Montana labor news., 1938-07-21
SOVIET Science
On ON ALL
RESEARCH FRONTS
Exploration and Study Hit New
Highs in Past Year.

The Soviet Union appears to have
gone pleasantly science-crazy. The
Papanin North Pole expedition was
given more space in the Soviet press
than the Lindbergh flight in the
American and discoveries and finds
came so thick and fact in all fields
that no one can keep abreast. The
more interesting late achievements
of Soviet scientific exploration are
sketched by James B. Turner, thor
ough and longtime student of Soviet
affairs, in the July number of
Soviet Russia Today" the only
American magazine specializing in
news and views of the U.S.S.R.
Mr.. Turner finds that, "All these
explorations and scientific expedi-
tons, bewildering in their scope and
complexity, are planned as an in
tegral part of the economic and Gull
tural development of the country.
They are endowed with ample e
sources by the government which
rightly regards them as a most vital
element of this program. The people
who participate in them r part of
a vast collective of scientists all
working in cooperation for the COM
mon welfare"
Soviet citizens have become so
echnique-conscious, especially since
the beginning of the Five Year Plans,
that scientific institutes and higher
schools cannot be built fast enough.
But, Mr.. Turner points out, the non
chronological sciences like paleon-
tology, ethnography and astronomy
have also attracted hundreds of
young enthusiasts.
Scores of archaeological parties
have made important finds in exca-
vations conducted in all parts of the
country" the article says. "Ethno-
graphic experts live among the less
er known nationalities of the remote
districts to study their languages,
%folk-songs and customs. Volcanoes,
earthquakes, meteorites, eclipses and
other natural phenomena have been
the objects of many extensive expe-
ditions conducted in the past few
years. Botanists and geneticists are
studying rare plants in deserts, for
ests and mountain ranges thousands
of miles from their laboratories in
Moscow. Scientists climb the loftiest
peaks or even ascend to the strato-
sphere to pursue studies of cosmic
radiation. Others descend far down
into the sea in submarine and bathy-
sphere to probe the underwater
depths"
Among the interesting achieve
ments noted by Mr.. Turner is the
finding of several settlements of the
stone age ranging in age from ten to
twenty thousand years in the foot
hills of the Altai mountains. These
and similar discoveries seem to indi-
cate that the valleys of the Oh and
Altai Rivers were densely populated
in prehistoric times"
Margaret Lamond, who, with her
husband, Corliss Lamond, revisited
the Soviet Union after six years
notes the changes that have occurred
in the record of a Moscow radio
interview appearing in the current
number of Soviet Russia Today, and
Jessica Smith, the editor, makes a
thorough study of the workings of
Soviet democracy under the new
constitution. A mid-western profess
sor, DR.. John S. Cornett, tells how
his initial mixed feeling turned to
enthusiasm upon thorough examina-
ton of the Soviet world, and an
engineer, Bernard Sherman, casts a
trained eye at Soviet planned
economy.
The August issue of the magazine
will contain, "Jobs for Everyone" a
study of the why's and ~wherefores of
the complete lack of unemployment
in the U.S.S.R. with nostalgia re-
productions of Soviet "help wanted"