Turtle Bay, 1950-1951 Summary and Analysis

Some of the playfulness that mixed with respect for New Yorker Publisher Harold Ross is evident in an interoffice memo from E.B. White to Ross on the subject of New York taxicabs from early 1950. In the memo, White says he has personally measured the height of taxicab doors and found them to be about 38 inches, or half the height of the average man. A person would become "infuriated" if required to enter a bar, a subway or a closet through such a small space. Instead, White suggest to Ross, taxicabs should return to their more vertical, box-like structures of the 20s and early 30s. He includes sketches of taxicabs then (1930s) and now (1950) to illustrate the point, but tells Ross he has declined an invitation to speak at a symposium on automobile design at the Museum...