The notion, incidentally, explored in "It Isn't Like Us", that federal housing projects would work to eradicate slum conditions in urban areas, of course, seems ludicrous and naive to us today. But the alternative in 1938, that of doing nothing, would have worked obviously to encourage that which would have led to doing nothing again and again. No one ever suggested that Utopia is on the horizon as a result of the New Deal, the Fair Deal, the New Frontier or the Great Society. But cynically to attempt nothing on the convenient premise that "it will always be that way" is to have no hope ever of approximating at least Fewtopia...

Indeed, the thought is reinforced in "On the Birth of a Child".

We burn with no great pride in the matter, but we set down for the record that the slums of Charleston's Catfish Alley, of "The Yellow Dog," "The Ark" and "The Red Devil" in New Orleans, and the shacks of Beal Avenue and the bluff of Old Man River in Memphis--to name only a wretched handful of the world's worst residential neighborhoods--are no more unsightly or unsanitary than Charlotte's own "Blue Heaven" and "'Skeeter Hollow."

And as for Austin, Syracuse or Youngstown, their slums would be almost an elite district here.

Those cities come to mind because their managements have seen the light of slum clearance; have seen not only the obvious fact that the slums are chiefly responsible for tuberculosis, syphilis, colitis, diphtheria, adult crime and juvenile delinquency, but that there is a way out. Charleston, with a new million-dollar project approved by the Federal Housing Authority; Austin with $643,000; New Orleans with $8,411,000; Syracuse with $3,930,000 and Youngstown with $2,835,000--these cities are aware not only that they have slums but also a start may be made in eradicating them. And Charlotte--Charlotte hasn't lifted a finger.

Louis Untermeyer, who will lecture at Queens-Chicora College Wednesday evening, is that rare creature--an excellent poet and also an excellent critic. His career has been a curious one. Born in New York in 1885, he left school after graduating from DeWitt Clinton High School at the age of 17 and entered the manufacturing jewelry business owned by his father and uncle. There he stayed until 1923 when he resigned to give his entire time to writing. Meanwhile, he had already been publishing poetry, beginning with "The Younger Quire" in 1910, and "First Love" in 1911. He has published since more than thirty volumes of one kind and another.

His name would probably have to be included in any list of the first dozen living American poets. And as for critical ability, he was one of the Editors of The Seven Arts, was poetry editor of The American Mercury in Henry Mencken's time, has contributed many articles on poetry, etc. to The Saturday Review of Literature, the New Republic, and other magazines, and is editor of the anthologies, "Modern British Verse" and "Modern American Verse."