Editorial Comment

Constituting the Council

Between the date of this issue and the first of March there will be in progress the nomination of new members to the Alumni Council from the respective districts. There is a slight difference this year from the rule in former years, in that the Council has adopted a provision which it seems" odd should not have existed hitherto, whereby any alumnus thus placed in nomination may if he so desires withdraw his name from consideration. In the event that withdrawals in any district leave only a single nominee remaining, his election will follow as a matter of course, no ballot being sent out —nomination in that case being tantamount to election.

The normal course of making nominations under the revised constitution is for the secretary to send out to the alumni, by regional districts, a notice in January specifying in each case the number of elective councillors for the district concerned whose terms will expire next July. This notice gives the names of the present incumbents, and states which, if any, are eligible to a further term. (No elective member is eligible to more than two successive terms of three years each.) The alumnus receiving this notice will be requested to indicate on an accompanying blank the name of someone person whom he desires to nominate for each vacancy. The nomination ballots thus returned are canvassed by the secretary at Hanover on March 1 and it is his duty to designate as the three nominees for each of the several vacancies, the three persons who have received the largest numbers of votes. If there are tie votes leading to a greater number than three, choice among them is to be made by lot so as to reduce the number to three.

The nominees in the various districts are then notified; and if none declines nomination an election ballot will go forward in due course to the alumni of the district, to be marked for one name among the three and returned to Hanover before June 10. The secretary will then tabulate the votes and announce the elections. It is here that the new withdrawal provision comes into operation, so that in case two of the three original nominees of the district insist on declining, the one remaining is deemed automatically to be elected, without the necessity of any vote.

We have said before and would now repeat that this process of nominating and electing members of the Council is one which it is hoped the alumni will take most seriously, since the functions of the Council are of growing importance and amount, in effect, to those of a sort of Congress representing the whole alumni body, much as any legislature represents any other constituency. Since the total number of the graduates of Dartmouth has grown to the present size, it is obvious that efforts to transact alumni business by resort to a "townmeeting" type of assembly at Commencement would be an empty travesty.

As a result the Council has sprung into being. It consists of 25 members, all told, partly elected by regional districts and in part recruited by other methods, such as the Secretaries' Association, the Faculty, and two or three members ex officiis. The regional representatives, especially in the case of localities remote from the East and North, are generally chosen with due regard alike for their ability to serve with intelligence and interest, and for their probable opportunity to take actual part by being present in person at the two Council meetings of the year. One of those meetings is required to be held in Hanover—usually at the start of Commencement week. The other may be held anywhere, and has been variously located at Boston, New York and Chicago. The attendance of remote members entails a sacrifice of time, convenience and money exceeding that of members closer to the scene, but is of very real importance. Hence the reiterated suggestion that, in making nominations or elections, some weight be allotted to the possibility of the candidate's being so situated as to attend at least one meeting each year, and preferably both.

It should be added that the record thus far has been remarkable for attendance, usually marshalling all but two or three of the entitled 25 members. It has been no less remarkable for the intelligence shown and the interest displayed in handling the problems presented for decision. As a "liaison officer" between the corporation of the College and the widely scattered alumni, the worth of this body can hardly be overstated. Hence this appeal for thought and pains in making nominations for 1928, in the idea of maintaining the already admirable record.

The Annual Problem

Since Dartmouth College has no endowment of sufficient size to yield an income adequate to span the gap between what the students pay for their education and what that education actually costs per man, the gap either has to be spanned in other ways, or left a yawning chasm which the successive years would widen.

The obvious alternatives are either to enter upon an intensive quest for a permanent capital fund, yielding an income about equal to the normal deficit between what is paid for tuition and what the tuition costs, or else to go on as we are now doing, collecting every year a sum which roughly equals the interest which an adequate endowment fund would give us. And of course there is still a third suggestion, which is not capable of being used all at once, but which might sensibly reduce the size of the discrepancy; to wit, to make the tuition fee more nearly equal to the cost of the thing it secures.

We are concerned here with only the year 1928. During the current college year, although the tuition fee is larger than it used to be and by so much tends to narrow the space to be spanned by other funds, there is certain to be nearly the normal deficit to be met; and as the permanent endowment remains inadequate, this deficiency will require to be counterbalanced by the usual Alumni Fund, contributed by the loyal graduates and non-graduates, whose love and affection for their College has thus far proved happily sufficient to insure an absence of red-ink entries on the final balance sheet.

After so many years of instructive experience, the MAGAZINE believes it to be needless to argue salesman-wise in "selling" the Fund to Dartmouth men. Surely we all know what it is for, appreciate the pressing necessity of it, take an honest pride in raising it, and stand perfectly ready to cooperate with the unselfish men to whom is delegated the by no means coveted task of making this annual solicitation. It would be difficult to express in words the appreciation which the Fund Committee and the corps of Class Agents feel for the ready-handed alumnus who delays not, but makes prompt avowal of his willingness and his desire to assist by contributing whatever he honestly believes to be the utmost he is reasonably capable of giving. This appreciation, it should be added, is wholly independent of the positive size of the contribution. The man who promptly and enthusiastically gives the one dollar, the five dollars, or the $10 which represents the utmost he can well spare does his bit just as surely as the man who gives $25 or $100—and very often does it more surely by far. In any case, what he does is warming to the cockles of the heart.

Nevertheless the successive Fund Committees have found it true that some otherwise ready participants incline to hold back, because of a feeling that a small gift is not of sufficient consequence to warrant making it. That simply is not the fact; and if we would say one word more urgently than another in this matter, it is the word which must persuade the man whom circumstances constrain to do less than he would be glad to do, that his participation is still of paramount necessity and of paramount satisfaction.

The aim this year is the same as lastto raise $115,000. Last year the Fund fell short by a trifle; yet, after making the usual dispositions to subordinate ends, enough remained to square the balances for the year and bring the college out with all bills paid. It has been felt that to increase the total this year would be unjustifiable, and therefore it remains precisely what it was before. It should be met, this time—but it can only be met if every one will cooperate cordially and generously in the common task. We would add the usual counsel against procrastination, which in this matter is the thief not only of time, but also of your Class Agent's peace of mind. One who knows he is going to give and about how much, will assist materially if he responds to the first appeal, and will also increase the net yield of the total Fund by curtailing the overhead expenses of collection. One who is in doubt will also assist if he will make plain his doubts and difficulties to the committee in charge of the campaign—for that committee exists in part to answer questions and resolve doubts.

Herbert Darling Foster

The sudden death of Professor Herbert Darling Foster in England in December removed from the roster of the Dartmouth faculty one of its oldest and best known members. Familiar to students in the College from 1893, when he first came to the History Department, and probably more often referred to under his sobriquet of "Eric the Red"—an affectionate nickname presumably derived in part from a rufous complexion and in part from courses dealing with early explorations—Professor Foster was a most useful and stimulating instructor, enjoying a widespread--popularity among both students and graduates of Dartmouth. He was himself an alumnus, graduating with the class of 1885; and at the 40th reunion of that class two years ago was conspicuously honored by it.

His earlier teaching experience was in the departments of English and History at Worcester Academy, in Massachusetts, where he served for three years immediately after graduation from Dartmouth, then becoming the head of the history department at Worcester which he had reorganized. From 1891 to 1892 he pursued postgraduate courses in his chosen subject at Harvard and obtained at that university his A. M. In 1893 he began his long career as a teacher of History at Hanover, incidentally taking postgraduate work as opportunity offered abroad —at Cambridge, Berlin, Geneva, Paris and London—and receiving in 1909 the degree of Litt. D. from Geneva. He served conspicuously in the educational work of the A. E. F. in France during the first half of 1919, was a fellow of the Royal Historial Society, a past-president of the New England History Teachers' Association, and an energetic member of the Anglo-American Historical Research Committee. His writings were numerous and included many magazine articles of an historical character, always instructive and never dull.

Few members of the Dartmouth faculty in the past 30 years have been better known, or more genuinely appreciated as knowing well how to mingle the scientist and the humanitarian, making companionship at once a mental stimulus and a social delight.

Sporting the Oak

Among recent undergraduate suggestions has been noted one which was very probably ironical, to the general effect that, as dormitories heterogeneously populated are notoriously noisy places at all hours, it would be well for the faculty and administration to designate someone hall as a dormitory for really studious students, in which of course quiet would reign.

It appears that there is not in American colleges as yet the tradition long prevalent in Oxford—if not also in Cambridge—which goes by the name of "sporting the oak." This means merely that when the heavy outer door of a student's apartment is closed it is a signal that the occupant wishes not to be disturbed and while it may not be respected invariably, and is presumably violated when the occupant has for some reason acquired unpleasant notoriety, it is pretty generally the rule that a man who sports his oak should be let alone.

One imagines the class-consciousness and consequent deviltry that would be promoted by the open designation of a special dormitory as sacred to the only men in college who were seriously moved to consider getting an education—the rest being common to the many who regard study as a distasteful concomitant of residence in town, to be relegated to a very subordinate position. It is much easier to assume that the suggestion is a clever satire on the supposed indifference of young men to the aspirations of the Greasy Grind. At which point the eye scanning a newspaper runs across the outgiving of a feminine educator, who openly takes up the cudgels for the idea that "what one goes to college for is a good time," anyhow, and that it's not a half-bad idea. The reaction to that outburst of candor may well be that it is quite needless as an incentive to the student population of the country to embrace the idea.

Two Varsity Teams

The suggestion advanced a year ago by President Hopkins that, as one method of saving football from itself and its own exaggerations, it might be well to provide two varsity teams of equal calibre, one to play games away from home and one to play on the home gridiron, seems to have been taken up in earnest by two of the western colleges. There is much to be said for the idea as a theory for obviating undue concentrations of interest but it may be well to await the trial of the plan in practice because there are practical considerations which seem to us to make for doubt.

Is it, for example, a practical matter to make two football elevens of such equal excellence that both will command equal enthusiasm ? There is likely, it might seem, to be a vague impression that one team is the "first" team and one the "second," strive as one may to make them absolutely equal. It is the way our minds work, and to quarrel with it may be useless. It will therefore be well to watch with intelligent interest the working of the idea as put into practice by the industrious Mr. Yost of Michigan and see what happens. It may mitigate the over-emphasis of this sport—or it may double it. One can tell better what it is worth after seeing it tried, but a shrewd guess might be that one team of the two will be spoken of as the real varsity and the other as a sort of second-string organization, contrive it as you may. The accident of scores might easily produce that result; but even without such elements of preponderance there is only too likely to be a tacit differentiation to the advantage of the one time and the detriment of the other.

Shall Fraternities Cease?

There were bound to be occasional repercussions of the remarks made last year by sundry undergraduates concerning the national fraternities, in which the question was raised whether or not the international character of the Greek letter societies of the various colleges was worth what it cost. No such question would have occurred to the fathers of boys now in college, and it is possible that the rise of such questionings now will not be fully understood. One reared in a day when it was felt to be desirable to have fraternity chapters scattered through the colleges of the land, and appreciative since that day of the pleasant associations which grew out of fraternity relationships extending through the country, might be cool toward this current suggestion that the national character of such bodies be abandoned in favor of a purely local club system. But the idea continues to be argued in such undergraduate publications as the Daily Dartmouth, which has referred with pertinence to the changing conditions, the inability of even 25 fraternities to take care of much more than half of any Dartmouth class, the "stupid ritual," the bother and perplexity of an intensive rushing (or chinning) season, the disadvantages of trying to mingle the joyous functions of a local club with those of "the cumbersome national organizations"—to mention no more.

It will be a grief to -some older alumni to find the cherished bonds of fraternal fellowship spoken of thus lightly, for it betokens the decay of something which to many was once genuinely dear. Evidently the young of today are less impressed than were their fathers by the notion of a nation-wide society, with chapters in all sorts of colleges. The expense of keeping up a relationship which is seldom or never of tangible use appears to outweigh any theoretical advantage there may be in having fraternal affiliations with other young men from Maine to California and from the Lakes to the Gulf. "What's the use, if you don't use it?" is briefly the question. One merely feels that perhaps it would be well to await in patience the experiences of several years following one's graduation before rendering a final judgment. Possibly there is more value in it than appears to the undergraduate eye —and possibly there is not. The only way to find out is to wait and see.

Now and again there is manifested among contemporary students a curious spirit of self-immolation which flowers forth in manifestoes advocating radical deprivations of things generally regarded as inseparable from collegiate existence. There have been bold suggestions, coming from students themselves, that even intercollegiate sports be done away— than which undergraduate self-abnegation can no farther go. The suggestion that the century-old fraternities, with their Greek symbols, Greek mottoes, traditions and the like, be incontinently scrapped in favor of '"small groups of like-minded students" in each college for purely social .purposes, is of much the same sort. A part of the zeal may arise from the feeling that this reveals one as an independent thinker—for the independent thinker likes to feel that the unusualness of his postulates is the best evidence of his independence but the greater part of it unquestionably comes from an honest belief that old-line fraternities are a bore, and a costly bore, for which it is silly to pretend affection when one feels none at all, but toward which one's father and uncles manifest a perfectly ridiculous sentimentality inconsistent with this questioning and distinctly hard-boiled generation.

To such honest critics of his goodly heritage, an alumnus sincerely devoted to his fraternity will probably feel very much as a Fundamentalist in religion feels toward a Free-Thinker—but regrets will alter nothing. Certainly conditions have changed. The fraternity night programme common among us gray-heads a generation or more ago would bore the modern student beyond words and he would say so frankly, where his fore- Dears (although bored at times) kept that ignoble fact to themselves and went through with the "stupid ritual" now held up to editorial contempt. .Like Kipling's Mason, "we knew the ancient landmarks and we kept 'em to a hair"—and we rather like to think back to the time when we did it, although our rusty finger-joints lend themselves but unreadily to the grip, and our recollection of the fraternity motto may be imperfect. These things, it is suspected, appeal to the modern student as a sort of Babbittry. Gray youth in its sophistication and world-weariness resents this childish delight of senile predecessors—and gray youth may be right. It will be served in any case. But on the whole it will be better to wait a while and test the fraternity idea briefly in after days.

Frank P. Carpenter's Gift

Announcement was made at the Dartmouth alumni meeting in Manchester, N. H., in January of a notable gift to the college promised by Mr. Frank P. Carpenter of that city, in the form of a building to be devoted to the fine arts, which is intended to be located in close vicinity to the Baker Library. The estimated cost of such a building is given as $300,000, and the desirability of such an addition to the college plant goes without saying.

Mr. Carpenter, although not himself a graduate of the College, is of Dartmouth ancestry. His grandfather, Josiah Carpenter, graduated in the class of 1787, and he himself was honored by the College in 1915 with the degree of Master of Arts in recognition of his conspicuous service to the civic and industrial welfare of the community in which he has made his home.

It is stated that the plan for developing the area around the Baker Library includes the ultimate provision of three supporting buildings, of which the Carpenter Fine Arts building will be one, the others probably to include a building devoted to the English department and one for the department of Music. The Fine Arts building will, according to the forecast, provide not merely a capacious art gallery (which the steadily accumulating possessions of the College make thoroughly desirable) but also lecture halls, rooms for the use of classes under the department, and probably private studio accommodations, as well as a seminar room and quarters for the display of photographs and prints. Enrichment of the College curriculum, hitherto impossible because of a lack of facilities of this kind, will now become feasible and clearly will tend to increase the cultural power of the proffered courses of study. The value of such an addition to the physical equipment of the institution can hardly be overestimated. Details will, of course, be available somewhat later as they are worked out.

The 1927 Senior Mt. Washington Trip Photograph by S. A. Osborn '27