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FIRST AMERICAN MINISTER IN PRAGUE.
The announcement made by the State Department on April 18. that Richard T. Crane, Jr. was appointed the first American minister to the Czechoslovak Republic was nowhere received with more approval than among American citizens of Czechoslovak ancestry. They know Mr. Crane to be a sincere friend to the new state to which he is accredited.
Richard Teller Crane, Jr.
Richard Crane was born in Champaign, Ill., 33 years ago, son of Charles R. and Mary Crane. His father is well known in America as former head of the Crane Company of Chicago, manufacturers of valves, fittings etc. , an establishment that employs many hundreds of Bohemian workingmen. Mr. Crane Sr. is still better known as philanthropist and student of Slavic and Eastern affairs. Richard Crane studied law at the University of Wisconsin and Nebraska, held important positions under the Crane Company, and for the last four years has served as Mr. Lansing’s secretary. As such he came into close relations with President Masaryk during his stay in Washington last summer. It may be stated confidently that Mr. Crane will be cordially welcomed in Prague, where he will find a number of personal friends. It is announced that he will sail on May 3rd.
The new minister will have with him as a member of his official family Captain Frank Jedlička who will serve as military attache of the Prague legation. Vladimir Geringer, American trade commissioner, with his secretary Louis Jalovec, and John Bouchal, viceconsul in Prague, are already at their posts. The United States Government will thus have several representatives in the Czechoslovak Republic able to speak the language of the country.
WHAT THE MAGAZINES SAY.
Literary Digest for April 26 reprints Dmitrij Chaloupka’s story which the readers of the Czechoslovak Review found in the December number. It is given in this important weekly under the title "The Plain and Illuminating Tale of a Czechoslovak Private." In introducing the story the editor says: “Phrases that appear very nebulous in newspaper reports of the Peace Conference, such as free determination of peoples and government resting on the consent of the governed, receive very practical illustration in this Czechoslovak private’s story, which is not only his individual story, but something of a modern history of a whole nation.”
The American Review of Reviews for May has an account of the "Music of the Czechosloslovaks", based upon Ladislav Urban’s booklet “The Music of Bohemia.” Mr. Urban who contributed a brief article on Bohemian Musical Art to the last issue of the Czechoslovak Review has recently written a more detailed story of the "Music of Bohemia", published tastefully by the New York Czech Artists Club. The American Review of Reviews quotes from this booklet at great length and prints the entire score of the great Hussite hymn “Warriors who for God are fighting.”
The National City Bank of New York, an institution with deposits of more than 800 million and assets of nearly one billion dollars, publishes a monthly business magazine, entitled “The Americas”. In the April issue the most important article deals with Bohemia. It is entitled “Picturesque Old Bohemia to be a New Market for American Products.” The story is very well written and based upon a sound foundation of facts, historical, political and economic. It is illustrated by a map and twelve excellent pictures of scenes from Bohemia.
