Letters

Shantytown

I was appalled to visit Dartmouth during the recent Thanksgiving weekend to see three mangy huts occupying the center of campus. What a disgrace to view from any perspective-McNutt Hall, Baker Library, Dartmouth Hall, or the Hopkins Center. I thought the center of campus was reserved for College-sponsored activities such as the football bonfires and Winter Carnivals.

I was further appalled to listen to a small group of students espouse the issues of apartheid/scrap the Sullivan Principles/divest now/impose economic sanctions, etc. Presumably all on behalf of the oppressed blacks of South Africa-never mind the oppressed blacks in all.nations south of the Sahara. The entire approach was negative; stop this. . . abandon that. . . forget this. Nothing positive which might serve to help the blacks of all Africa.

I was even further appalled when no one was willing to listen to another viewpoint. I am what they consider a "U.S. corporate executive." The fact that I'm in the mining business, familiar with South Africa, and have been a frequent visitor to that nation meant nothing to them. I was part of the "other side" and therefore not to be listened to. True, I am not fortunate enough to visit Dartmouth more frequently than perhaps once or twice a year and therefore may not qualify as a "voice crying in the wilderness" but where are the other students, faculty, and townspeople who feel differently on this very complex issue? Where is our pride in preserving Dartmouth's center of campus for College purposes? I do not fault the group seeking improvements in life for their fellow man-though I might suggest we look closer to home-like to Watts, Detroit, Harlem, Philadelphia, Chicago, and elsewhere. And to see the nearby smokestacks with a sign "one person-one vote." What hypocrisy to ignore our own problems while focusing our energies on issues halfway around the world! It is time for others to speak out and in a more meaningful and mannerly way.

New York, N.Y.

The spirit of moral outrage

Almost 20 years after my tumultous days at Dartmouth, those wonderful SDS antiwar days, I was excited to read about the Big Green in the pages of several progressive national newspapers. An anti-apartheid shantytown on the Green. Protest rallies. The call to divest. The administration threatening reprisals, backing down. The movement, the spirit of moral outrage and social action returns to Dartmouth.

Why didn't I read about it in the pages of the Alumni Magazine?

Portland, Ore.

[With a 6-week deadline, it is very difficult tobe timely. The Magazine coverage of Shantytown began in the Jan/Feb issue and-as youcan see-continues herein. Ed.]

Undaunted by logic

The December issue had a more-interesting-than-usual crop of letters, and I am writing in response to two of them.

The analysis, by Jeffrey Hart '51, of the tactics of the Indian symbol opponents was the most lucid I have encountered, although the latter will no doubt continue to be undaunted by logic. Professor Hart's reference to the use of Indian heads on senior canes prior to the symbol's use (or misuse) in the 1920s by sportswriters struck a familiar note. My own cane has a caricatured, warrior-type Indian head; but I also have a 1901 cane, and the head on it is realistic and detailed, and with long hair parted in the middle and with a long braid on each side the figure suggests to me a dignified and wise elder. If the older Indian head is characteristic of the symbol at Dartmouth before the 19205, and if my interpretation of it is at all correct, then why not return to such? An Indian elder as the Dartmouth symbol, while not as useful to the sports-oriented people, would certainly be more worthy of student emulation than the trumped-up warrior caricature.

The letter of Jim F. St. John '65 was mostly a mean-spirited attack on conservatives-as if they characteristically utter "crotchety whinings," are accustomed to blackmailing both their alma mater and their offspring, are stingy, and accept Bob Jones University and Jerry Falwell as the last word! His main concern was with what he sneeringly identified as alumni blackmail. There are many motives for either giving or not giving; and if he thinks it unacceptable to withhold financial support, or to threaten to do so, because of dissatisfaction with College policy, then if he is consistent he would have to urge rejection of such as capital gifts for specified projects. Does he really think that we should give with our eyes shut? Does he not in fact pick and choose among a host of potential objects of his charity, selecting those most in harmony with his thinking, plans, and priorities? Or does he think that selective giving is a strategy utilized only by conservatives-conveniently forgetting the current favorite voting-with-the-purse ploy of liberals: divestment of South African interests irrespective of the potential impact on the very people they say they want to help?

Mr. St. John's statement that Dartmouth in the past has obtained most funding from conservative benefactors is curious. What is the source of his claim, and how was the political persuasion of a donor determined? If the claim is true, does he think it is good or bad; either way he is an ingrate. But then, if it is true, why? Is it because conservatives characteristically are generous and responsible in giving their money, while liberals tend to be generous with other people's money?

Charlestown, N.H.

Standards?

Truly, I'm a stingy fool. Stingy because I give a piddling sum to Dartmouth every so often out of respect for old friends who call and still care. The fool this time while reading Jim Fosso St. John's Letter (Dec., 1985) which challenged John Barchilon's reasons for not giving to Dartmouth and urged "Dartmouth ... to remain immune to the ravings of the day" (if only it had) because I thought the Editor's "standards for accuracy, relevancy, and good taste" would preclude such meanness from being printed.

Being a '70 who was there when the seeds of destruction for Dartmouth's liberal tradition were first sown and harvested, and having resigned as a loyal son to the new Dartmouth some years ago, I would have suggested to Mr. St. John to wait maybe another 19 years before writing such slander since he's given Mr. Barchilon a real opportunity to settle this altogether. I only hope that Mr. Barchilon contributes the "formidable" proceeds of his court action to the school or charity of his choice.

Washington, D.C.

A "small" college

Daniel Webster successfully argued for the sanctity of contracts in the first Dartmouth College Case. (1819). Now, with equal fervor, he would, no doubt, say again, it is indeed a "small" college. The Yukica case shames us all.

A couple of months ago your refusal to print Howie Samuel's letter critical of a Trustee also debased us in the national press. John Sloan Dickey used to speak pridefully of "the liberating arts," but this administration and its minions have, sadly, lost their way. Hopefully, these lines are not "Vox clamatis in deserto."

Boston, Mass.

Disgraced again

Please stop sending me all Dartmouth publications and all Dartmouth alumni junk mail immediately! Please take my name off all Dartmouth mailing lists now! So that there is no confusion, know that I was Class of 1978.

At first it was unseemly that the Dartmouth football team should lose with such regularity. But then to fire the coach, as if he (who in fact is quite competent at his job) were guilty of failing to win the Ivy championship, a true symbol of football glory! Ha!

Just what do those who run Dartmouth College think Dartmouth is? What do they think the young men who play football for Dartmouth are-football players or (dare I say it?) students? Reggie Williams '76 and his colleagues play football for money. When he or his colleagues or his coaches are no good any more, they will assuredly be fired. The National Football League operates without pretense. Or will Dartmouth cower behind the pretense indulged in by the collegiate "football powers"? No doubt the money is there.

Dartmouth has disgraced itself yet again.

Somerville, Mass.

A sad contrast

What a sad contrast today in The New YorkTimes to read first of the appointment of Yale's exciting new president, and then a few pages later of Dartmouth's firing of Coach Yukica! Unfortunately, under the administration of President McLaughlin, this negative record of one firing after another has become the rule, and overshadows whatever positive changes have been made. It is time for the Trustees to look for a new president who will build up, not break up, the College.

Beverly, Mass.

A rudderless ship

My growing dissatisfaction with the policies of the College as evidenced by its handling of the NROTC and Indian symbol issues-eluctantly tolerable under the concept of reasonable difference of opinion-has now advanced to near disbelief as the result of the Coach Yukica matter.

I can well imagine that the athletic director was subjected to pressure as the result of the losing football season; but anyone with an ounce of principle would have seen this as an opportunity, even an obligation, to reaffirm that Ivy League sports are designed to enhance the development of participants as part of a comprehensive educational program. The failure of the athletic director to see this, as his duty is deplorable, but the President's abdication of his responsibility to set the matter to rights verges on the incredible. The concept of supporting a subordinate's decisions stops well short of the point of backing grossly irresponsible judgments.

In recent years Dartmouth has given the impression of having become a rudderless ship guided by no principle other than expediency and too often influenced by a faculty which, like any group largely devoid of executive and organizational experience, has little knowledge of the mechanics of creating and maintaining an educational experience based upon enduring values. Whim and ideological fad have frequently replaced devotion to the ideals which created a college that, until recently, deserved the devotion of its alumni.

I can only hope that the President will interpret the response to his recent appalling inaction as a need for him to examine whether his present examples of leadership represent the practices that he would like his students to emulate.

Cherry, Hill, N.J.

Worth the pricetag?You bet!

This concerns Mr. J. H. Feth's letter in the October '85 Magazine.

Yes, the experience of Ivy and top nonIvy schools is worth the $70,000 price tag. In fact, the cost is far more than that, but that is simply the price.

Educations at tax-supported institutions have approximately the same costs, but are lower-priced because the taxpayers pickup part of the cost.

Low tax-supported, or "private' institutions such as Dartmouth and Stanford (my two alma maters), more closely price at cost to the individual. However, roughly onehalf of tuition is not covered by the individual, but rather by the generosity of alumni, friends, and other donors. However, the state-supported schools are beginning to put some private institutions out of business by their "giveaway" pricing that requires the taxpayer to provide part of the cost. As a result, we tend to educate more people than we probably should in this country and also rob taxpayers who have other uses for student subsidies.

Thus, I think it is a moral choice to choose a "private" school that has relatively small government funding and, thus, is well worth the extra dollars it may require of a parent and/or child.

Again, there are very few who cannot attend Dartmouth due to its price to them, since well over 50 percent of the students receive some form of assistance, usually in the form of a scholarship, loan, and or work.

Cleveland, Ohio

A serious lack of. leadership

I continue to be astonished, dismayed, and embarrassed by the incompetence of the current administration of the College.

The failure of the Trustees to take remedial action for their past mistakes in choosing top administrators would never be sanctioned by any other type of institution except those also run by self-perpetuating governing bodies.

It is evident that the College suffers from a serious lack of leadership at its highest levels. While I am not impressed with Coach Yukica's won/lost record, his performance as an individual and leader far surpasses Mr. Leland's as an athletic director and Mr. McLaughlin's record as a corporate and educational executive.

During Mr. McLaughlin's term in office, the College community and the public have been treated to a continual turmoil in coaches, administrators, and teaching professionals. Perhaps this is in keeping with the wishes of the Trustees who have continually made it clear that they have no use for continuity or tradition.

Unfortunately, I have lost a great deal of respect for an institution I once greatly revered.

I hope that the alumni body will begin to realize that their opinions and input as to what the goals and direction of the College should be are more important than their contributions to the Alumni Fund.

Bedford, N.H.

Distressed

As a person whose political inclinations are somewhere to the right of Barry Goldwater and Atilla the Hun, I find it surprising that I have to point out that in the photo [of more than 100 living recipients of the College's Alumni Award, in the October '85 issue] there is apparently not one woman and not one black.

Evanston, Ill.

[We wrote Mr. Carrington, in part, "There wereno women enrolled at Dartmouth in the 60s andvery few minorities. Since the youngest of theAlumni Awards recipients dates only from theClass of 1957, it will unfortunately be quite sometime before women and minority graduates showup in such group pictures in any great numbers." Ed.]

Continuity on the Plain

After reading the thoughtful, precisely worded and unchallengeably valid letter on freedom of choice at Dartmouth by Lt. Col. Edward P. Stafford, Jr. '65 in the October issue, I am moved to corroborate and reinforce its message with a word or two on continuity on the Hanover Plain.

Lt. Col. (Ted) Stafford's grandfather, Edward Stafford '11, also made his choice, which made him a captain in the Coast Artillery Reserve in the First World War. Ted's father, the writer, also made his, which was to take a commission as Ensign, USNR, after his junior year and three months before Pearl Harbor.

Thus have three generations of Americans with"the hill winds in their veins" accepted the responsibility implicit in freedom of choice and opted to take arms to preserve it against every threat that has arisen in this century. I am proud that our college will once again provide that opportunity. Who knows but what Edward P. Stafford III, prospectively of the Class of 2006, may choose the same path?

Estes Park, Colo.

Read between the lines

Having read in the November issue letters from Al Hormel '44 and Isabel Finkbiner Bonner '77, here is a quote from another viewpoint:

"A team of eight Christian leaders recently went on a two-week fact-finding mission to South Africa where they visited five major cities. One of their goals was to interrogate black pastors and Christian leaders regarding their attitude toward apartheid and the present government. All agreed that the present form of apartheid is wrong and must be dismantled. However, . . . none of the evangelical black pastors approve of terrorism to achieve their goal; they prefer to negotiate with the present government for reform and human rights. It is the African National Congress (ANC), a pro-Marxist group, and the liberal churches affiliated with the World Council of Churches who are being persuaded to overthrow the present government. There is indeed terrorism in South Africa, but it is being promoted by a minority faction . . . The Communist world wants control of strategic South Africa."

In the late twenties I met the former U.S. ambassador to China, who said that after six months he could have written a book about China; after more than five years there he would not have presumed to try to write a book about that country. Perhaps Al, Isabel, and Alva should do a bit more research. And perhaps looking at a world view could help. See, for example, Fernand Braudel's trilogy on civilization and capitalism, 15th through 18th century. Heavy going, but read between the lines.

Green Valley, Ariz.

Yes, Virginia

Yes, Virginia, there is a Dartmouth. [See Dec. letters]. Maybe the boys didn't play football so well this year; maybe the cheers aren't what they used to be; maybe the Indian doesn't make the scene. But the songs haven't withered, though no glee club sings them. Things can change, and, as someone who used to be here as president once said, "Change is opportunity." Girls can come to Dartmouth and they do. They are smart, they are into sports; and they play well. Dartmouth is still Dartmouth, as Ivy as Harvard, Yale, Princeton. So, Virginia, you don't need to wonder. There is a Dartmouth. And when you grow up you may even want to come.

Victorville, Calif.

Errata

The most notable among many omissions from my article "Are the Fireflies Ghosts? (in the October issue) is this sentence: "These stories, I should say, are in essence factual, but the facts have been changed for rhetorical purposes and for the protection of my students."

Furthermore, the published article does not correspond in many particulars to the copyedited galley proofs I submitted.

Hanover, N.H.

[Prof. Sears' quibbles notwithstanding, we havehad several people comment most favorably onher fascinating account of teaching in China. Ed.]

The symbol (cont.)

I have been reading the Alumni Magazine for nearly 14 years, ever since my husband's graduation in 1972. I have followed with interest the struggle to find an acceptable symbol.

Why not restore the name Dartmouth Indian, and change the symbol to represent the people Columbus intended to find? The richly varied culture of the subcontinent offers any number of choices for the mascot itself: a business-suited Brahmin with a bejeweled turban, a white-robed swami, or perhaps a snake charmer complete with cobra and basket. There could be an elephant-borne rajah leading the cheers at the football games. Madras jackets and paisley ties would take on deeper significance. Possibilities as vast as India herself loom.

This solution offers one other feature unmatched by any of the others I have seen proposed in these pages. It would restore official recognition to those Dartmouth mementos with the printed legend "Indians."

Ithaca, N.Y.

Self-evident truths?

I was distressed to read Prof. Jeff Hart's exclusive claim to self-evident truth (December '85).

His contentious language includes "disgraceful," "atrocious," and (three times!) "lies."

While the Indian symbol issue won't go away, I wish the merits could be discussed without such pejoratives.

I would first like to suggest to classmate Hart that a "mentality" cannot lie (or pat itself on the back) only a person can. On this issue, those who may differ with Hart have no need to lie. Established American values are on their side.

The "Dartmouth Indian" was often caricaturized as a wild-eyed savage with a hatchet in one hand and a scalp in the other. If there is ever any doubt that such caricature can hurt, the doubt should favor the victim.

Our college is not in the business of hurting the innocent be they few or many.

Truths are self evident in the eyes of the beholder on this issue, apparently, better the eyes of Jefferson than Jeff.

And for all of us who would deeply like to preserve the traditions Of the College, we might direct our energies to those traditions which count: "... Stand as sister stands by brother, dare a deed for Dear Old Mother."

Western, Mass.

Timely withdrawal?

I was quite amused at reading the enclosed article in today's Wall Street Journal ("Indian Head Banks Inc. Buys New Hampshire Firm," December 31, 1985).

I wonder if the "minority groups" in Hanover will withdraw all their funds from the Dartmouth National Bank now that it is a subsidiary of Indian Head Banks Inc.

Short Hills, N.J.

Whence "Wah Hoo Wah"?

Being a resident of Washington, D.C., I have long been intrigued by orange bumper stickers occasionally seen bearing the words "Wah Hoo Wah." Recently someone told me this was a University of Virginia cheer. Quite aside from the propriety of the words for Dartmouth, there must be a fascinating story there somewhere. How did it happen that these three seemingly meaningless syllables came to be adopted by two institutions as far apart as Dartmouth and the University of Virginia? The linguistic odds against independent, chance creations are enormous. Do any of our older alumni know what the common origin might be?

While my primary purpose in writing is not to debate the Indian symbol, may I suggest that there is only one possible outcome to the debate. The American people are basically pretty decent folk. The majority generally seek not to give needless offense, and to accommodate others' strongly held views. A whole nation, switched from "Negro" to "black" for essentially that reason. I feel certain a .majority of Dartmouth alumni would not wish for a symbol generally offensive to Indians.

And that is precisely why the debate is ongoing, and has only one possible ending. With the passage of time, it has become evident that Indian symbols are not generally offensive to Indians. At Dartmouth the Indian symbol is defined as offensive, not because of visceral reactions, but because of freshman year indoctrination. The driving force behind anti-Indian-symbol sentiment is a relic of the past, 1970s style radical-chic. Increasingly, the issue is whether a small minority, because they say they are offended, can override.the wishes of a majority, which tests its views against other sources of information and reaches contrary conclusions. That Dartmouth s current undergraduates, whom I find as principled as their predecessors, favor the Indian symbol tells volumes about the true nature of the controversy and its ultimate outcome.

Washington, D.C.

[To say that Dartmouth's current undergraduates "favor the Indian symbol" is far too sweeping a generalization some of them clearly doand a substantial number of them very clearlydo not. And, for the record, Charlie Widmayer'30, was Editor in March 1972, when the WahHoo Wah" column changed to "Give a Rouse. Ed.]

The Indian: a well-wornsubject

Concerning the Indian symbol and the letters pro and con, Liza Minelli, daughter of Judy Garland, when asked to sing "Over the Rainbow," said: "It's been sung.

Perhaps the Alumni Magazine could at this point assign the year 2000 as an end to the printing of letters on this well-worn subject.

Thetford Hill, Vt.