The First Letter
Dartmouth CollegeSept. 20, 1933.
Dear Mother: Well, I've not been "thrown" yet. And I sure have had to take it.
Bill has gone to the show this evening with another guy who lives down the hall. I just came up from work. Bill also is a waiter. I don't know why we are called waiters, for none of us do much waiting. We work about hrs. in the morning, and 2 hrs. at noon and night. And it is no easy job for fifty waiters to take care of 700 hungry boys. Only one waiter has dropped his tray full of dishes so far. When he did all the eaters burst out in loud applause. All the waiters eat on their own table until the fellows come in; then they jump up and wait on their bunch. My table is right next to Jack Wells'. Food is O.K. About the first twenty-five tables have double set-ups. I'm No. 24.
After a two hour process I was finally administered and matriculated, with the President's signature and all. I expected to see an old grey haired guy up there with whiskers. The Bursar or one of his assistants very kindly received my check. That afternoon I went to the library where we learned how to find ourselves around it. It is certainly a very beautiful place. A fellow is still working on the mural paintings down stairs. It looks to me as though art was going back to the Stone Age type. The same night the new waiters stumbled around the dining hall for the first time. The boys were very nice about overlooking our difficulties. That night I slept—, —and boy did I sleep.
Bill is a very nice fellow. I will get along with him fine. In fact, all the fellows I see or have met are exceptionally nice guys. They are all just as green as I am and looking for friends. And talk about polite. Why if a freshy was kicked, he'd turn around and apologize to the upper-classmen. One sure has to be brilliant to shine out over these guys.
On Tuesday I had my physical examina- tion. In those two hours I found out that I had about a hundred different measure- ments, from the width of my neck to the strength of my lungs and slope from one shoulder to the other. I could swim the fifty yards alright. By the way, while taking my card through the registering process I came across a fellow who went to school to papa in Jackson. I can't just remember his name now, but it was something like Wilkins. Tuesday night all the freshmen had their Scholastic Aptitude Test. It was flukier than any intelligence test I've ever come across.
Wednesday morning I took my French placement exam. I bought a second hand French book at the bookstore. Our first English class met in the afternoon and we were assigned our first theme—one every week—and 166 pages in the Autobiography of Lincoln Steffens. That night at about eleven p.m. I and my roommate were aroused by a great noise down in the street. When we were awake enough to hear what all the commotion was about we heard about a thousand voices chanting, "'37 out, '37 out," and an equally powerful chorus shouting, "the hell with '36." We donned our clothes while there was yet timeover our pajamas—and rushed out before we were carried out. But the poor sophies were outnumbered, so they didn't have a chance. So the freshman hazing turned out to be a sophomore massacre. We raided several dormitories and built one or two fires.
Thursday, President Hopkins gave the address at the opening exercises at Webster Hall.
In the afternoon the freshman and sophomore fight. They won for the first time in several years. The idea of the game was this: All the '37s were lined up on the south side of the campus and the '36s on the north side. So that the '37s could tell themselves from the '36s a dob of shoe polish was put on each freshman's forehead. Five footballs were lined up half way between the two lines—the object being for one side to bring as many of the balls back over his side as he could. '37s outnumbered the '36s about six to one. Before the smoke from the cannon had cleared away the '36s had four of the balls. They had put five of the best sprinters in the front lines. The fifth ball was bounced back and forth for fifteen minutes until we finally pushed it over our lines. We heard Prof. Bruce speak on "The Curriculum" the same night. He being one of the best of the speakers I have heard. Although this letter was started on the aoth it is now Friday. I am gradually improving on the typewriter, in speed if nothing else. I bought a freshman placard and a green freshman cap. So far I have been so busy that I am tired all the time. Sorry I didn't write sooner.
Love to all,
P.S. Send my best wishes to Freddy, as I won't have time to write him. I almost forgot: Will you send shaving brush and razor sharpener? What about laundry case and pillow? Has papa any typewriting paper. It's pretty expensive here.
