Letters

If more people could have Gordon Gund's inner drive to succeed
in life, regardless of the odds, this world would be a better
place.
--JOEL FREIMARK, Beachwood, Ohio

GORDON GUND

I am fascinated and inspired by stories such as that of Gordon
Gund, the blind co-owner of the Cleveland Cavaliers (Second
Sight, Jan. 12), in which an ordinary person becomes
extraordinary by excelling at life under difficult
circumstances. Some of today's troubled athletes should read
this article and reexamine their supposed hardships.
CURT EISENHOWER, Ashburn, Va.

PRINCETON BASKETBALL

I have been a basketball coach at every level from elementary
school to college for 20 years, and Alexander Wolff's article on
Princeton basketball (Back Door Men, Jan. 12) is unquestionably
one of the finest documents ever written about the sport. It
covers the subject from Basketball 101 through the doctoral
degree level. It should be required reading for fans, coaches
and players.
MARK SMALLWOOD, Greenwich, Conn.

INTERNMENT

It was with special interest that I read Two Different Worlds
(Jan. 26), which told how the family of NHL star Paul Kariya's
father was interned by the Canadian government in Greenwood,
B.C., during World War II. I am a member of the Franciscan
Friars of the Atonement, a Catholic fraternity of brothers and
priests. In 1942 I was 27 years old and working in our mission
to Vancouver's Japanese-Canadian community. Our companion order,
the Sisters of the Atonement, staffed the school there. When the
orders came to intern the Japanese-Canadians, two of our friars
asked Bishop Johnson of Nelson, B.C., if there was some place in
his diocese where we could keep the families together. He
suggested Greenwood. I remember that several of the sisters left
for Greenwood a day early so that when the internees arrived by
train they would see familiar faces. My job was to drive the
truck with the internees' furniture to Greenwood. The friars and
sisters remained in Greenwood for the duration of the internment.

I was pleased to read that the Kariya family, like so many of
the families we were privileged to know, harbors no bitterness
toward the Canadian government.
BR. GEORGE CLAY
Garrison, N.Y.

Most Americans are still unaware that, in addition to 120,000
Japanese-Americans, more then 10,000 Italian-Americans were
interned on the West Coast during World War II. Even the parents
of baseball great Joe DiMaggio were subject to curfew and travel
restrictions.
BILL DAL GERRO, Chicago

HOCKEY RULES

Regarding your ideas for increasing scoring in hockey (INSIDE
THE NHL, Jan. 26), the problem is not making new rules but
calling the existing ones. If holding, grabbing and interference
were called, the ice would open up and allow the players to move
with the puck and set up scoring chances.
STEVE JOHNSTON, Riverside, Ill.

I played goalie from age 13 through 26, and at 42 I am in my
24th season as a referee. You would think that I would pull for
goalies' getting every edge possible, but I suggest cutting down
on the dimensions of the goalies' equipment.
SCOTT NORIS, Farmers Branch, Texas

The NHL should do away with the two-line offside rule. If the
guys who run the NHL are serious about playing the world's
fastest game the way it was meant to be played, then simply open
it up. How? Eliminate one of the dumbest rules in sports.
S. BURT, Toronto

COLOR PHOTO: HEINZ KLUETMEIER [Gilbert Brown]

GILBERT BROWN

You refer to Green Bay's Gilbert Brown (left) as a "nosetackle
without peer" (What's Eating Gilbert Brown?, Jan. 26). Maybe in
the stomach area, but on the field he doesn't compare with
Buffalo's Ted Washington. In Washington's seven years in the
league, he has had 459 tackles and 18 sacks, compared with
Brown's 92 tackles and seven sacks in five years. In 1996
Washington piled up an amazing 130 tackles, 105 of which were
solo.
ROB HALEY, Buffalo

I find it troubling that you featured a man who is a walking
cholesterol warehouse, a heart attack waiting to happen. Cheese
fries cooked in Crisco? Sausage sandwiches? Brown may be a
premier defensive player, but was I the only one who noticed how
gassed he was in the first quarter of Super Bowl XXXII?
PHIL FOURNIER, Hanscom AFB, Mass.

Don't tell me how great Brown is, how he loves kids, how he
loves his mom, and then tell me, Oh, by the way, he was arrested
for assaulting his girlfriend.
CHUCK YASINSKI, Palmyra, Pa.