The Undergraduate Chair

Arrival of Winter Brings Out the Real Dartmouth Spirit; Wartime Campus Maintains Traditional Liking for Snow

FOR WEEKS, EVEN BEFORE the first sparse blanket of snow covered the campus, the stores along Main Street have had their windows filled with various types of winter sports equipment, and novice and expert alike have been window-gazing and discussing the relative merits of the different brands of waxes and base lacquers. What with shortages of equipment brought on by the fourth winter since we entered the war, the pickings were rather poor, and all kinds of makeshifts will probably be seen on the hills outside of `Hanover once the season gets into full swing. At least one feature of the pre-war Dartmouth still survives: civilian students, Navy and Marine trainees all make the Hanover winter what it has always been.

The Christmas spirit followed close on the heels of the skis in the store windows, and miniature evergreens lined the sidewalks from the corner of Wheelock and Main down to the post office. The size of the trees may or may not be an indication of the national emergency, but the cryptic "NO!" in Tanzis' window (referring to cigarettes) definitely is indicative of the fact that Hanover is no different from the rest of the country in certain respects.

However, there are differences. There is something about, something in the air; winter in Hanover may be no different from winter anywhere else, but the attitude is different. You can sense it in the conversations as students stream across the common between classes, with the chimes of Baker cutting through the crisp December air. You can sense it in a quickened spirit as afternoon classes end, and the daily exodus to the golf course begins. It is there in the skis lined up along dormitory hallways, dripping crusted snow that falls to the floor and melts into pools of water. It is there in spite of turned-up collars, frozen hands, and steaming breath. Dartmouth likes winter, and, war or no war, makes the most of the snow. The only thing that at the present moment stands in the way of Hanover desires is the lack of snow, but history of past years reconciles us, for we know that it is just a matter of time before there will be enough.

Other than the present lack of sufficient white to satisfy everyQne, there are a few differences from the Dartmouth winters of the past. The campus is quiet, relatively, with the east end (Topliff, New Hampshire, and South and Middle Fayerweathers) all dark since the Navy moved over to the west end when enrollment in the Unit was cut to less than 1300 at the beginning of the present semester in November. Attendance at eight o'clock classes, even on the most bitter mornings, is overwhelming until you think of the fact that twenty-five demerits and a weekend spent in checking in every two hours at College Hall await the trainee who prefers to sleep through his first class. Civilian students, even, manage to show up most of the time, as a result of the no-cut rule, but the general tired air in those crack-of-dawn classes is enough to prove that peace-time spirit still exists.

With so much regulation, all of it so foreign to the stories we had heard before coming to Dartmouth, the question gets down to just how much we do have that survives from former days. What do we civilians, who have never known anything but the Navy at Dartmouth, find here that gives us a kinship with the classes that have preceded us? Fraternities boarded up, wild beer parties a thing of the past, or at least carried on very much under cover, weekends beginning Saturday noon and ending Sunday night—these are the prominent differences. There are subtler ones too.

The intimate contact with professors, once so characteristic of Dartmouth's small classes, has become more difficult to find. It is hard to be informal when the whole class stands at attention as the professor enters the room. With bigger classes, the opportunity for close exchange of ideas has been minimized. At any rate though the informality once a part of classes has disappeared, most instructors are willing to give up their own time to talk with students about anything and everything.

Still, there is something that makes former members of our class, and of the present freshman class, most of whom have known very little of college life, write of their memories of the little time they spent in Hanover, and write with a hope of coming back as soon as they possibly can.

Is the Dartmouth spirit still here, still so contagious that mere contact produces a life-long affliction? There can be no other conclusions than that it is. The spirit of •fellowship, whether it grows from isolation in the North woods, or whether it springs from the physical being that is Dartmouth, with the ever-present background of Baker's chimes and the misty shapes of Dartmouth Row on a foggy morning, or from the sense of friendship that Hanover gives you, still is here, and now is the strongest sensation we have. It is this fellowship which has made others call us "clannish," but it is the Dartmouth spirit, and it has survived in spite of war, for you just can't forget "her sharp and misty mornings, the clanging bells, the crunch of feet on snow."

Guest occupant of The Undergraduate Chair this month is David G. Stahl '47 of Manchester, N. H. He is managing editor of the Dartmouth Log, wartime successor to The Dartmouth, and also serves as student correspondent for The Manchester Union.