Harry’s letters, musings give me hope today

Continuing a wave of letters I’ve discovered in Harry’s computer files, here are two brief ones he wrote in the 1990s. I originally rejected them for this blog; you see, they are just ordinary, friendly letters – one to a former office colleague, the other to a writer at The Washington Post. I changed my mind about sharing them because, on second glance, they inspired me with thoughts that we are all ambassadors of hope simply by showing kindness and understanding to others. Plus, I took a moment to look up the article he was talking about in the second letter.






October 1993 – Country Care Center, Illinois

Dear Dottie:

Alice Price gave me your address and told me you will soon hit a major milestone – your 80th birthday. So here’s a happy birthday wish a couple weeks in advance. When you blow out the candle(s) on your cake, may your fondest wish come true. Jeanette and I passed a milestone in August – our fiftieth anniversary. In this day and age, when the statisticians tell us that fully half of all marriages now end in divorce, that is looked upon as an aberration. It just isn’t fashionable any more, they say, to stay married to the same person for fifty years. How little they know! Actually, it still seems incredible to me that we were married fifty years ago, in August 1943, in the middle of the war. How fast these years have flown!

I suppose the young people in every generation think they are living through troubled times, but it seems to me that no generation faced more uncertainty about the future than ours did. And yet, despite the war, I think the whole country was optimistic about the future. We knew that somehow our country would survive and become stronger and better – and it did. So we – all of us – have much to be thankful for. Of course, like everyone our age, we have some health problems, but we still continue to enjoy life with all its heartaches and challenges. And we still have faith that this great country will somehow muddle through and continue to get better and, having been around since Woodrow Wilson was President, I don’t think it matters one little bit who the President may be at any given time.

Anyway, Dottie, we saw some tough times and some good times during our years together in the Pentagon, and looking back on them, it seems that I remember more clearly only the good times, and you were a part of all of them.

Happy Birthday and all best wishes,
HZ


17 March 1994 – Ms. Amy E. Schwartz, The Washington Post

Dear Ms. Schwartz:

I just want to tell you how much I enjoy reading your columns in the Post, no matter what subject you choose to write about. (Or, as Winston Churchill would have it, no matter what subject about which you choose to write.) This letter is long overdue, since I have enjoyed your columns for a long time. It was yesterday’s column, however, (3/16/94) on “Laughter in the Movie House”, that finally triggered me to act. I find your columns usually loaded with background information on the subject at hand, invariably thoughtful, exquisitely worded, and always provocative.

Strangely, it sometimes seems to me that I detect the same facility for language, the same gift for phrasing and a similar trend of opinion and commentary in two of your colleagues, Meg Greenfield and Lally Weymouth. Either you are all sisters under the skin or there is a particularly skillful editor at work here. Whatever the case, all three of you seem to echo my own thoughts frequently and much more elegantly than I could express them myself. So thank you, thanks to all of you, for being there and for making the Post always worth reading.  

Here’s the URL to the Post article:  https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/1994/03/16/laughter-in-the-movie-house/9bf23e60-2aec-4854-abd5-ea5a7a7b4636/


September in History – Things we should know and remember

Also on my blog chopping block was this musing, last edited by Harry on July 29, 2009. It’s one of many notes he saved on quite a variety of topics. 

On September 30, 1946, the International Tribunal at Nuremberg handed down its verdicts in the war crimes trials. (I was there.) The Nazi Leadership Corps, the SS (Schutzsaffel), the Security Police and the Gestapo were declared criminal organizations and their leaders were placed on an automatic arrest list. The Tribunal adopted the historic principle that one who has committed criminal acts may not take refuge in superior orders nor in the doctrine that the crimes were acts of the state.

This quote by Judge Dan Haywood (Spencer Tracy) in JUDGMENT AT NUREMBERG, one of the greatest movies of our times, is worth repeating and remembering.

“This trial has shown that ordinary men can delude themselves into the commission of crimes and atrocities so vast and heinous as to stagger the imagination. There are those in our country, America, today who speak of the protection of the country. Of survival. The answer to that is:  Survival of what? A country is what it stands for when standing for something is the most difficult. Before the world, let it now be noted here that this is what we stand for: Justice, truth, and the value of a single human being.”

Copyright 2016, Elaine Blackman

Harry’s wit and wisdom in more random letters

If you have enjoyed the letters Harry wrote in several earlier posts on this blog, you’ll like the following letters, too, also recovered from his computer files. They add humorous and thoughtful details to what we know about his personal life. And, they further prove that he could write about anything.






January 1991 – Undergraduate Advising Center, University of Maryland

Dear Wendy:

Your letter of January 28 came as somewhat of a shock to me, since you indicated that I had a “difficult” semester in the fall. As a Golden ID Student, I audited a course in Modern Military History (History 224) and I must say I enjoyed every minute of it. Not only did I not have a “difficult” time, I had a truly delightful time. I found the course both informative and entertaining, while the Professor, Dr. David Trask, and his Teaching Assistant, Paul Moreno, both displayed a depth of knowledge that added immeasurably to the texts we studied. Indeed, I came away from the course with a feeling of satisfaction at a semester well spent and a sense of accomplishment at subject matter well learned.

You will understand, therefore, why I was at a loss when your letter suggested that I consider repeating the course or perhaps attending a workshop on “Recovering from a Bad Semester.” You also suggested that I consult my “assigned advisor”. I’d be happy to do so, except that I didn’t know I had one. Did I get one somehow while I was having a “difficult” semester? In any case, I am currently auditing the follow-up course, History 225, and I will be most pleased if this semester turns out to be as “difficult” as the fall semester.

I don’t really mean to be facetious, but I’d be very interested in hearing what bureaucratic procedure or what legal requirement prompted you to send me that letter.         


June 1991 – Richard Cohen, The Washington Post

Dear Mr. Cohen:

As a man of relatively modest stature, at five feet five inches, even more modest than yours, I truly appreciated your column entitled “Selling Us Short” in the Washington Post Magazine of 9 June. You did, however, inadvertently, I’m sure, forget to mention one other problem. In addition to the problem with shoes, which you described so eloquently, there is also the problem of men’s socks.

I refer, of course, to the monstrous hoax perpetrated on the male population of modest size by all the manufacturers of men’s socks who advertise that one size fits all – size 10-13. This is an obvious lie, and surely a violation of the law that prohibits false advertising. It may very well also be a violation of the anti-trust laws, since all the manufacturers seem to have entered into a conspiracy to hoodwink men with this “one-size” scam. Not only are those socks too big to begin with – the heel comes midway up my ankle – but it is my observation that socks are the only male garments that do not shrink but rather grow with each washing.

As a result of this nefarious practice, I and many others I know are reduced to shopping for socks, furtively, to be sure, either in the Boy’s Department or the Women’s Department, where size 9-11 is available. Unfortunately, neither the Boy’s nor the Women’s Departments carry socks of a quality and style equal to those in the Men’s Department. So I want to go on record as endorsing your call for men of modest size to rise up and rebel against the clothing manufacturers of America and their unfair sizing policies, as well as their unfair pricing policies. The trouble is, almost all of them are now in Taiwan, or South Korea, or China, or Hong Kong, or Indonesia, or Latin America, or Eastern Europe – or almost anywhere but the United States.


29 November 1991 – National Geographic Society, Washington, DC

Dear Bob:

It was very thoughtful of you to send me a copy of your December issue, and I can’t tell you how pleased I was to receive it. The pictures and the maps are phenomenal; Allen’s accompanying commentary is outstanding. Over the past fifty years I’ve read hundreds of articles and dozens of books about Pearl Harbor, but nothing I have ever seen presents so clear and graphic a summary of that event as this issue of the National Geographic magazine.

I recall very well where I was on that fateful day. I was working for one of the so-called war plants – the Bell Aircraft Corporation in Buffalo, New York – which was on a three-shift schedule at the time. Everybody knew that we could not stay out of the war in Europe forever, and that a war with Japan was probably inevitable, too. We were producing airplanes, mainly for the Russians for lend-lease, but also, we hoped, for eventual use by our own Air Corps.

It was Sunday afternoon with the plant going full blast when the loudspeakers came on with the announcement about the attack on Pearl Harbor. The grim certainty that this meant war only confirmed our fears, and when President Roosevelt announced that the Congress had declared war a couple days later, it was almost an anticlimax. I decided right then and there that I would devote my life to serving my country and, aside from my military service during the war, that’s exactly what I did as best I could as a civilian for almost forty years.

It’s hard to believe that the attack on Pearl Harbor took place fifty years ago. (It’s also hard to believe that I am seventy years old.) And it’s equally hard to believe that the Japanese are so sensitive about the subject. December 7 ought to be a day of remembrance in Japan, as well as in the United States. If they had any public relations sense at all, instead of withdrawing their advertising ($1.8 million from National Geographic alone, according to the Wash. Post), they would increase their allocations to help fund such retrospectives. Indeed, I believe that a properly planned and executed public relations campaign centered around the Pearl Harbor experience could very well help bring our two countries closer together. As it is, the Japanese seem to be fostering the impression that they would gladly do it all over again in a 1990s kind of way – not militarily, but economically.

Ah well, that’s neither here nor there. Thanks again, Bob, I really do appreciate your thoughtfulness.

Copyright 2016, Elaine Blackman

Harry sounds off on government in letters to Post

It stands to reason that retirees have more time to pursue other interests. In Harry’s case, he loved to express his opinions and share his knowledge through writing. So, if you thought you couldn’t learn any more about him, check out these letters I found to The Washington Post – two to journalist David Broder and one to the Editor. They reveal more bits of Harry’s background – and his views on government.



21 July 1993

Dear Mr. Broder:

I have long admired your column, your writing and your thinking. You set the standard for political reporters or commentators to emulate throughout the world of journalism. Your column in this morning’s Washington Post (7/21/93) is a case in point. As you frequently do, you have hit precisely the right note in describing the Vice President’s efforts to institute a sea change in the way the government operates. A note of cautious optimism.

You note that some of the people helping Al Gore in this project are relatively young and inexperienced, with, presumably, inadequate understanding of how the government works or how to effect changes. I have often observed over the years just how these governmental study programs get their staffs. I worked in the Pentagon for 36 years, the last 25 of which was in a position of considerable responsibility. During those years, I witnessed countless commissions and blue ribbon panels established to study and improve the way the government operates. All of them were headed by distinguished individuals; all of them were staffed mainly by people assigned involuntarily by the various government agencies, or through personal contacts by young volunteers. The volunteers were invariably enthusiastic and uninformed. The assignees were usually people whom their respective agencies were happy to farm out. Almost all the studies thus produced were uninspired and deserved the chance to gather dust on hidden shelves.

What is true of all those study groups is that none of them ever seemed to tap the vast pool of talent represented by the recently retired career government employees. I am talking about the middle management people who rose to their positions through the ranks, so to speak, who know and understand the intricacies of federal organizational arrangements, who know where the levers are and where the roadblocks are, and who know when to move them and when to circumvent them.

Don’t misunderstand. I am not volunteering my services, but I personally know dozens of retirees from the middle management levels of the government who could make a truly constructive contribution to Al Gore’s study effort. And I’m sure there are hundreds, perhaps thousands, more who would happily place their knowledge and experience at the Vice President’s disposal. In all probability, OPM [Office of Personnel Management] could surely give Mr. Gore a short list of outstanding recently retired individuals from each of the federal agencies, from among whom he could choose a few who could bring their accumulated wisdom to bear on the problems being studied. If you think this suggestion is worthy, you might mention it to Mr. Gore or one of his key people. (No need to credit me.)

All that aside, I want to thank you for all those great columns you produce, for the depth and the breadth of the information you impart to your readers, and for the pleasure you give this reader by the quality of your writing.


16 March 1994

Dear Mr. Broder:

Your column in today’s Washington Post moves me to contribute a few random thoughts about the workings of government and the bureaucracy. It is no wonder that the public has a negative view of government, considering the following factors:

1.  Every presidential candidate in recent memory has run for office against the government. It has become fashionable to badmouth the government and the bureaucracy, and every time a candidate says something negative, the press multiplies it a hundred-fold. No matter how well the government operates, the public will not believe it so long as politicians continue to deride it.

2.  The professional civil service, which is to say the bureaucracy, operates at a severe disadvantage. The problem is that every President appoints people to the top positions in all the agencies, and these people are answerable only to the President. Now, here’s the rub. The kinds of people who are appointed to the statutory positions are chosen not on the basis of their professional qualifications for the job, but rather on the basis of their political qualifications. In fact, many of them are completely unsuited for the jobs to which they are appointed, despite the scrutiny by the press and the Senate confirmation process. With few exceptions, they are either campaign workers being rewarded with government jobs, financial supporters being rewarded with government jobs, representatives of industries that do business with the agencies involved, political and/or personal cronies, and an assortment of hangers-on who take any job that’s offered. 

Most of them enter into their jobs with an attitude of unrelenting hostility to the professional civil service. Very few of them, very few, try to work with their staffs of professionals or make a serious attempt to understand the peculiarities or intricacies of government operations. Instead, they staff their second- and third-tier ranks with pals and cronies, and they try in every way imaginable to circumvent the bureaucracy in order to do things that their agencies should not do, or to prevent their agencies from doing things that they should do. 

Rarely do their illegal or unethical activities get public scrutiny, mainly because the press is always too busy scrutinizing the President instead of looking into the less-glamorous conduct of lower-level appointees in the agencies. And, also because the press seldom talks to the professional civil servants who, in any case, are seldom willing to blow the whistle on the statutory appointees. Only occasionally are some of them exposed, either through a Justice Dept. investigation or a congressional investigation, and in those instances, the resultant press coverage solidifies the public perception of the “bureaucracy” as a den of thieves. Most of them are never exposed, either for the “shady” things they do, or for the ineptness of their conduct in office. Still, what they do makes their agencies look bad and you, by which I mean the press, really ought to differentiate between the civil service bureaucracy and the statutory bureaucracy.

3.  As I said in my letter to you last July, I want to thank you for the all the great columns you produce and for the pleasure you give me by virtue of the quality of your writing.


11 May 1993

To the Editor, The Washington Post
Regarding Rule XXII

The articles by Lloyd Cutler, George Will, Howard Baker and Norman Ornstein (today) all miss the mark, though the discussion itself is fascinating. The fact is, however, they all start with the assumption that the United States Senate is genuinely willing to act in the best interests of the country, and that the current policy on filibusters thwart this purpose. In my view, and I honestly believe a great many Americans share this view, nothing could be farther from the truth. If anyone still believes that the Senate is interested in the good of the country or the welfare of the people, I have a bridge in Brooklyn for sale at a bargain price.

The Senate has displayed time and time again its complete indifference to the best interests of the country. Individual Senators, Bob Dole included, are interested in their own self-aggrandizement and their own reelection first. Secondly, and a far second indeed, they pretend to work on behalf of their own constituents. In that respect, they put up a good front, but it’s all for show, not for real. I do not believe the good of the country enters their considerations at all. All their pious mouthings about their concerns for the welfare of the American “middle class” are sickening, especially coming from Republicans, who did as much as they could during the twelve years when they owned the White House, to eliminate the middle class. And those Senators who point with pride to their years of “public” service are hoodwinking the public. Their service was performed for private or special interests, not for the public.

If the Senate as a body were genuinely concerned with the best interests of the nation, it would find a way to cope with the filibusters that thwart the public interest. Until it does, until it demonstrates a greater degree of active concern for the country, it will continue to be regarded by many of us voters as a joke.

Copyright 2016, Elaine Blackman

Once a poet, always a poet

I never asked my dad to name a favorite poem or a poet who inspired him. I have a hunch, though, that his poem-writing flowed without influence from the greats or anyone else. One thing's for sure -- once he started, he never stopped. Only in the past year have I learned the extent of his poetry -- about people he knew, places he went, events of the day, and just ordinary thoughts that drifted through his mind. Even when he wrote a Letter to the Editor, he did so in rhyme! Harry submitted the four poems below in the 1960s, each to a different publication.


Harry might have submitted this one to FLYING magazine, which still publishes.

On Zero Defects

Harry, smiling through the '60s

The question that I often hear,

I’ve asked myself the same.
Is Zero Defects’ meaning clear,
Or is it just a name?

Can this apply to us? I said,
Or should we pass it by?
Is this alive or is it dead?
I wonder – so said I.

I pondered it, by day and night,

And really thought it through,
And in the end I thought, they’re right.
This is the thing to do!

Harry and Jeanette, 1962

For none of us is perfect, see?
This thought occurred – in rhyme,
Not him, or her, or you, or me,
We’re not right all the time.

We make mistakes, we’re sometimes wrong.
We’re human, but, good grief,
This poor excuse won’t last for long,
Let’s turn a brand new leaf.

And leave us all get on the ball,
Let’s shift our gears to high.
And let’s support it, one and all,
Let’s do it right – let’s try.

_________________________________________ 

In August 1965, Harry wrote this letter to The Washington Post columnist Bill Gold.

Dear Bill:

Here is an unsolicited testimonial from your faithful reader and long-time admirer:

I start each morning, every day,

Circa 1965

With breakfast -- and the Post,

I read what pundits have to say,

Both here -- and coast to coast.

But first, a habit that is mine,

I carefully unfold

The paper, to The District Line,

And read each word by Gold!

Your column sets the tone each day,

And cheers me up no end,

It matters not what others say,

At least you've got one friend!

By the way, Bill, thanks for including my name in your birthday greetings (June 16). It's an honor to be in such distinguished company.

Sincerely,

Harry Zubkoff

P.S. The contribution is for your favorite charity.

 _________________________________________ 

In January 1966, Harry submitted this poem to Poet Lore, still in publication.

Harry in flight

The Brink of Space

Let sailors spin their wondrous tales,
Of ships and storms and shining seas,
Of winds from hurricanes and gales,
Of waves as high as redwood trees;
Let sailors spin their wondrous tales.

But when an airman’s contrails track the sky,
And leave his crinkled lines on God’s own face,
The magic stirs men’s minds and hearts – they sigh;
For mankind trembles on the brink of space.
Aye, mankind trembles on the brink of space.


I had to look up "contrails," did you?

 _________________________________________ 

Harry sent this Letter to the Editor to New York Daily News on September 20, 1968, the day they published an article titled "Wall Street Tickers Flip Over Sweater Girl Figure." Did you know -- "sweater girl" was a term made popular in 1940s and '50s Hollywood for shapely women wearing tight sweaters; it became synonymous with "pin-up girl" during WWII.

Dear Editor:

The attached story published in your newspaper has excited my imagination to the point where the only appropriate response could be the following poem:

Harry's copy of the original Daily News article

A Poem Maligning Sweaters

Now this has been the subject of
Much idle conversation,
And it could fill a lot of books,
That's no exaggeration.

So if what I'm about to say
Sounds somewhat idiotic,
It's because those lovely sweaters
Make me mentally neurotic!

For everywhere I look, it seems,
I see a lovely vision,
No wonder all the scientists

More 1960s photos

Invent atomic fission!

I sign in every morning,
All prepared to do my share,
Then for eight exciting hours
All I do is sit and stare!

Though I make an honest effort
To perform a job that's right,

I can't do any work at all
As long as I have sight.

I spend a whole day scheming,
Ah, fantastic plots and schemes,
Then at night I wake up screaming,
For I see them in my dreams!

Once I thought I was impartial,
I could look but never touch!
But really, now, I must admit
That this is much too much.

I used to be quite sane, you see,
But now I'm on the brink,
Indeed I'll go quite mad if
I allow myself to think.

I used to be quite virtuous,

The rejection letter

But now I'm on the verge;
These things arouse in me a
Certain predatory urge!

Every time I see them,
they contribute to my rage,
They're so easily encountered,
But not easy to engage!

After reading through this poem,
I am sure you will agree,
There is nothing worse than sweaters,
For creating misery!


I didn't find the original NY Daily News article online, but this article gives a brief explanation of the young woman's short-lived fame: The Bizarre Story of the Wall Street Sweater Girl. And here's the complete story of Francine Gottfried on Wikipedia.

Stay tuned for more poetry next week.