GETTY MEMORIES

I greatly enjoyed Suzanne Muchnic’s article “A Getty Chronicle: The Malibu Years” (July 6).

However, in speaking about the old days at the museum, I was quoted as saying that the staff “groveled for supplies and sent three-page memos to justify expenditures of $2,000.” Somehow, a few zeros ended up on the wrong side of the decimal point.

No one may be groveling these days for $20, but I can assure you that even with the Getty’s significant resources, a $2,000 expenditure still warrants a pretty good memo.

BARBARA WHITNEY

Associate Director for

Administration and Public Affairs

J. Paul Getty Museum

Los Angeles

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As one who has been a frequent visitor to the Getty over the 12 years I have lived in L.A., I can tell you it’s not only the employees who are shedding tears at the temporary closing of the Getty villa. The realization that I won’t be able to visit my favorite place in California for four interminable years fills me with sadness.

For a lover of classical antiquities as I am, it has been my mecca. For total retreat and repose, it has been my place of refreshment and renewed hope. Wherever one looks, there is only beauty. The promise that it’s going to be even more wonderful when it reopens is my only consolation.

SUSAN MARZORATI

San Marino

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Few American cities have been blessed with the gift of such a cultural gem and the opportunity to study and enjoy some of the world’s great art treasures, which rival those in many of the finest museums in Europe. I can’t wait for the new Getty Center to open--appropriately in December as a marvelous new gift for everyone at the Christmas season.

CHARLES F. QUEENAN

Encino