# The New York Times/1929/10/24/Letters

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Miss Mitzl and Professor Auer.
To the Editor of The New York Times:
I have read with some astonishment in The Times Professor Auer's statement that my daughter, Kayla Mitzl, "as a matter of fact had only five or six half-hour lessons from me several years ago, at the Chicago Musical College, during one of the Summer courses; besides, she has received no endorsement from me whatsoever at any time."
I can only say that when I took Kayla to Professor Auer in January, 1925, for an audition he spent a full hour with her and made his admiration known not only to me but also to a pupil from Australia who had just had a lesson with the professor and was listening to Kayla. It was at Professor Auer's own suggestion that I brought Kayla to study with him at the Chicago Musical College the following Summer. During this period on many occasions Professor Auer called the attention of his class to Kayla's wonderful playing and at the end of the Summer term told me distinctly that at the end of three years Kayla should be absolutely finished. She was then 10 years old.
Professor Auer also suggested that if we could not afford private lessons with him in New York he would recommend Kayla to the Damrosch Institute, where she would come under his supervision.
Mrs. E. D. Mitchell, Mother of Kayla Mitzl. New York, Oct. 22, 1929.
The I.R.T. in Queens.
To the Editor of The New York Times:
Surely it isn't possible for any service to be worse than the Interborough is giving in Queens these days. Since the line was extended to Flushing the people from Woodside have the greatest difficulty in boarding trains. The population has increased considerably the last three years in that section of Long Island, but the I.R.T. has not kept up with the increase.
Why can't the middle track be used for express service to New York in the morning and to Flushing in the evening? If these trains stopped at Woodside, Jackson Heights, &c., it would relieve the congestion further in and give us a chance to reach our offices with a degree of comfort and in reasonable time.
E. M. B. Long Island City, N.Y., Oct. 21, 1929.
Credit to Mrs. Edison.
To the Editor of The New York Times:
Aware of the fortitude, the patience, the self-renunciation necessary to realize accomplishments of such magnitude as those of Mr. Edison, I feel that in the celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of these accomplishments tribute should be paid not only to the inventor himself but also one who has taken an indirect part in his glory—his wife. Genius, while great in promoting the welfare of mankind at large, is not easy to abide in the home. I therefore feel that the fortitude, the patience and self-renunciation which Mrs. Edison has contributed should be recognized.
LURIA ARMS.
New York, Oct. 23, 1929.
THOMAS HASTINGS.
An Estimate of His Civic Art and His Spirit.
To the Editor of The New York Times:
In the splendid roll of the art achievements of Thomas Hastings published this morning should be included works which he conceived and designed at his own expense out of sheer civic art spirit—works which were never carried out. As a native son of New York he was ever imbued with the artistic development of our metropolis, educated and inspired as he had been by prolonged residence in Paris, where the art spirit reigns supreme and constantly triumphs over economic and political obstacles. He always strove to combine architecture with appropriate landscape or garden setting and dignified or majestic approaches. Greatly to his credit it should be recorded as regards the site of the Public Library that he strongly urged placing the stack room on Sixth Avenue, thus affording the east façade the lovely broad frontage and approach through a redesigned Bryant Park. He naturally conceived what the influence of Bryant Park might be with statues of William Cullen Bryant and other great men of letters of our city and country. An approach to the library of this kind would have engendered a reposeful frame of mind for all the sweet influences of literature. As it is, our Public Library is too near "the madding crowd" of Fifth Avenue.
Another of Hastings's great concepts with which I happen to be familiar is preserved in his two superbly drawn plans for the space between our two great museums, the Metropolitan and the American, now occupied by the southern reservoir. He rightly was attracted to this central area in the heart of the toiling population of the east and of the west as offering an opportunity both for repose and for artistic inspiration. Many offensive plans and projects had already been suggested for this very space, but Thomas Hastings rightly conceived that the replacement of the old Croton water reservoir should be through the inspiration and symbolism of a fountain group. This he made the central feature of the northern end of the reservoir space faced by a southward extension of a broad lagoon flanked with lines of trees and paths. This inspiring and beautiful design was submitted to a group of citizens, including the writer. Owing to the lack of any body of sufficient permanence to consider this project, this beautiful fountain plan was dropped.
Again, after the peace of 1919. Thomas Hastings conceived a second plan which included north of the fountain design a colonnade peace memorial of majestic proportions. This beautiful design, which had many merits, although in certain features subject to further study and modification, met the approval of the city authorities, but instead of being submitted to a trained body of men competent to pass upon its intrinsic merits it came before a public hearing in the Aldermanic Chamber of the City Hall, and there it was the subject of intensely emotional discussion on the part of a large body of men and women who neither by experience for training were competent to pass judgment.
These three great civic art projects conceived among many others by Thomas Hastings are not mentioned in the present sad hour to arouse further criticism or discussion, but as a tribute to the idealism, the generosity and the unselfish devotion to the artistic advancement of our city and country which distinguished the entire life of one of the greatest architects and kindliest of men of our times.
HENRY FAIRFIELD OSBORN. New York, Oct. 23, 1929.
TRACING THE JAZZ AGE.
One Believes Clamor of Big Cities Was Responsible for Its Inception.
To the Editor of The New York Times:
I am deeply impressed with the thoughts developed by Edith Nichols in her letter regarding the effect of the city's roar and din on the ears of children. As a musician I, like my colleagues, find it a chief task, in training the young, to develop the sense of pitch.
I think serious musicians will agree that the clamorous noises in New York and other big cities are responsible for the jazz age. Clearly jazz came into being because the delicate tympanum and the rest of our hearing mechanism had become so coarsened by the constant assaults of noises that our younger generation was not able to appreciate the delicate, sensitive qualities of good music. The ear, as Edith Nichols points out, in the organ to suffer, for the reason that the hearing apparatus is composed of millions of nerves and strings like a tiny, wondrous harp. Unless this harp is kept in tune by harmonious sounds, our whole nervous system and physical being will be thrown into discord, and any physical discord means mental and physical anguish.
I gladly join with Miss Nichols in offering my mite toward the formation of an active and intelligent society for the suppression of unnecessary noises.
Incidentally, the noise abuses cited by Miss Nichols are by no means the worst offenders, in my locality at least. There are the pestiferous burglar alarms, which seem to be constantly going off accidentally during the night hours. I have complained to the police station repeatedly and they have always acted promptly and tried to bring relief by stopping the noise: but I am informed that for the most part the mechanism of these instruments is concealed. Therefore, the police cannot stay the hideous ringing of the alarm bells, and all of us in the locality must resign ourselves to sleepless nights. Surely the owners of these alarms could be compelled to have their alarm systems somehow under the control of the local police station.
W. M. New York, Oct. 14, 1929.