19th Hole: The Readers Take Over

BROWNED OFF
Sirs:
Tex Maule's article, The Curtain Falls on a Long Run (July 25), stated that the Cleveland Browns had probably lost the Eastern Conference championship of the NFL due to the retirement of Jim Brown. True, Jimmy has been the best running back in the league for the past nine years, but it is well known that no one man is a whole team. There is a lot of time between now and the opening of the football season for the Browns to come up with a replacement.
ROBERT HENRY
Youngstown, Ohio

THREE-STAR STATE
Sirs:
I would like to compliment you on your article on the Coaches All-America Game (Pro Football, July 18). I would also like to point out that the three best players in the game were from Texas (Anderson, Nobis, Johnson). This is typical of football in our state. Nobis is as good a linebacker as there is in football now. Johnson is a promising quarterback with all the equipment. Anderson is probably the greatest back to come along since Doak Walker (another Texan). Let's face it, Texas is the king of football, both high school and college.
BOB ROBINSON
Happy, Texas

SOFTLY NOW
Sirs:
I gather from the three letters in your July 18 issue that Mr. Ed Mulford has raised quite a Softball controversy among your readers. As a diehard Softball player, fan, writer and administrator, it did my heart good to know of his concern for the game and of your willingness to publish his letter.

Hurray, too, for Dale Mitchell Jr. (the son of ex-major leaguer Dale Mitchell, by the way) and Robert A. Fiedler II for their replies. I'm in agreement—fast-pitch softball is not dead. Take, for instance, the International Softball Congress World Tournament held in Rock Island, Ill. and mentioned by Mr. Fiedler. In the five years it has been held there this tourney has drawn 187,760 people. The ISC tourney will be held in Rock Island this year from August 27 through September 5, with two dozen of the top teams from all over the U.S. and Canada competing.

Mr. Mitchell referred to the Amateur Softball Association of America as the governing body of the sport, but the ISC is the true governing body of fast-pitch. It does not register women's, or "sissy pitch," teams but concerns itself solely with the perpetuation and growth of men's fast-pitch Softball.

Our own Western Softball Congress of Southern California, generally regarded as the top major fast-pitch league in the country, has enjoyed tremendous success in its eight years of operation. And there are other top leagues, such as the Atlantic Seaboard League, the Southern Major Softball League, the Dixie Major League, the Ohio Big 8 and many others, which are bringing this exciting brand of Softball to thousands of fans.

Finally, I must take exception to Mr. J. L. Lopez of Monterrey, Mexico, who states that soccer is the top sport of every kind in America. I suggest Mr. Lopez travel to Mexico City this October and take a look at the first Men's Fast-Pitch International World Tournament.
MILT STARK
Secretary-Treasurer, Western Softball Congress
Gardena, Calif.

SLIME IN PARADISE
Sirs:
My brother and I recently completed a canoe trip down the north branch of the Susquehanna River. We paddled 200 miles in five-and-a-half days; then the work began. We had to scrub and scrub and scrub, using strong detergents, to remove the slime that had accumulated on the sides of our 13-foot canoe.

For that reason we were amazed to learn that Mr. Russ Chaffee had actually swum the river (SCORECARD, July 18). What with the raw sewage emptied into the river by Scranton and Wilkes-Barre, plus coal wash water that kills fish and the various industrial wastes that give the river the odor of guava jelly, it was a miracle that his skin was still intact!

The first 65 miles of the Susquehanna, from Towanda, Pa. to Tunkhannock, Pa., are clean and truly form a recreational paradise. However, from Tunkhannock on down the river is, in many ways, worthless. In many places it is unable even to support fish.