Mrs. B. T.,
79 Av de Harmonia,
Macao,
Dear Jenny:
Since you are about to receive the Earl, Uncle George, and my Father for the New Years holiday, (best wishes for the Year of the Pig, if my next slips behind schedule!) you are also the lucky recipient of this newsletter. The important material is at the back, as usual. Ther endless bit at the head is just comment on the news, which is usually done in aid of defending Uncle George's very speculative stock investment strategy.
This time, you will see that rather more is at stake. You will find the Earl very frightening, tallking of socialist revolution by the summer. The news does not seem quite so alarmist, but I cannot believe that The Economist, usually so skeptical of the Labour Government, has not seen the handwriting on the wall. It is perfectly capable of doing the arithmetic, and seeing how much worse a bad winter would make things. My sense is that it is not saying anything, so as not to frighten anyone. There is also the little difficulty that the only possible route through the thickets runs through the new Republican Congress in Washington. If things go as badly as the Earl fears, it will be very difficult politics for them!
I keep returning to the Earl's news instead of my own, and now I find that I have run quite out of time. It is a good thing that I wrote you last week, after so many delays, or you would think that nothing ever happens here in Santa Clara!
"GRACE."
P.S. Thank you for your Christmas gifts, especially the gown for Victoria, which is beautiful, and extravagant. You are perfectly correct in thinking that the rest of Arcadia can get very cold when the air conditioning is working hard enough to keep the nursery cool! A case of marmalade, and something a little more Californian, is on its way to you by return!
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| Return with us to the thrilling days of yesteryear, when the people who stayed at the Mayflower did, sometimes, also stay at auio courts in Nebraska. |
Flight,
2 January 1947
Leaders
“The Old Year” 1947 was a year in
which British aviation was wonderful.
“—And the New” Will hopefully see
something done about these airliner crashes. The paper thinks that with engines
and navigation as reliable as they are (and navigation could be even more
reliable, if not for politics), the crash problem boils down to landings and
takeoffs, and the pursuit of high speed, which means high landing speed, is the
issue. Which is, Uncle George reminds me, something that it has been saying for
a long time.
 |
| It certainly doesn't have anything to do with the industry being reckless! |
“Duplex Airscrews, Part II: An
Analysis of the Rotol Hydraulic ‘Contra-Prop’” Rotol has put a contra-rotating
airscrew on the Rolls-Royce Griffon 85-engined Spitfire 22. Unlike coaxial
airscrews, which are driven by separate powerplants with the driveshafts
co-axial, a contra-prop runs off a single engine plant, with the reduction
gears complicated up to the point that one of the shafts rotates in the
opposite direction from the other. This balances engine and air mass rotational
torque and gives hydraulic engineers an excuse to build a ridiculously
complicated gadget, when you include in the need for pitch changes, and the
fact that the pilot controls engine speed and air flow, and the only way that
engine speed can be reconciled with air speed and with the fuel-air mass is via
automatic pitch changes. Any significant time change would lead to surges in
the fuel mass flow and oscillations of the airscrew blades, which would be bad.
And by “significant,” I mean a lag that exceeds the overall dampening effect in
the pitch-change mechanism.
“Naval Aircraft: Design Requirements
Discussed by Supermarine Technical Staff: Precis of a Talk Given to the
Southampton Branch of the R. Ae. S. by A. N. Clifton” Deck landing-capable
aircraft have to land very hard on a very short deck. This makes them heavier.
For a 10,000lb fighter, undercarriages (40lbs), arrestor hook support (60lbs),
accelerator hook (50lbs), folding wings with lashing and slinging points
(160lbs), and provision for oil heating and fuel draining (5lbs) and extra
radio (30lbs) add up to an penalty of 450lbs. When landing on and launching at
the same time, an aircraft carrier might allow only half its very short deck
for takeoff. Lowered flap takeoffs are necessary, and contra-rotating
airscrews, to eliminate swing, desirable. RATO units give a 1200lb thrust for
four seconds, and weight 60lbs, with their jettisonable container adding 50.
Engine and rockets together give 1 “g” acceleration. The British accelerator
was a cordite or compressed-air powered winch pulling a trolley attached to the
aircraft at four points, giving a maximum acceleration of 2.5 gs, or 1.75 on
average. This, combined with engine, rocket, and 20 knots of wind over the
deck, give an airspeed of 80knots at the end of a 250ft run. An alternative
American system was better and simpler, and was adopted by the Royal Navy. Launching
a squadron of 12 aircraft might take ten minutes, and if the accompanying ships
were not headed upwind, the aircraft carrier might be 7 to 8 miles separate
from the fleet by the end of the manoeuvre, something of a nightmare in a
“Jutland” type situation. Fortunately, the Pacific Fleet never got into that
position, thanks to Ray’s care and the Admiral’s dumb luck. Landing on was a
much more difficult matter. Once again, the plane must approach against the
wind. The arrestor gear can only absorb 60 knots of horizontal aircraft
velocity relative to the ship (you have probably seen an automobile accident or
two where the driver was “going like sixty”), so a 20-knot headwind absorbs
almost half the total energy of an aircraft landing at 80 knots. At the same
time, the aircraft’s undercarriage is absorbing a vertical velocity of 16 feet
per second. Landing on is to take only 30 seconds per aircraft, which is why
power wing-folding is so important, as the folding can be done while the
aircraft is taxiing to the deck park or elevator.
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| The only problem with aircraft carriers is that the manufacturers keep failing them. They must love the Air Force or something. |
In the future, the atomic bomb may
make aircraft carriers more important, as they are much harder to find and blow
up than land airfields, which can hardly move at all. Mr. Clifton can imagine a
future in which radio-controlled missiles replace piloted aircraft, in which
case an aircraft carrier will become something like a battleship –a magazine of
expendable missiles, and a “complicated radio ‘brain’ for directing them.” This
is a nice reward for reading through to the end –I can put it to Uncle George,
and he will be off to design this radio brain twenty years ahead of its being
necessary.
The paper remembers T. R. Thomas,
Secretary of the Air Registration Board, who died at 53 last week, and Mrs.
Richard Pearse, the former Dorothy Spicer, Pauline Gower’s flight engineer, at
one point in the 1930s the only woman qualified as a ground engineer in
England. Dorothy and her husband were killed in a York airliner crash near Rio de Janeiro this week.
“The Old Year: High Lights of 1946”
The year has seen some informal records: 53 hours from England to New Zealand,
32 hours to South Africa, and very real, important ones, including the speed
record; and, more importantly the distance record, of which more below. It was
also, I remind myself, a year of first after first in civil aviation as the
postwar air services launched. It is now possible for a civilian to buy a
ticket to fly from Europe to America, and once again possible to do so from
England to Australia, Hong Kong and South Africa. All the dire news from the
airlines’ business offices come down to it not happening even more and faster.
Accidents didn’t help with that, notably the Constellation crashes that delayed
BOAC’s Constellation service over the North Atlantic. Pacusan
Dreamboat’s Honolulu-Cairo flight over the North Pole shows that B-29s can
fly a long way, even if it falls short of a genuine threat to Russia, as it was
not carrying an atomic bomb. The year also saw the return of civil flying to
England. New planes this year included
the Sabre-engined Fury I, which set a speed of 483mph at 18,500ft, 150mph
faster than a Hurricane of the Battle of Britain, even if the piston-engined level
flight speed record is still held by a P-47J Thunderbolt that exceeded 500mph
in level flight. Nene-powered Vampires and Meteors are the future, but there
are no English jet bombers to match the American ones, and no Mosquito
replacement. Various wartime secret
projects, including the Short Sturgeon and the General Aircraft tailless glider, were announced, as were details of the abandoned Miles M52.
 |
| By The Flight magazine archive from Flightglobal, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18167555 |
New planes under construction at
year’s end included the Supermarine S.14/44 variable-incidence amphibian and
the Heston twin-boom observation aircraft.
Exciting new programmes planes
include the Percival Prentice trainer and the Avro Tudor II airliner, though
some of the shine is off it now that it is no longer deemed Atlantic-capable,
even if being able to carry 60 passengers is impressive. The Viking II and
Handley-Page Hastings have arrived. The paper is far more excited than I am
about the Solent, but until Hong Kong gets a new airport, flying boats are far
safer, and offer the only hope for an international service into Macao. There
are no completely new turbojets in full production, but the Derwent V almost
counts, and the Nene and the Ghost are very near production. The excitingMetrovick turbines, with their ducted fan thrust augmentors, are doing well on
the bench. Their potential for fuel economy may be the key factor when airlines
come to choose jet engines. If not them, then the turboprop might steal the
show. The Bristol turboprops are gadgety and interesting. The newly announced
Armstrong-Siddeley Python is the most powerful British engine to date: 3,750shp
at the airscrew, plus 1150lb thrust.
 |
| Westland Wyvern with Armstrong-Siddeley Python engine. It was originally to take the Rolls-Royce Eagle 22. |
The Mamba, on the other hand, is the
smallest turboprop to date, at 1010 shaft horsepower plus 320lb thrust. Both
use axial compressors. For the moment, however, civil services still depend on
the old piston engine. It simply has too much of an advantage on fuel economy,
especially while the problems of pressurising cabins for 40,000ft are being
worked out. New piston power units include the Hercules 230, Sabre VII (the
first English engine rated for water/methanol injection), Griffon 130, Merlin
620 and the coupled Centaurus on the Bristol 167. The Hercules 130, a 38.7L,
14-cylinder radial, gives 2055hp, a 50% improvement on the original, from a 20%
increase in weight. This is more impressive in that air-cooled engines usually
have less room to grow than liquid-cooled ones. The Merlin 620 is the civilian
version, giving 1770hp at 3000rpm. It will be installed on the Tudor II and the
Anglo-Canadian DC-4, making them loud and buzzy planes. (The paper doesn’t say
that; James does, with the emphatic agreement of Reggie, Junior, who has had
his war-surplus Indian motorcycle out for the entire holidays. He claims to
know an old-time motorcycle courier who has lost the tip of three fingers to
gangrene brought on by engine vibrations. All the more reason, I say, to not
ride the thing, at least in winter! )
“Another American Amphibian: The
Grumman Mallard Eight-ten-seater for Airline Work” A “feeder airliner” that can
land on dirt or water. It should be just the thing in Hawaii and the
Philippines.
“Metrovick R.5: Open Fan Thrust
Augmentor on Standard F.2 Gas Generator” The paper has already mentioned this
obliquely. The idea here is that a “fan,” basically an airscrew, is placed behind the turbojet engine, and driven
from the turbine, in the same way as the compressor, receiving cold air ducted from the front of the
wings. The Metrovick installation is much simpler and
lighter than a true airscrew, since it is not geared (It is “free-wheeling”),
and the F.5 installation, isn’t even cowled. It’s just out there, like a regular
“pusher” airscrew. The fuel efficiency comes from a little thermodynamic
identity –and I had to stop myself after writing that. Please forgive my little
pedantries!
Here
and There
The paper celebrates two ex-RAF
P.o.W.s who invited four German P.o.W.s from a nearby camp to celebrate
Christmas with them. The paper has now decided that it is good to be nice to
Germans. The Americans have tested a 14 ton V-2, launching it to a height of
111 miles with a top-speed of 3600mph. It is hoped that in a future trial, it
might “hurl small metal slugs . . . [with] enough speed to overcome gravity and
continue into space.” I assume that this means establishing an “orbit” around
the Earth, and not achieving the actual Earth escape velocity, which is a
staggering 7 miles per second. Nature has given us one satellite, the Moon; any lucky Martians are treated to
two “hurtling moons of Barsoom,” Jupiter and Saturn have dozens, and our own
dear Sun has nine it its planetary family. Earth will soon surpass its neighbours and be far too gaudy and
ostentatious for polite planetary society!
Correspondence
D. Usher thinks that the Governmentis discouraging ultra-light aircraft “[T]o destroy our inheritance of airsupremacy towards the establishment of the Big Idea of a World State controlledby a World Government enforced by a World Police Force with propaganda by a UNOwhat –the ideal of most Internationalist and well-meaning, if misguided FederalUnionists who are among its most enthusiastic supporters.” So much for my
notion that the civil air authorities were trying to stop crazy people from
killing themselves! Norman Vaughan thinks that the Government is BUNGLING radio
operator training. D. Usher’s second letter
of the week thinks that there should be a powered-sailplane association, as
well as a glider association and an ultralight aircraft association. “474”
thinks that the Government is BUNGLING the “B” license. “Serving Volunteer”
thinks that RAF medals-giving-out is being BUNGLED.
The
Economist, 4 January 1947
Leaders
“Oil Politics” Standard Oil of NewJersey and the Socony-Vacuum Oil Company are the joint American partners in an
oil field in Iraq near Kirkuk, held in equal shares by Anglo-Iranian, Royal
Dutch-Shell, the Americans and a French group. It is connected to the
Mediterranean by a pipeline. Aside from this, Standard and Socony’s interest in
the Middle East has been small; but now they have bought a substantial interest
in a large field mid-way down the Persian Gulf coast of Saudi Arabia. This is
probably the largest oil field in the world, and they are talking about
connecting it with the pipeline at Kirkuk. Hitherto, American and Caribbean
fields have provided 78% of the world’s petroleum, but Western Hemisphere
consumption is growing rapidly, and the American oil exporters look like they
will soon have no oil to export. Meanwhile, the Middle Eastern oil producers
have the opposite problem. Anglo-Iranian’s production, mainly in southwestern
Persia, but also in the small trucial principalities of Kuwait and Bahrain, has
doubled during the war years, even though Anglo-Iranian is hard pressed to
refine and export it. The Americans
will buy it in the Middle East and sell it in Europe. It will be, in effect, an
American re-export, and a highly favourable item in the American balance of
payments.The question is whether England will refine it, instead of importing already-refined oil from Abidjan in
Persia. as it does now.Various concerns about Mediterranean strategy in WWIII, and the Arab reaction to Zionism are raised.
“Divided Zion” Speaking of Zionism,
the Zionists are meeting in Basel more. Dr. Weizmann continues to believe that
Palestine must be partitioned between Arab and Jew, while Rabbi Silver wants
the whole country, and believes that American policy can be turned to that
position, while the British have already made up their mind to be awful to
Jews, so that there is no point in negotiating with them. Mr. Weizmann lost a
vote on attending the London Conference, and has left Basel. A steering
committee is trying to put the Silver vision into effect –which basically means
violence. The paper calls on the Government to stop BUNGLING and enforce a
partition.
“The Teaching of Economics” The
universities are BUNGLING it.
“Danubian Outlook, I: Prospects for
Agriculture” In the countries along the lower Danube, peasants want land reform
and better prices.
Notes
of the Week
‘Nineteen Forty-Seven” The next year
might not be completely horrible. Under the heading of “New Year’s Honours,”
the paper unaccountably fails to mention my husband’s promotion.
“Atomic Energy and Disarmament” The
Russians have tentatively embraced the Baruch Agreement, in hope of securing
atomic disarmament. Diplomatic manouevres continue.
The Russians, being paranoid, are afraid that an inspections and sanctions regime will be exploited to create a casus belli.
“France and the Saar” France has
sent customs officials into the Saarland and sealed off its German borders. The
French are still angling for the incorporation of the Saarland into France, but
won’t ask their allies for it, presumably because they expect to be refused. So
now they’re caught halfway, and the paper thinks it was a serious misstep that
will only hurt Germany further.
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| Irony! |
“The Coal Board Takes Over” The Coal
Board has officially taken over the industry, promising a five-day week from
May, but not adequate coal this winter. In related news, the extended
unemployment benefit is now in effect. It won’t be expensive, since years of
full employment have left the Unemployment Fund with a healthy balance, but it
will address the worst aspect of unemployment, the long-term kind. The paper
also notes that it reflects the “extreme immobility of labour.”
“Intelligence and the Birth Rate”
Sir Cyril Burr of the Royal Commission of Population, has done up a study,
recently published by the Eugenics Society, on the question of whether stupid
people are having more babies than smart people, resulting in the population
becoming ever more stupid since at least last Tuesday. (I am being facetious,
but with a point, since extrapolating this trend back far enough yields
ridiculous results, and no-one can ever explain why it shouldn’t be so extrapolated.) He has found the usual tosspot of
rubbish about rich peoples’ children being smarter than poor people’s, and that
all the world is going into the trash unless we stop assisting poor people with
family allowances and start helping rich people with a “generous tax allowance
for children increasingly progressively with earned income.” If I sound a bit
vehement, it is because I have had far too many conversations with mothers
about their children being excluded from San Francisco schools on the grounds
of maladministered IQ tests. I even have a copy of one of Dr. Burt’s
books, handed to me by a school administrator in the case of Tommy Wong, which
I somehow restrained myself from returning in care of a dacoit.
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| It turns out that by this point in his career, Burt is just straight making up his "The Working class r dumb" data. The Economist will blame one of the typos in this article on its printers next week, completely missing the fact that it has misspelled Dr. Burt's name. |
“Misunderstanding Over the Sudan” The
English seem very enthusiastic about colonial independence when the alternative
is handing it over to Egypt.
“Deflation by Exhortation” France
has declared a 10% reduction in all prices over 60 days. The idea is to
encourage the French to “hold” currency instead of goods, which are being
hoarded. The paper thinks that the initiative is doomed, even if the current
problem is “psychological” instead of inflationary, that is, due to budget
deficits.
“De Gaulle and the Presidency” De
Gaulle will not stand for the presidency of the Fourth Republic. Will there be
a Gaullist coup? Further bulletins as events warrant.
 |
| Ten years more of this. Yay! I was going to paste in a picture of General de Gaulle here, but then I saw this one of Patricia Cutts, and I decided, if the choice is between two narcissists., I like Ms. Cutts better. |
“China’s New Constitution” The English
press is reporting that the “Confucian Santa Claus” has blessed a grateful nation
with a new constitution that is more democratic than otherwise because of
American pressure. Meanwhile, T. V. Soong is under heavy attack in the Assembly
for his “too obvious” American connections, with Chang Chun seen as a possible
successor.
“Imperialism in Antarctica” The
Antarctic might have uranium, in which case the current surge of national
scientific research there may lead to said imperialism.
“Special Juries” The paper cannot
see a problem with a system in which High Court jurors have to be men of
property, and the “special jurors” have even more. (It is also quite excited
that “black coat” professionals who work for local councils might soon be able
to get their expenses remitted.) It reports that the lifting on the ban on
married women work is spreading through the County Councils.
“Danish Economic Crisis” The Danes
are going to fix their heavy adverse trade balance by cutting imports 25% and
increasing exports by 50%. English cars, textiles and luxury goods will be
heavily affected, and the Danes blame the English for refusing to pay
acceptable prices for Danish ram produce. The paper points out that it is
(mostly) down to Danish extravagance and feckless irresponsibility.
Correspondence
W. N. Leak, of Dingle House,
Winsford, Cheshire, is upset about the health services act. William F. Jordan,
of 23 Arlington Road, Eastbourne, Sussex, points out that the paper’s attempt
to compare Burma and French Indo-China goes astray. A revolution, if not a
civil war, is clearly about to break out in Annam, while in Burma, the Burmese
are cheerfully getting on with preparing for self government after the English
leave, and since they seem prepared to do so, the country is as peaceful and
orderly as can be expected. It would lift Great-Uncle’s heart if he were alive
to see it. John Jewkes replies to Professor Balogh on the lines of, “No, you’re
the unrealistic one.” Professor Balogh is at fault for liking planning, not
liking America enough, and liking Denmark too much. (See above; also, France.)
Charles F. Carter, of 20, the Broadway, St. Ives, Huntingdonshire, thinks that
the paper is much too harsh on the Government, and another correspondent
complains that none of the draft reports and agreements on international trade
have been published so that he can see them, due to paper shortages.
From
the Economist of 1847
Incredibly, the paper used
to be even more long-winded than it is now. “Monopolies, corn laws, bounties,
excise restrictions, heavy discriminating customs duties are known to be wrong
or forbidden by the laws of nature, like murder or theft, for their manifold
evil consequences. . . “ Maybe so, but you just had a precious paragraph to prove these claims, and it boiled down
to “Just say no to seconds at dessert.”
American
Survey
“The International Bank (From Our US
Editorial staff) Is the International Bank in trouble due to the resignation of
Mr. Meyers and the delay in appointing a replacement? No, not as long as it
acts like a bank, and also takes over Unrra’s job of providing relief, which
isn’t what a bank does, but hem-haw responsible borrowing moral upstandingness
conditions of trade it will all be right in the end! So long as certain
countries (countries that are just like England) get loan
repayment relief. Also, there should be legislation to allow insurance
companies to buy World Bank bonds, because even though American banks are
allowed to buy the bonds, and the Wisconsin decision was irrelevant, hem-haw
some more.
“Basic Metals: Limits to Production”
During the war, it was fashionable
to think that production could continue to rise forever. Now it turns out that there
is not enough steel, as production of durable goods is running ahead of 1941,
when there were 83 million tons of steel available, and this strike-shortened
year will likely see 80 million produced. I very much preferred Fortune’s version, where it was mainly a
shortage of types of steel, but even
the paper notices that the shortage is mainly in sheet steel. Also, copper is
short, leading off the base metals, such as lead, which has crimped theproduction of tetraethyl lead for high-octane gasoline and for paint, where theshortage is complicated by a lack of linseed oil to make lead-less paints.
As you know, the family took an
interest in a large lead mine and refinery on the Columbia River at the
Canadian border a half-century ago, because it was good cover for other
business. Now we find quite embarrassing profits flowing from it –to the point
where we’ve had to have very serious talks with the company about the box cars
reserved for our use. (Traditionally we've had two or three at the back of the train as “dead head”
be."It turns out
that you can play the same game with timber, because it is almost as much lighter than lead concentrate as migrants. It has been a very good line in
America for the last few months, and mine management thinks that we’re getting
greedy. The reason that you care is
that we’ll be taking more migrants.)
I’m sorry. That interjection may be
out of place. Anyway, from the perspective of the larger world, the more
important implication is that the punishing American import duty on copper,
enacted to protect the Anaconda partners, might be going.
American
Notes
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| Completely irrelevant, but I'm never going to find a better place for this. |
“Programme for Congress” The new,
GOP Congress wants lower taxes, still fewer controls on the economy, limits to
Presidential power, curbs on labour, “full implementation of
sovereign powers” abroad, and a probe into all the things that the Democrats
got away with in the last fourteen years.
The Administration will go along with
curbing organised labour, but not nearly so far as “extending anti-trust
legislation,” as industry is now demanding. In fact, here business has managed
to find something so reactionary that even Senator Taft won’t go along with it.
(In other news, the United Steelworkers might want a 20—25% increase this year,
Chrysler wants 23—5 cents an hour, and there is increasing talk of
“portal-to-portal” pay.)
“Dulles for Uno” Senator Vandenberg
wants to run for President in 1948, and John Foster Dulles may replace him at
the Uno. He is a Republican, and Congress wants more say on foreign policy,
especially trade and tariff agreements, which the GOP are sure result in crafty
foreigners getting their way over feckless American negotiators, led by
Secretary Byrnes.
“Bilbo’s War Gains” Will Senator
Bilbo be thrown out of the Senate for taking favours from war contractors, for
intimidating Coloured voters, or, in the latest development, tax evasion?
Probably the first, since the tax evasion case is slippery, and the Senator
didn’t need to be out bribing and
beating Negro voters when the state government stood ready to do it for him.
“The Morgenthau Diaries” Secretary
Morgenthau’s diaries of his thirteen years in the White House extend to 900
volumes of 300 to 400 pages. The first published establishes that the Presidentchanged the price of gold fecklessly and with no consultation based on whims,
and the fact that he had to maintain the price of American exports, and that it
was all terrible, and that Montagu Norman and George Harrison of the Federal
Reserve Bank of New York had every reason to be horrified, even though nothing
bad happened. (Although financial
markets suffered that worst of all perils, “uncertainty.”)
The
World Overseas
“The Soil of Canada”
Canadians have joined the world in
promoting soil conservation, with the establishment of a National Committee onSoil Conservation in Ottawa. Although it is not actually doing anything, and
has no money to do it with, it is an important step. Dr. A. Leahy, the soil
specialist of the Dominion Government, says that there are 89 million acres of
land in use in Canada, including improved pasture, but that this includes 4
million acres of inferior land that should be withdrawn from cultivation, and
that the virgin arable lands of Canada are, in addition, about 45 million
acres. This is about 10% of the area of the provinces, and 5 ½ percent of the
Dominion. The virgin lands include 2 million acres of “brown soil” in southern
Alberta and Saskatchewan, another “2 or 3 million acres” of “black soil” to its
north, and 5 million acres of the “eastern podsol soil zone” in the Maritimes
and eastern Quebec. British Columbia might have as many as 3 million acres of
virgin land –it’s hard to tell with all the mountains. In short, there is no
reserve to cover losses from erosion. Many techniques can reduce soil erosion,
but Canadian yields per acre are so low it is not clear if they are going to be
profitable.
“Dutch Financial Policy”
“The Return of Vargas” Ex-President Vargas will contest the elections to be held in Brazil that, by the time you
have read this, will have long since happened, so you will know how it came
out. For the record, the paper seems to think that he will probably win.
“Import Control in Shanghai” In an
utterly unsurprising development, import controls at Shanghai will have a
protectionist effect, but exclude certain interests from most favoured nations
for the good of the Soongs Chinese people.
“Nationalisation and the Czech
Two-Year Plan” The Czechs are nationalising industry, like Labour, and have a
plan with “years” in it, like Russia, but also France. It might not work out due to lack of exports
to pay for imports.
The
Business World
“The Kaffir Dilemma” Costs are going
up, especially payments in kind to Coloured labour, due to rising prices, while
the American buying price of gold remains unchanged. Higher costs affect the
“pay limit,” or the amount of gold that can be extracted from a ton of ore at a
profit. (The lower the pay limit, the leaner/deeper/unsafer the ore that can be
extracted.) So the effect of rising costs is to shorten the life of a mine by
reducing the amount of ore it can process. This is “hardly an auspicious
background for the Kaffir share market.” The South African government will probably subsidise new mines.
Business
Notes
“Looking Forward” The paper is still
upset at the Chancellor for pushing interest rates on investments down. It is
sure that the stock market is about to turn down, and points out that there is
a limit to cheap money, because interest rates can’t go below zero, and
considering that municipal bonds and the National Debt Commissioners are going
the same way, it is clearly a sinister conspiracy.
“Only Chains to Lose” The paper
hopes for an Association of Investors, and dreams of a “Capitalist strike,” but
supposes that it is hopeless, because if the Government can alienate a million
railway shareholders, it won’t hesitate to alienate investors.
“Fuel for Industry” Because it was
the first to feel the pinch, Austin Motors got coal from the Ministry of Fuel
emergency supply. Now Dunlop Rubber, the Bury cotton mills, and weaving firms
around Blackburn have come close to stopping work. GEC at Witton is“precarious,” and EMI, near London, which employs 10,000 workers, has narrowly
avoided a shutdown. The Northwestern Regional Board is proposing, in effect,
coal rationing on non-essential services such as street-lighting, and the
concern is that absenteeism and winter weather will push down coal production
and make the problem even worse. It’s worth noting, however, that coal
production the week ending 28 December 1946 was 2.275 million tons, compared
with 1.701 million tons in the same week in December, showing that there has
been progress.
“The Budget Recoil” The “recoil”
towards a balanced budget predicted by the Chancellor, has happened. The paper
also notes that export prices have not begun to rise in reaction to rising
import prices yet, and that no-one has volunteered to be President of the World
Bank yet, because the Americans ignored wise English advice about
administrative details. Also, the “end of window-dressing” failed to cause any
of the catastrophes that some expected, while silver price discrepancies
emerged again on the international market, due mainly to heavy demand in
Bombay. Clothes prices are down, cotton profits are up, and base metal prices
are going up, while platinum is going down.
“The Five-Day Week” The five-day
week is spreading, and many employers find that it is not causing productivity
declines. Amalgamated Cotton disagrees, but Standard Motor even proposes to go
from a 42 ½ week to a 40-hour week as soon as possible. The paper hopes that
there will be an independent study of whether or not the five-day week is bad.
Flight,
9 January 1947
Leaders
“Closer and Closer” England and
America should be. The paper is very pleased by an official announcement that
the two country’s armed services will continue wartime cooperation. “It is not
to be expected that the two nations ill agree on every piece of equipment. . .
“ But the Americans should license our jet engines, I add, under my voice.
 |
| This is a great idea if you can get the Americans to buy your stuff. If, on the other hand, you end up buying theirs, something about military Keynesianism in one country? By Tony Symonds - Symonds Family Archive, CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=39152517 |
“Boscombe Down” Boscombe Down is
where the Air Ministry has its trials and experiments establishment. The paper
asked to send a team to look around and take pictures last fall, and it took
until 23 December for the Air Ministry to vet the resulting article, and now
here it is.
H. F. King, “Work and Organisation
of the Aircraft and Armament Experimental Establishment” Oh, that’s the
problem, right there. The paper sent an idiot to cover the story. He opens by
complaining that the facilities of are inadequate. Considering that it was
moved here in a hurry from a sea coast site at the beginning of the war, and
has expanded enormously since, I wonder if this even needed saying? He goes on
to a long, long list of essentially everyone who works at Boscombe Down, it
seems. I wonder if they were besieging the paper, wanting to know when their
story would appear? As for concrete details, well, it turns out that they do
flying testing, and landing tests, and deck landing tests, also firing and
bombing tests. The Ministry of Civil Aviation also farms out the work of
granting the Certificate of Airworthiness to them.
 |
| It's been privatised now, because why wouldn't you want a private company operating Britain's Area 51, right? |
American
Newsletter
“Kibitzer,” “Air Transport Deflation: BOAC’s Popularity:
The Light-Aircraft Market”: Line-shooting ‘par Excellence’” “Kibitzer is smugly
pleased to see that his prediction that air services were being over-expanded
have come true. TWA, Colonial and Pan American have made 20—30% staff
reductions; TWA has cancelled an order for eight Constellations and some DC4s;
Western Airways has cut its orders for new machines by 50%; airline stocks are
down. In the midst of this, BOAC’s Constellation service is building up “an
excellent reputation.” “Despite the current unpopularity of air transport,
BOAC’s courtesy, comfort, reliability, passenger handling and service generally
are, even at a time when things British
are none too popular here, receiving high praise from everyone who has
travelled with the Corporation.” He concludes that the idea of buying
Constellations was the best ever, and all the old grannies of the British
industry who wanted to wait to start flying until they had good, British planes
were silly and wrong. After all, it has allowed the industry to focus on new
types for 1950, instead of “fill-in types” for right now.
"The Flying Skyscraper"
“Kibitizer” also thought that the
light aircraft market was being overblown, and he pats himself on the back for
being right about that, too. He confidently predicts that special-purpose
freight aircraft will benefit those who build them “on a world-wide scale.” He
is also upset about an article in the 9 December issue of Life in which a pilot gets all hardboiled-talk about pulling a
10G turn at 500mph at 10,000ft, which would cause any aircraft existing to
disintegrate. “[I]t is high time that the Press everywhere tried to treat
aviation as what it is, not what a few neurotics think it should be.” He
supposes that this article was planted in Life
by the American air force to promote the P-80.
“Detecting Ground Resonance”
Ground resonance is a beat in
helicopter rotors in the plane of rotation caused by resonance with the ground.
This short article describes a report by a
special committee on the SAE describing how to diagnose them.
Here
and There
The King’s Flight is taking some Vikings out to South Africa with ground
crew in advance of the Royal visit. Miss Hilda Margaret Lyon, of Farnham,
Surrey, of RAE Farnborough, the first woman to become an Associate Fellow of
the R. Ae. S. has died at 50. The Air Ministry must be serious about supporting
the ATC, because it has done a Physical Training course for it.
New
Years Honours
Well, it is not here. You must get
the full London Gazette to see it,
but there it is. “Captain (E) Sir James Cook is promoted to Rear Admiral (E) on
the occasion of his retirement from the active list.” No more Captain Cook
jokes!
“Jet Propelled Flying Wings:
Consideration of a Large Air Liner for High-speed Operation at Altitude” “Some
day the flying wing will emerge as the accepted form of a passenger air liner.”
No, it will not. And the reason that I say that is that it will have to have a 200ft wing span, and will have to
counter tip-stalling with nothing but the “elevons” at the back of the wing, so
all the talk about how much parasitic drag is being lost by getting rid of the
fuselage is, and remains, complete mooonshine. Says me. But I am just a girl,
who hasn’t been promoting this moonshine in and out of season for above 30
years, ever convinced that this time
it was just around the corner.
 |
| So this is the only production flying wing aircraft before the fly-by-wire era, right? |
Short articles cover work on cold
starting jet turbines, the Swedish J21 being rebuilt as a jet fighter,.
Yetanother announcement of the B-36, which carries 300 electric motors, including a 22.7lb, 16hp pump, driving the hydraulic system, and a 1/50th hp motor for opening and closing the carburettor air filter door. It has ducted air de-icing, 28 cylinder Pratt and Whitneys, 110” main wheels, and all up weigh of 278,000lbs to achieve that long-dreamed-of 10,000lbs of bombs at 10,000 miles capability that will allow it to bomb anywhere on Earth.
Rateau continues to work on a turbojet.
Yetanother announcement of the B-36, which carries 300 electric motors, including a 22.7lb, 16hp pump, driving the hydraulic system, and a 1/50th hp motor for opening and closing the carburettor air filter door. It has ducted air de-icing, 28 cylinder Pratt and Whitneys, 110” main wheels, and all up weigh of 278,000lbs to achieve that long-dreamed-of 10,000lbs of bombs at 10,000 miles capability that will allow it to bomb anywhere on Earth.
 |
| Undercarriage detail. I doubt that any actual B-36 could have reached a 10,000 mile unrefueled range while carrying an atomic bomb; but no aircraft of its era came anywhere near as close. |
Rateau continues to work on a turbojet.
Civil
Aviation News
Joseph A. Blondin, “Misleading
Statistics: Candid Comments on ‘Passenger-mile Safety Criterion: Honesty as the
Best Policy” Twenty years ago, Scientific
American showed that, statistically, there was one fatality for every 8,422,460
streetcar traveller, 1 per 6,313,800 railroad passenger, 1 per 5,973,436
steamship passenger, and 1 for every
24,452 aircraft passenger. The airline industry responded by abandoning the
fatality-per-passenger statistic in favour of fatality-per-passenger mile.
Multiplying passengers by miles flown produces a safety number with so many
zeroes in it that it[EL1]
just has to be safe, says Mr. Blondin. It is not.
 |
| A minor Constellation accident of the early '50s, not the Shannon accident, for which I could find no images. With the Prestwick catastrophe coming up, I don't want to overhype the December 1946 episode. Source. |
In shorter news, the Government has
directed that government departments should, like private passengers, pay a
fine when they cancel their tickets. This will help ease the financial strain
on the airlines. Qantas isn’t strained. It has had a very good year. Miles is bringing out an enlarged version of the
Aerovan, the Miles Merchantman. America and China have signed an agreement
allowing for reciprocal air rights, with passengers, cargo and mail at
Shanghai, Tientsin and Canton; and in Honolulu, San Francisco and New York. BOAC American Overseas Airline freight aircraft will be using rocket assist to take
off from Mexico City. TCA continues to expand, despite a worrying decline in
airmail traffic. It has bought the Boeing hangar in Vancouver; continues to
maintain the Liberators used by BOAC on the North Atlantic ferry route, is
using Dakotas domestically, has begun receiving its DC-4 “North Stars,” and is
planning services to the West Indies and Australia. Air India is now operating
two Dakota services a day from Bombay, one to Delhi and the other to Karachi,
in addition to its six daily services. Captain David Brice has left British
South American for Silver City Airways. TWA has cut its schedule by 22% and its
orders by 25 aircraft, because it finds itself in “as critical a position as
when air-mail contracts were cancelled in 1934.” Boeing has abandoned plans to
build the Type 417. 200 Piper Cubs have been shipped overseas since V-J Day.
1512 export orders are still in hand. Skytravel, the Liverpool Charter company,
has taken delivery of a Bristol Wayfarer for service to South Africa.
“AEAF Operations in North-West
Europe: Air Chief Marshal Sir Trafford Leigh-Mallory’s Despatch” The late
Marshal’s headquarters prepared a historical sketch of its operations before
and during the Normandy campaign, and it appeared in the New Year’s number of
the London Gazette. It is quite
interesting from a historical point of view. I am a bit dazed to think of all
the single-seat fighters that were pressed into service to spot for the fleet’s
guns during the beachhead weeks. Before the war, the Fleet Air Arm was
convinced that this duty required two, three, or even four crew! An amazing comment on the way that radio
controls have improved in the last ten years!
 |
| Blackburn Blackburn. A three-seater. Grace has it confused with the Cubaroo. |
J. Henderson thinks that joint
ownership will promote private flying. I thought that was why they had flying
clubs! M. Hughes agrees that people will think that air travel is safer if the
newspapers would just stop reporting accidents. J. H. R. Allen points out that
the papers hated airships even more; but a new American dirigible, three times
faster than the Queen Elizabeth, with
fares as cheap as £37, is imminent.
 |
| R. 100 over Toronto, from Toronto Then and Now |
The
Economist, 11 January 1947
Leaders
“Disarmament” The paper thinks that
starting international peace efforts with atomic disarmament is going about
things the wrong way around, it takes two pages to get around to saying. Good
to know, even it does mean burying General Marshall’s appointment one paragraph
from the bottom.
 |
| I was going to make a sarcastic comment about the strange way that The Economist is playing General Marshall's appointment down, but then the third image in a "General Marshall Nobel Peace Prize" image search turned up this sweet picture. |
“The Planning Bill” My dear Jen, if
you ever do take up reading The
Economist, be prepared for an endless series of articles about people
talking about how they are going to talk about something in the future. It’s
something that I picked up from reading after Uncle George, who used to make
snide and sarcastic comments about the endless, numbing writeups about
preparations for talks about the future of international civil aviation in Flight. He would call them “Talking
about talking about civil aviation.” I love Uncle George, even if he thinks that he
is much funnier than he is, and he is not wrong about the way that "serious" papers love to talk about talking. The Planning Bill is about how English towns and counties and shires and principalities and
what have you (“local administration”) are to go about making sure that
buildings are built, and sewers dug, in an orderly fashion. So it is about talking, and, in short (too
late!), this is an article about talking about talking about talking. Hurrah! I am sure that the Earl
knows all about the details. It’s just not that important to anyone else. And
it is as long as the article about global nuclear disarmament!
 |
| Sweden's atomic-bomb proof underground aircraft engine factory is only the beginning. |
“The Music Boom” From the ridiculous
to the sublime, as you English people would say. The paper introduces the idea
that there is an “economic boom” in music by pointing out that the Albert Hall
is booked months in advance, and that the BBC has just launched a third
programme devoted entirely to music. “Do the deaf now hear?” It then wanders
off into the weeds, because for it, music is serious music, and while there has been an expansion in "full-time orchestras” in England, and bookings.. The audiences aren't coming along. Since people’s taste for serious
music is limited, perhaps this shows that the boom is already over. Next
week, the paper proposes to discuss the costs and sources of revenue of “the
various branches of the musical world.” At which point it might notice that there is a boom in the kind of music that people like.
“Danubian Peasant Parties” Are nice. The wine is cheap, the music is rousing and the dancing ---Oh, this
is about something else. Never mind, then.
Notes
of the Week
“The Drive for Production” Workers
aren’t working hard enough, and it’s not for lack of urging and exhortation, so
the next step is clearly more “education in the factories.” Although as the
paper points out, there is no way to measure per-man-hour productivity in
industry, it is nevertheless clear that it is too low, and should be higher.
“Anglo-American Military Policy” Talks
on standardising equipment and coordinating military policy between England and
America have gone a long way. As near as I can tell from the article, this has
led some people (Oh, you know those some
people, always some-ising) to say that it is too much, too close, England
will have to fight America’s wars, England is losing its independence, etc.
Tommy-rot, the paper says. In fact, Russia is welcome to join in, if it only
will.
“General Marshall Leaves China” An
unkind person might say something about being fired upwards. The paper
concludes that there was nothing for him to be done, as the Chinese are
xenophobic about foreigners due to their peculiar ways. (The peculiar ways of
the Chinese, that is, since there is nothing peculiar about wanting other
people’s silver, and taking it at the business end of a steam gunboat.)
 |
| It's a little self-serving for the descendant of a Guandgong merchant tong to emphasise the indemnity over the opium trade, but I don't think that it's wrong, either. |
“India: Sections and Provinces”
India isn’t likely to achieve independence as a single country, but everyone
will talk about it until independence sneaks up on them
and it is too late. And the paper will be there, talking about what everyone is
talking about: in this case, Sarat Chandra Bose resigning.
“Educational Touchstones” The
Government is BUNGLING the 1944 Education Act.
“Disappointing Housing Output” This
week, the news is that housing completions in November were disappointing, seeing
the lowest rate of increase since March, owing mainly to the lack of timber for
roofing, although the paper hopes that Mr. Bevan will admit that it is due mainly to his BUNGLING.
“Changing Administration in Germany”
The paper is worried that
the three chairmen of the German agencies are too conservative, and that this will retard full German unity.
“De Gasperi in Washington” Where he
is going to talk about the $900 million deficit in the Italian trade balance,
which will make it impossible to keep the Italian economy going after Unrra aid
ends in March, and will lead to left wing government in Italy, which is clearly to
be avoided at all costs. The country will need 300,000 tons of
grain a month to hold the ration. Only America has the transportation and the
grain, and the strikes have made even that uncertain. Now there must be a hurry
up effort extending after the end of
Unrra, and there is no clear idea how this is to be accomplished. In other
Mediterranean war-crippled countries-related news, a parliamentary report on
Greece recommends that the Greeks be urged to form a broad coalition government, and that English troops should withdraw.
“And So to Work” This is the title
of an exhibit in London about the effort to employ the 707,000 people on the
Disabled Register. The Churches’ Committee on
Gambling reports that gambling is up as much as threefold in seven years (they
have numbers for dog racing, but not horse-racing or football pools), and
probably amounts to £475 millions out of a total of £4,600 million spent on all
forms of personal consumption. The Committee is appalled. The paper wants a “heavy” tax on the heedless extravagance of
the poor.
“Suspense in Palestine” Uncle George
used to summarise this kind of article by just saying “Palestinians are excitable,” or the like. I say
“Palestinians,” becaise if I said “the
Jews are excitable,” I would sound far too much like the typical GOP County association member here in Santa Clara.
“Commonwealth Occupation Force”
There are 17,000 Commonwealth troops helping to occupy Japan, in which capacity
the recent tidal wave has a silver lining, since it gives them something to do.
The paper also notices a story about another force reduction, and since that
allows it to talk about the Indian troops in Japan, it can talk about how awful the Indian NationalArmy was.
 |
| Source |
“Armenian Exodus” The Soviet
Government’s effort to repopulate the Armenian highlands with Armenian
expatriates is going well. Of 60,000 in Persia, 12,000 have already left, and
20,000 recently left Lebanon for Soviet Armenia. The ones who go are typically
poor, as the rich are happy where they are, but perhaps they will contribute
money?
 |
| I don't see any way this could go wrong. |
Finally, a correction notices an
extraordinary statement to the effect that there will be a “5 to 10 pointdecline” in the average English IQ score by the end of the century due tostupid poor people having too many babies compared with smart rich people. Itis actually 0.5 to 1.0 point. Well! A correction nicely appended at the bottomof the page will do wonders to correct the confirmed prejudices of anyself-satisfied Economist reader!
Letters
to the Editor
R. P. Lynton, of 69, Exeter Road,
London, writes to point out that Amalgamated Cotton’s report on the
consequences of the five-day week was preliminary by its own account; that many
other factors have to be
taken into account; and that the likely result of the 40-hour week is increased
productivity due to reduced absenteeism. “It remains to be seen whether the
consumer will pay for increased costs, or, alternately, for increased profits.”
Walter A. Anderson, who writes from the Oriental Club, Hanover Square, London, suggests
that the paper has made a mistake in its coverage of the Companies Bill, 1946.
Tom Sargant, of 67, Haverstock Hill, London, takes the paper to task about its
insistence that nationalisation is only justifiable if it increases efficiency.
(The paper loves “efficiency.") Mr. S. T. Killick has opinions about the paper’s opinions about
the oil business in the Middle East, which is that the petroleum companies are
already too kind and generous to foreigners. Martin Madden, of 3 Hillcroft
Crescent, has opinions about how economics should be taught.
From
the Economist of 1847
A century ago, the paper speculated
about the composition of the Cabinet. The paper wants a Peelite (that is,
Conservative) ministry, mainly because it hopes that he will betray “the
Protectionists” again. Then it goes on snidely about a
recent hunt that killed “1039 of those destructive vermin –game, on one
estate.” The idea is that this game is eating “the scanty crops of the
impoverished tenants" between hunt meetings, and this is terrible.
American
Survey
“Majority Position” The paper spends
a full column on the new Republican leadership of the more important
Congressional Committees before moving on to the stock-taking now on within the
Democratic Party. Henry Wallace wants to draw clear lines between “reactionaries” and liberals, while the Union for Democratic Action wants to include “all sections of heirs of the
New Deal,” under
the chairmanship of Leon Henderson and Wilson Wyatt.
 |
| I'm worried that I'm being too subtle. |
“Saving the Soil” (From a
Correspondent in Iowa)
Back in 1939, “When Messrs. Jacks
and Whyte wrote their book, The Rape of
the Earth,” many had been aroused to worry about soil destruction, but
little had been done. [G. V. Jacks and R. O. Whyte, Rape of the Earth: A World Survey of Soil Erosion; American title, Vanishing Lands.] The world, etc. In the eight years since,
however, A Correspondent in Iowa reports, an enormous amount has been accomplished,
and while a lot of it has to do with the formation of organisations with
alphabet titles, concrete things have been done, as well.
American
Notes
It’s halfway through the paper,
probably time to notice that Secretary Byrnes has resigned to make way for
General Marshall, who, it is hoped to make the Republican Congress brighten up a bit.
“Truman to Congress” The Annual
State of the Nation Address was a chance for the President to throw down a
challenge. There will be more trust-busting; debt reduction will take
precedence over tax reduction; the budget will be much above Republican
estimates, and will feature increased excise taxes; and Mr. Truman will
continue to veto anti-labour bills in the wake of the unexpected upholding of
his veto of the Case Bill. Also, the war is over effective 31 December, says
the President, and so are the emergency proclamations made under the War Powers
Act. That means the War Labour Disputes Act is gone, and farm subsidies are
only guaranteed through the harvest.
“Filibusters After Bilbo” The “Bilbo
filibuster,” which last week-end threatened to paralyse the Senate, has been
brought to an end by a compromise arrangement, as Senator Bilbo retires under
the pretext (or reality) of serious illness. This has led to talk that theremight be action on reforming the Senate filibuster.
“Ford-Ferguson” Ford, which has been
making Ferguson’s revolutionary hydraulic-takeoff tractor (or so the paper sees
it) for the American market, has broken with Mr. Ferguson. With annual sales of
$1 billion, up from $450 million before the war, the farm implement and tractor
business is very lucrative, and high farm wages will continue to promote
mechanisation, so it is likely to get even bigger, and Ford doesn’t want to
share.
 |
| If Ford does it, it's not piracy. By Mulad - flickr.com, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2599124 |
In shorter notes, Washington is
still pushing the Soviet Union for a final resolution of Lend-Lease obligations
to clear the way for a Russian credit; and the State Department is planning
educational meetings around America to explain why internationalism is good for
you.
The
World Overseas
“Crisis in the French Empire” (From
Our Paris Correspondent)
The Franco-Annamese War, which has
been in abeyance for 60 years on account of the French having all the guns, was
resumed on 19 December. The French find this inexplicable, since it is only
fair that people, once conquered, should stay conquered. Even more unfairly,
the Chinese are interfering. Hurrah! Somewhere I can support the Koumintang! The French
Communists actually agree with this –the thought must make the Koumintang very
uncomfortable. If, that is, they can tell the difference between French
Communists and a piece of ripe cheese, which they probably cannot. The French
Socialists try to occupy the middle ground, which is that the Annamese (and manyothers) ought to
be more grateful for being conquered, and the French should be more accommodating of their feelings. The future of liberty,
equality and fraternity on a world scale is whether the French have enough
guns.
“The Nyasaland Market” After six
years of steady economic expansion thanks to the war, Nyasaland is suffering
from a severe shortage of trade. Nyasalanders need a steady supply of cotton
piece goods, blanks, shirts, singlets and underwear, and aspire to have a
bicycle and a sewing machine each. They have been paying for ever more of these
imports with their ever-increasing cash income, largely thanks to Askari
remittances. With the war over, they face the problem of finding £1.75
million in imports, some two-and-a-half times total imports in 1939. There is
just not enough goods coming in, even though there is the cash to pay for it. In
shorter news, the paper notes that more money circulating in West Africa has
led to an insatiable demand for a tenth-penny copper bronze coin of local
minting. 375 million are in circulation in British West Africa, despite efforts
to popularise notes.
The
Business World
“Programme for Steel” England is
short coal, timber and steel, and the three interact. Coal must be exported to
pay for timber, and steel is held back by a shortage of coal, despite the
effort to refit furnaces to burn oil. To meet the steel shortage, Britain is
scrounging supplies from as far afield as Canada and Australia, and hoping for
a Continental recovery. The loss of exports due to the diversion of steel to
the home market, is a blow to the export drive, and affects steel producers’
profits, as they lose an export differential of about £2/ton. The problem is, not
enough steel, and the solution is in the sight in the distance, as European
steel production comes back. But that does not fill up a page and a half, and
the paper hasn’t talked about talking yet (I told you!) so now it launches into
the way that steel supplies are allocated, and the threat of nationalisation,
and something something the Government is BUNGLING. In shorter news below, a
similar situation is emerging with cement exports, with total production in
November at 6.9 million tons against a pre-war estimated capacity of 8 ¾
million.
Business
Notes
By business, the paper often means
finances, which could hardly be more irrelevant to a newsletter discussing how
we are investing the money that our friends and family are slipping out of the London market to America. The paper is busy looking for places where English investors
can escape “cheap money” and also with the alarming news that the Loan has been drawn down by $800 million
out of $3750 million already. Speaking of, I hope the Earl survived his landing at Kai Tak and the ferry ride.
“Central Bank and National Debt”
Marriner Eccles has made headlines by asserting that the entire American
national debt is, in effect, a pay-on-demand obligation, inspiring a parade of
the professionally worried to pronounce that the entire debt is about to be
paid out in million dollar bills, leading to wheelbarrows of money to the bakery, etc. Marriner Eccles! The paper sets us straight. It’s only true for if no-one tests it, as with any kind of banking.
“The Sate of Labour” Strikes are
down, the five-day week is advancing, the working class is still not convinced
that it makes more sense, from the full technical efficiency perspective, to
take their Christmas holidays in February and their summer holidays in
November. (That is me, nudging Mr. Crowther in the ribs. In theory it is a wonderful idea to “stagger” paid holiday weeks so that everyone is not
crammed into the trains at once. The problem that the paper refuses to
acknowledge is that the labouring classes will be “staggered” into bad times, and shouldn’t they
be allowed to bargain for something in return? (Perhaps I'm too sensitive on this score,having heard a few appeals in my time about Bay-area employers having the bright idea to work their heathen Chinese employees on Christmas Day without compensation later.) The Transport
Nationalisation Bill is in trouble due to a haulage strike. On the other hand,
Christmas coal production is up to 5.336 million tons vice 4.366, whether due
to patriotic exhortation or the fact that “staggered” holidays are better than
none at all. So far, this has been enough to prevent works closures.
“Shipping after ‘The End of
Hostilities’” The end of War Powers means that by 30 June, 500 American ships
on barebone charters to Allied Nations must be either purchased outright or
returned. England, which has about half, or 2 million tons, wants to maintain
the charters, and emphatically not buy
these floating heaps of junk, held together across the welds by bale wire and
rats. Although we’ll take the Victories and the Maritime Commission tankers, or, really, anything not made by Uncle Henry. The Maritime Commission is excited
by the idea of selling them while it can, and thinks that the revocation gives
it leverage. The State Department sees disaster in the wind, and disagrees.
“Fur Market Difficulties” Fortune covered the failure of that
company that was making the new sheepskin products last month. This week, The
Hudson’s Bay auction (of 20,000 fox furs and 10,000 mink skins) did much better
than recent New York sales, leading the paper to hope that more fur sellers
will consign to London instead of New York, which will show up as a re-export
to England’s credit when sold in Europe.
 |
| Unfortunately, timing prevents me from covering the story in next week's Economist about how the "electronics industry" is going ahead. So let's look at the Old Vinyl Factory, currently employing 10,000 people, and threatened with a shutdown due to lack of coal. |
Aviation,
January 1946
Line
Editorial
James H. McGraw’s monthly editorial
insert somehow ended up in the middle of the paper, and looks more than usual
like an amateur production. Not surprisingly, considering that the title is
“The Closed Shop: Key to Labour Monopoly,” and the subject is getting rid of
the “closed shop,” in which everyone working in a given facility must be a
member of a union, or the union. Mr.
McGraw thinks that such agreements were needed in the old days, with predatory
employers exploiting weak employees and imposing “yellow dog” contracts,” but,
nowadays, in our modern world we do not need them any more, because peace and
light and understanding prevail.
Aviation
Editorials
“Cold Realism for 1947” The
Government needs to buy more warplanes, because it would be good for the
industry, and also WWIII.
 |
| Underground factory under construction in Sweden. |
“Microscope Those Markets” The
plight of the personal plane makers is the result of their failure to know
their markets. If only they had “microscoped” their potential markets, instead
of, oh, say, taking the aviation press at its word, they wouldn't have lost their shirt on small civil aircraft.
The paper then bulks out the
editorial content with a few pages of new products –so, ads between the ads.
Aviation
News
Through October, the American
industry produced 31,013 aircraft, as against a predicted 35,000, and sold them
for $300 million, a much more serious disappointment, since it was hoping for a
billion-dollar year, 60% military, 40% civilian. The largest contract went to
Republic, for 500 P-84s. Development-wise, the year saw two new jet fighters,
North American’s XFJ-1 and the Chance Vought XF6U-1,
while there was one new bomber, Martin’s XP4M-1 four engine jet-reciprocating navy plane that uses a combination of the Wasp Major and I-40.
First deliveries of the Martin 202 are expected next month. Curtiss-Wright has announced a new cargo plane, the CW-32. The National Aviation Trades Association is reorganising again. The aviation industry has been given $70 million to work out a mass-mobilisation plan. The new Congress may insist that the Administration submit bilateral air traffic agreements to the Senate as treaties; and cut appropriations for the airport programme. NAA has awarded the Robert J. Collier Trophy to Dr. Alvarez for the Ground Controlled Approach radar landing system. Interservice talks on cockpit standardisation is going ahead. The first XS-1 trial flight happened some more. Taylorcraft and Culver have applied for bankruptcy protection. A Swedish firm has paid CentralAircraft Corporation, of Yakima, Washington, $1 million for helicopters, the first quantity order for commercially-licensed helicopters. Sikorsky is working on its new S-52, and Wright Field is testing the German built Dobhoffjet-propelled helicopter, in which propulsion comes from jet nozzles at the tips of the rotors. Last year saw aircraft passenger deaths reach the lowest point since 1939, 1.2 per million miles. Canadian air transport reached 76,000 passengers per month last August, almost double a year earlier. Canadian domestic airlines now employ 455 pilots and co-pilots, 2,422 ground crew and administrative personnel. TCA is proud of its new “drydock” for servicing DC-4Ms.
 |
| Another example of "honeycomb" construction as they understood it in 1947. |
while there was one new bomber, Martin’s XP4M-1 four engine jet-reciprocating navy plane that uses a combination of the Wasp Major and I-40.
 |
| Interesting service history, to put it mildly. |
First deliveries of the Martin 202 are expected next month. Curtiss-Wright has announced a new cargo plane, the CW-32. The National Aviation Trades Association is reorganising again. The aviation industry has been given $70 million to work out a mass-mobilisation plan. The new Congress may insist that the Administration submit bilateral air traffic agreements to the Senate as treaties; and cut appropriations for the airport programme. NAA has awarded the Robert J. Collier Trophy to Dr. Alvarez for the Ground Controlled Approach radar landing system. Interservice talks on cockpit standardisation is going ahead. The first XS-1 trial flight happened some more. Taylorcraft and Culver have applied for bankruptcy protection. A Swedish firm has paid CentralAircraft Corporation, of Yakima, Washington, $1 million for helicopters, the first quantity order for commercially-licensed helicopters. Sikorsky is working on its new S-52, and Wright Field is testing the German built Dobhoffjet-propelled helicopter, in which propulsion comes from jet nozzles at the tips of the rotors. Last year saw aircraft passenger deaths reach the lowest point since 1939, 1.2 per million miles. Canadian air transport reached 76,000 passengers per month last August, almost double a year earlier. Canadian domestic airlines now employ 455 pilots and co-pilots, 2,422 ground crew and administrative personnel. TCA is proud of its new “drydock” for servicing DC-4Ms.
“Design Details of the Martin 202” Details
of auxiliaries aside (for example, new cabin heaters and provision for
water-injection), the major improvement that jumps out at me here is the
“honeycomb” construction of the fuselage floor and bulkheads. These are
double-thickness large, flat surfaces, and instead of being solid (or,
alternatively, hollow), they are filled with a “honeycomb” of strengtheners
which might be anything from fiberglass to linen. Anti-icing is with piped hot
air, and there is an automatic stabiliser on the flaps.
John Shesta, Director of Research
and Engineering, Reaction Motors, Inc., “RMI’s Rocket Engine Which Powers
Supersonic XS-1” RMI has an impressive name, but sounds like a very small
company. Mr. Shesta is the treasurer, as well as Director of Research. (The
rest of the board consists of Lovell Lawrence, H. Franklin Pierce and James H.Wyld.) Their 6000C4 is a “liquid
propellant regenerative rocket engine.” It is regenerative because the fuel
(kerosene and liquid oxygen(!)) is piped around the combustion chamber. This
vaporises it, drawing heat from the combustion chamber walls, and then
returning the energy to the motor.
Stanley A. Hall, Northrop Aircraft,
Inc., “Towards Better Cockpits: An Engineering Approach” Dr. E. F. DuBois, of
the National Research Council on Aviation Medicine, has analysed cockpit
control elements as “an extension of the pilot’s nervous system,” and come up
with various numbers that calculate . . something. Then he turns it into a
formula, and the formula infallibly tells him where all the controls go. I am
not sure how it adds in all the new controls that people keep introducing, but
perhaps now that the war is over they will stop introducing new ones.
James G. Ray, Vice-President,
Southwest Airways, Co., “Rotative Flight Brake Proposed to Moderate Landing
Speeds” I am going to go out on a limb and suggest that Mr. Ray is one of those
vice-presidents who become vice-presidents on the strength of their investment
in the company, and not their grasp of the business.
Worlddata
The English transonic research test
rockets exist more. In France, the Leduc 6-10 was tested for the first time.
Russia will begin flying a four-engined transport[?] between Vladivostok and
Moscow in 1948. An Indian firm is interested in building the Cheslea Ace.
“Landing Gear Pre-Rotator Housed
Within Wheel” Pre-rotating the landing wheels up to speed greatly reduces thestress on the undercarriage. In this gear, which is to be tested on the
Lockheed Constitution, a self-contained electric motor in the landing gear does
all the work.
“Aircraft Engine Plant Goes
Underground” The Swedes have built a complete, underground engine factory. Full
details are not available, but it seems that the halls radiate from a central
hub. It was built in two years, and there is another one near Stockholm. It has
air purification filters, and can be cut off from the outside for as long as 34
hours in the event of atomic or poison gas attack.
Ernest G. Stout, “Static Stability
Analysis for Flying Boats and Seaplanes, Part II”
John E. McDonald, “Practical
Engineering of Rotary-Winged Aircraft, Part VII” Between them, Mr. McDonald and
Mr. Stout have written about half the content in Aviation over the last year, thanks to his exhaustive discussion of
how floats work. No-one cares, but either the paper paid him a lot of money
back when it was flush, or he is doing it a huge favour in the way of putting
words between ads.
“Bell XS-1 Readied for Supersonic
Trials” After you’ve read the trade press for a while, you get used to these
endlessly repetitive articles. The Bell XS-1 is a rocket research plane
designed to go up and fly very fast and see what happens. (Hopefully, it
doesn’t turn out to be, “The pilot dies.”) It will be lifted by a B-29. It has
a rocket motor. Etc.
“Two New All-Jet Fighters Join
Navy’s Air Arm” Speaking of repetitive. Although this feature has pictures of
the new North American and Vought jet planes. The Vought looks particularly
squat and ugly.
“Convair Producing All-metal L-13Liaison” It is an “XL-13,” because it is an experimental type, but it’s just a
tiny little high-wing personal plane. The novelty, such as it is, is that
they’ve gotten rid of residual bits of fabric that often show up on the control
surfaces of other planes of its type. That will be a huge advantage for
maintenance. I’m not clear how they handle the weight, although I do notice
that they’ve put a 245 hp Franklin
engine, which is very large compared with rivals. The Taylorcraft Auster, for
example, has a 130hp engine.
Cmdr Thomas D. Davies, USN, and Lt.
Hugh L. Hanson, “Design Key to Turtle’s Trick” When the Navy introduced
land-based maritime patrol planes, it soon found that Army planes weren’t suitable
without what amounted to a complete redesign. So why not design a new one from
the ground up? The chosen aircraft was a development of the Lockheed twin line,
most notably the “Hudson,” or A-20 in American use. The aerodynamic design is
not particularly innovative, but it does have a large dedicated volume for
fuel. For the record flight, tanks were added in place of the original package
of 6 20mm cannons in the nose, and in the bomb bay in the fuselage, giving a
total capacity of 8,600 gallons. The plane was optimised for cruising
altitudes, which meant that it needed a 6000ft run to get off the ground in
Australia, and booster rockets. The cruise fell short of its original
objective, Bermuda, which would have taken it the long-dreamed-of twelve thousand
miles, but it did set a record.
Michael Marsh, McGraw-Hill World
News, “French Plane Industry Accents Variety” The company’s French stringer
goes to some factories and takes photos of the S0-6000 under construction to go
with press releases about current and future offerings.
“Grumman’s New Mallard Has Novel
Refinements, Part I” The Mallard is Grumman’s new “feederline” amphibian. The
novel refinements are mainly cabin furniture, although the strut that lifts the
wheels out of the water is very neat and compact.
Hagan L. Jackson, Engineering Department,
Industrial Electronics Department, Westinghouse Electric Corporation,
Baltimore, “New Instrument System Proposed for Flight and Landing Safety” Small
radio beacons along cross-country pathways and at smaller airports substitute
for onboard radar. CRTS show results.
Fred W. Zellmer, Southwest Airmotive Co., Maintenance Coordinator, “Southwest Airmotive Builds on War-Acquired
Tooling” You might think that it was naked boosterism for the head of a maintenance
company’s maintenance division to publish an “article” about how wonderful the
company’s maintenance practices are, but you are not an editor desperate for
cheap editorial content and advertising.
Fortune,
January 1947
Leaders
“The Promise of the Republican
Return” The paper is happy that the GOP is back, and upset that the New Republic is so worked up about
it. The paper would like to fit in with the best society of papers. It isn't at all like those Republicans, after all. Although it then launches into “free enterprise,” and “liberty,” free trade, “China” and
the needs of defence, and the “overreach” of labour, suggesting that The New Republic isn't necessarily completely wrong about "those" Republicans being back.
Fortune
Survey
This month’s survey tests American
commitment to the “American credo.” That is, the idea that our futures will be
better than the past, and that our sons (“asked of men only”) will have a
higher station in life. The answer is that more believe this than in 1940
(two-thirds of respondents), and that people are less likely to believe it, the
poorer they are. Since poorness coincides with working union jobs in factories,
the paper draws the obvious conclusion –that mass-production dulls ambition!
Not surprisingly, it then goes on to
ask whether respondents are thinking about starting their own business. The
answer is that rich people and Coloured people do, and poorer, white labourers
do not. People are more willing to take
a chance on uncertain employment, want more money, and, by a “bare majority” of
56.4%, don’t expect WWIII within ten years.
Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., “The
Supreme Court: 1947” I can’t for the life of me see why you would care about
the Supreme Court. It does rule on business cases, but no-one ever cares about
that.
“The Housing Mess: As Thousand of
Veterans Failed to Cheer, The Building Boys Huffed and Puffed and Blew in Mr.
Wyatt’s Housing Programme” Wyatt’s programme aimed at starting more homes in
1946 than were built in the whole of the 1930s, which is remarkable, and 1.2
million homes, which is also remarkable, but not in a good way, since it is
less than one house for every hundred persons over an entire decade! I don’t
remember that way –and then I recall that pursed lip look of our elders In talking ( Judith and Wong Lee are
particularly good at it), and get some vague sense of how much they sacrificed
to shelter us from it. The President called upon him to “make no little plans,”
and delegated war powers to him. Mr. Wyatt compared it to Roosevelt’s 50,000
aircraft plan. The initial response was enthusiastic, with 884,00 starts in the
first eight months of 1946, more than any full year since 1925. This was
compensated in part for a rapid decline in non-residential construction; but
there were also major increases in production of housing materials. Yet, in the
next eight months after, much of this building stalled. Shortages from plumbing
fixtures to water pipes to electrical switchboxes held up completion. In San
Francisco, the Chamber of Commerce identified a need for 41,500 new units, 2500
were started, and only 300 completed. In Detroit, where need was 100,000,
starts were 50,000, and completions 3000, the last number was less than in
1939, 1940 and 1941. So much for an emergency building programme!
In Buffalo, which has seen little
development within 6 miles of the centre of the city since the 1850s, a pre-war
slum clearance that built 2270 public housing units in four federal projects to
replace shocking slums, [Buffalo slum explosion 1936] was the only significant
effort before the war, which saw a net population growth from 858,000 to
909,000 (including 100,000 going off to war). The city has held this gain since
the peace, since although the two Curtiss-Wright plants, Bell Aircraft plants,
and Bethlehem Steel’s Lackawanna plant are no longer building for the war,
Westinghouse has bought the new Curtiss plant and Western Electric has leased
the old one. Thirty-four new businesses are looking to open in Buffalo; the
veterans have returned, and no-one knows how the city accommodated its
population gains of the war period, never mind how it will accommodate new
workers on top of the veterans. The vacancy rate is under one-half of one
percent, and families are living in rented rooms, trailer and tourist cabins.
Fourteen thousand new units are needed. Families looking to buy can afford
$5600, or $45/month in rent; while families looking to rent can afford $40.
That’s not very much! Very few new homes are selling for less than $6000, or
renting for less than $50. Wage increases are being eaten up by higher
builders’ costs, which seem to be necessary to get the homes started. (For it
looks as though 1946 will be a record year, after all.
Although private builders are upset
about price ceilings, construction material priority schedules and the usual
“government red tape,” they are most upset about the “coddling” of
prefabricators, who are allegedly getting more than their share of raw
materials. Continuing its focus on the Buffalo area, the paper sends a reporter
to interview Melvin H. Baker, President of National Gypsum Company. Its
complaint is that it has been forced to
produce board rather than the more salable lathe. The National Housing
Administration points out that this has more to do with the lack of wire than
its priorities, to which Mr. Baker replies that he is being squeezed by the
high price for wire offered by Sewell Avery’s U.S. Gypsum, and he will not go
higher. He also tells the story of how, during the meat shortage, when cattle
hooves disappeared from the market, he substituted chicken feathers in plaster
production. After a week, his workforce broke out in rashes, and he had to
abandon the new material. AT Dohm, Field and Company, one of the city’s largest
lumber yards, President Oliver J Veling pointed out that while the lumber industry
was all jumbled up by price ceilings, which allowed too-generous profits and thereby led to lumber mills buying lumber
yards and lumber yards buying mills, the real problem was that greedy builders
started far more houses than there were materials in sight to build.
At this point, the paper throws in a
conclusion, that the Wyatt programme was derailed more by people being sick and
tired of controls than by the effects of the controls themselves. (At the
actual end, it notices that the wyatt programme was a “private enterprise”
programme, and that entrepreneurs made a great deal of money on it, and that
the only problem was that it was not as much as they wanted.) Unfortunately, it
is difficult to put a conclusion in the middle of an article, so it goes on to
notice the controversy over Lustron’s attempted toakeover of the Detroit
Arsenal, funded by a $52 million government line of credit and $36,000 of Lustron
money. Wyatt’s handling of that affair is what most people think led to his
resignation.
However, it is still not time for a
conclusion, so the paper goes on to discuss “industrialised,” as opposed to
“prefab” housing. Industrialised housing is not mass-produced in factory, but
mass-housing-estate-ised in large blocks of land. Once again, there is a story
about new materials. If we see, in the future, 100,000 aluminum houses and
100,000 steel to 150,000 wood and plywood structures, the “long-awaited
home-building revolution” will finally be here.
“Fiberglas: Owens-Corning Has Had
Monopolies on the Prospects and Problems of a Versatile New Raw Material:
Competitors Will Soon Share Both” Owens-Corning has its origins in Mike Owens,
who created the first mechanical bottlemaker. This led, in some obscure
fashion, to the modern fiberglas business, on which Owens-Corning has an
American “product monopoly,” created by a combination of patents and capital
investment. Although a true, woven fabric, fiberglas is not suitable for
clothes, much as Barbara Stanwyck wants a Fiberglas bathing suit. This sounds
like a promotion to me, as actual Fiberglas production was minimal before the
war. It has exploded since then, because it is good, cheap insulation. Postwar,
Owens-Corning is caught between fears that if it goes into mass production, it
will compete with other products, such as rock wool, for a too-small market,
and that, if it doesn’t, it will see competitors take its place.
 |
| I have no idea what the deal is with a "Fiberglas bathing suit," but I suspect that it would be awfully itchy. |
“The Trouble with U.S. Wool” This
is, or ought to be, dear to the family. Our forebears invested heavily in the
western sheep-farming business as the San Francisco tallow trade died away
after the Gold Rush. The truth is, our lands can’t even compete with Wyoming
and Utah, never mind Australia and New Zealand. Wyoming’s senators have been
successful in winning generous subsidies for American wool, but even at that, a
combination of high labour and production costs and poor quality fails to make
up the ground in competition with empire cloth. The future for American
woolgrowing is probably confined to low-quality ranch land in Texas and Utah
that’s not good for anything else.
 |
| Sheep in Australia |
“Wool in Australia” How to the
Australians do it? Three million square miles, seven million people, 205
million sheep; what they lost per sheep, they make up on volume! Or, more
seriously, they have lower labour costs. The paper cites the 900,000-acre ranch
of Haddon Rigg, 240 miles northwest of Sydney, where G. R. Faulkiner produces a
clip of 1000 bales a year, carefully graded at “the station” into sixty
different types.
 |
| The caption I couldn't help cutting says, "Graded and stamped." It looks like the Australian advantage is labour costs? |
“The Watch” The paper’s readers like
expensive watches. I like expensive
watches, too!
 |
| Tiny, cute little machine tools! |
“Hamilton Watch” Hamilton Watch
makes nice, expensive watches.
“The Furniture Industry” The
furniture industry is very local, because it is expensive to ship long
distances. Here are pictures of many nice pieces, and some words to go with
them. I won’t bother you with the words, as we’re not investing in furniture!
“Astrophysics: In Thirty Years,
Man’s Concept of the Universe Has Undergone Enormous Expansion The New Year May
Bring a New Milestone” We are also not investing in the Palomar Observatory,
but its enormous new telescope will bring us new revelations about the nature
of our universe. Perhaps. It will certainly bring work to optical scientists
and specialist camera-makers. (Of course, as we know from my father-in-law,
there is a good, solid basis of business for camera-makers in the trade that
dare not speak its name. I notice that there is also a resurgence of “solar” astronomy,
or looking at the Sun, and I suppose that that is not unrelated to our search
for Sun-like conditions here on Earth, in the form of nuclear test explosions
of suspiciously communistic politics.)
“The Universe: Expanding or
Oscillating, Finite or Infinite, It is Vast and Unstable” It is pretty clear
now that the universe is expanding, but not in the sense that it is flying
apart, but that space itself is expanding(!) Whether this continues, or it
begins to shrink, we do not know; but it is probably finite, since the
“boundary conditions” of a closed universe make more sense than an open one. Ahem. Upon rereading that, I can see why
my father-in-law keeps telling me to tone it down. I've cut a very long lecture about light speed and redshifts and galaxies. Do let me know if you want to hear more, sweet cousin!
“Is There a German Policy?” The
paper is asking, because it really wants to know.
“The Great Throat: Bing Crosby:
First on Films, First on the Air, and First on the Phonographs of His
Countrymen” When I am being coy, I talk about the grandson of Bing Choy and the
Reverend Crosby as “Uncle George’s friend.” It makes us sound almost
possessive, and we did do him a good turn a few years ago. If you think about it, his marriage to a white woman is technically illegal under California law, and his network
was inclined to hold this over his head when he was trying to get out of his
radio performance contract. It didn’t help that he made the mistake of not
rushing back to his house when it caught fire in 1943, with all those
subpoenaeble documents inside. We suppressed some evidence that came up in the
matter; not the first favour we have done to his clan, nor the first that his
has done for us. Now we have taken a share in Philco, his new sponsor, and a
much greater one in the companies that aim to provide him with new recording
equipment. That’s our share in a
virtual, one-man industry. Somehow, we have managed not to be involved in his
other major business enterprise, frozen orange juice concentrate.
Crosby sold twelve million records
last year. He makes movies, and has a half-hour radio show every Wednesday
night. He won the Academy Award for best actor in 1944, and continues to act.
So much for the revenue stream. This puts money in hand for other business. He
earns $20,000 per year from his investments exclusive of royalties, and his
sons may each earn a bit more from an investment company set up in their name
in 1942. The conclusion from that is that he has to keep on working, until his
investment income exceeds a million a year! That may not be as far away as the
numbers suggest. Mr. Crosby takes in $7500/week out of a total Philco budget of
$22,500. Philco makes much of it back with
subsidised ad buys from local Philco dealers in the towns where radio stations
use the transcribed show instead of expensive network “live” broadcast. The paper notes that he sold his interest in the
Del Mar race track for $481,000, and took 14% in the Pittsburgh Pirates for
$215,000; and took a six year lease on a 30,000 acre ranch in southern
California at $35,000 a year. I think the idea here is that the ranch makes him
money on top of the lease, although I have a feeling he is paying for privacy.
 |
| The Palomar 200" telescope doesn't belong here, but it does break up the wall of text. |
His show will
probably lead to more “transcribed” radio shows, much to the upset of the
networks, which have built their business on live broadcasts. I’ve also heard
it said that the transcribed shows do not always have good sound quality due to
poor handing of the master record discs. That day will come to an end when all
local radio stations have tape-recorder-players, which day cannot come soon
enough for Mr. Crosby, Philco or silent partners. (Us!) And, just think had it
not been for their mistake of supporting the losing side in a world war, it
could have been Deutsche Gramophone, instead.
“Uncommonly Scarce: The Common Nail”
It takes 400lb of nails to build a
conventional house. 350,000 tons of nails were projected in 1945 under the NHA
emergency programme. Nail prices were frozen in 19441 at $51/ton. IN May of
1945, the price was increased by $7/ton, and another $10/ton in June, at which
point the country had a 45-day supply on hand. This brought production up to
63,000tons per month in September, well short of the 74,000 tons per month
target. Steel companies do not like to overinvest in nails, which are a
boom-and-bust proposition. The same steels can go into springs and wire, which
are more stable. Priorities under the
plan led to a black market, which ended with the end of price ceilings in
November, but not the nail shortage, which is now a major factor in holding
back construction.
 |
| So the Hale Telescope discovered quasars |
Shorts
and Faces
“Liquidation of the Middle Brows”
The paper shows that, statistically, everyone making “$5000 or more a year” has
seen a decline in his income since 1940 after taxes and a 20% reduction in
purchasing power due to a rising cost of living. That is, if their income has
been constant over that time! The idea of the “liquidation of the middle class”
is widely peddled, but, as the paper points out, all Americans think that they
are in the middle class, which is why it prefers “Middle Brows.” This is why
everyone hopes that the Republicans will slash income taxes. Somewhat
facetiously, I think, the paper adds that “But one practical manifestation of
the general unrest is already in evidence: expense accounts and entertainment
budgets have burgeoned with unprecedented splendour.”
 |
| This looks pretty devastating until you realise that no-one living off salaried income had a static wage between 1940 and 1946. It is a revelation that even in 1946 the party of fiscal responsibility wanted to lead with tax cuts for the wealthy, but I'm not sure why I would be surprised. |
This feature usually has brief
stories about companies, focussing on their presidents, rather than news bits
like the one above. Uncle George used to joke that the choices for this section
were determined by which parties Mr. Luce wanted to be invited to, than
anything the companies had actually accomplished. That isn’t always fair, but
it does make a good short-hand, since the companies often haven’t anything much
new to offer, and even when they are successful, it is far too late to “get in
on the ground floor” by the time they make the pages of Fortune! For example, there’s more than a page devoted to Jamison Handy, “President of the Jam Handy Organisation,” which seems to offer mostly
promotional services to Detroit-area manufacturers. After-dinner speeches,
charts, models, slide-films, and even an artificial cow model for Purina Chow.
Also, Wendell Willkie’s billion-dollar utility holding company, Commonwealth
and Southern, has recently been revealed on Wall Street as a hollow shell,
likely worth closer to 91 cents a share than $5. The company disagrees with the
SEC on the matter, and various legal manoeuvres are underway. Also, Pepsi is being
squeezed by the rising price of sugar, but trying to hold the line against
Coca-Cola in hopes that the price of sugar will begin to fall soon.
It turns out that there's dozens of Jam Handy short films on Youtube.
The
Farm Column
“City Farmers and Their Clubs” “City
farmers” might be dilettantes farming some small portion of an estate otherwise
rented out, or, conversely, people who only have time for a spread that is too
small to be economical by itself. Either way, they live in cities, and some of
them have clubs. How many? Who knows, but it is winter, and Ladd Haystead, the
author of this column, always has trouble filling it out in mid-winter, and
farmers who take the paper are probably very interested in this kind of club.
At least, I hope they are, because Ladd spends his entire column on them. I
used to make fun of Mr. Haystead. Now I am more worried about his health and
his job.
Business
Abroad
The first managing director of theIMF will be Camille Gutt, of Belgium a famed “hard money man.” The paper points
out that while the political delegations to the great meetings that set up the
postwar financial order were preoccupied with the threat of a postwar
depression and currency depreciation to keep exports going, “hard-headed
bankers” expected inflation, on the contrary. Now, the bankers have been proven
right. The money supply is increasing in country after country, prices are
rising, exports are becoming more difficult, and imports can only be financed
by borrowing.
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