The Mail SQUARE SHOOTING

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

I am a Harvard Square resident, a fairly recent grad, and not quite an establishmentarian yet. Howeveh, I was a little put off at your treatment of my ex-landlord Richard Dow. "Tony" is not any rad-lib, even though his son is a genuine freak, but he is a pleasant curmudgeon. During the time we rented from him over the Billings and Stover store, we thought that he'd go mad with us hairy freaks running all over the building. But he remained as pleasant as he could, and when a broken pipe in the wall doused our office, he gave us a month's free rent to make up for it.

The facts are that Mandrake was paying a very low rent. So was Bill Turtle. When Bertha Cohen was found dead in a whirlpool bath several years ago (S, I think) she left no will. The rents on her dilapidated buildings were frozen, and some people, like Bill Turtle, had some good luck. Bill, as you know, makes a pile of money by selling "antiques" to rich folk and junk to poor folk. This is fine and good, and he has prospered. Naturally, when Wasserman bought up the whole estate, normal rents began to come back. You thank your luck for the eight cheap years, you don't damn Wasserman for playing the regular game. Taxes haven't been frozen. Similarly, $400 a month for the Mandrake store must have been el cheapo cheapo, considering that we were paying $250 for much less space two floors up. Skip, the manager at Billings and Stover, has moved to another Dow building, and is briskly in business opposite the Brattle Theater. It was a lousy corner for a drug store. Maybe Bill Turtle will do better than the Maudrake did. But that's up to the gods and his business sense.

You wouldn't want to be a landlord in Harvard Square. The place is turning into the combat zone. At least we have a few local characters like Tony around rather than out of town conglomerates like Restaurant Associates (Zum Zum, Hungry Charlies, Barneys) to feed off our quarters and pence.'66