Letters, Jun. 10, 1935

(2 of 5)

I read your account of Pacific Greyhound's opening their "Nitecoach" service between this city and Kansas City with great interest because I have just completed a round trip on these buses (TIME, May 6). However, you are not entirely correct in every detail.

In the first place, the running time (which is so fast that it is hard to keep—we were late most of the way along the route, at one time as much as two hours and ten minutes which was later mostly made up) is not 52 hours but 51½. Secondly, their fare is not $24, but $29.50 plus $5 berth charge. Other minor points: there is no table in the compartments: there is no "hot"' water; the radio went out of commission within an hour of our start in our compartment but it wasn't any good any way because of static due to the bus generator. . . .

Schedules and equipment and operating personnel have not yet gotten down to a satisfactory state. . . . Our Western trip was canceled a few hours before departure because of motor trouble on the eastbound bus. "somewhere in Kansas." Had a passenger written your story he probably would have added that: the speed maintained to keep on time exceeds many trains, for we traveled over 60 m.p.h. for hours at a stretch . . . the motors are rather noisy in gear; on a smooth highway such as Kansas offers, travel even at high speed is considerably steadier than any extra-fare Pullman ever built; the natives of much of the route regard the bus as a creation of Mars, judging by the way they stare at the apparition as it roars along the boulevards or chugs through small-town streets; passengers have to trust to luck to find congenial traveling companions, inasmuch as they are put together in groups of five or less in a compartment which, on the inside, is arranged much after the fashion of European trains.

Despite the imperfections which are obviously due to the early stages of the business, these "sleeper buses" are far more comfortable both day and night than the conventional "parlor car bus," or the day coach of the railroads; are cheaper than even "tourist sleepers;" offer the great middle class of travelers a novel, adventuresome medium for the long journey from the coast to the Middle West; will no doubt be in the near future greatly improved and extensively used.

DON SQUIRES

Los Angeles, Calif.

Reader Squires errs in his second major point. As TIME reported, the Los Angeles-Kansas City fare is $24 plus $5 for a berth. The rate is not to be confused with the Los Angeles-Chicago fare of $29.50 plus berth.—ED.

Younger President

Sirs:

In speaking of President-elect H. W. Caldwell of the University of Georgia on p. 28 of the May 20 issue of TIME you state that he "will be the youngest president of any State university," at the age of 36.

A younger president of a State university is I. D. Weeks, who was recently (May 2, 1935) appointed by the State Regents of Education to the presidency of the University of South Dakota. President-elect Weeks was born on Sept. 5, 1901, and hence is at present 33. . . .

President-elect Weeks, former State Superintendent of Public Instruction, was chosen following the resignation of Dr. Herman G. James, who had previously accepted the presidency of Ohio University at Athens. . . .