Letters

Heisman Caliber

The article "Heisman Caliber" on page 22 of the December issue contains some glaring errors. Jim Oberlander '26 was a halfback. The quarterback was Robert B. (Bob) McPhail '28. Oberlander was indeed a great passer and runner and unanimous Ail-American.

To say the team was two deep in Phi Beta Kappa's is nonsense. There were three. Nate Parker, captain and tackle, Arthur C. Smith, a guard, and Hal Marshall, understudy to Bob McPhail as quarterback. All three were Class of' 26.

Mr. Kaye is not the first to make this error on Phi Betas, as the attached letter indicates. However, I also made an error in saying there were two; 1 overlooked Art Smith.

I hope very much you will find space to quote at least the first page of my letter on the subject of the great 1925 team.

Sarasota, Fla.

[The letter Mr. Hanlon alludes to is quotedin part below:]

Dear Messrs. McCallum and Pierson:

I have been reading with much interest your fine book on the National Hall of Football Fame. It is an excellent job.

Please do not think I am carping or that I am a nitpicker when I say that you went a little overboard in stating that all members of that 1925 team became Phi Beta Kappa then or later. The fact is that there were only two Phi Beta Kappa members: Nathan K. Parker, captain and tackle, and Harold T. Marshall, quarterback (understudy to the late Robert B. McPhail '28). I say this was no disparagement to any members of that great team only in fairness to those members of Phi Beta Kappa, some of whom were athletes and some of whom were not.

[Mr. Hanlon was one of many who noticedthat we had inadvertently shifted SwedeOberlander to quarterback. We were quotinga New York Times writer and should havedouble-checked. Ed.]

The Symbol

The Board of Trustees should squash the movement toward adopting the symbol "The Dartmouth Artichokes" as reported in TheNew York Times until a full debate is held on its impact on the vegetarian community- native and otherwise. The Board apparently has little enough else to which to devote its attention.

Riverside, Conn.

President McLaughlin's statement ("Indian Symbol") in the fall Bulletin exemplifies the illogic so often applied in dealing with minority rights.

The statement leads off with "Recent incidents . . . reflect an insensitivity to the interests and feelings of certain segments of our community. ..." There is no mention of the "interests and feelings" of a rather large and important segment of our community: the alumni.

It continues to the effect that the Trustees' decision, "in the early 1970s," against use of the Indian symbol was "a reaffirmation of . . . a respect for the rights, views, and sensitivities of others. ..." "Others" apparently does not include the alumni, whose "rights, views, and sensitivities" quite obviously were not reaffirmed.

One might excuse the administration's abject surrender to minority and liberal pressures "in the early 1970s." But a decade has passed: it's time for the administration to mature, to reject once-fashionable notions, and to rejoin the real, though tolerant, world President Hopkins lived in!

San Francisco, Calif.

Good Neighbors

That "neighbor" helping Dimitri Gerakaris with his 2 1/2-ton iron tree in the photo on page 87 in the October issue of the Magazine is Edward M. Levin '69. In fact, it was Ed who designed and built the massive roof of Dimitri's stone-walled blacksmith shop. A close look at the photo will reveal Ed's mastery of medieval joining and, in this particular case, his duplication of the beautiful hammer beams of Rollins Chapel.

An accomplished craftsman in his own right, Ed lives next door to Dimitri far off in the reaches of North Canaan. One of Ed's projects rated front coverage in the [Lebanon, N.H.] Valley News this past summer: he redesigned, cut the joints for, and installed a massive frame in Boston's Old North Church to hold a new carillon of bells donated to the City.

I wonder who took the picture.

Hanover, N.H.

[The photographer was Tom Wolfestaff photographer for the Valley News and a frequentcontributer to the Magazine. Ed.]

Ex Aedibus AcademicisDartmuthensis

We have been led to think that whereas the present generation of students is short of classical learning, things. were different in the past. It is evident from a letter in the October issue by Sam M. Taylor '31, however, that Dartmouth was thin on Latin even half a century ago. Mr. Taylor ends his letter with an attempted adaptation of Cicero: "O tempora, O more." Any Yale graduate of that era would know that the proper forms are "O tempora, O Mory's."

Hanover, N.H.

[Eli Terrie is, as many of our readers know,Professor of English at the College. Ed.]

Renovating Admissions

What a welcome change Architect George Hathorn has wrought! ("Admissions gets a Face-lift," Dec. '83.) The College was wise to recognize the impact that a visit to the Admissions Office has on prospective candidates and their parents. They now will enter a warm, relaxed, and inviting atmosphere which should help to quell the apprehension that many feel when they face the admissions process.

This is an excellent example of form and function fitting together in a sensitive manner. As redeveloper of several historic properties, I know how challenging it is to achieve results that are both tasteful and efficient in renovating older buildings and how many architects disdain the use of classical features.

Architect Hathorn has done a remarkable job of combining elements of the College's Georgian heritage (the fan light and window surrounds) with contemporary ideas (the glass "facade"). One hopes to see more of his work, and his influence, on new buildings as well as old.

Washington, D.C.

The Mad Hatter's Tea Party

In Charles Osgood's article in the December issue ("Psycho-Social Dynamics and the Prospects for Mankind"), there unfolded such a mishmash of claptrap, half-truths, inanities, ignorance, and (at best) questionable assertions as to put a glaze on Jesse Jackson's eyeballs. Mercifully it wasn't on national TV or Dartmouth would have been associated for the second time in two weeks with the Mad Hatter's Tea Party.

Gettysburg, Pa.

Ars Poetica

I wish you had told the alumni that my poem ("Fish Dinner" in the October issue) was read at the 1983 Fish Dinner given by the English Department in the Sanborn Library last spring term. But maybe they got the idea anyway. I much appreciate your setting forth this poem so well in the Magazine.

On a short letter about changing Hovey's "muscles and their brains" line, that would take care of only one line. How do you change the whole poem to fit men and women? How do you invent a new word for soror and frater? A few years ago I had my class work out on this problem, but I seem to recall that there was no good solution.

Hanover, N.H.

Shaping Up

As a recent graduate of the College, I was most interested to read what various members of the Dartmouth community had to say concerning the fraternity system at the College. Although I was relieved to find that several different opinions were offered, I must take issue with the statement by Edward Scheu '46, the chairman of the FBO.

Mr. Scheu states that the fraternities are in such poor condition "that it is inconceivable that sufficient funds can be raised by the fraternities themselves to make them comparable to other housing on campus." This belief leads him to conclude that the College should assume ownership of the fraternities as soon as possible. To that I can only reply with the example of my own fraternity, Sigma Nu Delta. During the spring and fall of 1982, my former house largely completed the process that Mr. Scheu deems inconceivable. The best part of all is that the job was completed for under $20,000. Briefly, new carpeting was installed in the hallways and the rooms, something the dorm alternative sorely lacks. The entire house was painted, both inside and out, a new water heater and new energy saving boiler were installed, the rooms were fitted with new doors, and the badly damaged staircase leading to the basement was replaced. Finally a washer and dryer system was added and the kitchen was completely remodeled. All of this was accomplished with existing funds held by the Sigma Nu Delta Corporation (a non-national organization), weekly labor by the brothers, and with exacting detail in respect to fire codes. As chairman of the FBO, Mr. Scheu should have made it his duty to be aware of this renovation as well as of the others which are in progress on the campus.

The second issue raised by the chairman is that of ownership. It was almost comical to read Mr. Scheu's pronouncement that "the general sentiment of the community is that mandatory own-or-lease is the best thing," when Craig Byrne, the summer term president of the IFC, completely refutes such a statement in the next column. The obvious question is, then, to which majority of which College community is Chairman Scheu refering? Once again it seems likely that Mr. Scheu has either been misinformed, or that he simply decided to overlook opposing opinions. Although he refers to "strong constituencies" in a variety of College communities, it is painfully obvious that no such consensus exists. Recent fraternity/sorority pledge rates, as well as consistent alumni contributions, tend to contradict Scheu's assertion.

In all likelihood, Mr. Scheu would brand me as one of the "hard-core group of alumni [just like the ones who back the Review] who will back the fraternities to the end." By bringing in the controversial Review, Scheu is seeking to equate legitimate alumni concern for the fraternity system with the wild-eyed extremism of the Review. I am not proposing to back the system I joined in 1979-80. At that time, there were considerable problems that each fraternity had yet to face. However, by 1983 most of the houses had begun the arduous process of "shaping up." Each house has chosen its own method, usually in accordance with what the members themselves feel is most comfortable. Some have'chosen to rejoin the national chapters, others have not. The point is that the most important factor, that of attitude, is already present. Thus, once more has Chairman Scheu completely missed the mark, when he claims that the defensiveness of the fraternity system is "rooted." Defensive is the wrong word; cautious would be far more accurate.

I can only suggest that Mr. Scheu attend a few IFC meetings so that he may inspect firsthand what is actually going on within the system. Thus far he seems to have relied on the opinions of a select few, and therefore he appears sorely out of touch with the sytem he supposedly represents. Finally, as the everquotable John Woodhouse '21 so clearly states, "Hard work will solve any problem." To that I add, only if one is given the chance!

Bielefeld, West Germany