Letters, Jun. 22, 1942

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Last week the local Republican organization announced that the Republican Party has "no room for Communists," would not endorse him for re-election this year. And the conservative wing of the American Labor Party also wants to deny him renomination.—ED.

Speed Merchant

Sirs:

Mr. Kane's letter [TIME, May 25] expresses surprise that The Case of the Drowning Duck, written by my uncle, Erie Stanley Gardner, took less than five months from inspiration to advance copy. I can only think that Uncle Erie must have dawdled.

I was visiting in his home when he wrote the first of the Perry Mason series, The Case of the Velvet Claws. He worked in an upstairs study, with doors and windows tightly shut and the furnace set at about 90°. (He is a devotee of the Great Outdoors, but he wants it to stay outdoors.) He used a dictaphone, into which he talked almost steadily from 5 in the morning until midnight for three days, his voice monotonously audible throughout the house, while members of the family went around glassy-eyed, hands clutching their aching heads. At noon on the fourth day the first, and final, draft of the book was finished.

MARIAN SNYDER Oakland, Calif.

SPDRAB

Sirs:

When you are supposed to be so alert and up on things, it is discouraging to find that you waste space (TIME, June 1) to reprint a bit of malicious verse about Brooklyn, There is no such thing as Brooklynese.

It is about time that weird impressions about the borough of Brooklyn and its residents were debunked. If you fellows are really well informed, then you know darn well that the average Brooklynite does not talk out of the side of his mouth, speaks no more slang or colloquialisms than the average citizen and resents insinuations that he is not as astute as the next fellow.

We expect an apology or TIME goes on our boycott list and, boy, we're 18,000 loyal members.

SIDNEY H. ASCHER Society for the Prevention of Disparaging Remarks about Brooklyn "We Love People Who Love Brooklyn" Brooklyn, N.Y.

> TIME neither hates nor loves Brooklyn, fears no bercott.—ED.

Hot Spotters

Sirs:

So now, according to TIME, the Army is going to replace amateur observers with trained, paid WAACs!

The 50-odd volunteer observers of this coastal observation post were "amateurs" that Sunday afternoon when the radio announced the Pearl Harbor attack. Nearly six months have passed. Whoever says we are still amateurs is crazy. Most of our volunteers have now served over 150 hours each—at shifts averaging three hours, 24 hours a day. They can spot a plane, a blimp, a ship or submarine without field glasses far more quickly than can the average Army officer with glasses. That's experience. . .

If ever there was a trained, efficient group of reliable men & women, this and hundreds of other similar posts has them. . . .

WHIT WELLMAN Chief Observer

Yankee Point Observation Post Carmel, Calif.

More Good Neighbors

Sirs:

It may interest you to know that our Good Neighbors include not only the white populations of the southern republics, but also the Indians.