Letters to the Editor
Complaint
TO THE EDITOR
Jean Shepherd, the voice of my favorite "talk show" (locally WAMC-FM, a NPR station) is my authority for the statement that letters to the editor are the most read department in the news media. I seldom skip them in the DARTMOUTH ALUMNI MAGAZINE.
Those in the October 1974 issue reminded me of a group of which I was once an elected member (the town Republican Committee) where the chairman always began the agenda with the question "Any complaints?" By the time the question had gone the rounds of the 18 members, the tone was set for a disgruntled majority to find fault with everything.
I found a majority of letters to the editor of that nature. I could not share the complaint of two writers about an honorary degree for the Supreme Court Justice. While I do not condone the cause of objection, unlike the writers, I can think of numerous individuals in public life who certainly deserved it less, including at least one who has received it. Perhaps I have a built-in bias toward Justice Douglas because I have enjoyed reading some of his books, beginning with Of Men and Mountains.
One letter writer has "two gripes," and the complaints and "nit picking" continue almost to the end when one writer comes up with adequate authority that the long harangue about the meaning of Wah Hoo Wah was, after all, only a "snow job" in a tepee. Certainly some of those who clung so desperately to use of the yell might have discovered this long ago if they were so concerned.
The Letters Department might be more worthwhile reading with fewer "gripes" and. when gripes are inevitable or at least justified, if the subject was one of greater public concern.
End of my complaint.
New business: My nominee for an honorary degree from Dartmouth, Judge John J. Sirica.
Schenectady, N.Y.
Apology
TO THE EDITOR:
As a successor to that "professor of Moral Philosophy at nearby Hamilton College" who, a century ago, led the attack against the Oneida Community, my apologies to the Community and my thanks to Mary Bishop Ross for a very fine article. ["The Kingdom of God HasCome," October 1974.]
Professor and Chairman Department of Philosophy Hamilton College
Clinton, N.Y.
A Great Teacher
TO THE EDITOR:
"Teaching is forever," and Bancroft Brown reminds me of the truth of this statement.
He was kind to a scared freshman who had flunked math, even though that freshman had worked hard to pass. I shall never forget his clarity and charity; great teachers are rare but he was indeed one of the truly great teachers.
Branford, Conn.
Dismal Episode
TO THE EDITOR:
The following is hearsay.
A professional colleague of mine, in his late 60s, a graduate of Harvard, his wife, his daughter, a graduate of Cornell Medical School, and her husband, a graduate of MIT, traveled to the Harvard-Dartmouth football game in Hanover, October 26, 1974. They sat in Section 20, Row EE, entering through Gate 8, Port 3. In the same section adjacent to them were several other Harvard alumni and their wives. The rest of the section was filled by male and female students identified by my colleague as members of the Dartmouth Class of '78.
These young people proceeded to pour forth a game-long cacophony of language so foul as to pass beyond the bounds of profanity. My colleague could only use the words "filth" and "obscene" in attempting to describe the vocabulary to which his wife, his daughter, and the other adults were subjected. The atmosphere was totally unleavened by any mitigating sense of humor or heavy handed boisterousness. The anachronism of sportsmanship never entered the scene. Female members of the group participated fully in the performance, and if the purpose was to discomfit and humiliate the older women present, this goal was achieved.
The whole dismal and vaguely malignant episode took place under a miasmic haze of stale beer and cheap wine dispensed from unmarked plastic containers. Vox clamantis in deserto.
ambridge, N. Y.
High Praise
TO THE EDITOR:
The unusual cover and the inside story of new construction that appeared in the October issue of the DARTMOUTH ALUMNI MAGAZINE were most impressive. However, I feel that mention must be made of the man who is doing this beautiful building for Dartmouth College and who has done much of the new building for the College in the past few years. Phil Jackson, president of the Jackson Construction Company and a devoted member of the Class of '43, deserves not only to be mentioned but to be highly praised. The relationship between the College and Phil Jackson I'm sure has been mutually satisfactory and is evidence of Dartmouth's desire to keep its physical plant as beautiful and functional as proud alumni would want.
WALDO L. (DOC) FIELDING M.D. '43 Brookline, Mass.
Remember When
TO THE EDITOR:
It may seem strange but I remember when The girls looked like girls and men like men. Today as I gaze at the campus scenes With those hairy heads and those worn blue jeans
I find it takes more than a second glance To tell which it is in those passing pants.
Portland, Maine
The Symbol (cont.)
TO THE EDITOR:
I am indeed surprised that some member of my class has not risen in defense of the Indian as the real Dartmouth symbol.
Webster defines the word tradition as "a long established custom or practice that has the effect of an unwritten law; specifically, any of the usages of a school of art or literature handed down through the generations and generally observed."
As a freshman, I thrilled to the sound of the Indian war-whoop as given by "Chief Walking - Stick" at the fall football games. This impressed me with the fact that Dartmouth was founded originally to educate the Indian; that any student of the Amerind race was given free tuition.
The lives and influence of Eleazar Wheelock and Samson Occum inspired my youthful mind.
"Lo, the poor Indian! whose untutor'd mind Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind."
As a member of the Dartmouth Outing Club. I trod many of the Indian trails in the White and Green Mountains and reveled in their musical names.
Some years later, as a candidate for my doctorate at Cornell University, I wrote my dissertation on The Indian in American Literature - 1775-1875, publishing a major part of it. Incidentally, a typescript of this dissertation is in the Baker Memorial Library.
All of this brings up the question: Why is Dartmouth, because of the protests of a small minority, guilty of discarding the worthy Indian symbol?
With our Dartmouth poet laureate, Richard Hovey, may we take warning:
"Men of Dartmouth, set a watch, Lest the old traditions fail."
Bloomsburg, Pa.
TO THE EDITOR:
A few miles southwest of New Bedford. Mass., near Buzzards Bay, is the Town of Dartmouth. Dartmouth High School has a spirited football team whose nickname is "The Dartmouth Indians." They are so written up by the sportswriters of Boston and other easters Massachusetts newspapers.
They are in good company ... like the Cleveland Indians, the Atlanta Braves, the Washington Redskins, the Kansas City Chiefs, and the Florida State Seminoles.
Here in New Hampshire, our largest banking chain is called "The Indian Head Banks. National Shawmut Bank of Boston proudly continues to use as its identifying symbol of dignity, character, and strength the handsom bronze head and shoulders of Chief Sarnoset
Out on the Pacific Coast, are they still "The Stanford Indians" or have they, like Dartmouth College, weakened and succumbed?
Derry, N.H.
