman Oregon Senator Dick Neuberger, and then the Martin SeaMaster, here pitched as an antisubmarine aircraft and not a go-anywhere strategic atom bomber (perhaps of atomic mines, if there is such a thing), and finally the Byrnes of South Carolina, skipping over the resolution of the story of the inheritance of Mollie Newbury's fifteen million dollar Chicago-area department store fortune, which goes to sole-heir namesake grand-daughter Mollie Netcher Bragno, who is 28 and loaded already.
"Asia: Can the West Hold Back the Tide?" Is there such a thing as the Metaphor Police? Can I call them to take this headline away? No-one can hold back the tide. It's in the name! Therefore, the advance of Communism in "Asia" is inevitable! But if we prevent this "tide's" formation, everything will be fine. Therefore the West should support pro-Western African and Asian powers going to the conference and counterbalancing the Reds. The new Japanese Prime Minister is increasing the Japanese self defence forces, looking for trade and normal relations with his Red neighbours and a $45 million cut in Japan's share of the costs of American occupation forces, and the leader of a country full of fascinatingly eccentric people who do strange things. A snowstorm in Britain was a "preview" of the paralysing two-day rail strike that began 9 January. Daisy Freyberg-Freyberg (Per Almanach de Gotha, Daisy Freyberg zu Eisenberg), "Miss Germany of 1931" and formerly the starlet, Daisy D'Ora, is had a "nervous collapse" after getting in trouble for giving a venomously anti-British speech to the Christmas Party at the German consulate in London that seems to have cost
her husband his career. I should say so! The President of Turkey has flown to Iraq to visit his friend, Nuri al-Said, "[t]he Arab world's shrewdest politician," while Saudi Arabia is kicking up a fuss in the UN General Assembly over "the critical situation in Algeria," with France's "brutal" repression of Algerian nationalism. Leon Volkov uses his column sensibly for a change, explaining that the Soviets are kicking up such a fuss over German rearmament because they are genuinely frightened by the development, and the likely restoration of the German General Staff thereafter.
"This Dangerous Planet" Worried about fallout? Don't be! There were radiation health menaces long before mere man split the atom. "More than once in the earth's 5 billion year history, great surges of radiation may have extinguished whole species of animal life and drastically transformed the path of evolution." "Some modern geological scientists" speculate that this was caused by either eruptions of radioactive minerals onto the Earth's crust, or storms of cosmic radiation. But that's enough of those wacky geologists, let's talk about fallout now. The AEC says we have nothing to worry about; many American scientists, especially geneticists (since the main danger is to our genes) think that the AEC is being irresponsible. After all, we don't know how much radiation is left over from the various tests, and we don't know how much radiation does what to the sex cells that determine whether a child will inherit a deleterious mutation, but Dr. A. H. Sturtevant of the California Institute of Technology offered a conservative estimate of 70 affected births a year in the United States at the current level of radiation exposure, much less after a global atomic war, or just the detonation of a few H-bombs rigged as cobalt bombs. Meanwhile Dr. Alexander Nettleship, head of pathology at the University of Arkansas, points out that all that global fallout has to do is knock out some vital link in the chain of life, such as nitrogen-fixing bacteria to leave a lifeless world, a "biophthora." And while other scientists are skeptical, the only scientific authority that can answer the question, the AEC, isn't. The AAS is therefore forming a "top-level committee" to get the bottom of it. 
You-Chan Yang, Claire Boothe Luce, Marlene Dietrich, Nathan Leopold, Gone With the Wind, one royal, and Mrs. Roosevelt get in the column for the usual reason, while Fanny Ennis of London gets in it for finally getting around to suing her fiance of 47 years for breach of promise,and Howard Goldbrick of New Jersey for changing his name by deed poll ahead of his draft call-up to avoid "embarrassment." Also, the local telephone company in Slagelse, Denmark, has told women to stop giggling over the phone, as the "sound vibrations break connections." The same phenomena is reported from New York. Now I've got to try it! Chancellor Adenauer is 79, Carl Sandburg is 77, Herbert Morrison, Harrison Williams, and Thomas E. Millsop are married, James Lorin Richards, Diana Bixby, Arthur Berridale Keith, Shepard Barkley (which is a real name!) and Charles Weitenbaker are dead, Bixby in a plane crash.
The New Films
The big news story in Aviation Week is the Air Force demanding that aerial weapon system contractors not bid for contracts for other aircraft subsystems. Stay in your own backyard is the phrase, and Lt. General Bryan Boatner goes on to say that the Air Force has the "police powers" to prevent it. The weapon system concept does not relieve the Air Force of responsibility for management and control. Meanwhile the new Democratic Congress is going to take a searching look at military airlift capability, and the Navy's new flat television integrated cockpit instrument display (by Douglas and Willys Motors) is expected to cut instrument training by 5% and will fly experimentally in 1958. The Aviation Crash Research Committee has some very detailed suggestions for seat design.
The Periscope reports that Dag Hammerskjold privately thinks that the release of the U.S. airmen in Peking is imminent. The Senate probe into union pensions is going to report plenty of bungling and laxness. The Air Force budget has money hidden away to start development of a space satellite, which the Soviets have been rumoured to be working on, and further credit tightening is foreseen. A special Pentagon study group, including "Brigadier General Charles A. Lindbergh," concludes that an intercontinental stratospheric missile, travelling at 5000mph, should be possible in ten years, that air defences will be useless against such missiles, and that push button war will "cancel each other out" and lead to an increase in peripheral wars. Some Senators intend to block the promotion of any Army general involved in the Peress case, while General Ridgeway will be promoting a quick-moving airborne "Pogo stick army" as a strategic strike force. "There's a strong possibility" that the SeaMaster could "change the shape of U.S. air power." The Army wants them for air transport, and "top Defence officials" are impressed with their speed and economy. The first of the four Liberty ships to act as offshore radar pickets in the Atlantic have been completed, with more to come for the Pacific. Tennessee Senator Albert Gore is said to be on the top of Stevenson's Vice-Presidential list as an effective way of stopping Kefauver.
The upshot of the Bandung Conference (which is the name we've settled on for the Afro-Asian Jakarta conference) is that everyone except Bill Knowland wants Red China recognised. Well, then, who's the GOP Minority Leader, Bill Knowland, or everybody? The answer is "Bill," thank you very much. Next topic is Cardinal Spellman, who is over in Indo-China grandstanding on board ships evacuating Vietnamese Catholics from Haiphong. Our chances of getting a sequel to Bridges of Toko-ri are getting better every day! (It's funny to me because I can't be drafted!) At least the refugees get enough free land for 125 new villages around Saigon, with US aid to build amenities like sewage systems, schools, and churches, as part of a $40 million US emergency aid grant that also paid for the evacuation. Mendes-France is in Italy pushing his last hope for a European armaments pool. Meanwhile, the talk in Paris is that Mendes-France has been told to pick a good issue to fall over and stage his own defeat in the Assembly, and come back in '56, but the Premier wants to hold on, even though observers give him three months at the outside. It is reported that Adolph Galland's return from Argentina makes him the frontrunner to be the first head of the new Luftwaffe. Ticking It Off reports that a Social Democrat, Otto Suhr, is the new Mayor of West Berlin, and a handwritten letter from Noel Field confirms that he is in Hungary of his own free will, and the proposed Turkey-Iraq mutual defence pact is progressing. Given longer stories are reports that John Noble, the American emigre recently released after fifteen years in the Soviet prison camps, says that the camps are seething with unrest and ripe for rebellion. Private William T. Marchuk, also recently released, is in Army custody in Berlin, where the JAG is preparing charges of being AWOL, at least. The Soviets are also said to be ready to release Private William A. Verdine, of Starks, La., whom they have denied holding since his disappearance in 1949. A new edition of Marx's collected works is being released in Moscow, but it shows that Communism is bad, because there will be editorial errors corrected, and, of course, that is very sinister. A vending machine operator in Lubeck has a model that dispenses dating cards.
On this continent, the Nicaraguan invasion of Costa Rica has started with a band of 100 men crossing the border and occupying Villa Quesada, while mystery planes buzzed Costa Rican cities, strafing. Costa Rica's 1500-man national police force has been supplemented with a militia call-up and requisitioned DC-3s flying with machine guns at the doors. President Somoza has offered to settle the affair with a pistol duel with Costa Rican President Jose Figueres, leading to the very cogent observation that Somoza is "crazier than a goat on midsummer's day." Washington is taking urgent action: President Nixon will fly to Central America next week to see what's what. (The OAS has proposed selling Costa Rica four fighter planes and flyaway prices, which seems like a more practical response.) In Panama, the National Assembly has ordered the arrest of the Vice-President on charges of assassinating his President, with Second Vice-President (hey, can we get one of these, too? They're keeping Nixon far too busy!) Ricardo Arias Espinosa being sworn in as President instead. This is based on leading local figure Ruben Miro's confession to assassinating the President at the behest of the Vice President. The question of where Miro got the machine gun he allegedly used opens other angles in the story. Jamaica held a national election this week, and someone named Michael Manley is now Prime Minister there. It was a busy week south of the border!
Notes: Week in Business reports that Hamilton Watch is buying out Hathaway Instrument, that Kodak has won its case before the SEC, RCA is cutting the price of its 21" colour television in the hopes that some people will buy it. Allied Stores is building seven more suburban shopping centres around the country because that's where the shoppers are. Products: What's New reports an electronic facsimile system from Western Union to transmit railroad reservations, a Singer sewing machine attachment for decorative stitching, previously only available on more expensive machines, Purolator has a dry air filter for heavy-duty gas and diesel engines, which previously only had oil filters. A box interview with Robert E. Gross of Lockheed underlines that atomic-powered aviation is inevitable, and so is remote-control planes, but not commuter convertiplanes in every garage or 10,000mph transports.
Dr. Serge A. Korff has completed the first world-wide tabulation of high altitude research stations, and advises that some fifty other locations, such as the top of Kilimanjaro and La Paz in Bolivia would be perfect. Good science teachers are hard to come by in the United States, and the AAS is stepping in to do something about it. William Zeckendorf of the New York real-estate firm Webb & Knapp and architect Ieoh Ming Pei have filed a joint patent for a circular apartment building. Can you patent those?
Wilmington College gets a fluff piece. Periscoping Education reports that the President is going to reverse his 1954 decision not to fund local school building, and well, fund local school building with $75 million. The Senate wants a billion dollars instead, so some kind of compromise in the middle would be perfect! The Illinois branch of the American Legion has been smarting since the summer after picking a fight with the Girl Scouts over their alleged spreading of "United Nations and world government propaganda," but now Robert Maynard Hutchins has stuck his nose in to promote educational initiatives in the Legion, where branches hold sessions on what's in the Constitution and such, which should turn things around in no time. GM is getting so much back in taxes that it is splashing $54 million in non-profit funding for colleges and universities.
Adlai Stevenson, Mamie Eisenhower, the Aly Khan, and various royals are in the column for the usual reasons. Christian Dior is in it for more important reasons, as he has "declared war on the elbow and knee," which should go as well as his last war, on the bust. Also, a nursery school teacher in Northampton, named as Audrey Jeffs, is not in trouble in spite of spanking 39 of the 40 9-year-olds in her care, which an appellate judge has determined to be just fine.
The Periscope reports that there's going to be quite the reaction if the Senate committee investigating the Administration's security programme subpoenas Nixon to explain his comments to the effect that 96% of all "Security risks" in the current Administration were hired by Democrats. Scientists at Oak Ridge have found that radon gas is a serious health risk in concrete buildings due to all the crushed rock used in it, at least in areas where there is a high concentration of uranium in the rock. The State Department has decided to risk Congressional disapproval by inviting the Red Chinese to truce talks over the Formosa Straits. GOP leaders are bitter that the Democrats are firing staffers to make room for patronage appointments after all the nonpartisanship they did. Democrats are set to have an infra-party fight over Federal regulation or non-regulation of natural gas. A fight is brewing in the House GOP caucus over supporters of Minority Leader Joseph Martin and Chalres Halleck, who was angling for the job. The Army and Air Force are fighting because when the Army drew up plans to drop an Army parachute regiment into San Jose if the situation in Costa Rica got serious, it turned out that the Air Force only had enough planes to drop an understrength battalion on hand. So much for the mobile airborne army! Latest word is that the first atomic airplane might be a sea plane, over the Air Force's bitter protests. The Democratic-led committee overseeing the AEC is expected to pile in on Lewis Strauss this week. Kefauver and Stevenson will clash again this year when Kefauver's committee investigates RCA for alleged monopoly practices and Stevenson represents them in court. Communist labour activists in New York are fighting over tactics. Aides believe that a Washington newsman is leaking advance copies of Presidential speeches to the DNC. "Helicopter mail, believed doomed a few months ago," has been revived by an official Post Office decision that the mail runs in Chicago have been successful. Where Are They Now reports that Dolores, "The Most Beautiful Girl in the World" circa 1919, is now married to Tudor Wilkinson (which is a real name) and helps her husband in his Renaissance art and literature collecting, which has filled their "triplex apartment" in Paris. Count Felix v. Luckner, the legendary "Sea Wolf," is 73, and doing lecture tours of Germany in his caravan. "Later this year he and his wife plan a lecture swing through southern Africa."
National Affairs explains some more that Administration policy is that Red China is here to stay, that it isn't going to let Red China have Formosa or a UN seat until later, and so it will sink any Red Chinese ships that try to land on Formosa, but not any of the little islands. A long follow up profile of Admiral Radford explains that he still thinks that we should fight for the islands, and pretty much everywhere else, maybe throwing a few atom bombs around, because that's no big deal, really. A box story inserted into the Radford story gives short biographies of the five of seventeen U.S. airmen in Chinese custody shown in a recent picture released by the Chinese. Ernest K. Lindley's Washington Tides is promoted this week, more-or-less directly following the lead story, because it's also embedded in the Radford profile. Lindley doesn't have anything to say, but "coexistence with Red China" is a pretty important point, and deserves to be a cliche.
"Drifting and Drenching" Snow in Scotland has closed the roads and forced the air drop of supplies to isolated farmsteads. The snow fell as rain in England, where it is causing flooding. Some residents of Paris have had to take refuge on high ground on the Pont d'Alma, The basements of Notre Dame are flooded, the Longchamps race course is submerged, as is the Invalides air terminal, and multiple rivers are flooding, leading to flood warnings. The Rhine has risen 26ft above normal level so that barges can't get under bridges.Mendes-France's latest ploy for extending his premiership is hosting a four powers summit, while strikes in the Ruhr challenge the Adenauer government. Franco has allowed the proclamation of a new successor to the Spanish crown, Prince Juan Carlos of Bourbon, who is seventeen and won't be eligible to be King until he is 30, by which time Franco will be 75 and probably ready to retire.
The Periscope Business Trends reports that the President's foreign trade is going to get through Congress and it's great, and his tightly guarded school building programme has various administrative details, but the bottom line is that $50 million are going to be committed.
Eartha Kitts, Albert Einstein, the President, Nixon, Sam Rayburn, Joe McCarthy, Jacobo Arbenz, Carl Sandburg, Sax Rohmer, and the Queen of Iran are in the column for the usual reasons, and also an anonymous donor who keeps giving random people sheafs of fifty dollar bills in the Chicago area, because it's a nice story.
Aviation Week, 31 January 1955
Claude Witz reports for Aviation Week that the guided missile progamme is starting to deliver and that the Atlas Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (IBM) is the missile of the future, and then gets into the Air Force crackdown on prime contractors, with sources dismissing the idea that the Nike programme was only successful because Western Electric took over the whole contract. The last three columns of the scattered article go on at some length about the problems that the Atlas or any other long range ballistic missile will have to overcome, having mainly to do with weapon accuracy. It is pretty tricky, because the missile loses almost all control capability after the engine burns out at the end of the "boost" phase. (You might think that the missile could just flip over and accelerate downwards, but if you did, James would hunt you down with a legal pad and an HB pencil and explain why you can't. With math! And drawings of a stick figure person in a stick figure castle with a stick figure cannon! It was cute. James-James was fascinated. I don't think he understands orbital mechanics, though. Just in case anyone was interested --ANYONE-- Seventh Fleet planes are waiting for an attempt to invade Formosa with ATOMIC BOMBS. The British are acting fast to speed up aircraft production. The latest on Air Force mobilisation is that the Air Force needs it. The new Red fighter has been dubbed the Fresco, and is an improvement on the MiG-15, which, recall, has the reporting name "Falcon." Canada is said to be looking at the Gnat for its carriers, and a Mach 15 Laboratory is said to be underway in New York. Air Transport sends Dan Kurzman to the Far East to report on the Koumintang ambition to turn Formosa into an air transport hub.
Aeronautical Engineering has a summary of the RAE report on the Miles E.24/23, "The Opportunity That Was Not Seized" It all seems a bit rich considering that it was Miles Aircraft that was chosen to lead the project, in spite of the company's near complete inability to actually deliver on any of its many contracts, and its 1948 petition into bankruptcy by one of the British industry's most indulgent suppliers. The full report suggests that it was just as much a Rube Goldberg device as you would expect from Miles, with lots of borrowing of German gadgets like the V-1 autopilot and their hypergolic propellant. (Look it up, it's a real word!) It is also a very hurried discussion because what the RAE really wants to talk about is that pilotless test missile programme that followed the Miles cancellation, which was prematurely cancelled, the RAE Supersonic Section thinks, and which it clearly still feels upset about.
Avionics reports that the National Symposium on Quality Control and Reliability of Electronic Components heard from F. A. Hadden of the Rand Corporation that punch cards are the solution, because they allow for control of management feedback by checking their complaints against the data. Other contributors talked about quality control programmes. Next we throw in a good, solid page of advertorial, including Lear on its new 800 channel VHF aircraft radio and a whole buffet dinner lineup of testing equipment from four different firms, and five radio gadgets from as many firms, including an ADF from Lear, which is getting exhausting, frankly. New Aviation Products offers prime advertorial space to Fairchild's analyzer camera that takes fast pictures of fast-moving events and instrument dials but has "new uses" photographing other kinds of instrument dials than the ones it has been used on so far. Then more testing equipment, miniaturisations, a smelting furnace, a power torque wrench, and a snow compactor that "builds military runways fast."
(Not) the Seven Day Journal attends a lecture by Tom Gilling to British agricultural engineers on British tractors in America, where they are pretty successful because of diesel. The Royal Society lays out its plans for the International Geophysical Year this week. The Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation has announced the inauguration of work on the Conway Bridge. It also visits the Society for Aircraft Production's section on "Integral Construction Contrasted with Traditional Methods" and cribs a paper to look forward to later in the issue. The Institute of Mechanical Engineers is giving this year's James Watt International Medal to Igor Sikorsky, then the Institute is off to Cambridge to have a drink with the ASME and throw a conference on combustion. The week of the 28th sees acknowledgement of an ugly rail accident, a summary of Imperial College's expansion plans and Lloyd's Return for 1955 showing the highest construction rate since the war in spite of growing foreign competition, with the hope expressed at the North-East Coast Institution that the clearing of backlogs will lead to new orders to remedy the lean order books now showing. The Measuring and Control Apparatus Manufacturers' Association had a nice lunch, while the Institute of Metals presented a portrait of Sir William White at theirs.
I. Hammond's "Comparison of Electrical Properties of Various Cements and Concretes" starts in the 21 January issue, as does William Prager's "Theory of Plasticity: A Survey of Recent Achievements." On a non-serial note, Holman Brothers invited The Engineer to a demonstration of dustless drilling and roof bolting during the week of the 14th, featuring their "Dryduster" drills. Roof bolting was invented in America and is now being done over here, and involves bolting the roofs of mine tunnels so they don't fall down, but if you work at it you can make that description long, boring, and confusing. Hurray!
"Atomic Energy in 1954" The big news is that hydrogen bombs, which, it is generally understood, requires a uranium bomb to produce the temperatures at which hydrogen fusion takes place, is easier now that there are "wet" and "dry" hydrogen bombs, the former using "liquefied hydrogen isotopes, elaborately cooled and kept under pressure," while the "dry" version uses lithium hydride and is much lighter. The device used at Eniwetok was "wet," and the 1954 test used a dry one, for the first time. The Engineer doesn't know what to make of the Soviet claim to be operating an atomic power station for civilian use, because the Western powers naturally hope that they're ahead, and the AEC is very impressed with its Westinghouse plant, a liquid-cooled plant as opposed to the sodium-cooled, breeder, and homogenous power plants that are out there. (North American Aviation's "atomic pile catalogue" is the source of the "homogenous" reactor concept, with a mixed core of graphite and uranium. The Engineer reproduces a chart claiming that "fossil" fuels, mainly coal, have only a few hundreds of years of power, while the world's uranium and thorium offers the promise of thousands of years of industrial civilisation. The AEC has a $200 million programme involving all the above, and boiling-water reactors, too. The British Atomic Energy Commission is by contrast very boring, and is just working on a water and graphite enriched uranium reactor that is expected to be operating in two years. It then goes on at length about the organisation of British atomic power and then for a bit about heavy-water moderated reactors, which wouldn't require enriched uranium, before hopping over to the continent, or atomic war, it's hard to tell.
Even if everyone can agree that hydrogen bombs are too big to be used in war, uranium bombs aren't, and will probably be thrown around with abandon as an alternative to conscripting more battalions. But what if some crazy Hitler type is cornered? He'd probably fire off the most damaging hydrogen bomb he could. and that's where people are talking about "'aggressive'" casings of cobalt or such. The Bikini device is said to have been the equivalent of 14 million tons of TNT, and the fallout cloud that reached the Lucky Dragon trawler shows how hard it is to predict how far the fallout will reach. Even the Nevada tests led to high radiation counts as far away as New York. It might be that only a few thousand detonations would be enough to end the human race, "a general level of radioactivity which no one can tolerate or escape."
The Engineer summarises work on atomic aircraft engines in the 21 January number as perhaps the most likely user of "light nuclear fuel," with the USAF and Pratt & Whitney collaborating on an engine with 25,000lb thrust, while there are reports of work at GE and Vultee. Seagoing powerplants or "large vehicles to be used on the road," although The Engineer suggests perhaps working on getting stationary power plants before getting quite this ambitious. Then there's the usual talk about the big cyclotrons they're building now, and medical isotopes, and the possible future of power through light element fusion, which has the potential to dwarf the results from atomic fission.
On the 21st, The Engineer delves into aircraft design and production with a look at integral production, or in other words the use of large forgings and light alloy slabs, which are precisely milled (sometimes as much as 90% of the slab being discarded!) into large wing sections. These techniques promise savings in time and perhaps even cost in volume production, and are said to be the only way to achieve the more ambitious aerodynamic goals, as well as yielding greater strength by reducing joins. The drawbacks are various difficulties now being discovered in largescale forging. And that's enough tedious details as it is time to review Petter's summing up article, which from the sounds of things is yet more of the old "Americans better, bureaucrats bad, British do too many things except when they do too few things" whining. Even The Engineer feels some relief turning to the Commonwealth Conference of Engineering Institutions, which recently held its first conference since 1946, with the usual result that concludes that we need more academically trained engineers who need to have more practical training, now here's some organisational talk. I'm sorry, but I've been proof reading or reading this stuff for twelve years now and a lot of these talks just blend into each other, and "Engineer apprenticeship-style training good, but also bad, some of one, some of the other, where's the right balance, who can say?" is definitely one of those smooth and creamy blends. A lifelong dredging expert best known for his work in China, and a former editor of The Ironmonger get obituaries, just as a reminder that there have been academic engineers in Britain for over a century, and not since just last week, as you'd sometimes think from reading my "smooth and creamy blends." "Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering in 1954" is up to Part IV by the end of the month. Tankers keep getting bigger and seem like the main refuge, liners apart, for steam (turbine) work in the civilian world.
On the week of the 28th, we say goodbye to steam rail, because the British Transport Commission has told the Ministry that there's no future for steam in British rail. The Engineer finds this excessively bold. We next greet the bright dawn of the hydrogen bomb with Montgomery's report on H-bombs that concludes that there's no use for anything, definitely including ships, with the H-bomb. The Engineer disagrees and goes on to explain that for the work the Navy is going to do, there is no need for Forrestal-type ships, that Ark Royal is already too big, and that thanks to the (British) genius of the steam catapult, the Hermes-class can do the fighter fleet-defence and antisubmarine work for which Britain needs heavy carriers. Letters features an argument between Folke Oldqvist of the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm and A. E. Johnson of Glasgow over the proper mathematical treatment of complex stress creep, and Frank Archibald, an analyst at Arthur Little, looking for readers' insights into some issues in the history of the theory of lubrication that might incidentally break a 1915 U.S. patent. J. M. Alexander of the Aluminum Laboratories, Limited, Barbury, applies the theory that Prager is developing to Coulomb friction in plane strain compression.
"Universal Precision Grinding Machine for Bearing Races" Cooper Roller Bearings Company has long wanted to be a professional novelist, and although I would personally suggest that it look into finding a pen name and writing some steamy romance novels, they haven't asked me for my advice, and so consider me as not having given it. A summary of the article Cooper Roller Bearings wrote instead? It's for grinding. This takes up enough space that there isn't any need to find an illustration leading into W. E. W. Petter's much-promised "Where Do We Go From Here" talk, which I have pre-summarised as not having anything interesting to say. Was I right? Were British specifications and timetables too ambitious? Well, what was wanted in 1946? A Moscow bomber and a transonic interceptor for ten-years-after-WWII. And what do we have? Leaving the "emergency" Valiants aside, I hope I'm not in trouble for reporting that the first production Vulcan will fly this winter, and the Hunter is in service. Meanwhile there are no fleets of B-52s flying, and the F-102, which is admittedly much more ambitious than the Hunter, was an outright failure. As usual, there are too few technicians at the drawing office, and one major new production aircraft per design firm every six years is not enough. Ronnie rolls her eyes.
"Cutting Tool Research Laboratory," "Fork Lift Truck with Slewing Mast," a longer summary of H. H. Phillips' paper, "Economics of Intensified Use of Railway Operating and Motive Power Resources," and "Research in Aeronautics at the National Bureau of Standards" round out the issue for the 21st. Ransome's forklift with a swivelling mast gets some diagrams and I include a picture of part of Firth and Brown's "metallographic laboratory," but the real and exhaustive material is from NBS, and although scant on details, I'm taken by the work on automatic sky-looking to detect the direction of the sun on cloudy days and the level of cloud when there is an aviation ceiling, and by the Bureau's work on ceramic coatings for steel, which is admittedly qualified as the first such work in the United States, but which sounds like a real bargain for the government, making money for it directly and saving wear and tear on Government equipment.
"Engines at the National Boat Show" is a treatment of bigger diesel and gasoline engines from builders such as Perkins and Meadows, rather than yachting stuff. We catch up on the equipment built by Charrold, Ltd for mechanised coal terminals for retail customers handling 12,000 or more tons a year, first featured here two years ago, which can fill a transport sack in place on a lorry in twenty seconds, and a review of the "Flying Bedstead Film," which is a Rolls-Royce documentary about its flying bedstead and not some whimsical children's movie based on a book that I am reading to James-James even if he is a bit young for it. Our American Editor has strong opinions, very delicately expressed, about "The Oppenheimer Case," and speaking colossal things about in the world, Bethlehem's World Glory is a 45,000t "super-tanker" with a very modern military-style gas turbine machinery with a cruising turbine and reduction gearing.
Letters
Readers disagree about whether George Gobel was the right person to go on the cover of the Christmas issue, but everyone can agree that the editorial about how great religion and Jesus and Christmas are was the best thing they ever read. I have a new appreciation for it, too. It saves my writing hand! For Your Information lets Leonard Slater explain the reason that the Los Angeles bureau is so great. It's that you can interview Edward Teller, Chuck Yeager, Arlene Francis, and Marilyn Monroe, go scuba diving, take yoga lessons. He took the first polar express, and is first hand witness to the fact that sometimes when it is very cold in the morning when you set out from San Francisco, it is quite hot by the time you arrive in Palm Springs. California truly is the Golden State.
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| John Held in Life, January 1926, scraped from the Washington University's John Held collection web page. |
The Periscope Washington Trends reports that
the second half of the term will see Republicans fighting over the President's foreign policy and Democrats dividing north and south over the increase in the federal minimum wage sought by the President.
National Affairs
The President gets a fluff piece on the occasion of the State of the Union, and then a second one explaining that he sure likes to read Westerns, then a third one explaining that he is a progressive moderate who favours holding the line against Communism while cutting the defence budget, especially the Army, then a fourth one detailing all the promises he has kept since 1953. Did you know that his tax cut (No, really, there was an Eisenhower tax cut, not that you remember it over the chorus of "What have you done for me lately?") was the largest in American history. Oh,. no the "Ingenuous" page is falling out of my Funk &Wagnells! He also fired a bunch of security risks, cut the budget, did his best for free trade, and ended the war in Korea. Then just for variety there's a fifth fluff piece about how he'd like to retire in '56 but can't because the Party needs him and he really likes golf, and he has lots of interesting and varied guests at his stag dinners, which are not just him and a bunch of cronies. Senator Fullbright gets a box story to explain how, when he said that the Senate needed to investigate Wall Street and get to the bottom of its wild swings last week, what he meant was that it shouldn't investigate at all! Just to show there's more to politics this month than flattering the President, that Republican freshman congressman who won in Dallas(!) gets a profile and a pictorial.
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| The "Mink Coat Mob" that cost Nixon Texas. What an incredible episode to disappear down the memory hole! |
Ticking It Off reports that convicted NSA spy Joseph S. Petersen, who was spying for the Netherlands for reasons the government declines to discuss, began his seven year prison sentence this week. Air Force Secretary Talbot revealed this week that a B-47 set a new 21,000 mile non-stop flight record by refuelling many times. The Texas Council of Churches calls on Texans to greet desegregation with "honesty and integrity," and accept "the new interpretation and pattern of brotherhood" as being compatible with the democracy and equality guaranteed by the Constitution. Ernest K. Lindley's Washington Tides discusses "The Military Cuts," which have gone from "the New Look" reduction to the "Reprieve" increase back to the "New Look," down from the New Look in an "acceleration," and then up from that, in nine months. The thought is that this is all pretty dumb.
International
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| Three stories about Japanese murder-suicides couched as romantic escapades. Picture of Mount Mihara and it's "Sucide Crater By Donners - http://wikitravel.org/shared/ Image:IMG_4759.JPG, CC BY-SA 1.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/i ndex.php?curid=7185384 |
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| The permanent wave gives this glam shot a very modern look. |
"Fabulous Adventure in Africa" Newsweek visits the fabulous Belgian Congo. It is hard to tell if Newsweek's reporting on the crushingly oppressive Belgian patrimonial state is tongue-in-cheek or on the level, especially given the careful omission of the obvious easy reference to Heart of Darkness, but I have the depressing feeling that it is meant to be taken at face value. In this hemisphere, the fatal racetrack ambush of Panamanian President Jose Antonio Ramon has Americans puzzled about possible motives. Non-Americans think that it was because Ramon was opposed to new arrangements for American bases on the Canal, but who cares what they think? Certainly not Newsweek! The Throne Speech in Canada was televised and given by the Governor General who is Raymond Massey's brother, and has some throwaway lines that might make it hard for Uncle Henry to flood us out. The inauguration of the Corumba-Santa Cruz railway completes a rail link between Arica in Chile and Sao Paolo over the spine the Andes, which is good news for Bolivia and railway enthusiasts.
Business
Top reporting in Business is focussed on the stock market, where market watchdogs were concerned by an excessive runup in the indexes, leading to a tightening of credit and Senator Fullbright's already noted intervention, which seems to have calmed the market. Lincoln-Mercury's new "Futura" might be more appropriate to these letters since it has "Future" right in the name. The problem is that I don't want to have any part of this future! Hudson and Wily's new 1955 models are out, and Parker Pen's Liquid Lead Pencil[?], which uses liquid graphite, is quite the thing.
The Periscope Business Trends reports that the Federal Reserve's hike in stock margin requirements has been "properly interpreted" as heading off future trouble rather than an urgent reaction. Credit should now stabilise. It is now acting to protect shareholders, while the Administration is concerned with the rise of thirty-year no-down-payment mortgages, which sure sounds like easy credit to me! Oil, liquor and films are doing well.
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| The global shortage of "No, but seriously" supplies continues. |
Products: What's New reports Vega Industries' prefab fireplace with a metal chimney, which can be installed four-to-six hours with a saw, hammer, and screwdriver. Chas. D. Briddell has a home, powered knife sharpener, and Saginaw Furniture Shops of Chicago has a sideboard that converts into an eight-seat, no-leaf dining table by inserting the built-in-table-top.
Business gets the Special Report this week, looking at the hotel/vacation boom in Florida. Henry Hazlitt's Business Tides takes a daring and iconoclastic stand against the increase in the Federal minimum wage, making the rare choice to put some data in his column to the effect that increases in the unemployment rate followed the previous two changes in the Federal minimum wage. Speaking of daring economic iconoclasts of the Thirties, Stanford is taking Hoover's money to found a graduate business school.
Science, Medicine, Education
"But Life is Sweeter" Doctors have long suspected that business executives were in worse health than they appeared, and now 500 checkups of supposedly healthy businessmen conducted by the University Hospital of Ann Arbor and reported by the NIH finds that 77% had some kind of physical abnormality, that 52% were in need of immediate treatment, and that only 11% were even aware that anything was wrong. Four cases of cancer, 27 cases of high blood pressure, 14 peptic ulcer, twelve gallstones, eight organic heart defects, 3 diabetes, 1 case of tuberculosis were found. Dr. Andrew Comley, a psychologist at UCLA, and George Watson, a philosopher at USC have published a joint study showing promising results from treating mental disorders with good results even in cases of schizophrenia. Polo belts, it is reported, are sold more often for back problems than for actual players of polo. No way!
"Marx and the Guitar" The Jefferson School of Social Science is in danger of not being allowed to open this year because the State Attorney General has determined that it is a Communist front due to its 32 week Institute of Marxist Studies programme that includes a course on "Guitar Playing and Song Leading." The Houston School Board is in trouble with the NEA, which has determined that its decision to fire the deputy superintendent for being a Communist and stonewalling the NEA investigation was, in fact, a sign that they were a bunch of fascists.
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| At some point it looks like Cook or his heirs had to give it back. Image from a 1927 number of The Art Bulletin via JSTOR. |
Art, Press, TV-Radio, Newsmakers
Walter W. S. Cook's collection of authentic Spanish Romanesque church art has a show at the Cloisters this week. Newsweek celebrates how Cook used to travel the Pyrenees, scooping Spanish authorities and amassing the finest collection that "America can offer in the field of Spanish medieval art."
Clark Mollenhoff is an ace reporter for the Cowles press. Vampira is so successful for KABC-TV that now there's a Voluptua (Gloria Pall) hosting Hunt Stromberg's Wednesday night romance movie anthology on same. So This Is Hollywood, The Ray Cummings Show, and Norby are mid-season replacements for shows that flunked in the ratings. The first two are situation comedies, and the last one has a gimmick, which is that it is --nothing!
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| From a 2013 Atlantic story that thinks that phone phreaking was a Sixties thing |
The New Films
The Bridges of Toko-ri, the Paramount adaptation of the Michener book, is okay, with Mickey Rooney doing a great job. The Belles of St. Trinians gets a review title, "School for Zanies," that . . . that. I am just not going to say anything about that. "St. Trinian's is the perfectly horrid and steadily comical girl's school conceived and rendered by the English cartoonist, Ronald Searle," who continues to have his moment, and now a movie! Alistair Sims is great, and London Studios continues the British campaign to right the dollar balance with zaniness. Animal Farm is a 75 minute cartoon, but it is not zany. Warner's The Silver Chalice has the Bible in it, but thanks to CinemaScope and WarnerColor is "a huge screen [filled] with grandiose and tedious posturing."
Books
If you're tired of the American literary novel, here's C. P. Snow's The New Men, which is a novel about scientists but not science fiction, and Harvey Swados' Out With the Candle, which is a war story. Rounding these out is a review of a biography of the noted but idiosyncratic composer, Charles Ives by Henry and Sidney Cowell. Periscoping Books reports that Liberace's memoirs are coming out in the spring and that Conservative MP Christopher Holles is completing a biography of George Orwell.
Raymond Moley's Perspectives column is sensible and, for a wonder, researched. He shows based on voting records that the Senate Republican and Democratic caucuses respectively skew conservative and liberal. For most people, "moderate" is a delusion, often a self-delusion.
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| "No, but seriously . . . " |
News Digest reports the TWA crash at Cincinnati and the National crash at St. Petersburg, record rollouts of Super Constellations at Lockheed, a multi-code radar transponder, ground breaking for Lockheed's new guided missile laboratory. Industry Observer reports that the Regulus is about to begin trials, that the Australian mission now in the US looking for a new bomber will settle on the Avro Vulcan, buying 10, with some being produced in Australia (it is reported from London). Hughes Aircraft will change its name, the USAf is struggling with grounded aircraft, with the F-100 grounded by safety concerns and the F-84F by problems with the Wright J65. Washington Roundup (no name byline) reports another procurement investigation, talks with India for a new carrier agreement, expansion of Elgin Air Force Base for more missile testing, Alan Bible going on the Commerce Committee (the newly elected Senator is seen as Air Force-friendly), and the Administration still not being able to settle on what it wants to do with the CAA.
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| Boatner retired in August at the age of 48 with 80% disability pay. |
Production Engineering has Irving Stone, "How Martin Tailored P5M to ASW Job," which belongs in the rapidly-growing science fiction sub-genre of "People Actually Want Martin Jobs." It is about how Martin fixed the tail and hull to reduce spray damage, plus other details that don't really address what the plane is supposed to actually do. I mean, sure, it can land and operate a sonar, but it can't land anywhere a submarine would be and do that, because flying boats can't take off from open water on a regular operational basis.
Avionics has Philip Klass, "Lear Bases L-10 on Proven Components," which makes a virtue of the L-10 being an upgrade of the L-5. 
The new North Atlantic navigational radio network uses low frequencies, Barnes Development Company wants us to know about an assortment of test equipment it has on offer, Filter Centre reports that GE says that it is on the verge of "electronics advancements . . . " while National Aeronautical will begin delivering DME equipment at an adequate rate shortly.
New Aviation Products has George L. Christian reporting on the "Loadair Dock," a Whiting mechanical aircraft loading dock now in use at Idlewild, which boards passengers at one level while a conveyor belt sends luggage into the hold at another. Alar has an anti-blackout valve for G suits, J&H has new A.C. system components for aircraft, a circuit breaker and some control panels. Sperry's Reflectoscope for non-destructive testing has an alarm that makes it semi-automatic, and Airtron has a lightning arrestor for antennas. What's New reports that it has received good brochures from Rubber & Asbestos and Ferguson Machinery about rubber coatings and roller bearings respectively, and tedious ones about sailing aerodynamics and new trigonometric tables (from the NBS) that don't need comment. Feature Page has Dr. Ross McFarland explaining that pilots can go on flying into their fifties as long as they are healthy and haven't suffered too much hearing loss. Letters hears from "A.G.W.," an "Executive Pilot," who wants VFR rules tightened. H. B. Johnston, who is president of something called the Aircoach Transport Association is hopeful that a nonsked air exchange can be worked out, Chess Abernethy of Lockheed really liked the article about the TAC Mobile Atomic Strike Force," Jerome Lederer of the Flight Safety Foundation has to correct the article about it, because some firms were omitted, and Warren Bodie has some corrections about details from years ago, before the war.
Aviation Safety clears out its report on the 27 June 1954 American crash on a bright sunny day at Columbus to make room on its docket for this year's Christmas traffic crashes. It is blamed on crew and towers, although "Stewardess [J.] Gunn" did a great job of evacuating the passengers. In defence of the Columbus tower staff, their tower is a terrible design with no good windows(!)
Letters
Charles Carroll really liked the article about Romano Guardini because American Christianity is one big, happy family, and you can burn in a lake of fire if you say otherwise! Everyone who was moved to write liked the article about cricket. R. U. Darby II of Bigpool, Md (real names, etc.) explains why the pictured Colt .44 was incorrectly assembled, albeit using Old West dialect, so bless Lucius Beebe of New York for not dwelling on it. For Your Information tells us how impressed it is with the accuracy (It says this!!!) of the Periscope feature and its editor, A. T. Hadley, who is particularly praised for never being in the office.
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| I don't know what Hadley's obsession with black funds in the defence budget is about. It's not like Vanguard is a secret! I hope he's not scooping WS117! |
The CIA reports that Khrushchev is behind the move of the Soviet holiday for Lenin from the date of his death to oihs birthday. No genetic damage has shown up around Hiroshima, although survivors have a 25 to 30 times normal chance of leukemia, and eye trouble. The French will reduce the size of their army soon over SHAPE's protests. Another hot spy case is about to break in Berlin involving a Communist phone tapper. Hammerskjold and Eden are said to be neck and neck for the Nobel Peace Prize. Chou En-lai is expected to demand that the members of the Afro-Asian conference of nations leave the UN if Red China is not admitted. Tito has cut off his propaganda broadcasts to the East European satellites in his most conciliatory gesture to Malenkov yet. The French Communist Party is split over Jeanette Vermeersch. The Soviet Embassy in Berlin will be reshuffled due to black market dealings, Stalin's daughter is to be exiled to Siberia, It is reported that up to 1 million Communist Chinese workers have been moved to Ukraine to replace anti-Communist Ukrainians sent to Siberia, and that the Russians are stepping up their infiltration of Afghanistan, employing the dastardly ruse of contributing aid to the poor. Where Are They Now catches up with Wendell Hall, who is now an advertising executive in Chicago, and George Gay, who is living in Stosset, New York, and who is only interesting now because he likes boating and fishing!
The Periscope Washington Trends reports that everyone is embarrassed by the U.S. airmen being held in Peking except for Bill Knowland, who wants to start WWIII over them, and various generals who want to fight the Army reductions on the grounds that Communism is bad. (The column reports that the retirement of various generals is being delayed so that they can't go public on the cuts.)
National Affairs
Politics in Washington is increasingly being defined by the expectation that the President will run in '56, and will be unbeatable. The Democratic goal has been reduced to preventing a sweep of Congress. There's a nice box cut of the Administration's budget proposal for 1955--6: 40.5 billion for defence, 1.84 billion for foreign aid, 7.7 billion for farms, 3.9 billion for general welfare and government, 7 billion for "commerce and manpower," a category that includes the Post Office and the St. Lawrence Seaway, and 1.2 billion for "natural resources." The $60 billion request comes from a national forecast GDP of $370 billion. The budget will not be balanced because the President doesn't feel that it is safe to cut defence further (and we need a fifth Forrestal and more Nautilus-type submarines), but at least we can be assured that he will continue to resist creeping socialism and public enterprise. Because he is a "moderate"! Or a Communist. Most people are, these days, it seems. 
"Sharp Curve Ahead?" The President's highway programme will be a $101 billion, 10-year initiative, it is reported, $54 billion more than present planning. The details of funding are given some space before we get to the meat of the story, which is that Senator Byrd of West Virginia wants to cut it in favour of giving the money to the states. A box interview explores the rock bottom morale at the Foreign Service with Alexander Wiley, the GOP ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. It's not just that everyone and their dog is gnawing on the defleshed carcass of the diplomatic corps. Those that are left want a pay raise and bigger foreign allowances, because foreigners won't sell their own mother for a Yankee dollar any more.
A 4 1/2 page cover story fluffs up Clare Booth Luce. Ticking If Off reports that Senator Mansfield has introduced a bipartisan resolution calling for a joint Congressional committee to supervise the Central Intelligence Agency. Supervising cowboys? That's no fun! Next the Agency won't even be allowed to drop spies into China on rubber bands! Ernest K. Lindley uses Washington Tides to explain why the budget isn't balanced: Tax cuts are more important.
International
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| Josef Kammmhuber, of the Kammhuber System, was the first Inspector General of tne new Luftwaffe. |
On this continent, the Nicaraguan invasion of Costa Rica has started with a band of 100 men crossing the border and occupying Villa Quesada, while mystery planes buzzed Costa Rican cities, strafing. Costa Rica's 1500-man national police force has been supplemented with a militia call-up and requisitioned DC-3s flying with machine guns at the doors. President Somoza has offered to settle the affair with a pistol duel with Costa Rican President Jose Figueres, leading to the very cogent observation that Somoza is "crazier than a goat on midsummer's day." Washington is taking urgent action: President Nixon will fly to Central America next week to see what's what. (The OAS has proposed selling Costa Rica four fighter planes and flyaway prices, which seems like a more practical response.) In Panama, the National Assembly has ordered the arrest of the Vice-President on charges of assassinating his President, with Second Vice-President (hey, can we get one of these, too? They're keeping Nixon far too busy!) Ricardo Arias Espinosa being sworn in as President instead. This is based on leading local figure Ruben Miro's confession to assassinating the President at the behest of the Vice President. The question of where Miro got the machine gun he allegedly used opens other angles in the story. Jamaica held a national election this week, and someone named Michael Manley is now Prime Minister there. It was a busy week south of the border!
Business
The Periscope Business Trends reports that businessmen think that this year will be pretty good, because, unlike last year when the defence budget was cut by $4 billion, there's lots of spending on ships, planes, ammunition, electronics, and plant is coming along.
"Plug for Red Loopholes" Various terrible people are smuggling tantalum, brass, copper, and aircraft parts behind the Iron Curtain, leading to the key point that East-West trade is bad, but also good. The Chase-Manhattan Bank gets a fluff piece, the Air Force is ordering a vertical take-off jet fighter from Ryan, a three column story examines a real estate play (for a 2000 acre parcel north of Detroit for housing developments) is in the paper for some reason. A two-paragraph story notices that air-conditioning will be a $14 billion business next year. Priorities! The Union Pacific is going all-diesel.
Henry Hazlitt uses Business Tides to point out that the Eisenhower Administration is basically the reincarnation of the Roosevelt Administration because Ike doesn't want to just get rid of the government, which was invented by FDR in March of 1933.
Science, Medicine, Education
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| The Zeckendorff/Pei story is illustrated with a lacklustre pencil sketch and this picture is great, so I'm using it. |
Unicef is helping out the poor people in the Holy Land and upper-crust Philadelphia is torn over whether Dr. Clare C. Hodge should have his admitting privileges at Bryn Mawr Hospital restored after serving a prison sentence for tax evasion.
Press, TV-Radio, Art, Newsmakers
The heartwarming story of the National Press Club accepting its first Coloured member of last week turns into a race riot story this week.
"Mrs. Knight's Morale" The BBC is in trouble for letting Margaret Knight, a psychology lecturer at Aberdeen, give some lectures where she said that Christianity isn't that great. Fleet Street is all over it, and if you can't trust the sincerity of Fleet Street on matters of morals, who can you trust? Russia broadcast its first colour television in late 1954. Periscoping TV-Radio reports that Errol Flynn and his wife are getting a TV show, that Goodman Ace is getting a TV show, that Walter Winchell is getting a TV show, and it can't decide which unlikely person is getting a show at NBC.
"Big and Real" Daring iconoclasts at New York's Davis Galleries are striking back against abstract art by making hilarious japes about how their five-year-old could have painted that, and also doing some realist paintings.
Jack Webb is married. Virginia Merrick, Marshal Graziani, General Jon Kenneth Cannon, Lucy T. Aldrich, William Dinneen, Elizabeth Finnegan Farley, Fanny Haslip Lea, Baron Louis de Rothschild, and the Reverend Daniel Lord have died.
The New Films
Over from Britain is The Green Scarf, which is not zany, so give it a pass. Fox's Prince of Players is a life of Edwin Booth, and, yes, that's the family of Lincoln's assassin. It's pretty good and "unusually adult." Taking over from Britain in the zany department is France, with Holiday for Henrietta, which sounds incomprehensible from the summary, but is probably a very funny movie just like Newsweek says. MGM's Green Fire is some melodrama showcasing Grace Kelly's lovely bone structure and also the jungles of Colombia. Life and Leisure looks at the American wine import business, which is booming, as the world tries to balance our exports of whine.
Books
Speaking of American whine exports, D. W. Brogan's Politics in America is a British observer praising the fundamental conservatism of American politics. Derek Hudson's Lewis Carroll explores the fact that the author of Alice of Wonderland was a very strange man in person. Who would even believe it? Hudson is in trouble with the reviewer mainly for being defensive about it. Alberto Moravia's latest book is out in an English translation and he is in the United States after the State Department overruled a decision to refuse him a visa. Elizabeth Bowen's first book since 1949 is disappointing.
Raymond Moley''s Perspectives has a new reason for not developing the upper basin of the Colorado. All this talk of a world food shortage by 1975 (which justifies all the new irrigated acreage) is a big fraud! you can tell that he is passionate about this because he actually cites a study prepared for the Truman Administration in 1949 that refuted many of the arguments on which it is based. (For example, showing that estimates of the amount of land required implicitly includes acreage to produce the fodder for the horses and mules that the increased population will need, based on extrapolations of figures from the Thirties, when people still needed horses and mules.)
News Digest reports that an order has been placed for Regulus missiles, that a GE turbojet for drones and pilotless aircraft has been given the designation "MX2273," that Westinghouse will build the automatic tail turret for the A3D beginning this summer, that "wingless aircraft" inventor Willy Horton is going to jail for stock fraud. A pictorial following is practically a column item. Industry Observer reports that NACA helicopter research is focussing on twin-rotor configurations, that Rolls Royce is supplying Avon engines to the Ryan vertical takeoff fighter project, that Finland might buy six MiGs to match their 6 Vampires, that Litton might snipe an important inertial navigation equipment contract from North American because its offer is too good to pass up, that one Navy guided missile project might switch to Project Tinkertoy electronics to ease possible wartime shortages, that the Bell 47H has hydraulically-boosted controls, that Sfecmas is working on the SS10 missile for the French army, that Bell's XV-3 convertiplane will roll out soon, while arcane arguments continue in committee over Tacan vs. DME at the Air Navigation Development Board. We skip the Washington Insider column this week and move right on to the highlights of the 1956 military aviation procurement budget, which exceeds $7 billion for the first time in peace from a $34 billion Defence Department budget. Civil Air and NACA are also up.
Craig Lewis, "Crowded Areas Need IFR Control" The report on the Cincinnati TWA crash makes it clear that busy airports need 24 hour instrument control rules. Kaman's new Rotochute for cargo drops is pictured. Turbine builders don't like the Defence Department's new standardisation plan, Senator Edward Thye doesn't like the mobilisation plan, there is no explanation yet for the A4D crash that killed James Verdin, and the USAF has ordered engine checks for the C-119 after a series of mishaps in Alaskan parachute exercises. The Navy is flying cosmic ray research balloons. Yes, I'm sure they are! Cosmic rays. That's something the Navy is interested in! What's New makes up for slighting the NBS table of trigonometric integrals by featuring its new 32pg booklet on new ways to solve linear equations, by Olga Taussky, and also notes a booklet on resource conservation practices from the Newark Air Procurement District, asnd brochures on resistance welding from Sciaty Brothers, one about the services available at the Avio-Diepen at the Hague airport, and one from Glenn L. Martin on the Marbond composite material. Tom Sopwith's address to the annual Hawker Siddeley general meeting gets a mention.
Production Engineering has Douglas Aircraft on "Simplicity Pays Off in Skyhawk Design," which picked a bad week to run! We hear in detail about how Douglas built its lightweight attack type. Avionics also runs an unsigned lead, about new hope for the NBS's "Project Tinkertoy" modular ceramic electronic components, which I sort of thought had died a quiet death in favour of semiconductors and printed circuits. No, it turns out that a problem that no-one ever mentioned in the initial publicity (ceramic capacitors are v unstable and degrade quickly) has been completely solved by replacing them with tape capacitors, which are also made of ceramics but are different. (Reading between the lines, the project's original boosters at NBS, J. G. Reid and Robert Henry, have left the Bureau for ACF Industries' electronics division, and are trying to resuscitate it from there, and D. B. L. Davis designed the new components at Standards. Also, Lear has bought all rights to designs from servo maker Auto-Control Laboratories, Aeronca has bought Industrial Research Laboratories of Baltimore, Collins and Canadian Marconi are opening new facilities in Canada, Elgin Watch's Neomatic division is now Elgin-Neomatic, and Westinghouse announces an exciting array of new miniaturised components that are more miniature than ever (servos, thermistors, switches, relays.) Filter Centre reports that Soviet electronics seem to lag Western based on their low TV production rate(!) Texas Instruments has reduced the price of silicon semiconductors, and Crescent Engineering's new transducers are very rugged. Equipment summarises a talk given to the National Safety Council in Chicago by Howard Naulty, head of the Industrial Division of Cornell Aeronautical Laboratories on how to "inert" (it's a verb, now) aircraft fuel tanks, for sure and for real this time and not fake like we've been doing since WWII. It's the same way as always (filling them with pressurised inert gas), but it's non-corrosive, now, and cheap and light enough that airlines should actually do it, to the DC-7B, for topical example. Aero Supply's coaxial power cable is pretty neat.
New Aviation Products has nothing to say that will justify its new "advertorial format," so it goes to the old standby and tells us about an agricultural spray modification, this time of the Aero Commander. Shorter bits tell us about a better photocopier and a flow control valve, introduced for guided missiles, that can be put on planes, too, the FC-2, from Cadillac. Oh, that's a joke waiting to happen!
"A Message From the Publisher" informs us that Robert B. Hotz will succeed Robert H. Wood as Publisher of Aviation Week when he leaves effective 1 February 1955, with the best wishes of McGraw-Hill, and then tells us that the magazine is doing great, advertising is at a new high, the industry is doing great, everything is fine.
Letters
J. H. M., a lieutenant in the USAF, writes to point out that the 280mm batteries of the US Army in Germany are not, in fact, "sitting ducks," because it is so hard to spit camouflaged targets in low-level jet passes. Just to underline his point (which is that he is a horse's ass), he throws some insults by way of Jerry Hogue. David Cole is happy with the way that Newsweek portrayed the British West Indies as the victims of colonialism rather than as tropical paradises. M. K. Piyous is happy that Albert Schweitzer got the retroactive 1952 Nobel Peace Prize. W. D. Anthony of Dunsmore Business College obliquely points out that whatever else Robert Hutchins is, he is a horse's ass. (This week's phrase!) The cover photo of Sam Rayburn against a map of Texas marked with its regional cattle brands elicits some questions from people who don't know what the heck they are. For Your Information reports that Managing Editor John Denison is in charge of photos, as opposed to Photographic Editor Russ Countryman, who is in charge of photos. Or something like that. Honestly, I wasn't paying attention to the details.
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| Kathleen Mary Rose, Mrs. Tudor Wilkinson, in 1919. "She is credited with inventing the blank hauteur." |
The impasse in Peking is going to be resolved by the Chinese recognising the airmen as servicemen rather than civilians and releasing them to the UN without being seen as bowing to US pressure. Those omnipresent "intelligence officials" are saying, now from Tokyo, that the Reds will balance the release of the airmen by grabbing the Tachen Islands. "It develops" that Chou En-lai regards Nehru as a "pest." The National Defence Committee in France is going to make the front pages when a grand jury demands that the National Assembly withdraw parliamentary immunity from a "prominent fellow traveller." U.S. military shipments to the Koumintang will speed up soon because the Koumintang can use them, and what else is there to worry about? The ninnies at somewhere called "Soviet Radio" accused the United States of backing Nicaragua when it actually backed Costa Rica!
The Periscope Washington Trends reports that sentiment is building in the Senate for recognising Red China, but also Congress is as strongly in favour of holding on to Formosa as ever, subject to the fact that the average American remains stubbornly anti-WWIII, no matter what Bill Knowland wants, because this is a democracy, at least unless you listen to James.
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| Wikipedia says that Radford "kept his disagreements out of the public view," although that is only directly referring to budget arguments, and not his WWIII advocacy. |
The President's health is said to be very good, with a blood pressure of 140 over 90, but his doctor says that he needs to get out and play more golf, or maybe even do other exercise. There was yet another in the "30 prison mutinies, major escapes, or strikes" which have occurred in the last three years. "Major" is the operative word. Time says there were seventeen at the Cherry Hill prison alone. "Washington Wives" get a profile, as does Joseph Dean Lohman, the new sheriff of Cook County. In anti-Communist news, Michael Ondrejka is trying to get custody of his kids from wife Lily because she is a Communist, while Lily is trying to divorce him because it turns out that he was an undercover FBI informant, while the California Supreme Court is letting a Berkeley drug firm fire Doris Brin Walker, for being a Communist, even though it is actually because she is a union organiser, because Communism is bad. General Spaatz's occasional column is back, explaining that it would be more efficient if the Air Force had all the planes.
International
"Chiang: Biter, His Back to the Wall" Fighting in the Formosa Straits is becoming more vicious, and Edendale has been sunk, the 252nd episode of Nationalist action against British flag shipping in the last two years. An invasion of the Tachens is imminent, it says here. The Japanese and Americans are negotiating over the appropriation of fifty acres to allow the extension of runways for American air bases in Japan, despite protests in Japan. Newsweek explains why Nguyen Van Hue's defection from the army to Diem raises his odds of "saving South Vietnam" from 1 in 10 to 1 in 5. It's because his private army is based on a large sect and their support will be valuable, and maybe other sects will join Diem and South Vietnamese society in general.
"Lifting the Curtain on U.S. Air Power in Europe" "What the Soviets already know won't help them," is the motto as the USAF gives exact details of its sixteen wings, logistical facilities, and several independent squadrons in two air forces, and cost $762 million and employs 83,400 USAF personnel, 2400 American civilians, 43,000 native civilians, 58,500 dependents, and 50,000 "others." What will not be revealed is the number of units of heavy atom bombers deployed overseas in 5th Air Division in Morocco and 7th Division in England. On this continent, the almost-war in Costa Rica provokes an explainer telling us why Central America is so restless. It's because it's full of shiftless Latins. In Mexico, Trotsky's assassin is up for release.
Business
The lead story is that the President also says that the economy is great and getting better, and there will finally be some tax cuts in the '56 budget. An oil well in Montana is for some reason the second story. Under the Aviation header, we here about a TWA symposium where Wernher v. Braun predicts 2000mph airliners flying at 60,000ft, Fred Whipple of Harvard predicts flying wing airplanes with atomic engines, while Hall Hibberd likes 1500mph transcontinental airliners flying at 80,000 feet and vertical takeoff feeder airliners. TWA's President, Ralph Damon, then threw the floor open for audience predictions, promising a $50,000 prize, paying out in thirty years, for the best prediction. He also offered another $50,000 prize for the best blurb for TWA service. Products promises magnesium luggage from Dow, as new milling equipment becomes available from its new Madison plant. The liner United States, after having to heave over for thirteen hours during a storm, is showing less damage than expected, making United States Lines confident that its new neoprene coating for stern and rudder parts has licked a persistent problem for ocean liners. Henry Hazlitt's Business Tides column for this week flirts with protectionism as he takes on President's "Wonderland Foreign Policy." If you're wondering what could turn Hazlitt against what is so traditionally called "classical liberalism," it's that he hates foreigners so much, and how can you hurt them without tariffs? Also, he hates farmers, so why should there be protection for them? A special feature on Investment Clubs follows up.
Notes: Week in Business reports that steel production is up, that Sinclair Oil is the 32nd company on the New York Stock Exchange to crack the billion dollar value. Consolidated Foods is merging with Libby to create the biggest process food company of all. United Fruit has stuffed an invitation on an eleven day Caribbean cruise in the spring at the usual $265 to $1055 rate, but guests will be "entertained at the company's establishments in Guatemala."
I preferred it when my "shortage of 'No, but seriously" jokes referred to silly technology stories.
Science, Medicine
The University of North Carolina's in-house atomic reactor is quite the story. The 1955--56 Federal budget science slice adds up to $2.218 billion, with 68% going to the Department of Defence, the AEC gets $274 million, the Weather Bureau $28 million, and the National Science Foundation is up to $20 million from $12 million last year.
"No Laughing Matter" A conference of nutritionists at Iowa State College is worried that there are twice as many fat men in the white population of the United States, with the figures reversed for Coloured people. They go on to warn against relying heavily on weight-and-height tables. Middle-aged people. Dr. Ancel Keys, director of the laboratory of physiological hygiene in the University of Minnesota, says that middle-aged people need to cut back on fats, oil, and butter, and lower their cholesterol, while other speakers urge us not to great obesity as a moral failure. If you are ready to reduce weight, yogurt, wheat germ, brewer's yeast, powdered skim milk, and blackstrap molasses are recommended, and meals including Belgian endives, steak Diane, green asparagus Amandine, and wild strawberries with yogurt. A doctor in Knoxville who does an unusual number of night house calls rounds out the feature.
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| The copyright tag for this photo seems to be hidden behind the NYT paywall? Weird. It's by Ed Steichen, obviously. |
Art, Press, TV-Radio, Newsmakers
Photographer Ed Steichen gets a show at the MoMA this week in a very short story in The Arts that is mostly made up with a profile of long-lived art critic Henry McBride.
Ray Brennan, the Chicago-area journalist who has been under indictment for two-and-a-half years after pretending to be a Federal employee in a call to Kefauver's office, has had the charges dropped. Lee Hills of the Knight press gets a promotion.
Ike's first televised news conference gets a story, while Ed Sullivan is sparring with NBC, topping invites of NBC stars like Fibber McGee with an invite to General Sarnoff, who points out that NBC's "Spectaculars" are going to go head-to-head with Sullivan in the new year, and why would he undermine that?
Emmett Kelly is engaged, Lady Phoebe Pleydell-Bouverie is married. William L. P. Althouse, August S. Deisenberg, Dr. Richard Sheppard, Gus Arnheim, and Robert Tristram Coffin have died.
The New Movies
Theodora, Slave Empress, is an Italian import, and gets a bad review from Newsweek. On the other hand, it liked West of Zanzibar which comes from the Rank Organisation, but sounds a bit colonialist to me.
Books
Simone de Beauvoir's 1946 Tous les hommes sont mortels is out in English and gets a good review from a sympathetic reviewer. Osaragi Jiro's Homecoming, translation credit to Brewster Horwitz, deserves a review just for being the rare example of a Japanese novel translated into English. Americans are so interested in things Japanese that you could wish that there were more working translators to give us a window into what the Japanese are actually thinking. It's a typical Japanese novel, the reviewer assures us. Angna Enters' Among the Daughters is a first novel by the famous mime artist, which is odd. The book isn't so much odd as undercooked. Maybe next time!
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| It's not that the cover for this issue is missing, it's that it's a full page all-text Goodyear ad. |
News Digest reports that colour radar is great and has a picture of the B-47D Wright T49 testbed on taxi trials. Industry Observer reports that Grumman has a full-delta carrier fighter and a new amphibian on the drawing board. The CAA will install radar beacons at five airports after airlines promised to put in tansponders. Boeing will test its jet engine thrust reverser on the 707. Lockheed will abandon its straight wing philosophy for its jet transport. Washington Roundup reports that the new Congress is more open to nonskeds, and the Air Force is shaking up its mobilisation plans.
Aviation Week's Picture Brief features the Convair Sea Dart, which is apparently a valuable experimental aircraft and not oa disaster on skis. Westinghouse wants us to know that its new silicon lube is great, Detroit Testing Laboratories wants us to know that its fuel filters are great, and Robinson Aviation wants us to know that its rubber vibration-dampening mountings are great. What's New has six brochures and pamphlets this week on everything from the course offerings at the USAF Academy to the current offerings from Hufford Machine Tools and a 20p how-to booklet on shipping by air. McGraw-Hill explains why government subsidies for private colleges are necessary. Necessary, it says. For science! And the nation! For freedom! What is this thing called "state colleges"? (Anyway, they're tax-funded, so why not tax-fund private schools so that the students will go there and be a different burden on the tax payer?)
Captain Robson is back with a Cockpit Viewpoint, "Fatigue and Lights," denouncing slopelines, which have been a scapegoat in the Air Italia crash, but observing that the real problem was that after eighteen or more hours in the air, Captain Algarott just wanted to be home in bed. People need to accept that fatigue is real!
Notwithstanding that Wood's departure date is next week, Robert Hotz has the Editorial page this week to lay out the history of this year's air procurement budget, which goes like this: 1946--8, inprovident cuts; 1948--50, slow recovery; 1950--3, PANIC; 1954--5, unspent cushioning; 1956, normalcy. The Democrats are pushing for more than $7 billion, and may get it, but spending won't fall beneath $7 billion.
Goodnight, Mr. Wood, wherever you are.
I will cover The Engineer's 21 and 28 January 1955 issues in this letter.
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| Birmingham Mail. |
On the 28th we get a review of "Progress on the Langton-Canada Scheme, Port of Liverpool." £16 million! This is followed by "Life of a Small Gas Turbine," which you can tell was written by a very boring author considering the emphasis on how little the protagonist drinks, in spite of being all around the world with a Globemaster! "'Terylene' Synthetic Fibre Manufacturing Plant" tells us all about ICI's new £10 million plant. Terylene is made by reacting this and that feedstock at high temperatures and extruding the resulting liquid, which turns into a solid as it cools, and is then spun. I find it hard to imagine that this cost three-quarters as much as tearing that massive hole in the Liverpool docks and filling it with concrete, but I am not a civil engineer. Continuing with the issue for the 28th, we get "Modernisation of British Railways," which is actually the summary of a British Railways report, so The Engineer is not on the hook for the title. Permanent ways are getting upgrades, telecommunications improvements will allow centralised control in some areas, urban electrification continues, catering cars are getting better, more people are taking the train, continuous brakes will go on all goods wagons,of which there are 1.1 million on this island! "Steam Catapult for Aircraft Carriers" describes the catapult going onto new British and American aircraft carriers in some detail. They don't sound complicated, just steam pistons with a few arrangements to ensure that planes are catapulted when it is wanted, and not at random, although the description is notably "downstream" of the turbines where the steam is taken off in the first place. "Cracking in Service of 0.5" Molybdenum Steel Steam Piping" follows up on investigations set in motion in 1946 to better understand the issue. To make a long story short, 0.5% molybdenum is bad on stress and shouldn't be used.
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| Kirby's later stuff works better as fever dreams than stories, and the Hairies' giant road-thingie is definitely one of those. (Jimmy Olsen 142 (1971). |
Even if everyone can agree that hydrogen bombs are too big to be used in war, uranium bombs aren't, and will probably be thrown around with abandon as an alternative to conscripting more battalions. But what if some crazy Hitler type is cornered? He'd probably fire off the most damaging hydrogen bomb he could. and that's where people are talking about "'aggressive'" casings of cobalt or such. The Bikini device is said to have been the equivalent of 14 million tons of TNT, and the fallout cloud that reached the Lucky Dragon trawler shows how hard it is to predict how far the fallout will reach. Even the Nevada tests led to high radiation counts as far away as New York. It might be that only a few thousand detonations would be enough to end the human race, "a general level of radioactivity which no one can tolerate or escape."
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Colbert is now a museum ship. By Selvejp - travail personnel, own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2931481 |
It then moves on to the second part of its review of "Gas Turbines in 1954" with further discussion of those visionary Swiss plants, in this case a blast furnace blower at Sulzer, which demands a recuperator, a single-shaft combined turbine/compressor at Escher-Wyss, and a combined steam/gas set at Oerlikon in Zurich. "Naval Construction in 1954" has a signed author (Raymond Blackman), and concludes in the 21 January number, beginning with a look at the last six-ship batch of the Sverdlov-class light cruisers, then the Skori destroyers, and a report of 40 "medium-sized" submarines underway in Soviet yards. The French ordered a new aircraft carrier, the Clemenceau, in 1954, and an anti-aircraft cruiser, Colbert. De Grasse, relaunched after hibernating through WWII, is so far an unlucky ship. Surcouf and Le Corse-class smaller combatants continue to launch, four ocean-going submarines are under construction, and 37 coastal minesweepers. The Italians are mainly working on rebuilding WWII holdovers for anti-submarine work, the Netherlands has large ocean-going antisubmarine escorts of almost light cruiser size that are very interesting, Sweden's new destroyers have automatic gun turrets, and the two destroyers that Venezuela ordered in Britain are almost done. "Civil Engineering in 1954" hits its third installment in the 21 January number and looks again at Owen Falls and various Scottish works. "Electrical Engineering in 1954" concludes on the 21st with a look at big machinery and then a sidestep to electronic computing with some comment in TRIDAC. The installment of "Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering in 1954" that appears on the 28th is actually interesting, in that it discusses some unusual types, including a diesel-electric dipper for Norwegian harbour work.
Leaders
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| I don't understand why this is put in a l letter. (J. M. alexander) |
Cdr (E) Baker's "Some Factors in the Selection of Machinery for Cargo Liners" starts on the 28th, while "Performance Tests on a Second BICERA Compressor" continues the discussion of a British Internal Combustion Research Association experimental high-speed rotary compressor that might be better than a Rootes compressor.
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| An actual plane that the USAF was actually flying overhead while Petter was sharing his immortal words with a dictaphone. Because you didn't do double entendres in 1955. |
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| Esso Exeter, 1955--82. C. Malcom Cranfield. |
Industrial and Labour Notes has on the 21st a qualified defence of collective bargaining from the Minister but nothing about the rail strike. Trade is good, a delegation is off to Egypt. On the 28th we hear about the railway settlement, the good export news last year, the clouds on the horizon with respect to dollar-area exports thanks to growing German and Japanese competition, the excellent numbers for machinery and other engineering exports. Three Launches and Trial Trips for the 21st, cargo and cargo liner motorships and a steamship tanker, but the feature is skipped on the 28th, perhaps alternating with British STandards Institution, this week featuring standards for barometer conversions and tables, and an addendum on unified thread taps.
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