Postblogging Technology, November 1950, II: Platypus Time

R_.C_.,
The Peninsula,
Hong Kong




Dear Father:

Yours truly has caught up with events, so I am writing just days after I received my magazines. Which means that as I write I have no idea how many of the Marines are going to make it back down the Chongjin road, if any, and my anger is burning. I know that you did what you could last month to bring the dangers home to Washington, but I guess it was all futile, wasn't it? And even if not a single Marine makes it home, Time will just wave the bloody shirt and make it an excuse to drop a few atom bombs on the damn, dirty Communists. (In fact, having cheated and paged a few issues ahead, I can spoil the suspense and tell that that is exactly what those bastards did.)

So, no, before you ask, I'm not moody!

Your Loving Daughter,
Ronnie

Time, 20 November, 1950

Since there's no important news out of Asia or anything, Time splashes a pretty redhead and a Broadway producer on the front cover. (Beats giving General MacArthur another one!)

Letters

Bill Corson and 

Dean A. Worcester, Jr. of the University of Washington are AGAINST the recent Eberstadt "pro-WWIII" article, while Emma LaPorte of Stephens College, Missouri and H. P. Langworthy of New Orleans are FOR it.   A cynical person might decide that Time's mailbag was running pretty hot and heavy anti-WWIII for it to try so hard to make the representation in the letter columns look so even-handed. Or maybe a hopeful person? Can there be such a thing as a hopeful cynic? The picture of the burning USS Franklin should not have been credited to Captain Streichen. Time is still super-duper mad at Merriman Smith for breaking the Wake Island embargo. Several people still like Omar Khayyam even if the edition was improved. Our publisher catches up with Korean Presbyterian seminarian Ye Yun-Ho, who survived the Communist occupation just fine, although the American bombing and the inflation have been a trial and now he has to make ends meet by painting the portraits of American GIs, and just the other day when he went to a church in Pusan a stray dog bit his leg, and in general he is ashamed that before the war he was trying to go to America. I feel like Our Publisher either needs some help reading between the lines, or that he's just passing the message along to someone else who or might not be Henry Luce. 

National Affairs

"Only an Idiot" Bob Taft celebrated his victory by suggesting to Time that the new controlling minority(I know!) in the Senate was going to take this silly old North Atlantic security thing apart piece by piece. Then when he noticed Europe having a fainting spell, he came right back and told everyone that "only an idiot would be an isolationist today," which sounds an awful lot like "only an idiot" would take him seriously. He just wants to defend Europe with "air power" instead of troops. It's only in Formosa that he wants to use ground forces! Your GOP today! Time scrambles to explain that only a few GOP isolationists were elected, so everything is fine. It's all just a "misunderstanding of McCarthyism," which is just one of those made-in-America things excitements that don't mean anything. (Putting this in the lead articles isn't enough, so National Affairs circles around to putting the same argument in the article on the election results before squeezing in some brief notes on the winners at the bottom.) Also, Harold Stassen says that Dean Acheson will be out by the end of the war and US casualties in Korea, updated to 3 November, just before the Chinese attack, are at 28,235 including 4,655 dead. 

"Command Request" Anna Marie Lederer Rosenberg is George Marshall's Assistant Secretary of Defence in charge of manpower and personnel. It is the biggest job that's ever gone to a woman at Defence, which is a bit less impressive when the Defence Department is only five years old, but also an acknowledgement that Mrs. Rosenberg knows manpower. Policy. Manpower policy! 

"Photofinish" Five days after the election in Michigan, it looks as though incumbent Governor and sopa fortune heir, G. Mennen Williams, had defeated war veteran Clem McCarthy by just 535 votes. With the results so close, a recount seems like a good idea. By law, a recount has to be requested by someone, who pays $5 per precinct, which turns out to be quite a chunk of change, $21,000 statewide. The Detroit News suggests that the state should step in and pick up the tab, since it's in everyone's interest to know who won.  

In local results, South Carolina ditched its poll tax, Georgia rejected Governor Talmudge's outrageous plan to count general election returns by county instead of by popular vote, Arizona refused to ban segregation in its schools, Portland, Oregon voted down an ordinance that would have made it illegal to refuse service to non-whites, more states added veterans' bonusses, pro-gambling and Prohibition measures failed all over the place, and "[w]herever he got the chance, the voter swung at home-grown subversives." 

"The Country Boy" Senator Lyndon Johnson reports on the story of a Texas farmer who saw a War Services Administration ad for 168 surplus aircraft computers, and, assuming that they were slide rules, put in a bid for 5 cents each. Back comes the letter from the WSA saying that his $6.89 (20% discount for being so prompt!) was the winning bid, and could he swing by and pick up his property at his earliest convenience. When these turned out to be parallax computers, which is to say, 270lb electronic fire control instruments each about as big as a bathtub, taking up a full acre of the WSA's back forty, the farmer said he didn't want them after all, to which the WSA say a deal's a deal and they'd already told Bessie the cow she was moving into the vacated pasture and they couldn't hardly go back on that! So the farmer took delivery, dropped a line to the Air Force about how if they ever wanted parallax computers, sold them back to at $63,000 and made some money. 

You know, in this version of the story it sounds like the WSA was taking advantage of a poor country boy, but I can imagine another way this story could be told!

"Prescription: More and More" Gordon Gray told Congress this week that Europe would continue to need US aid through the Marshall Plan until 1953 and 1954. Although European economies are recovering and trade is humming along, rearmament is imposing inflationary pressures, and Europe could use dollar aid, as distinct from military, as well as a grab bag of American changes to make exporting to the US easier and exporting from the US, harder. 

"TAC Has Its Day" Everyone is mad at the Air Force for spending all its money on strategic bombers for SAC just because that is what it was told to do. Now it turns out that it should have been spending just as much money on Tactical Air Command as on Strategic Air Command, and so it will. The new commander of the new TAC is General John Cannon.

"No More 4-Fs" The US Armed Forces passed over 6.419 million men as 4-F in WWII, but Colonel Warner Bowers thinks that the category should be abolished in favour of a new "special limited duty" category that could be called up as needed for "less strenuous duty behind the lines." 

War in Asia

"Red Mystery" The Chinese have pulled back from their offensive in Korea, leading Time to speculate that the Chinese are offering a bargain: Recognition in return for ending the war in Korea. Time now blames the British for pushing the idea that the Chinese intervention was to safeguard the Yalu dams, and presents their argument as being that if the UN promises a free and democratic Korea with Chinese interests in the border area "respected," that some kind of diplomatic solution to the war can follow. Red China has been invited, and agreed, to send a delegation to the United Nations to talk about Formosa and "American intervention in Korea, if not precisely "the Korean war," to be led by General Wu Hsieu-chuan. 

"Interlude" Time's man with 8th Army reports that they expect to be hit hard in a few days time, with offensive operations confined to extending the bridgehead across the Chongchon. Meanwhile, X Corps is still attacking towards the Changjin Reservoir, with 7th Division reporting that it could advance another thirty miles if its flanks were clear, and horse cavalry of the ROK Capital Division making initial gains along the coast before being driven back. 

"Halloween Party" Time's Hugh Moffet interviewed survivors of 8th Cavalry, 1st US Cavalry Division who had filtered back to UN lines seven days after the "Halloween Party" that destroyed their regiment. They had it rough, and so does Timesman Hugh Moffett, who hasn't written a single book as good as his Dad's history of Christianity in Asia from earliest times. That is, if they are related. I wouldn't even be mentioning this story if I didn't think they were, though! Time really is rotten with missionary kids.

"Busiest Week"  It has been the busiest week of the war for US air power, and increasingly for Russian, as Russian jets race across the border to dogfight American jets and piston planes. Allied air counts 48 Russian losses. Time assures us that US bombing lines remain south of the Yalu, even though Communist AA is cheating and firing from north of the river. Sinuiju was hit again by B-29s, this time 300 fighters and 79 bombers dropping 640 tons of bombs and 85,000 incendiaries. The Air Force reported 90% of Sinuiju levelled and "damage" to the approaches to one of the big Yalu bridges. Air Force fighters returned later in the week and took out the remaining bridges. In the air, a scrap between "eight or more Russian-made MiG-15s" and four Lockheed F-80s reportedly led to the loss of one Communist jet, no American losses. American pilots report shooting down "at least" seven Russian jets in the first week of jet-age warfare.

"A Sorry Business" Rumour says that Lhasa has fallen to the Reds, that the Dalai Lama is in flight, and that the lamaseries are "in turmoil." India's agent in Lhasa, meanwhile, reports that there are no Communist troops closer to Lhasa than 60 miles as they wait for supplies to arrive by caravan tracks over "lofty passes." The Dalai Lama and his regent are still in Lhasa. They have sent an appeal to the UN by radio, but it is generally agreed that Tibet is part of China, and that nothing can be done. 

Foreign News

"Government by Ambulance" Four confidence votes on housing, the cost of living and price controls over the last week have had the London ambulances busy, shuttling sick MPs to and from their hospital beds. I think it's a joke. The Government also lost a non-vote of confidence motion. 

"C'est Terrible" The Atlee Government has compromised on the Russian-inspired Second World Peace Congress, called for Sheffield. The meeting can go ahead, because of freedom. But the delegates can't enter Britain, also because of freedom. You see, Communists like Frederic Joliot-Curie and Dmitro Shostakovich are against freedom. Pablo Picasso did make it into the country, however. That left only a few hundred delegates of 2000 expected, so the meetings were shifted to Warsaw and meanwhile one of the British organisers, Frank Cecil Powell, won the Nobel Prize for Physics. Continuing on an otherwise unrelated note, Lord Russell got the 1950 Nobel Prize for Literature. Oh, wait, it isn't unrelated because Russell said something bad about Communism once, which just goes to show. The 1949 Prize was also announced this week, it having been stuck in traffic for the last year. Or something. Because it went to William Faulkner, an American, who is a moderately experimental writer (I should mention because I know you don't follow these things.) The important thing is that he is about the safest Southerner you can nominate. There happen to be a lot of very important American writers from the South right now, but most of them are stone cold Confederates, and this might not be the right time to give them Nobel prizes. Best to make sure that the one you have is politically safe, is my thinking. 

"Monster Rally" The Admiralty has put out a statement denying that the mines it laid in Loch Ness during WWI led to "Nessie" sightings on the grounds that the Admiralty doesn't want to put the hotels of Inverness out of business. That doesn't seem 100% scientifically secure reasoning to me!

"The Plane to Moscow" Maurice Thorez has flown to Moscow for medical treatment for a stroke. Jacques Duclos will replace him at the head of the French Communist Party, and that leaves about a column and a half to explore the novel idea that Communism might be terrible. Also, the French Foreign Minister went to Moscow for talks about a "Third Force," underlining the fact that Communism is terrible because the French are terrible for talking with the Communists, who are terrible. 

"On y Va" An Air India Constellation has crashed on Mont Blanc. For two days a rescue party of French and Swiss mountaineers struggled to reach the site through heavy snow and howling winds, fortified by plentiful grog. Despite the death of one of the mountaineers, they reached the site, saw some bodies, and brought back some packets of air mail to confirm that they had reached the site. Everyone was impressed and there was a party, with lots of champagne, and it is almost beside the point to report anything as tedious as the death count. (According to the dailies , 8 crew, 40 passengers.)

"Sri Wins Again" Time reports on the Rana family's dominance of Nepal with a certain degree of freshness. They have controlled the prime ministership since 1846, ruling through puppet kings. "Nowadays there are 80 subfamilies of the Rana clan. All of their legitimate sons are automatically appointed major generals on the day they are born. At birth, the illegitimate sons of the Ranas become lieutenant colonels. (Some US Army captains see a similarity between American and Nepalese practices in this respect.)" The kings, meanwhile, were allowed to preside over the barley festival and call themselves "Sri Sri Sri Sri Sri." The Rana prime ministers have only three "Sris." In the last two weeks, however, this comfortable circumstance has come a bit undone, as the reigning king, who is a great favourite of the Nepalese Congress Party by virtue of not being a Rana, has been allowed to go into exile in New Delhi after some prodding from New Delhi, and a new, three-year-old king has been placed on the throne. It has been suggested that, given the Chinese move into Tibet, New Delhi might be cleaning up its Himalayan back yard before the new neighbour notices the broken-down feudal monarchy rusting behind the compost bin.

"Toward Unity" There may be progress in the Malayan Insurgency as the Malayans seem ready to agree to extend the franchise to 50% of the country's Chinese inhabitants, up from an original 10%, and to the rest in twenty years, when they have become assimilated into Malayan society.

Also, Semyon Budenny has appeared out of nowhere to head this year's October Revolution parade, perhaps marking a turn towards Russian patriotism and away from Communism. 

Business

"New Orders" The National Production Authority has ordered a cutback in rubber use, "frivolous construction," and, more specifically a 35% cut in aluminum for civil use. Steel producers have been told to keep production steady, and orders are being cut to allow Canadian companies to participate in defence work. Some businessmen are saying that this is all dumb because there's not actually a war on. 

"Desert Victory" Remember how the Arabs won't ship their oil through Haifa and its pipeline? Well, this week the Arabian-American Oil Company's Trans-Arabian pipeline starts pumping 350,000 barrels of oil a day through the Lebanese port of Sidon. It's the largest foreign project ever financed by private US capital, which allows Time to wax lyrical about (construction) towns in the desert, private airlines and vast fleets of freighters and tankers. 

"Solomon's Verdict" Two consortiums have been arguing before the National Power Board that they ought to get the right to supply New England with Texan natural gas. This week, the NPB decided that they could both have a share, with the company that actually has a natural gas supply lined up, getting the first and biggest cut. 

"To Arms"  Beardsley  Ruml has appointed himself head of the fight against the excess profits tax, although there's plenty of competition for the head of the column, since business tends to agree that it's a bad idea. Ruml has two advantages, though. First, he is the tax expert who led on "pay as you go," and, second, he has an alternative, an emergency income surtax. 

"Insult to Injury" The FCC is still bumbling through colour vision, this week telling RCA that it had to turn its tri-colour tube over to Columbia so that CBC could experiment with it. 

"King's Crown" Justus Kleberg's attempt to breed the heaviest and hardiest beef cattle breed ever, the Santa Gertrudis, seems to be paying off, as the first auction of breeding stock wins record prices. 

"Border Raid" US stock speculator Charles Allen launched a takeover attempt against Sun Life, the Canadian insurance company last week that came very close to succeeding before the Canadians ordered all hands to battle stations to repel boarders. But since this included Sun Life issuing a special $1 a share dividend, Allen managed to make a bunch of money out of being beaten. 

Science, Medicine, Education

"According to Hoyle" There's a real sensation going on in Britain over cosmology, which is the science of the beginning of things. Fred Hoyle and Arthur Lyttleton, two brash young men of science, have presented a theory according to which the "universe has no beginning and no end." This is a bit hard to swallow, since we now know that stars work by "burning" hydrogen to make helium, and, to an extent, heavier elements as well. The heavy elements are a bit of a problem. The Hoyle Lyttleton working theory is that they are made when starts occasionally blow up.) Hoyle and Lyttleton begin with the observation that there is actually more hydrogen in the dust clouds between the stars than in the stars themselves. New stars condense out of the clouds, while old stars may capture the hydrogen of the interstellar medium as they pass through it. Planets also form from the gas, at one step remove after the heavy-element making explosion. But once all the gas is gone, it's over. Back in the Twenties, Ed Hubble found evidence that the galaxies are all receding from a common centre, which is where a primordial explosion sent them flying away from each other in the first place. Unfortunately, the theory doesn't really work because the galaxies are going too fast, so you need to fix the theory somehow, and the Hoyle-Lyttleton theory is that hydrogen is constantly precipitating out of nothing to fill out the clouds and also make the math of the expansion work. Although Hoyle and Lyttleton have abolished the original explosion (and also the final heat death of the universe that it implies) in favour of a steady state universe that goes on forever. Then Hoyle went on the BBC to explain, and there you have it, a very British fuss.

   

"Man or Dog?" Time points out that surgeons practice on stray dogs bought from pounds for very good reason, and it is very upset that the City of Baltimore is considering an ordinance banning the practice. So are some of the good citizens, but not others, and much heat and no light was had by all. Time then drags in Los Angeles, where the anti-vivisectionists are even halting the AEC's crucial research into the effects of radiation poisoning, and where the anti-vivisectionists were recently defeated by 357,000 votes to 262,000. 

"Hormones and Arteries" Last week, three doctors of Manhattan's Mount Sinai warned that new treatments with hormones such as ACTH and cortisone may lead to  hardening of the arteries. 

"Intestinal Fortitude" Humans have 25 feet of intestine, most of it in the small intestine and consisting of the duodenum, ileum and jejunum. Last week, Dr. Theodore Leonidowitch Althausen of the University of California provided an estimate of just how much of that intestine could be removed for various surgical reasons and leave the patient with enough gut to live: all but two feet, he estimates on a grand total of two test cases. 

"Grand Tour" Time for some reason thinks that the retirement of President Harry Woodburn Chase of New York University is worth a full column, which at least beats a story about how a survey of Wellesley girls show that most of them went to Wellesley because of the name and not because it was just down the road from Harvard and MIT. The Fords send all their boys to the Hotchkiss School, and in gratitude are buying it a stately pleasure dome, or maybe a new library. Cambridge University continues to show why you shouldn't go there, appointing Lord Tedder to replace General Smuts as chancellor.  Johns Hopkins Science Review is quite a television show. 

Press, Radio and Television, Art, People 

Carl Shires, a former copy boy and now a journalism student at Columbia, got an exclusive interview with Ambassador Malik by walking up and talking with him. 

"Editor's Choice" The Radio Daily awards are out. Jack Benny and Eve Arden are the man and woman of the year, and so on through 21 categories including Best Quiz Show (You Bet Your Life) and best television sportscaster (Jimmy Powers.) Get your own Time if you want the full list! New York World Telegram and Sun columnist John McClain is in trouble for printing a parody of a small town newspaper story that is making the rounds. Vision is a Spanish-language weekly newsmagazine printed in New York and distributed in Latin America starting this week, which is news because the publisher used to be with Time (and also Newsweek and Quick.)

"Fog over Kalimpong" The Chinese invasion of Tibet naturally had the press in a stir, and 15 foreign and 200 Indian journalists trying to cover the story from New Delhi led to a natural bit of one-upmanship as the stars of the Indian press rushed to the border town of Kalimpong to talk to the stranded Tibetan delegation-to-points-to-be-determined (London? Lake Success? Peking?). The delegation, which is probably headed for Peking, declined to talk to the press, leaving it with nothing to do but make up stories about the fugitive Dalai Lama, headed for India at the head of a yak caravan loaded with the gold and diamond treasure of Lhasa. 

"Hearst Hideaway" The Los Angeles Examiner promises to microfilm the private papers of readers and forward them to an atom bomb-proof safe in the wilds of Arizona, 25 cents the page. Time is pretty sure that the readership thinks that it is a terrible idea. As Time would, Time really doesn't like the Hearsts, for which I can hardly blame it. 

Francis Goya was a "Rocky Genius," by which Time means that his Manhattan show this week shows that he was "rocky." Meanwhile, in Tulsa, the First National Bank of Tulsa has money to burn, so it decided to have a mural on its building, which will be by Fred Conway of Washington University. Time is pretty sure Jackson Pollack is a painter, tells us so. 

Elizabeth Taylor, Ava Gardner, Esther Williams, Mrs. Alfred G. Vanderbilt and Mary Pickford are in the column because they are attractive in ways ranging from "voluptuous" to "favourite aunt." Pope Pius, Sugar Ray Robinson, Faye Emerson, Elliott Roosevelt, Lyle ("Skitch") Henderson, Thornton Wilder and Helen Toubel are in the column for being in productions, for having entourages, or for being formerly married to Faye. Sibelius, Antonio Brico, Albert Schweizer, Henry Wallace, Leigh Colvin, Carl W. Ackerman, Robert Service, Lily Pons, Robert Montgomery and Hedda Hoppner are in it because they are alive and ticking, while an assortment of Swedish royals are in it because Gustav V isn't. Earl Wavell, also not alive, is on the page for leaving a $138,00 estate to his wife and his medals to his son, Archibald. You'd think there's a story but I have no idea what it is. (I checked, and it was Field-Marshal Auchinleck's wife who left him.) Vice-President Barkley and King George VI are not dead. Daniel Malan is sick (hurrah!), and so are a former prime minister of New Zealand, Martha Raye, Konrad Adenauer, Harold Ickes and Lizabeth Scott.  Well, Ickes is actually just old and Scott has torn knee cartilage from a stunt, but the rest of them are sick. 

Blanche Theborn and Harry Blackstone are married. Lieutenant Colonel Carlos Delgado Chalbaud, Oscar Tschirky and Julia Marlowe have died. Chalbaud, the military dictator of Venezuela, was killed by an assasssin, so  just desserts and all of that. 

The New Pictures

Cyrano de Bergerac is by up-and-coming director, Stanley Kramer, and is apparently pretty good, and Maia Powers makes a good Roxanne. (The heroine.) Mad Wednesday is a late Harry Lloyd movie, by which I mean, made five years ago. I wasn't even sure he was still alive! The movie is apparently pretty lifeless. King Solomon's Mines is a Technicolor extravaganza set in the African wilderness with a cast of 8000 native tribesmen and 6000 wild animals supporting Deborah Kerr and Stewart Granger. Africa definitely overshadows Kerr and Granger. 

Books

Edmund Wilson's Classics and Commercials is a collection of literary criticism. Essays about fiction, in other words. Time didn't like it very much, because Time doesn't like Wilson. Russell Lynes' Snobs is one of those humour/social criticism things, this one being about the various kinds of snobs. Elizabeth Pollet's A Family Romance is another one of those lady novels that they are having these days. Says Time, assuming that I know what they're talking about. I don't! Bernard Ferguson's The Black WAtch and the King's Enemies sounds pretty much like a boy's version of Family Romance. 

Aviation Week, 20 November 1950

News Digest reports that the latest AJ-1 loss was caused by a hydraulic line leak leading to a fire. Captain J. S. Pricer's sudden death by heart attack fifteen minutes before takeoff in the cockpit of a scheduled DC-6 flight from New York occurred in spite of Captain Pricer passing the company physical only a year ago. Westland has licensed the Sikorski S-55, following its licensed production of the S-51. It intends to build 600hp Pratt and Whitney R-1340s to power them, too. Bell has a "moderate sized" contract for its new XHSL-1 antisubmarine helicopter, powered by the R-2800. Airframe and engine shipments are reported without context as very big numbers. 

Industry Observer reports that McDonnell's experimental miniature ramjet helicopter, the XH-20, has done some successful power-off auto-rotative landings, showing that it is overcoming the biggest practical drawback of an operating aircraft and that it might have legs in production. Lockheed wants $150,000 from the Air Force to extend its factory runway from 6000 to 7100ft. Ford is going ahead with mass production techniques at its new Chicago R-4360 plant. By the time the Piasecki H-21 is accepted into service, it will be up 1000hp on the prototype, although this won't be pure gain because of the "omniphibious" rescue equipment it will carry. Westinghouse's claim that its J-40 and J-46 turbojets will "soon be ready for commercial use" is deemed premature by Aviation Week. The Martin XB-51's all-moveable tail will be adopted in the F-86E and other new, high-speed airplanes. The Navy will be testing its new-type arresting gear on the Essex and Midway-classes as part of its ongoing refit of the big carriers to carry, well, bigger planes. It is predicted that underwing pod-installations for engines will continue to gain ground over conventional wing nacelles. 

Ben S. Lee, "Next Step in Bombers: B-36F or XB-52" Lee reports that the Air Force has to choose between a swept-wing version of the B-36 and the XB-52, leading to an anxious week for Convair and Boeing executives. I call foul on this one. Boeing had this in the bag! The Air Force is committed to taking 200 B-36s, and that's that for that for that monster. Now suddenly we're going to retrofit it with swept wings and give it another go with turboprops? Deep in the article we run into the real story. It's a competition between turboprop and turbojet. The turboprop in turn hinges on development of the supersonic propeller and associated engine controls, which have the backing of Curtiss-Wright and Aeroproducts, a GM subsidiary, as is Allison, the big turboprop (engine) builder.  Curtiss-Wright, meanwhile, has just licensed the Proteus to get into the turboprop game. 

The XB-52, meanwhile, has gone through its turboprop phase to emerge as a jet bomber. Like the B-47 only bigger, and a bit smaller than the B-36, it has speed to spare form eight jet engines, and somewhat improbably claims to hit the same 10,000 mile range as the B-36. It is said to hit 600mph, and Boeing is ready to begin production. The B-36F, in contrast, doesn't even have a prototype yet, although bringing it into production after the B-36 will give the Convair Dallas plant a job, and that factory cost the taxpayer a lot of money. 

Lee concludes that the Air Force is highly likely to go with the B-36F. I'm a bit skeptical about this. We've seen Aviation Week push the supersonic propeller and turboprop pretty hard, almost always in "advertorial" content probably written for it by Aeroproducts and Curtiss-Wright. Company money may buy  an air force contract, but we saw how that worked out for the Martin XB-51. I have a feeling that you Pacific Northwesters can put your faith in Boeing.  

Alexander McSurely, "Boeing Offers New Turboprop Feederliner" Just to be safe, Boeing sketches a turboprop concept "if customers want to buy it," and "if more urgent military airplane requirements do not block the project. In other words, Boeing will buy some Alison T-38s if it has to, although it prefers the Dart, which has the distinction amongst turboprops of actually working.) There's also the strong suggestion that, since Boeing has already taken a bath on a DC-3 replacement (the Boeing 417), although not nearly as much as competitors who actually tried building one, Congress should probably subsidise it. 

In war emergency news, the cutback in civilian aluminum supplies is the latest threat to civil aviaiton as NACA qualifies for DO priorities.

"Automatic Pilots Developed for Helicopters" The article mentions Sperry and the Naval Instruments Laboratory, so I guess this is actually a Sperry ad. It doesn't really have a lot to say about how they work, but there are pictures of HO3S-1s and XHJP-1s flying hands off. Sperry promises blind landings, a  much bigger deal, even for a helicopter. 

Pratt and Whitney needs 10,000 more workers, and NWA is "inspecting its 2-0-2 Fleet," and no wonder! Who is even flying in these planes at this point?

Avionics has David A. Anderton, "OBD: Its Errors, Coverage and Reliability" Airborne Instrument Laboratory has been doing a study of omnirange reliability for the air force. Using test flights by a C-47 within a SHORAN network for an outside check on location, the Laboratory has  an extensive series of data on errors between omnirange directional indications and actual magnetic bearing for the location, which they can then analyse for error sources such as terrain and ground station error. It turns out that error is dominated by ground station and receiver error, but AUL cannot conclude that omiranges have a single, calculable error range. Error reduction will depend on more careful calibration of equipment. Error does not increase with altitude. The "cone of confusion" around the airport is a problem with omniranges when you get too close, and is more or less in the nature of the equipment. 

Aeronautical Engineering has an article about a NACA-designed dual wind tunnel for school use. While it is pretty expensive at $250,000 per installation, it is perfect for instructional purposes with all sorts of bells and whistles. 

"Titanium Data" The Engineering Division of the Air Force Materials Command Laboratory reports on the mechanical standards of titanium pieces as so far tested. It sounds like good stuff, and the boys in Dayton are doing their best to make sure that nothing  nasty like stress corrosion sneaks up on us. 

"The Ashton Reports for Altitude Duty" The Ashton is the Avro Tudor (York?) conversion with four Nene engines. The Air Ministry has ordered six, to do a serious study of high altitude conditions. The gearbox that allows any of the engines to run the compressor sounds like quite the bit of work. 

Revere Copper, which makes bronze alloy counterweights for the B-47, is proud to report that it makes same. Students at Wayne University  have built their own intermittent-use supersonic wind tunnel. 

George L. Christian, "Remote Control for Safer Test Flying" AMC and Lear are collaborating on a new Aircraft Remote Flight Control system that is good enough to make remote test flying possible thanks to continuous control from the remote link instead of the "on/off" control of previous systems.  Also, the ground control unit, which fits into three trucks, is quite an advance and is much less likely to lose a drone to a sudden power failure.

New Aviation Products  has a battery-powered airways light from Bonanza Airlines that marks their Reno-Las Vegas route; a four-pole, double throw relay for aircraft that will take up to 50gs, from Hart Manufacturing; a new joint solder for jet engines from Wall Colomonoy, "Nicobraz," which is pretty strong and holds up to 2000 degrees Fahrenheit; and a new GE silicone rubber, enticingly named "81223 compound." Poetry is not yet dead!

Editorial takes up the whole page to lay out a very long argument about how there should be more publicity for USAF contracts. Very worthy indeed SNORE. 

Time, 27 November 1950

Letters

The US High Commissioner to Germany really liked the Stinson profile. Loyal K. King (which is a real name) of Pasadena thinks that Bob Taft will be nominated in '52. R. Robert Masters of Santa Barbara thinks that L'il Abner is disgusting (John Harwood Bacon of Jacksonville likes "moronic"), while Ed Flanagan of Patchogue, New York thinks that Al Capp is a genius. M. J. Palmer and Rudy Ertishek also like L'il Abner. Commander Richard Spofford writes to say that it wasn't his fault those three minesweepers got mined, it was the other guy. (Who was otherwise brave and a good ship-handler.) President Truman, General MacArthur (twice), Warren Austin, and "the greatest criminal in history, . . . 'Handlebar Joe' Stalin" get Man of the Year nominations. Louis Halvaz of Salzburg sends along a press clipping from a Hungarian paper that points out that the Marines that stripped those North Korean POWs of their clothes were violating their Geneva Convention rights, and concludes that pointing this out shows that Communists are, well, Communists. Our Publisher wants us to know that Time general manager, Edgar Baker, has been looking up all of Time's old friends as he sweeps through Asia and giving out free copies of Time to some, subscriptions to  others.

National Affairs

"A Face to the World" Time makes it very, very clear that it doesn't want the Administration to extend recognition to Red China in return for peace in Korea, suggesting that it makes America look weak and that Time will declare war on Dean Acheson even more than it already has if anything so disgraceful were to happen. It spares another couple of columns to scold General Bradley for suggesting that some kind of accommodation with China was better than atomic war. Time agrees with Red China that this is the wrong approach, then swings around to arguing that looking weak  makes atomic war more likely, not less. Then, because it has been a whole page since Time last went off on Acheson, it throws in another jeremiad to the effect that he is very condescending and pedantic. Egghead! Also, Republican leadership in the Senate is going to keep Wayne Morris out of the Foreign Affairs Committee and hopefully replace him with Bill Knowland, replacing a liberal Republican with a Soong family retainer. Once again, just so we know where we stand. 

"Bedfellows" Even Time has its limits, as it observes that "In Washington, it was be-kind-to-dictators week," with first Franco and now Tito getting their aid. Two peas in a pod! And Harry Gold's espionage trial goes on. 

Manners and Morals hits the big time as it gets a cover story featuring the things that the kids today like. (Hopalong Cassidy, Westerns, the Green Hornet, X-Ray Guns, radi and Kukla, Fran and Ollie. But mainly Hopalong.) Once the story has finished wandering around its introduction, it is about William Boyd. With the news from Korea today, I'm too disgusted to make another crack about it's not as if there's a war on. Time brought this on us, and as far as I can tell, is going to get away with it.

The Kefauver Committee is in California cross-examining mobsters, and Joseph Szigeti is out of detention at Ellis Island after nine days after Immigration determined that he didn't do the unknown thing that he might have done if he hadn't not done it. (Talk is that it was a McCarran Act detention.)

The for some reason after lots of end-of-the-section bylines like Crime and Immigration, we take a swing back back by Administration for a story about . . . oh. About the "controversial chief of the [the Department of] Commerce's Far Eastern branch. That's right, Commerce has a branch that has something to do with Asia, and it has earned the displeasure of a Senate committee that Time forgets to name.. Specifically, chief Michael Lee is a former Jew, has been to Moscow, was refused US citizenship on the grounds that he got divorced, might have held up a gasoline shipment to the Koumintang in '48, and, in general, was disloyal. The Senate demanded his resignation, Lee refused, and after humming and hawing for a while, Secretary Sawyer has come back with a compromise: Lee gets his loyalty confirmed, and in return, gets fired while trying to resign. Fair! He might not be disloyal, but we still don't trust you!

Background for War

"How Strong is Russia?" So how is this war going to turn out? Time seems to be nerving itself up to one, so that's a question we should probably ask now. Well, there's probably about 200 million Russians, most of whom live in the far west, about 65 million of whom are under 15, compared with 40 million Americans. 

I . . .Okay, let's just stop right there for a second. Remember the 1937 Soviet Census? The one that was stopped halfway through because it was expected to show a population of 180 million, but didn't? The 1939 Census ended up showing 171 million, but when anti-communists are talking about the effects of the Ukrainian famine, they say that the 1937 number was going to be 162 million or less. Now we're expected to believe that in the course of WWII, the population of the Soviet Union increased, according to Stalinist numbers, by fifteen percent? And if that weren't bad enough, Time reports that the Soviet next-war cohort is about 50% bigger than the American, which is probably correct, but without noting that the overall American population is smaller. Time goes on to suggest that the tiny Russian 24--55 cohort, reduced by the war, "is a powerful factor in persuading the Kremlin to postpone war for five or ten years." 

Time reports that the Russians are estimated to have 20--25 atomic bombs compared with an American arsenal of "several hundred" to "low four figures." So the Russians are out-atomed, but apparently US strategists do not consider the atomic bomb as an "absolute weapon" "capable by itself of achieving decisive victory." The Russians have an army strength of 2.88 million men, organised into 175 divisions of 6600 to 8000 men, including 125 infantry divisions and 50 mechanised. (Which would be more than 10,000 tanks equipped to American standards.) And if that's not enough, their "thoroughgoing system of compulsory training" means that they will have 300 divisions.  Whereas the US has fifteen divisions and is raising three more. The Russians also have good tanks and guns and the B-29ski in an air force of 14,000 planes. They are said to have 200 submarines, including 30--40 snorkel-equipped ones and two to three battleships on the way. Their industry is still recovering from lack of capital investment in WWII and they lack oil and even steel for a long war. There are also weaknesses in transportation and agriculture. US Intelligence supposes that Russians will carry on without regard for shortages, but perhaps all the subjects of the Soviet Union will rise up in anti-communist fervour as soon as things get bad. Or maybe not. Anyway, once they conquer Asia and Europe they will have all the resources in the world. So they will win the short war now and the long war later, and we might as well start learning Russian now. Cheery!

War in Asia

"Operation Flypaper"

If a certain facetiousness leaks into my tone, I assure you, dear Father, that it is my way of dealing with my boiling rage. I know that Time isn't responsible, that it is one of the privileges of the press to be irresponsible, but even so, the tone of Time coverage this last Thursday, the same day that the Reds launched their ambush of the Marines, is . . I've lost words. Words have no meaning. I've been taking Time to task, facetiously, for so long, that I can't say "horrible" or "terrible" or anything like that.

Evil. Will "evil" do?

"In Korea, U.N. forces, advancing cautiously toward the Manchurian frontier, were slowed down more by their own supply difficulties than by enemy resistance." The Chinese are holding off. Why? Some suggest that they're getting ready for a big push, but Time is confident that that's just silly, and they're there either as a diversion from Indo-China or to "extort political concessions." You know what would be a great way to extort political concessions? Putting Eighth Army in the bag! Time hasn't taken aim at the "unmilitary handwringing " at the Pentagon for a few pages, so it is time to return to the theme that all those dumb old generals are nothing but old ladies all in a fluster. Mao has made a "relatively small" investment in Korea to achieve the political concessions that the Administration are eager to foist on him. Meanwhile at Lake Success, the Iranian ambassador suggested a seven member committee to study whether the Reds should replace the Koumintang on the Security Council at some point in the future, was shouted down. 

"To the Border" ""Advance elements of the US 7th Division" have reached the banks of the Yalu at Hyesankin after taking Kapsan in an armoured assault. Supported by oxcarts and air drops after snow blocked the roads from their supply  port of Iwon, there is "nothing to worry about," says commanding General Barr. The Marines, who are fighting north along the roads along the west bank of the Changjin Reservoir, are not finding any enemies. The only real difficulties right now are from Red guerillas further south.

"Dreadful Winter" It's cold in Korea in the winter and now SHAEF is in trouble for not providing the troops with winter clothing. Fortunately, it turns out that it was the other guy's fault, and, anyway, it is just too cold for even parkas.  

"Some Crazy War" Everyone agrees that it is unfair that the Communists have a safe zone in Manchuria, which is the only reason that MiG-15s are doing such a good job against B-29s trying to bomb Sinianju. 

"Dikes Against a Flood" Time's London Bureau chief, Eric Gibbs, flew out to Hanoi this week to find out if the French are going to be able to stop the Viet Minh from expelling them from Annam. Viet Minh forces are estimated at 70,000, the French garrison of the Red River delta are 40,000 combatants, the rest of the 166,000 strong French force being supply services or the garrison of Tonkin. They are also deemed equivalent in firepower, as the Viet Minh has "heavy artillery" now. (I'm told that "heavy artillery" has a specific meaning and that the Viet Minh do not have it. They do have field artillery, though.) Also, the French have an air force, the Viet Minh do not. "But the Communists are building airfields on both sides of the Chinese border." The French don't have much armour, and the Viet Minh are reported to have some. The French have not completed their retreat into the delta, and the Communists already have guerillas there. The French have organised the delta into a network of defended localities and mobilised peasant militia to hold them. The Viet Minh are reported to be using bazookas to breach local defences. French officers' morale is high, but civilians are jittery. Antoher French division may be on the way, but the French can never win for good while the Chinese border is open. Ho will probably delay his attack until the weather clouds over again, but there might be a pro-Viet Minh uprising in Hanoi. The French insist that they are "no longer fighting to defend outdated privileges," but rather to stop the Communists, who will sweep through the entire region and then into India and the Middle East once Hanoi falls. Meanile, every Vietnamese person Time meets is passionately in favour of independence.  That's a bit of a pickle! On the other hand, the "thin edge of the wedge" is a logical fallacy even when applied to Communism.
 

"Plenty of Bite" The French are talking about sending 50,000 more troops, plus tanks, guns and warships to Indo-China, to be supplemented by aircraft if the US has any to spare. That is, Jean Letourneau  is talking about it and suggesting that the only reason it doesn't happen is that Moch is too fragile. And if that sounds a bit like a Le Monde reader trying to show that she's a Le Monde reader, what I mean is that the colonial minister is all for more guns, while the defence minister keeps arguing that France doesn't actually have more guns to spare, and the Finance Minister says that France can't afford more, either. 

"Crown in Peril" Just because it is okay for France to run Annam doesn't mean that it is okay for China to run Tibet. So the Tibetans have done the only thing you can do in such a situation, which is to gather round and throw the weakest man off the sled, in this case Regent Takta Rimpoche.  And if that doesn't work, they'll probably make a deal with the Reds. 

Foreign News

The elections in the German state of Hesse went to the Socialists, while East Germany has declared an anti-sparrow campaign to reduce grain losses. The British have refused to send a Russian defector back to the Russians in return for an RAF pilot who ejected over East Germany and a sapper who went AWOL in Berlin. Time is very pleased with the pilot's young bride, who agrees and so has cosen "honour before love." Over at the National Coal Board, the Board is going to try to raise 1.8 billion dollars over fifteen years to increase coal production by 40 million tons while reducing the mining work force by 80,000. British coal mining is very labour intensive due to all the inefficient seams it works, and while productivity increased during the first years of nationalisating, it is starting to fall again, while the labour force has fallen to 687,000 and is declining by 1000 a week. The NCB aims to scrap or amalgamate half of Britain's present mines over the next fifteen years while opening 70 new mines and rebuilding 250 at the same time that it dieselises the hauling system and mechanises coal cutting. Of course coal is a bit passe in this age of the atom, so Time hails the latest split in the 9 member Liberal Party as "Splitting the Atom."

From Silly Foreigner Land, news that Italy has authorised a new decoration, "Knight of the Republic," that Iran has kicked Voice of America off its radios again, and an Australian inquiry into the case of a Transcontinental Express that hit 72mph while rocketing through a scheduled stop at the flourishing town of Deakin not because the engineer and fireman were getting drunk while entertaining two "blondes" in the locomotive but because of other perfectly good reasons. 

In this hemisphere Bill O'Dwyer is still news even though he is now exiled to Mexico. The US ambassador to Argentina has resigned to "enjoy a sabbatical." An airliner carrying 58 Canadian Holy Year pilgrims has crashed into Monte Obiou in the French Alps, 48 miles and ten days from the Mont Blanc crash. Among those dead, a father of nineteen. Quebec is in mourning.

Business

"Fair Warning" US Steel has announced a 10% increase in the price of steel and warned Washington that any decline in steel earnings imperils expansion, and tells off all the inflation worrywarts by suggesting that it only adds a 4 cent increase to the price of a $22 automatic toaster, which is justa bout nothing. 

ATT has settled its strike, Time is still ginning up opposition to the excess profits tax in the guise of news stories, and S. C. Johnson's new laboratory building is a Frank Lloyd Wright design "with no visible means of support."

"New Lease" A group of San Francisco car dealers are getting around the new restrictions on consumer credit by leasing cars to individual customers the same way as business already do. 

"Toilers of the Sea" The old Dollar Steamships Line has been in trouble for a few years. Founded in 1901 by Captain Robert Dollar, the Dollar family has been accused of "milking" it of generous salaries while draining it of assets through a system of holding companies. Twelve years ago the company settled matters by handing over 93% of voting stock to the Maritime Commission, no cash, no liability, hands clean. The new American President Lines has been doing so well for the Maritime Commission that the company wanted to sell in '45, at which point the Dollar family stepped in to argue that they still owned the company via their preferred stock holdings. Last July, circuit court upheld the Dollar family and the APL reverted to Dollar ownership. 

Earnings up, controls up, down and sideways. Honestly, no-one knows.

"Ceiling Unlimited" Yes, sure, everyone is calling for price controls and production controls and austerity, but Anno H. Johnson, "economist and vice president of J. Walter Thompson, Corporation," points out that the same thing was heard in 1941, and look what happened. Americans have more than the werewithal for a $200 billion investment in defence over the next five years without taking desperate measures. He breaks down the numbers in a bit more detail. Even though the full plan calls for a 8% increase in production next year --5% for defence, 3% for civilian consumption-- this is well short of increases achieved during the war, and some $86 billion has been invested in production in the last five years, while the labour force has increased by 9 million to 65 million during the war. By 1955 the population will hit 162 million and the GNP $350 billion, versus $270 billion now. We might be able to afford guns and butter. 

Science, Medicine, Education

"Ice Islands" The Air Force, which has been flying over the Arctic Ocean a lot, has a low opinion of most of the ice that covers it. It is "spongy, salt-water ice only about ten feet thick," only suitable for an Eskimo family with their low standards in unreal estate. However, it also contains some quite substantial ice islands up to 350ft thick, some flat enough to land planes on, or possibly bulldozable to that extent. Obviously you would have to parachute a bulldozer onto this Arctic ice islands to accomplish that, but once that is accomplished you could easily build an advanced bomber base. 

"Come the Revolution" It has been three years since Norbert Wiener predicted the Cybernetics Revolution. So how is it coming along? Well, we're still in danger of having automatic factories and mechanical brains take over human work and destroy society, and since WWIII will require enormous numbers of men and encourage automatic factories, that day is closer than ever. Allan Seares of Remington Rand agrees, pointing out that UNIVAC can already do most of the tasks performed by flesh and blood clerks, doing a complicated payroll for 1000 employees in only forty minutes. He has no idea how many clerks UNIVAC will displace, but is pretty sure that all is for the best in this best of all possible worlds. A bit of a difference from the Wiener position, there! Luther Gulick of the Institute of Public Administration is less sure. Not about the possibilities of machines, which can do anything a human can do routinely, including observe facts and reach conclusions from their observations and communicate them over any distance. What he is concerned about is that they will replace "78.4% of men in factories employing more than 100 and 16.5% of the white-collar help. In ten years . . . some 7.5 million workers will be replaced by the intelligent machines." Management and government better act now, or the US will be left with a vast population "without support or function."

"Cells Alive" Dr. Robert Barer of Oxford has come up with a new way of imaging cells without damaging them from stain or deadly ultraviolet light. (Because they are transparent to ordinary light.) He scans them with a beam of low-intensity, monochromatic ultraviolet light, focussing the image on a reflecting microscope which projects it on a screen, and then "scans" the image with a rapidly rotating mirror onto a photomultiplier tube that turns it into a fluctuating electric current powerful enough to be imaged in a CRT. A series of "curves" from image "slices" can be built into an image of the still-healthy cell. In the future, he hopes that his results will give an idea of the chemicals present in each of the cell's parts and allow science to understand LIFE ITSELF!!! (Cue mad scientist laugh.) 

 "Not Even Slightly" Doctors Paul H. Fried, Abraham E. Rakoff and Robert Schopbach have done the biggest study yet of false pregnancies, or pseudocyesis, publishing in the Philadelphia Medicine. It's mostly mental, they say. 

"Mice, Men and Mongolism" "Mongolian idiocy" appears in two of every thousand births. Identified eighty-five years ago, doctors disagree on the cause, with some holding out for it being evidence of "the Mongol in our midst," while "more responsible" doctors point out that it is caused by "advanced maternal age" and perhaps less obvious causes such as "exhausted womb," "ovarian disorders," "upset gland" (any gland), and even heredity. Last week, two Harvard doctors gave the most congincing explanation yet, that it is caused by an injury or shock to the fetus at eight weeks, because it is after that that the features most deformed in mongolism are formed. As to what the injury might be, the doctors speculate that it is oxygen starvation, so to prove it they put some mice in a high elevation chamber and produced mice with mongolism, to the extent that you can tell. Mainly, the doctors say, this is a message of hope, since it means that instead of blaming heredity you can blame the mother for falling down. Er, I mean, it is an environmental factor under human control. 

"Nature's Way" Speaking of pregnancy, it is well known that women who suffer from rheumatoid arthritis get temporary relief from pregnancy. Now Dr. Louis W. Granirer of Queens General Hospital has theorised that it might be because there is a ACTH-like factor in the blood of pregnant women, and found some evidence for it by giving transfusions of pregnant woman blood to bedridden arthritis victims. The victims get relief, and the relapses might be less cruel or immediate than occur with hormonal treatment. 

There are bedridden arthritis patients? That's horrible. 

"Employers are Unanimous" The University of Denver College of Law gave a literacy exam to first year law students this year and half the class flunked. (Shades of first year engineering!) Oh, and Pasadena is absolutely riven over its new superintendent of schools, who wants an increase in school taxes and summer schools. He has even promoted Communism in the schools, in the form of a sex education section in hygiene class. Harvard University's ROTC programme has decided not to distribute the West Point-produced Time for Decision pro-ROTC comic book on the grounds that it's pretty dumb. West Point agrees that Harvard men are too smart for comics aimed at State College men. 

Nice to know. 

Press, Radio and Television, Art, People

New Orleans newsman Clayton Fritchey has taken the head of public information job at the Department of Defence even though everyone says that he is dead as a doornail at the useless post that only pays $11,200/year. The press strike in Pittsburgh is over, Colonel McCormick is taking credit for GOP gains in November, and Clendenin J. Ryan is a "millionaire, amateur plitical refomer and onetime assistant to . . . Mayor LaGuardia." Funny, I would have called him a "right wing kook" even before he decided to buy The American Mercury and "revive" it. But credit where credit is due, because where other than in William Bradford Huie's inaugural column could you read that America has been stopping European strikes by paying French and Italian Communist leaders fifty grand bribes out of a slush fund raised by Secretary Forrestal. (So that was why Forrestal was isolated in hospital. Obviously, he would have talked!)

Pageant magazine has run a profile of Mrs. John Lewis among other wives of famous men who have great influence behind the scenes these days, not having been notified when she died in 1942. The AP is in trouble for biased coverage of Joe McCarthy.

"Up in the Air" A federal court has granted RCA a ten day temporary stay of the FCC order on colour vision. CBS has temporarily canceled its schedule of network colour television broadcasts but has gone ahead with an experimental broadcast of an episode of the Arthur Godfrey Show that wasn't aprticularly impressive, colourwise. The injunction allows RCA to continue developing its "dot sequential system" and delays mass production of CBS colour sets, adapters and converters, but CBS is still confiedent that it will win out in the end.  "Unless Daddy is found not guilty after he is hanged." Also, there won't be a television strike, and the American Television Dealers and Manufacturers Association ad that claims that not having a television inflicts a "bruise deep inside" on children is getting some criticism along the lines of it being a "vicious" attempt to "blackmail parents." Columnist Angelo Patri is trying to backpedal out of trouble for endorsing the ad, but the advertising agency (Ruthrauff and Ryan) isn't apologising, even though it is going to stop going "negative" in future ads in the campaign. 

Geoffrey Grigson has an article out in the Architectural Review about Henry Fuseli, John Henry Morrtimer and James Barry. Who, you ask? (No, not the author of Peter Pan!) Why, they were painters, and they were all born in 1741, which is about when Gainsborough and Reynolds were alive, but also William Blake. Now, there was quite the contrast between Blake and Reynolds, so that also goes for Fuseli, Mortimer and Barry, on account of their being alive at the same time, if you see  my logic, here. For example, Fuseli did dirty pictures, just like Blake did, I guess, passionate ones. On the other hand, he also did "surrealistic nightmares," also sort of like Blake. Meanwhile, Mortimer did "crass" paintings and Barry sometimes did absurd ones. So that shows . . . something. And also I have no idea where Gainsborough and Reynolds went. What I do know is that if there isn't much going on in art in a given week, you can can just write a half-baked summary of someone else's article to fill out the page count. (Art also has a profile of a Manhattan gallery director/painter and a contemporary painter named Ivon Hitchens. Time must really need to pad the page count.)

There better be a Science section this week! (Ahem. You can tell I write these out of order!)

Ernest Hemingway, "Mrs. Charles Dana Gibson," Miriam Hopkins, Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland, Cornelia Otis Skinner, Boris Karloff, Bertrand Russell (SIGH), Jack Dempsey, Duncan Hines, Evelyn Waugh, Margaret Chase Smith, John Nance Gardner, Francis P. Matthews, Elmer Davis, Mae West, Alfred Kinsey, J. B. Priestley and Louis Johnson are in the news for mostly no reason at all. Honourable-or-the-reverse exceptions being Russell, who was talking up a future "genetic race" between America and the Soviet Union to breed a race of supermen, and Elmer Davis, who was talking up his cat. Again, I have no idea what makes this page, apart from being old, English and obnoxious, but I do approve of General Gray the cat.

Barbara Ward has married Robert Jackson,  Poor romance lady. Louis Stix Weise, Robert Holbrook Smith, Robert Kilburn Root, John H. Fahey and Bill. B. Van have died.  

The New Pictures 

American Guerilla in the Philippines "muffs" the chance of making a good movie out of a good story. Jackpot  is a lighthearted look at how Jimmy Stewart's life is nearly ruined (as so often happens) when he wins a radio quiz show jackpot. 

Books

Felix Gilbert edits and translates the war diaries of Adolf Hitler in Hitler Directs His War. It turns out that Hitler was a pretty terrible person. Who would have thought? C. S. Forester's Randall and the River of Time is a novel by C. S. Forester with no Hornblower or naval adventures at all. Ordinarily we would just silently punish him for wandering off his subject, but since it turns out that this is a bad novel as well, we can make fun of him, too! Francis Stuart's Redemption is "overwrought and pseudo-prophetic" and also bad. John Bakeless' The Eyes of Discovery  is a history of explorer days from Columbus through Lewis and Clark. Now I want to say a word about Forester and Stuart, because both of them have tried to write novels about what they actually experienced in the difficult times. Forestter is rich now, but he really did struggle through two world wars and a depression, and this is his expeirence much more than the imagined one into which he puts his hero. Meanwhile, Stuart spent the war years in Germany, expecting to join other former IRA men as satraps of the former British Empire, only to have to return to provincial Ireland, all hopes dashed at the end of the war. Considering what the Nazis turned out to be, that is a pretty big burden to bear in the middle of a big slice of humble pie. Even if the book was bad, you have to feel for him. 

Or so says I.

Aviation Week, 27 November 1950

News Digest reports that the XC-99 broke a whole bunch of records flying cargo for the Air Force, which it darn well should considering how big it is. A TWA Constellation made an emergency landing in San Francisco last week, which is the kind of air accident you're still allowed to report in Aviation Week because no-one died. (Just for the record, a Constellation, a DC-6 and a 2-0-2 have all flown into terrain with complete loss of all on board in the last three weeks. Air India, a non-sked and Northwestern.) A USAF B-50 crashed in Arizona while refuelling with one of the British-built systems where you pick up a trailing line. KLM has ordered seven DC-6Bs and five Super-Constellations to go into service in '52.

Industry Observer reports that the Marines are buying 30 more Fairchild C-119s because combining the services' transport fleets was the fashion in 1946. 

The RCAF is buying 100 de Havilland Doves for radio and navigation training and as photographic planes. Saro is reviving its jet flying boat project. WHO IS PAYING FOR THIS? Is it the taxpayer? The RCAF is demonstrating its CF-100 night fighter to the USAF. The Army wants big helicopters, by which it means helicopters bigger than 4000lbs. It hasn't ordered any, because that is impossible, and someone should really do something about that. On the other hand it is not clear that the Air Force, Navy or Marines(!?) will let them do any such thing. It is hard to fly helicopters on instrument because the signal fades every time helicopter attitude changes, but the services are working on it. A new Russian turbojet is reported as giving 12,300lbs with afterburner, while Rolls Royce has the AJ-85 and AJ-500 projects, developing 8375lbs and 10,m500, respectively.

"How AIA Looks at the Excess Profits Tax" Fascinating, I'm sure. It turns out that the industry needs bigger profit margins than civilian industry because of risk or something. 

"AF Reports on Methods Project"   Remember that huge laundry list of improved manufacturing methods that industry was working on from last time? Those are the concrete results of the "Methodsd Project," which the Air Force is improving on to get even better results. The companies, it turns out, need to to a better job of reporting on their results. 

"Field Service Report on C-119" Some Fairchild representatives went along with the Marine Corps' C-119s on their first combat resupply drops and found everything working out fine. I just hope it continues what with the entire Corps trapped behind enemy lines!

Washington Roundup reports that Dan Kimball might be the new Navy Secretary, that there will be a supplemental $600 million budget allocation for guided missiles, which are now going into one ship for an experimental installation. The Air Coordinating Committee is talking about a new feederliner. Here's an idea! What about a DC-3 replacement? Air mail subsidy, air force contract clarity and NSF grants and scholarships are all being reviewed to fix any problems, progress being expected overnight. 

Aircaft Engineering has David A. Anderton, "Boulton-Paul's Transonic Triangle"

The second British research triangle-plane to appear in public is a Boulton-Paul number. The P. 111 is very small is not very sleek, looking more like some early German delta-winged designs. It has a single, underslung Nene and thin wings that should allow transonic or even supersonic speed. It has flaps, retracting undercarriage, a pitot boom and a yawmeter for the science part. 

"Edge Lighting Gives Dial Clarity" Designed by P. D. Betteridge of Hawker's experimental department, this is a way to give clarity when groups of indicators have to be located next to each other on instrument panels. Instead of piped light, it uses simple reflections from dial glass. The Air Force's new AN/ARA-26 is an Emergency Keyer Unit for faster emergency broadcasts. All the pilot has to do is lift the lid and the unit starts broadcasting an SOS and the unit call sign, with an entrained dot-and-dash for distance finding. 

"Apparatus Checks Jet Thermometer" The National Bureau of Standards wants everyone to know about its new apparatus for calibrating jet thermometers.

Engineering Forum has a letter from Arthur J. Droge, pointing out that while aircraft designers do their best to consider reliability, the buggy was a lot more reliable than the automobile, but that doesn't mean that it wasn't progress when the auto replaced the buggy.  That was certainly worth the column space!

George L. Christian, "Wafer Licks Hydraulic Pulsation" Christain rewrites an ad for Vickers, celebrating a thin wafer that can be installed in hydraulic pumps to eliminate failures due to pulses that no-one has ever mentioned before but can now be brought up since Vickers has solved them. 

TWA is buying new AiResearch cabin supercharging equipment for the Constellations it is changing from 57 seat transports to 81 seat coaches.

Clipper Manufacturing offers concrete saws for sawing runways., while Detroit Janitrol has a new portable ground heater for aircraft and Lear has an instrument for finding the highest cylinder head temperature.

New Aviation Products has a double-duty servo from Electrical Engineeering and Manufacturing that can work as either a power source for manual control of the flaps or for small trimming by an automatic pilot. Clifford Mfg offers stainless steel bellows for jet engines. Duracote's new Fiberglas fabrics are used in the interior of new Air Force trainers. R and D Turnbuckles offers turnbuckle aircraft control cable connectors. They are much faster in making connections against "some tautness" than bolt-and-clevis systems and will be a boon for rigging operations.

"CAA Gets Federal's Production ILS" Who else? What the article means is that the CAA just received the first of 190 ordered. Improvements include being much less vulnerable to weather and better pilot indication. 

"Scandinavian Lines Form One Company" Oh, those Scandinavians!

What's New reports on the latest edition of Harry D. Farren's Sabotage: How to Guard Against It, alongside pamphlets on calculating equivalent head winds and The Fundamentals of Steel Casting Design.  

Letters is mostly about the wage determination by the CAB, but Beech gets in a thanks for the Irving Stone article on the new twin Bonanza and the president of Seaboard and Western Airlines is similarly pleased with an editorial. Don Flower of Cessna writes about the Accident Investigation Report on EAL 605, the one that collided with a P-38. He notes that the report faulted the Tower for not broadcasting the P-38's location fast enough, but he goes on to say that this is only the half of it, as it also wasn't broadcasting on a wide enough frequency in spite of many industry representations. Doing so will require the tower having the equipment to shift from all-frequency to single frequency broadcasting when traffic is high enough to warrant, but that shouldn't be impossible to a nation that can build an omnirange network.