John -

This is an extremely disappointing referee report.  The referee's
objections are primarily based on the belief that our results are in error
due to background/foreground contamination.  We conclude that the referee
is completely unaware that this is a photometric redshift sample where the
filter set has been redshifted to the cluster mean and, therefore,
foreground and background objects are eliminated by their color indices.
This is the seventh paper of this series and, while I realize that noone
reads our papers, this photometric procedure was clearly cited in the
text.

Additionally, the comments about our English and grammar are clearly out
of line.  I wrote these papers.  The only time, in my professional career,
that my grammar has been criticized is when I collaborate with my Austrian
colleagues.  They do the data collection, I do the analysis and write the
text.  The referees display their gross bias when they see non-American
names as first author.  I was embarrassed to pass this report on to them
with that comment enclosed.

I usually value referee reports for their insight on where I can
strengthen a paper and its analysis. This report is useless.  I would
normally request a second referee, one more familiar with galaxy evolution,
but quite frankly I don't wish to wait another six months for a second
report.  So I responded to the referee below, with great restraint, and
made minor corrections to our text.

Jim

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Respond to Referee Report, Paper #50048, "Cluster Populations in A115 and
A2283."

We thank the referee for his work in examine our paper.  However, we are
disappointed in his/her report since the referee is clearly unaware of the
key techniques we use and the purpose of our study.  First, we would like
to comment that the paper was written (as are all seven papers in this
series and this response) by the American member of the team (JS).  Of the
over 50 papers I have written in my career, only the ones with my Austrian
colleagues have featured comments from referees about grammar.  The errors
are primarily typos and typesetting mistakes.  It is an interesting
example of cultural bias that brings these errors into a referee report
when the lead authors are non-American.

The primary problem that the referee feels we need to address is the lack
of redshifts for many of the cluster members in the three clusters we
study.  Words can not express our dismay that the referee is clearly
unaware that this study uses a photometric redshift system that eliminates
foreground and background objects.  Briefly, the narrow band filters are
selected to match the rest frame of the cluster in question.  Since the
filters are redshifted, foreground and background galaxies have abnormal
colors (i.e. colors unlike any kind of star or galaxy) and are removed
from the analysis.  We have performed numerous simulations and comparison
to known redshift objects to demonstrate that the color indices can be
used to determine cluster membership (within 1000 km/sec).  This has been
written up in many of our earlier papers, and is described in the second
paragraph of the introduction of this paper.

We also disagree with the statement by the referee that our methodology
for selecting blue galaxies is flawed, although this may be further
confusion about redshift effects.  The original Butcher-Oemler papers did
indeed focus on the cluster cores.  But this is because they did not have
membership information since they used zero redshift broadband filters.
Their corrections for foreground/background were made in a statistical
manner and they minimized the effect by using only the high density region
of a cluster core.  Our narrow band filters, redshifted to the cluster
velocity, allow us to investigate the full cluster population including,
most importantly, outlying galaxies to the cluster potential as long as
they are near the redshift of the cluster.  Since our goal is to study the
evolution of stellar populations in galaxies as a function of redshift,
the clusters serve only as signposts to this particular redshift for
collecting a large number of galaxies at a single epoch.  Thus, we find
the referee's comments particularly offense since, unlike other color work
on distant galaxies, we work in the cluster rest frame with no
k-corrections.  Our analysis is based on comparisons directly to
present-day galaxy colors, rather than cluster means as in the
Butcher-Oemler studies, and are *superior* to other work where statistical
corrections are made or interpretation is based on model which assume star
formation history parameters.

After removing the referee's comments that deal with redshift effects,
we can find very little to change in our original text.  We have attempted
to emphasize (again) the photometric redshift nature of the study in the
introduction.  However, we resist adding a section to discuss these
methods since we have described our method exhaustively in our previous
papers.

We address the individual comments below:

Section 1:

We are not quite sure what the referee wishes us to change in our
introduction.  This is a photometric study focused on the evolution of
stellar populations in galaxies, so-called color evolution.  The referee
would like us to reference morphological work and fundamental plane work.
Our understanding is that morphological work deals with the appearance of
galaxies, not their colors.  Fundamental plane studies attack problems of
galaxy formation and how galaxies evolve in a structurally and dynamical
sense.  While these impact indirectly on the stellar population studies,
in the sense that blue galaxies are often irregular indicating tidal
influences, or blue galaxies are overluminous on the Tully-Fisher diagram;
these areas are not the primary focus of our study and we found the
citation of them in our introduction to be superfluous.  We feel we have
referenced the appropriate work for the questions we address; however, we
have attempted to add as many references as we can throughout the paper to
satisfy the referees request.  

Section 2.1:

While the paper would be strengthened by the inclusion of the A2218 data,
this data is to be published in a separate paper by a different subset of
authors.  These authors were kind enough to allow us to use the reduced
data and to make this data is available at the web site with the other
cluster's data.  However, the discussion and goals of the A2218 data is
their prerogative and will be presented in due course. 

With respect to completeness, the referee is correct, foreground and
background objects do have extreme colors.  That is how they are
identified and removed.  We have expanded in the text how we calculate
various parameters, particular f_B.

Section 2.2:

Since this is a photometric study, we believe our photometric
classification to be clear and simple.  In addition, it continues the
definitions outlined in Rakos, Maindl and Schombert.  Phrases such as
'passively evolving' are needlessly clumsy.  We believe the experienced
and interested reader can follow our methods.

Section 2.3:

The referee is correct in pointing out our lack of error discussion.  We
have expanded that section.  We have stated that there is no change in the
A115's mean cluster color from the previous data.  Additional diagrams
seem unnecessary and would simple add to our page charges.  We have added
the reddening vectors as requested.

Section 2.4: 

We have quantified the statement in the text.

Section 3.2: 

We have modified the text to include the fits to the slopes of the CM
diagrams.  We have also added the homogeneity references requested.  The
scientific method requires that we report discrepancies, not explain them.

Section 3.3:

As above, foreground/background is not a problem.

Section 3.4:

Acronyms such as SN are obvious; but, in the interest of clarity, we have
expanded them in the text.