LETTERS

EXPOUNDING ON EDUCATION

AS A LONGTIME reader and subscriber to D Magazine, I have respected and appreciated the writers and their concern about education. An example of the concern was evidenced on “Editor’s Page” in the July publication.

I was stunned, however, by one sentence: “If funds are available, the scholarships might be provided in other subjects as well, with the proviso in all cases that students major in fundamental academic subjects, not in ’education.’ ” As an individual who has been a teacher all of her adult life, I cannot let the statement stand.

To a large extent, the teaching determines the student’s conception of the nature of the subject matter that he studies. The teaching determines the relationships, emphases, ways of investigation and the overall impact of the subject matter in each of the academic disciplines. Many who speak of “hating” science (or whatever) hate the way it was taught – not the subject.

It matters as much how you teach as what you teach. Through submission to the act of teaching, the education major can better understand what it means to learn. Without the how and the what, education will collapse.

Cherie Clodfelter, Ph.D.

Chairman, Department of Education

University of Dallas

Irving

YOUR EDITORIAL in the July edition [“Editor’s Page”] regarding teachers and the school system was excellent. This is without question the most important long-term issue facing Dallas, and I was glad to see you devote some time to it.

Elvis L. Mason

Chairman of the Board

InterFirst Corp.

Dallas



BUSINESS REVIEWBACKLASH

IN 1977, Forbes magazine called us “A Little Company That Could.” Well, six years later we did, and you didn’t even notice! I’m referring to your June issue [“1983 Business Review”], which listed the 100 largest corporations in Dallas. With last year’s earnings at $54 million, I figure we should be in 74th place.

Unlike most of the companies listed, Chilton Corporation was founded right here in Dallas in 1897. My grandfather gathered credit information from the local merchants and started one of the world’s first credit bureaus. Today, we operate one of the largest computerized information service networks in the nation, serving more than 17,000 retail and financial institutions and storing credit records of one-third of the nation’s consumers.

The financial world discovered us this year, and our stock price multiplied seven times. But my hometown magazine overlooked one of the oldest and largest companies in Big D.

J.E.R. Chilton III

Chilton Corp.

Dallas



THE LIST of the 100 largest publicly held industrial corporations headquartered in Dallas and Fort Worth in the 1983 Business Review section of the June issue omitted ICO Inc., a Fort Worth-based oil field service company that tests, inspects, reconditions, coats and joins sucker rods and tubular goods.

The company totaled revenues of $46,732,000 for the year ending September 30, 1982, which would place it number 76 on your list. The company’s net income for the year was $4,656,000. The company, which had approximately 827 employees as of September 30, 1982, has operations in Odessa, Denver City, Houston, Corpus Christi and Lone Star, Texas; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; Casper, Wyoming; and Long Beach, California.

Even though we are not a large company, we are extremely proud of our people and the services that we provide the oil and gas industry.

R. Jeff Anderson Jr.

ICO Inc.

Fort Worth



David C. Bradshaw of Rauscher Pierce Refsnes Inc. replies: In an undertaking of this size, the odds are, unfortunately, that a few companies will accidentally be omitted. We apologize for the oversight, and we appreciate your bringing these companies to our attention.

THE SCHOLARS OF SPIRITUALITY

AS A PSYCHIATRIST who, although male, has trodden a similar path, I was delighted by the article “The Lady is a Priest” [June].

Going from Freud to Jung and beyond, like Dr. Barnhouse, and exploring religious movements led me to an amazing independent scholar, Vernon Howard, who writes and teaches in Boulder City, Nevada. His work is a remarkable marriage of Judeo-Christian truths with effective self-improvement principles.

The great teachers -Christ being the ultimate example -embody all disciplines, and their teaching is unlimited in its application, whether to personal or universal problems. “Nothing whatsoever is pressing you down except that which wrongly exists within your own psychic system,” from the book Pathways to Perfect Living by Vernon Howard, is one of my favorite quotations encompassing both psychiatry and religion.

Jesse R. Freeland, M.D.

Boulder City, Nevada

GAY ARTICLE GARNERS PRAISE

JUST A note to compliment you for a job well-done on your article about gay people and city politics in Dallas [“Out of the Closet and Into City Hall,” July]. It was a thorough and well-balanced story, untainted by bias.

Don Baker

Dallas