Letters to the Editor

Sadie's Story

The current re-examination of fraternity life at Dartmouth has many of us recalling how it was "back when." As a case in point, here's an item that went out over national newswires in 1966:

"HANOVER, N.H. (AP) - The police are putting the heat on Sadie. She's in the woodwork of the Zeta Psi fraternity house at Dartmouth and won't come out. Everybody thought Sadie, a boa constrictor, was dead until a carpet man saw her head sticking out of a hole in the wall.

" 'lt kind of caught him a bit off guard,' said John O'Connor, the Dartmouth campus police chief, who has enlisted the aid of snake breeder Jim Norris to evict Sadie without tearing the house apart. 'We're using an electrical heater to make a room nice and warm for Sadie and hoping she'll come out to look around,' said O'Connor.

"Sadie and a mate were bought by some fraternity members for $10 each 6 months ago. The mate died and Sadie disappeared. Frat members assumed she died, too.

" 'We know she loves warmth,' O'Connor said. 'She used to stay wrapped around the steam line coil in the basement where they were kept as house pets.' Norris says the snake can survive as long as she can find a stray mouse or two. She was 4 feet long and 6 inches around when she disappeared."

I will comment on the more relevant aspects of this item, which seems unusually prophetic: Hanoverians back then could turn up the heat for no better reason than to flush a snake. Hard to imagine now, isn't it?

The elusive surviving snake was female. And that was before parity, before women lived on campus, in fact before women were allowed at Dartmouth at all, except on important weekends. There was a message there for those who could read it.

Sadie the snake was first spied by a carpet man. So, apparently it was not unknown for fraternities to have their carpets cleaned.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the campus police chief wanted the job done "without tearing the house apart."

Chicago, Ill.

On Drinking

Thanks to Dan Nelson for his brilliant article ["Drinking," January/February issue]. He said it the way it is.

Now 59 pushing 60, it's fair to say that I have been an alcoholic during the great bulk of my adult life. It started, I'm sorry to admit Dartmouth. On a very skinny allowance I nonetheless had no trouble finding the $1.50 (imagine!) required to buy a quart of booze over at White River Junction.

Then followed four years in the Army You can picture that scene. After that, too manyyears in too difficult a business, running it myself.

There's the background. To your notes, add these addenda: Students, under pressure to make grades, drink or whatever for temporary relief from whatever the hell bothers or they think bothers. In the service you are bored to death or and I've been there scared to death. Either way, you drink. Maybe not you I. In business you (again, not you, I) have to be friendly. You have to sell. If you fail to sell, that's another reason to get plastered Remember, you got half-gassed trying to sell! And so on, and on.

Glen Head, N. Y.

I was pleased to read the article on alcoholism in the January/February issue. I am currently working as an elementary-school guidance counselor, and one of my projects is to develop a drug abuse prevention unit for my fifth-grade students. I have been encouraged by Governor Gallen's Commission on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse Prevention.

As your article pointed out, the first step in dealing with alcoholism is to notice and talk about the specific episodes that occur. This step can be taken by each one of us at whatever level alcoholism exists in our environment. I am glad that members of the Dartmouth community are planning to tackle this problem.

Rye, N.H.

Sneak Attack

Your January/February issue arrived, and with it an irresponsible example of leftist hooliganism in the form of a letter by R. 0. Baumrucker '31, from San Francisco.

First, Baumrucker coyly prepares a sneak attack against the '68 valedictorian, who, he writes, "cowardly stood up and urged that his fellow classmates desert their country." I know the old Wobbly attack Baumrucker '31 is preparing. Getting me to think he's one of me.

Baumrucker then urges the Bantu to abandon their tribal life and customs, which will "improve their lot." The insinuations of a Marxist? Perhaps. But there's more to come. Immediately he gives the game away by attempting to slur the; "Nkomo-Mugabe types." The whom? A visit to the Depot of World Affairs would lead the reader to discover the aforementioned type as anti-apartheid and Marxist.

For a few paragraphs Baumrucker had me believing he was a tried-and-true California progressive attempting to make me believe he was an equally tried-and-true California reactionary. But no: In the penultimate paragraph he asks when Jane Fonda will be nominated for an honorary degree, thereby showing his hand darkly.

I know your game, Baumrucker. For nearly seven months I wrote a picture for Jane Fonda. Three of those months were involved in eighthour meetings, on a near-daily basis. She's a clever woman, all right. I mean, my God, she actually had me thinking hard, which is not an occupational hazard in the film industry. Worst of all, she asked very tough questions and had the optimism and trust to assume I could com up with equally tough answers. Okay, Baumrucker. She's a woman, and I admit I was a little taken. Or smitten, as you might have written. Who hasn't fallen for a Mata Hari once in his life?

But to ask the College authorities to nominate the finest actress in America for an honorary degree? To recognize the woman's heroics? After all, the '68 valedictorian was only addressing his class. In '68, Ms. Fonda was addressing America's conscience, at the expense of her own career. She was blacklisted for nearly five years.

It's non-Bantu types like you, Baumrucker, that continue to stir up trouble by pretending to be "objective" and "rational," and end up muddying the already polluted waters of international politics. But even if you're a Marxist and I'm not, I second your motion to nominate Ms. Fonda for an honorary degree.

Rome, Italy

The Glee Club

As a member of a Dartmouth family and close associate and follower of the Glee Club, I am writing this letter in an effort to up-grade their performances.

Our family attended the Glee Club's spring concert held at Episcopal Academy, near Philadelphia, on March 20. To begin, the concert was scheduled for 7:30 p.m., which made it difficult to arrive on time; however, we managed to find our way (no signs indicating where the concert was to be held) and were only a few minutes late. Thinking that we would surely have to stand (as in previous years), I was astonished to find the auditorium less than half filled.

The visual picture of the Glee Club was not exciting (no facial expressions, except two members who stood out as the exception). The "girls' " outfits were not uniform in length, and showed no imagination. The chorus continually changed places during the program, and in addition used music, and sometimes did not look at the director.

To add insult to injury, the selection of songs, in my opinion, was poor. I agree that to show versatility it is nice to include a song in Latin or German, but to spend three-quarters of the program singing foreign songs is not good planning.

I realize this letter sounds critical and probably it is but my intentions are good. I would like the Glee Club to be able to excite audiences (as in the past) and to entertain with a flair and show professionalism! Let's face it, they are acting as a representative of Dartmouth College on their concert tour. The performance I saw was not indicative of the high caliber of quality Dartmouth has always exhibited, and I would like to see the standard raised to its normal height.

I sing with a chorus of 100 women and have finished fourth internationally in chorus competition (Sweet Adelines, Inc.). I love to sing and perform before an audience with women, but in my opinion women (at least those that were on stage at the performance) do not belong in a Glee Club but rather in a choir. However, if they are to remain, a little enthusiasm, good grooming, make-up, costuming, and even perhaps choreography would go a long way to adding some pizzazz! Paul Zeller, the "Injunaires," and past Glee Club members would have been sorry to have heard the new Glee Club sound. Hopefully, the next time will be a lot better! "

Swarthmore, Pa.

[On the other hand, in last month's issue thesecretary of the class of 1945, Edward Smithreported his enjoyment of a recent Glee Clubconcert, particularly "the animated direction ofthe new director, Melinda O'Neal." Ed.]

Accuracy, Accuracy

For the sake of historical accuracy I'd like to make a couple of corrections to the brief column on the Dartmouth Flying Club in the March issue.

First, I am a retired colonel in the Air Force Reserve although I did enlist in the Army Air Corps as a flying cadet in 1941, staying through the changes to Army Air Force and United States Air Force.

Second, I was a fighter-bomber pilot, generally the only one aboard a single-engine aircraft. A bomber pilot commanded a crew of three to a dozen fliers and usually an engineer to monitor two or four engines. Single-engine pilots felt they had the best deal in most cases.

The film student mentioned in the same column is the talented, energetic Bill Messing '82, who recently finished the long and exacting task of editing the Freshmen Trips film. It should have its first screening in April. It now runs about 20 minutes, having been reduced from over 90.

Hanover, N.H.

Do It

Prescribed reading: the Jean Kemeny book. Utterly delightful!

Manchester, Conn.

Adversity

Apparently the mural madness has spread to other parts of the Granite State. According to an article in the U.N.H. student paper, a Durham psychologist named Kenneth Sole is upset over what he considers a racist depiction of an Indian in a mural in the local post office. The picture shows a torchholding Indian preparing to burn a white pioneer home, and is entitled "Cruel Adversity." It represents a series of burnings and killings in the Durham area by native tribes in 1694.

Sole proposes to commission a new mural reacting to the existing one and submit it to the postmaster. He is looking for contributions from local people.

I can't help but think that Sole was influenced by the goings-on just up the road in Hanover.

East Hampstead, N.H.

The ALUMNI MAGAZINE welcomes comment from its readers. For publication, letters should be signed and addressed specifically to the Magazine (not copies of communications to other organizations or individuals). Letters ex- ceeding 400 words in length will be condensed by the editors.