With the Faculty

FROM PRIVATE PAPERS in seven boxes locked up in Philadelphia vaults and written in four languages (Latin, French, Gascon, and Italian), Vernon Hall Jr., Assistant Professor of English, is unravelling the secret history running over 400 years of a famous European family called Scaliger. The language in the manuscripts is racy and rich; the situations, as mysterious as they are sensational.

Julius Caesar Scaliger, the man on whom Professor Hall is centering his attention, began life according to his own story as a page of the Emperor Maximilian; fought in the Low Countries, Greece, and Italy; became knighted and tried court life under Alphonso d'Este, Duke of Ferrara; thought of turning Franciscan monk in an attempt to become Pope and regain his family properties; studied medicine; fell in love with a girl only 13 years old and married her when she was 16 and he 45; built her a chateau and became father of her 15 children; taught Francois Rabelais and quarreled with him; attacked Erasmus and revealed Erasmus' terrible secret, that he was the son of a priest; encouraged Ronsard; wrote poetry and the first scientific Latin grammar; and became doctor-in-ordinary to the King and Queen of Navarre.

The United States and in particular the American Philosophical Society of Philadelphia consider themselves fortunate to possess so rich a collection of European manuscripts relating to famous men, the contents of which when published in Professor Hall's book are likely to stir scholars in this country and abroad and perhaps also the general reading public. Mr. Hall has already done most of his basic research and written some 50,000 words in rough drafts. The author of a scholarly work, Renaissance Literary Criticism, he hopes that his new book, though in no sense a romanticized biography (every word may be checked in the original sources), may appeal to the general reading public, for, as Mr. Hall himself says, "The age was a very rugged one, the language of the times rough and lively, and Scaliger's works and life passionate and exciting."

At Dartmouth Professor Hall teaches Freshman English; a course in writing; and two courses in Comparative Literature: Masters of the Modern Novel in which he lectures on such men as Dostoevsky, Proust, Joyce, Kafka, and Mann; and History of Literary Criticism, in which he traces the development of literary theory through the Renaissance and Neo-Classical age to the moderns.

FACULTY FEELING IN THE controversy over David Lilienthal's confirmation as chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission was demonstrated by the 146 signatures attached to the following communication sent to New Hampshire's Senators Tobey and Bridges:

"We, the undersigned members of the Dartmouth faculty, commend the statesmanlike statement of Senator Tobey in support of David Lilienthal as Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission. We believe that this is an issue of paramount importance to the future of the world. We also believe that Mr. Lilienthal is eminently qualified to hold this important position. We urge Senator Bridges to reconsider his announced opposition."

The >46 supporters of this statement represented the great majority of the Dartmouth faculty members reached in a hurried canvass.

DR. WILLIAM W. BALLARD '28, Professor of Zoology, is engaged in the unique assignment of preparing a textbook for a course that as yet only exists in the primary blueprint stage.

The idea for the course and the textbook came just prior to the outbreak of World War II when the Department of Zoology decided upon a revision of two of their pre-medical courses, Zoology 51 and 54 (The Anatomy of Vertebrates and Developmental Anatomy), into a single integrated, two-semester course. A text was needed and Professor Ballard, who is also Professor of Embryology at the Medical School, volunteered to undertake the assignment.

With a four-year break in his work caused by the war, Professor Ballard now estimates it will be another two years before the text is ready even in mimeographed or multilithed form. In preparing it he is doing intensive laboratory work on vertebrate embryos. Last year he studied anatomical changes in salmon, salamanders, tree toads, and snapping turtles. At present, he is studying perch embryos and plans a trip to Lake Champlain this summer to study bill fish, one of the most primitive native fish species.

Although deeply immersed in his scientific work, Professor Ballard finds time for his diversified outside interests in music, art, farming and foreign affairs. On the morning that the Four Power Conference opened in Moscow, The Dartmouth carried a lengthy interview with him on the conference's problems and chances for success. This interest in national and international affairs gets family stimulation from the fact that his father-in-law is U. S. Senator Ralph E. Flanders of Vermont. Professor Ballard is a member of the steering committee for the "Great Issues" course being introduced at Dartmouth next fall.

PROF. FREDERICK W. STERNFELD, who joined the Music Department last fall, has been invited by Princeton University to participate in the symposium, "Research and Scholarship in the Arts," which will be held April 22 to 24 as one of the series of assemblies of leading scholars marking the Princeton Bicentennial.

Professor Sternfeld, a native of Vienna, taught at Wesleyan University for six years before joining the Dartmouth faculty. He studied at the University of Vienna and took his Ph.D. at Yale in 1943. A musicologist, he has written many articles and is editor of the Quarterly Newsletter of the Committee on Renaissance Studies of the American Council of Learned Societies.

Another member of the Dartmouth faculty who has participated in the Princeton Bicentennial conferences is John W. Masland, Professor of Government, who also joined the College teaching staff last fall.

ALLEN L. KING, Assistant Professor of „ Physics, took an active part in the meetings of the American Physical Society and the American Association of Physics Teachers in New York, January 30 to .February 1. Before the former he presented a paper on "Arterial Pulse Wave Velocities," and before the latter a paper entitled "On a Generalization of Poiseuill's Law." Two other Dartmouth physics professors also attended the meetings: Arthur B. Meservey 'O6, department chairman, and Gordon Ferrie Hull Jr. '33.

ACTING ON THE BELIEF that astronomy J\ should not be kept the unapproachable secret of scientific specialists, Professor George Z. Dimitroff has been offering the Hanover community a series of five introductory talks on the subject. His extensive knowledge of the heavens has been translated into layman's language, and something to think about has also been provided by such titles as "Worlds Without End," which was the subject of his fourth talk. When weather permitted, interested members of the class were invited to Shattuck Observatory to view the stars through the 9.4-inch telescope. Persons entirely unfamiliar with astronomy were especially welcome at the talks.

Professor Dimitroff came to Dartmouth in March of last year, after serving as lieutenant commander in the Navy. Before the war he was superintendent of the Oak Ridge Observatory at Harvard, Mass., assisted in the astronomy department at Harvard University, and taught a general course in astronomy at Radcliffe.

VERNON HALL JR., Assistant Professor of Eng- lish, who is tracing the famous Scajiger family through 400 years of European history as back- ground for a biography of Julius Caesar Scaliger.

EMBRYOLOGY EXPERIMENTS to get material for a new textbook for proposed zoology courses are conducted by Prof. William W. Ballard '2B.