ARMED FORCES: Happy Isles

• Share

From the blue and surf-ringed isolation of French-owned Tahiti, Author James Norman Hall (Pitcairn's Island, Mutiny on the Bounty) decided that the world's dirty, teeming and fear-ridden old nests of civilization needed a word of cheer. After noting, with obvious satisfaction, that French Oceania was free of the ships, planes and men which cluttered it up during World War II, he sent TIME two items of news about its people:

"An immense buried treasure is being recovered from the lagoon of the island of Bora Bora where the U.S. had a base during World War II. The treasure consists of empty Coca-Cola bottles dumped by Army and Navy personnel during the years 1942-45. The natives have dived up more than 30,000 to date, which they sell to soft-drink emporiums in Papeete at 3 francs per bottle.

"Treasure of a far more valuable kind remains on Bora Bora; the So-odd children of Bora Bora mothers by unknown Army and Navy fathers. They are healthy, sturdy youngsters, and probably a great deal happier than nine-tenths of the children elsewhere in the world. Whether born in or out of wedlock, no island child ever goes into an orphan asylum. There are no such institutions down here."