Letters

Freedtnan's Stand

I was present when President James O. Freedman read to a packed faculty meeting his statement on the crisis at Dartmouth College sparked by the Dartmouth Review's attacks on members of the faculty. When he finished, the faculty rose to give him an ovation. Some were crying. President Freedman stood there, cool, judicious, committed, courageous. His words were those academia has longed to hear. He said it is the responsibility of the president to protect "what might be described as the College's moral endowment no less than its intellectual and financial endowment."

"If the president of Dartmouth does not speak out on momentous issues affecting the College's future, perhaps because of fear of alienating segments of the community or of creating repercussions in the public press, he has abdicated his moral responsibility as the leader of this institution."

I felt I was in the presence of greatness.

Hanover, New Hampshire

Those of us who have been waiting to see what impact James O. Freedman would have on Dartmouth now have the answer. The left wing has taken full command.

Hanover, New Hampshire

Thank you President Freedman. Finally it's been said and once again I can feel good about being an alumnus of a great institution.

Required reading for Professor Jeffrey Hart and his sycophants on the Dartmouth Review should be the book written some time ago by Arthur Schlesinger: "The Vital Center." The key to a democratic society is a respect for civil rights. It is this lack of respect that is held in common by both the intransigent Left and the intransigent Right. An understanding of history proves that this "lack of respect" has been the cause of most of man's problems.

If they would be faithful to his principles, the backers of the Ernest Martin Hopkins Institute should congratulate President Freedman. President Hopkins would have been the first to stand out against a "climate of intolerance and intimidation that destroys our mutual sense of community and inhibits the reasoned examination of the widest range of ideas."

Bethel, Connecticut

In reference to President Freedman's recent criticism of the Dartmouth Review, I congratulate the Trustees for having selected a man of uncommon and long- awaited moral courage.

Pittsfield, Massachusetts

With its latest round of silly provocation involving Professor Bill Cole, the Dartmouth Review has once again made front- page news out of what a racist, anti-intellectual place Dartmouth must be. How much longer do we have to put up with these right-wing pests?

The Review people have a First Amendment right to circulate their views. With their gin and tonics and lawn croquet, they can pine all they want for Dartmouth's erstwhile days of country-club fun and campus homogeneity. But the more their lowbrow troublemaking continues, the more good potential freshmen will be scared off by the horror stories and choose a college they perceive as more open-minded. A Dartmouth that strives for intellectual excellence should not have to bear this loss.

Let's give a rouse then for President Freedman's recent declaration. It's about time the administration recognized the Review's threat and stood up to its vitriol. If that also means standing up to the Review's wealthy alumni sugar daddies, then tough.

Whatever constitutional means President Freedman takes to fight back at the Review, he has my support. Maybe under his leadership, Dartmouth can rebuild its "mutual sense of community" and become the modern, progressive institution John Kemeny dreamed of.

Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts

False Advertising

We were very surprised that you ran the "advertorial" from the group that calls itself the Ernest Martin Hopkins Institute. Even though its rendition of "Women's Issues at Dartmouth" presents a very creative parody, it seems in clear violation of the following statement by the Board of Trustees in 1980:

"The Alumni Magazine has a long tradition of accepting such advertisements so long as they are truthful and in good taste .... It is not appropriate to the purposes of the Magazine to accept advertising which attacks individuals for their views or actions or which impugns the character or objectives of individuals or groups."

What we fail to understand is how you and the editorial board could have judged this material to be either truthful or in good taste.

To document only a few of the most egregious misstatements: • The statement that "only four percent of all Dartmouth students have taken courses in the Women's Studies Department" is false on two counts. Women's Studies is a program, not a department, and does not offer a major at this time. Yearly, it offers nine core courses and, in collaboration with departments, approximately 25 associated courses. In the last year alone, nearly 500 students were enrolled in these core or associated courses, representing 14 percent of the approximately 3,400 matriculated undergraduates in residence. This year, enrollments so far are even higher.

• Placing "normal, well-adjusted women" in opposition to "feminists" is crude and malicious. This insinuation of an oxymoron maligns the character of many female and male faculty, students, and administrators at the College. To be normal and well-ad- justed is to be a feminist, female or male. Obviously, to be a feminist is to be committed to advancing the equal rights of women. But in addition to that, as scholars and teachers we are also committed to making the curriculum, not just Dartmouth College, truly coeducational. (Incidentally, perhaps you might inform the Institute that one of its statements, to wit, "the long term interests of Dartmouth lie with a policy of compete equality for all," is a feminist statement. The group may wish to make a retraction.)

• The Institute's concern about losing supposedly "more qualified male applicants" is simply a clumsy effort to set women and men against each other and to imply, insultingly, that female applicants are less qualified.

• Films shown on campus that are intended to document the harmful effects of pornography are not "pornographic." Further- more, there is no "Ivy League pornographic lesbian magazine," except perhaps in the imagination of the Hopkins Institute's members.

• The Women's Resource Center was created to enhance the intellectual and social life of the campus. Dartmouth College, which was the first of the previously allmale Ivies to establish a Women's Studies Program, was in fact one of the last to found a Women's Resource Center. In welcoming men as well as women, the Center will become a setting in which all members of the community can identify and discuss genuine women's issues.

MARY KELLEY ANNE BROOKS

Nancy Frankenberry and Mary Kelley are cochairs of the Women's Studies Program. AnneBrooks is coordinator of Women's Studies.—Ed. Academia's Plights

My impression upon reading "Is Academia Failing?" is that Dean Prince, in his reply to Professor Hart's essay, has either not read Hart's essay or that he and Hart work at different schools.

Prince states that "universities must do more than transmit culture." His statement assumes that universities transmit culture, but Hart's complaint (and Professor Bloom's) is simply that they don't. Prince states that the "student is better able to appreciate the quality of Hamlet for having compared it with 'Things Fall Apart.'" Hart's point is that while members of the Dartmouth class of 1990 are assigned "Things Fall Apart," they are not so assigned Hamlet and thus are not in a position to make the comparison. Prince responds to questions about the worth of studying certain books and subjects in addition to the "traditional curriculum," but Hart's objec- tion is that these books and subjects have, in effect, replaced the traditional curriculum.

In sum, Prince's answer does not address Hart's complaint; in lawyer's jargon, it is non-responsive.

Washington, D.C.

I read with interest the debate between Jeffrey Hart and Gregory Prince Jr. in the March issue. As a fellow academic, I share Professor Hart's dismay at the impoverishment of the American mind, and I find myself in agreement with Allan Bloom on many issues. Where I and many others part company with Hart and Bloom is at the point where their insistence upon the su- periority of the Western, classical tradition becomes a narrow ideology.

I find it amusing, incidentally, that Professor Hart laments the fact that one can graduate from Dartmouth without reading Dante, and that he lauds Professor Brownlee's "superb Dante course, backed up by the Dartmouth Dante project." I, too, believe that every Dartmouth student should read Dante, but I am surprised that Professor Hart is adamant on that score. After all, Dante had the audacity to write his greatest work in the vernacular, a radical gesture that essentially pitted the language of the uneducated populace against the sacrosanct languages of Greece and Rome.

While Dante's creation of a "sweet new style" of literature was admired by many of his contemporaries, this apparent subversion of the classical tradition was also the target of pointed attacks launched by some of the more myopic humanists of the time. Niccolo Niccoli, the Florentine defender of classical antiquity, found the writings of Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio shamefully inept, even when the language was Latin, claiming that only the vulgar masses would equate their flawed Latinity with the perfection of Cicero and Virgil. Niccoli's diatribes against what he saw as the erosion of the classical tradition are remarkably similar to Bloom's and Hart's, and the narrowness of his vision was recognized and condemned by Florentine humanists of far greater intellect and accomplishment than Niccoli (and possibly of greater intellect than even Allan Bloom).

Professor Hart, if he has not studied the thought of Niccolo Niccoli, should do so; he would discover a kindred spirit. But it might change his mind about promoting the works of that "tom-tom pounder" who wrote "The Divine Comedy."

Freeport, Maine

In my opinion the debate should not be over Western Civ versus non-Western but how best to present the remarkable human drama from tribal consciousness through the great empires to modem times. I firmly believe that every student at every educational level should be required to take the broadest range of historically oriented courses. But I would insist that this alone would not produce adequately educated men and women. At the heart of the learning process is a teacher and a student. Period. That was the glory of my own education at Dartmouth. Alan Macdonald, Sidney Cox, Stearns Morse, Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy, they constituted an education in themselves.

They were all deeply conscious of the re- lationship of learning to everyday life. It has been said that it is not what you know so much as how you know it and what use you put your knowledge to. There are plenty of learned prigs in and out of the academic world; we do not need any more. Knowledge, historical or otherwise, is not, or should not be, a possession of the edu- cated but a means of affecting the future, a weapon against prejudice and oppression and the very kind of cultural arrogance that Bloom and Hart represent.

The substantial failures of the American academic world can be briefly and simply stated: the absurdly inflated emphasis on scholarship leading to publication and the consequent neglect of the needs of students. That and the bizarre overspecialization bred by the Ph.D. system. You can have the greatest curriculum in the world and if it is not taught by teachers with whole-hearted commitment to their students it is an empty and meretricous exercise.

So, by all means, more history, Eastern, Western, Northern, Southern, what you will, but as long as the specializing intelligence is in the academic saddle and the generalizating intelligence is a poor stepchild, as long as mediocre publications are more valued than inspired teaching, true education will languish. The problem at many colleges and virtually all universities is the same today as it was in the years when Charles Francis Adams, Jr. attended Harvard. "As for giving direction to, in the sense of shaping, the individual minds of young men in their most plastic stage," Adams wrote, "so far as I know nothing of the kind was ever dreamed of [by the Harvard faculty] .... This was what I needed, and all I needed—intelligent, inspiring direction: and I never got it or a suggestion of it."

I am sure that today Dartmouth students who care to receive it get "inspiring direction" as I did in my undergraduate years. That is the real measure of a Dartmouth education.

Santa Cruz, California

I believe both Professor Hart and Dean Prince miss the real issue Professor Bloom's book addresses.

Professor Bloom is an admirer of Greek philosophers, a group who kept slaves and had little respect for the brains of women. Our universities before World War I were filled with professors of similar views. Did they see that debacle approaching, do anything to prevent it or afterwards alter their ways to deal with it? And they did no better with WW II.

Greek or Cartesian thinking has done wonders when dealing with things. It took us to the moon. But when applied to the study of man, who is both object and subject, the method fails. The "objective" historian is a fantasy because he is swimming in the stream of history, with all its pollution, amongst the rest of us.

Social scientists all claim to be nonbelieving and objective. Man cannot live without believing. But we all must learn to be honest and admit to what it is we do believe because those beliefs do color what we find in our studies.

Dartmouth is sponsoring a celebration of a former professor, Eugen Rosenstock- Huessy, this August. He proposed the grammatical method as the way to over- come the sterility of the social sciences in the West, in the Eastern Block, the Third World and the Orient. The academic world is suffering from its limitation by Greek thinking. It must change before it can play its role of helping us to a better future.

Jericho, Vermont

In the debate between Jeffrey Hart and Gregory Prince, cast one ballot for Dean Prince.

The argument between the classicist (Hart) and the realist (Prince) is hardly new. Indeed, it has been going on since colonial days. The classicists have always maintained that the college should make "scholars" of the sons of the upper classes, limiting the curriculum to subjects long established by European tradition. The realists—Benjamin Franklin prominent among them—advocated early on a broadening of the curriculum and the inclusion of the new class of students: the sons of merchants, farmers, and mechanics. To the horror of the classicists, the realists succeeded in establishing the land-grant colleges in the mid-nineteenth century and, in our time, the community colleges.

It's interesting to note that Professor Hart's discipline, English, was not admitted as an academic subject until the late 1800s, over the objections of the classical establishment.

"Universities," says Dean Prince, "must do more than transmit culture. They must shape and create culture." New and emerging fields of study "are part of the testing and questioning of accepted tradition." The university, he adds, should be "an 'uncomfortable' place." Unlike Professor Hart, he stands for openness, inclusiveness, and the search for absolutes amid the welter of the temporary.

Education, said Emerson, must begin with respect for the student, and respect for students is a quality Professor Hart, and Bloomers generally, appear to lack. To paraphrase Hart: benighted they arrive, relativists all, intellectually illiterate; benighted, except for a saving remnant that has some- how been raked from the rubbish, they will depart. They may have read many books, but not the Right Books. They may have gained knowledge of many cultures, but not sufficient knowledge of the One Right Culture. It seems not to have occurred to Mr. Hart that the list of "Great Books" might benefit from enlargement, that the West may have much to learn from the rest of the world, and that his parochial vision of what constitutes an education might well be taken as arrogant.

Hastings-On-Hudson, New York

Thanks to Mark F. Emerson '25 for writing about John Mecklin, whose course was the most intellectually liberating experience I have ever known. He was worth an entire Dartmouth experience.

Often, over the past 50 years, have I thought of the words which Mark quoted: "We live our way into thinking instead of thinking our way into living."

As I turned to the articles by Jeffrey Hart and Gregory S. Prince, I thought of Mecklin again. Mecklin was no absolutist; on the contrary, his teaching was that everything is relative. However, in his teachings he drew from the ancient Greek civilization, from Plato, from Christianity, and from St. Augustine. Except that both men bore a resemblance to Mark Twain, Mecklin would never have noticed Vonnegut. Like Matthew Arnold, Mecklin emphasized the study of the best of what has been thought and said.

Courses in comparative religion might explore Judaism, Islamic, Christian, Confucian, and Buddist teachings and, perhaps, even Greek and Roman mythology, but what value can be derived from the theology of African tribes, Native Indians, Mayans, or Australian aborigines? Sun worship and other primitive forms have failed to survive. Likewise, women's studies, Native American studies, and Afro-American studies may have sociological value but these are all peripheral to the essentials of liberal arts. These studies may satisfy those who have demanded them in search of their own identity, but they are not the intellectual outgrowth of scholarly research. They are like the wheels on a wagon without a hub or spokes. They are the produce of "living their way into thinking."

Montgomery, Alabama

The opposing points of view expressed by Professor Hart and Dean Prince made for extremely absorbing reading. Each essay was persuasively written. You are to be congratulated for putting those two together.

I wonder whether Professor Hart might respond to a question that has long puzzled me concerning Bloom's central argument, which I gather Hart agrees with. There appears to be a gap in the logical construction of the argument, which begins with the premise that modern education is overly relativistic and ends with the conclusion that modern students are not taught, or do not appreciate, the classic texts. My own experience is at odds with that argument.

While still in public high school, I enrolled in one of those trendy, 19605-style curricula known as "flexible scheduling." The first and only required course in "flex" was called Frames of Reference. As its name implied, Frames of Reference used such tools as Margaret Mead and Chinua Achebe to instruct (indoctrinate?) us in the theory of ethnocentricity and to illustrate the diversity of cultural value systems. Upon completion of this introductory course, the students in flex proceeded to study in real depth the works of Plato, Socrates, Homer, Locke, Kierkegaard, Camus, de Tocqueville, Emerson, Twain, Thoreau and Shake- speare (among others, classic and not so, and not necessarily in that order!) as well as Eldridge Cleaver and Herbert Marcuse. While "flex" may fairly have been accused of being eclectic, I doubt that any student emerging from three years of this exposure could have been justly accused of not knowing where they were in human history.

Is it Professor Hart's argument that students are not taught the classics because they are busy reading "Soul on Ice," or is it that a student indoctrinated into the cult of relative value systems cannot appreciate the classics of Western literature? If the former, I expect he is in error as a factual matter, notwithstanding his disturbing anecdotes. At the least, it should be possible to teach the classics, and more, in four years of undergraduate education. Of the latter, it seems to me censorious to assert that an otherwise well-educated student should not be exposed to alternative values for fear of corrupting his or her immortal soul.

New York, New York

Leering Photo

At the time when we were an all-male school there appeared in the Jacko—a student-published humor magazine—a cartoon of a student emerging from the basement steps of Fletcher's. The gag was that the student's head was the same as the visage on a package of Trojans. There was an awful stink.

Now, in 1988, Dartmouth is coed. There is a leering photo and an article about a student who peddles Big Green condoms at football games—in the Alumni Mag. It will be interesting to see how many letters you get. O Temporal O Mores!

Providence, Rhode Island

Sexist Propagandizing

I was greatly disturbed by the inclusion of the advertisement for the Ernest Martin Hopkins Institute entitled "Women's Issues at Dartmouth College" in the March issue. While I understand that paid advertisements are a major source of income for the magazine, I do not understand why there can't be a minimum standard of selection, i.e., the elimination of ads which are plainly offensive to a large group of the Dartmouth community. Would you, for example, run an ad advocating white supremacy?

Even more disturbing are the distortions in this ad and the tone in which it is written. Half-truths and innuendoes do not lend themselves to a forum for fair discussion. Where and when, for example, did feminists at Dartmouth "host pornographic film festivals"? And the implications of the statement that a women's recruitment program will "put pressure on the admissions committee to overlook more qualified male applicants in favor of female applicants, solely in the interest of a false and superficial 'diversity' " are outright insulting to those colleagues who work very hard to make the College a welcoming place for all students.

It saddens me that those of us who try very hard to make Dartmouth College an even finer institution of learning are thus villified and misrepresented in your magazine.

Assistant Professor of German

I was distressed to find that bit of sexist propagandizing which appeared as an "advertisement" in the middle of the College section of the March issue. It is my understanding that most publications refuse to accept paid advertisements which are in reality political editorials. Placing this piece in the magazine's section on college issues was particularly offensive, especially given the demagogic quality of Mr. Champion's message. At the very least, I think the magazine should now offer some recognized feminist organization the opportunity for rebuttal—free of charge.

Bangor, Maine

I can think of no more salient illustration of the problems facing women at Dartmouth, than the attitudes expressed in the Hopkins Institute advertisement on coeducation.

Mr. Champion, the self-appointed judge of "normal, well-adjusted women," as opposed to feminists, could not state more clearly that women at Dartmouth are considered to be acceptable only insofar as they embody a misogynist, male-defined role within the Dartmouth community.

Thank goodness that President Freedman posesses enough humility to at least listen to and respect those at the College whose experience may not fit this "acceptable" standard.

Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts

Intellectual Content

Congratulations on the March issue. For the first time in 25 years, the magazine actually includes some intellectual content.

Dallas, Texas

Where Are the Women?

Try harder! The March issue offers an eight-page spread on free enterprise, pictures and all, yet not a single female entrepreneur. Either the author failed to identify the students or the College has failed all its students if it is not teaching and encouraging such entrepreneurial talents.

That "co" in coeducation argues for equality.

Boston, Masachusetts

I enjoyed the cover story in the March issue on student ventures except for one notable omission. All seven of the businesses featured are run by men. Are we to conclude that no Dartmouth women have started any interesting businesses on campus or merely that the reporter didn't look hard enough?

Palo Alto, California

Writer Charlie Wheelan '88 looked very hardindeed. He reported to us that undergraduateentrepreneurism was dominated by men. Womenrecently established a sundae-delivery businesson campus, but too recently for our deadline.

Had the article included alumni, womenwould have figured prominently. See, for example, our story on Denise Dupre 'BO and herinnovative attache case in the winter issue. Ed.

Fluffy Profile

If the piece on Robert Oden had been written by a male reporter about a female professor, your editorial antennae might have been quicker to detect the condescension in its fluffy tone. The title refers to Oden's book. But what does the article tell us? That Professor Oden's hair is blond, his form slender; that he blushes charmingly, married his childhood sweetheart, is a regular guy who just loves sports.

I'm glad to know that Robert Oden is an attractive and likable man, but I'd much rather learn something of what he's thinking about. Do your Dartmouth readers really find a substantial diet of ideas unpalatable without this kind of human-interest sweetener? If this is the Alumni Magazine's best shot at "honoring the faculty's contributions to the life of the mind" (James O. Freedman, February issue), President Freedman has a long row to hoe.

Boxborough, Massachusetts

Review Redux

A "sister" alumna recently alerted me to the latest issue of the Dartmouth Review versus Professor Cole. I must say that out here in the real world, it is getting embarrassing to admit to being a Dartmouth College graduate.

A non-negotiable in this nation is freedom of speech. Ideas need a free environment in which to compete. Certainly, a goal for all is justice and fairness. It is obvious that these ideals are dying at Dartmouth. The false god of pseudo-liberalism has taken their place.

Dartmouth, there are too many other battles, much more important, to fight. For what it is worth, this alumnus has written you off... Goodbye.

Columbus, Ohio

The February 24 Dartmouth Review's article on Professor William Cole consists largely of what are purportedly tape-recorded excerpts from one of Bill's classes in Music 2, "American Music in Oral Tradition." To judge from the reporter's concluding paragraph, he believes that Professor Cole is a person "for whom tenure is more important than teaching, and racist ranting is preferable to competence." I drew a different conclusion.

The Review describes Music 2's students as "types that exude Prepismo." If true, Professor Cole is faced by a formidable chal- lenge, that of trying to introduce people of very different circumstances to the kinds of conditions and outlook that have given rise to the oral tradition within American music, music that, as the course guide describes it, may be Afro-American, Anglo American, or Native American. Whatever its ethnic source, however, it goes without saying that this music has enriched us all.

As I read the Review's supposed excerpts, then, I am struck not by teaching incompetence but by teaching excellence, for when I finished the piece, I had, as I assume students did also, a much more tangible sense of those cultures of poverty and pain out of which our oral music grows. My only regret, really, is that I myself cannot take the course.

Lastly, I urge all alumni who still have copies of this issue of the Review to read, and then ponder the true meaning of, the boxed piece that appears on page five and claims to be the transcription of two telephone conversations between Professor Cole and John Sutter, the Review's executive editor. Since the Review's earlier attempts to bait Professor Cole resulted not just in outrage but a lawsuit, I find it difficult to believe that Mr. Sutter telephoned with what is usually termed innocent in- tent. As a result, I am struck by Bill's restraint in deciding to handle the situation in the politest possible way, simply by hanging up.

It appears, though, that Mr. Sutter is a persistent soul, for, not getting the message, he called again. This time he finally got what he was looking for—and what, frankly, he richly deserved—a tongue lashing right out of the oral tradition. Since that's the field that Bill Cole has long professed, his fluency with its terms seems scarcely surprising, but because Dartmouth's teaching load is heavy enough already, I do rather regret the Review's insistence that he continue to teach at home, outside of office and classroom hours. His talents are ones Dartmouth is lucky to have, so they should never be called on thoughtlessly.

DANIEL WEBSTER PROFESSOR OF HISTORY

The editorial on Dartmouth in the March 8 issue of the Wall Street Journal appears to be a clear summary of recent events and I think the alumni body as a whole should have a chance to see it. If this account of the remarks and acts attributed to Mr. Cole is accurate, it would appear that he has his share of counter-prejudice.

The defense of Cole's conduct by charging racism against his critics reminds me of a story that was going around in Jewish circles in New York City in the 19405. It concerned a Jewish applicant for the position of a radio announcer with a local station. He stuttered heavily and was denied the job. When his friends asked why he had not been accepted, he replied, "they were anti-semitic."

I would recommend that this whole incident be investigated from all points of view by a small committee independent of the College and containing some eminent and fair-minded black members.

East Hampton, New York

As an alumnus and Hanover resident with a decidedly conservative mindset, who actively participates in and greatly enjoys many facets of today's Dartmouth, I am deeply troubled about unwarranted and misleading communications concerning the Cole incident, written by such prestigious publications as The Wall Street Journal. These articles have been influenced by a "fringe element" conservative group, and I in no way feel that what has been written represents the feelings of the majority of the conservatives in this area.

I, along with many other Upper Valley conservatives, have great confidence that the hearing of the four students before Dartmouth's Committee on Standards was thorough, impartial, fairly conducted and necessary for the proper governance of this institution (of which I am an alumnus, as are a son and a daughter); further, the sentences which were meted out seem fair and appropriate.

Although there are many here who are not admirers of Professor William Cole's teaching techniques, there is no room at this institution for harassment because of them or of the individual himself. When people resort to such actions they must be held accountable, or our entire society will suffer serious consequences and the student population will risk their degrees and the $70,000 investments in tuition.

Please rest assured that the governance of Dartmouth College does distinguish between activity that is harassment and activity that is vexatious, and that responsible conservatism is alive and well on this campus.

A letter containing much of what I have written above has been sent to The Wall Street Journal.

Hanover, New Hampshire

On March 8, the Wall Street Journal printed an editorial titled "Dartmouth Teaches. . . Censorship." The editorial was a cleverly disguised and misleading discourse of the incident involving four members of the Dartmouth Review newspaper and their inquiry into the Dartmouth curriculum in general and Professor William Cole in particular. The column cited isolated examples intended to illustrate the College's declining academic standards and, in doing so, made statements which were deceptive. More significantly, throughout the editorial there was the implication that the students' scrutiny of Professor Cole was nothing more than an expression of their dissatisfaction with a professor whom they believed to be incompetent. In reality, this could not be further from the truth.

In explaining the sequence of events leading up to the harassment of Mr. Cole, the column stated that in an informal survey, half of 349 students interviewed couldn't name the leader of the French government- in-exile during World War II. To imply, as the editorial did, that this illustrates a weakness in Dartmouth's academic curriculum is absurd. It is completely invalid to consider such a specific question to be a barometer of the quality of one's education. Moreover, the classes of the students questioned were not revealed. Someone in the initial stages of his or her college career can hardly be considered an "educated" person.

The most serious incidence of deception in the editorial was its portrayal of the Review students' actions as a simple inquiry into the College's academic standards. Those involved with Dartmouth are aware that the Review has consistently made life difficult for minorities on campus for the last seven years. It has not supported their enrollment and has been in favor of abolishing several academic programs which focus on minority affairs.

In addition, the Review almost always has timed its protests to occur in the spring. The result of this is that every year, when members of various minority groups are deciding whether or not to attend Dartmouth, they read about these incidents and are discouraged from matriculating. What has happened with Professor Cole is just another intentional aggravation of racial tensions under the guise of simple academic criticism. This is something which is known to members of the Dartmouth community but is not clear to those unaffiliated with the College.

If the Review were conducting a genuine inquiry into Dartmouth's academics, it would not concentrate its analysis, as it has for years, on professors who are members of minority groups. It would also treat the individuals involved with dignity and respect. While the criticism of William Cole as a professor may be valid, the treatment of him as a human being is deplorable and is contrary to the principles of morality which the College espouses. Dartmouth must encourage a healthy dissent and exchange of ideas but must not tolerate disrespect and harassment of individuals, particularly when racial overtones are clearly evident.

New York, New York

President Freedman's statement sent to alumni recruiters following the Cole affair refers to sexist problems four times. Disappointingly, the Freedman statement fails to go beyond platitudes. Dartmouth was the last Ivy League school to establish a Women's Resource Center. Sexism remains a deeply ingrained fact of campus life and is especially virulent in some fraternities.

It is to be hoped that the College leadership will put in perspective the views of reactionary forces, supported by powerful outside voices such as the Wall Street Journal and groups close to the White House, and get on with long overdue measures to make women feel fully at home. A good next step would be official adoption of a new Alma Mater reflecting women's presence in the student body.

Hopewell, New Jersey

Somehow the College has opted in favor of a distinct lack of leadership. It is sad to see Middlebury College making a real contribution by their pioneering the US-Soviet exchange student program. And all Dartmouth has done for four years is encourage strident self-serving minorities and the irrational discussions they embrace. Best example is the Bill Cole incident—that's become a racist issue instead of one of professional conduct and competence. So I'd just as soon disassociate myself with the College.

North Pomfret, Vermont

Nominated for oblivion: The Dartmouth Review. What fatal fascination attracts William F. Buckley? Let him harass Yale, where he belongs.

Avon, Connecticut

An incredible amount of damage has been done to the "Dartmouth tradition" in recent years. What makes one "cry" at this point is that the new President, current Board and senior administration and faculty members are simply crowding further together in support of each other. Like federal bureaucrats they appear unable to see beyond their own political views and self interest. They have become the embattled establishment. We should not allow them to define what is "true" without the normal rules of evidence.

President Freedman's Feburary 29 statement, mailed to alumni interviewers, was in the finest tradition of a campus coverup. Rather than address the legitimate issues raised by the Review, he chose to fan the flames of imagined racism. I would advise alumni to reserve judgement until they have seen the series of Review articles on the need to strengthen the "Core" and set standards for the proliferation of "special- interest" courses now filling the curriculum.

Will President Freedman learn to control and lead Dartmouth's faculty and administration? Will he succeed in rebuilding the Dartmouth Tradition? Or have his ideals already been compromised by self interest or pressure from the liberal campus establishment? Thus far, the evidence we have seen is not encouraging.

Wayland, Massachusetts

It is certainly within all of our rights to criticize what we feel is improper or unjust, and I assume that the four students in question were doing just that. However, they did so in such a spectacular, pointed manner that they appear idiotic, as does William Cole, as do we in general for seemingly condoning all of it. Christopher Baldwin, editor of the Review, was paraphrased by the Wall Street Journal as saying that the students' action was "a serious inquiry into academic excellence weirdly transformed into a racial incident."

It is apparent to anyone reading the editorial that it was neither, but that is mostly beside the point. The real issue is that this was an editorial at all. Had the incident been a result of serious academic inquiry, and had it been I doubt it would have been an "incident," the editorial might have made us appear thoughtful in our concern about the future of our venerable insitution, just as we might appear thoughtful in lending our resources for the betterment of others. We never seem to appear that way, though, unless it is by mistake. Why?

New York, New York

Dartmouth's administration has sent a clear message to alumni seeking first-hand knowledge about the troubles on campus: stay home.

The College employs warm phrases such as "the Dartmouth community" in fund raising appeals and this magazine, stressing that graduates remain part of their college. But recent actions belie this rhetoric.

My inquiry about admission to the "open" March 8 disciplinary hearing for the Dartmouth Review quartet was stonewalled by several College administrators. A few seats were to be alloted to a handful of students, staff, faculty and press; not a single alumnus was to be admitted. "It's a campus matter," one college attorney explained.

Suggestions from students and alumni that an "open" hearing requires a largeenough room were ignored. "No one is being barred," I was told. Nonsense. Many students were barred from Professor Cole's Saturday testimony, as was every interested alumnus.

I am saddened and angered by the "shoot the messenger" reaction of the Freedman administration to student pressure for higher standards of instruction. The harshness of the discipline of the Review's editors can only be explained by the disciplinary committee's dislike for their ideology and criticisms; there is no other way the students' behavior could have been found to merit suspensions.

As alumni, all men and women of Dartmouth have the right to remain involved, to expect strong and fair leadership from Parkhurst Hall, and to demand academic excellence from faculty and students alike. By treating concerned graduates as meddlesome rubes and student critics as enemies, Dartmouth's administrators are risking our emotional and financial loyalty.

North Hampton, New Hampshire

Poor Dartmouth. For years famous as the college that inspired "Animal House." Now famous as the college that suspends students for the free expression of unpopular ideas. Gooey concepts like "measured, mature response" to harassment, and prating about the "right to privacy" do not white- wash outrageous violations of first-amendment rights. A sad inaugural for the new president's administration.

Corpus Christi, Texas

The recent disciplinary action against four Dartmouth students associated with the Dartmouth Review has continued the recent trend of responding promptly and favorably to strident,and vociferous minor- ities be they based on culture, race, sex or beliefs with little apparent regard to the circumstances. Why is it that those who respond to such violence as the construction of the shanties, the occupations of Parkhurst, the invasion of Baker Tower, the isolated indignities at Dartmouth Night and Commencement, and the apparent verbal violence of the classroom are the ones who always seem to be penalized, whereas the original perpetrators are generally left alone?

We lived for years in South America where comparable actions essentially put the students in control of the universities, resulting in almost complete anarchy in the educational process.

I do not condone violence, bad taste or poor judgment on either side of the various disagreements, but I have great concern that unless the administration recognizes violence in all its manifestations and endeavors to deal with it in an even-handed way, a lot of the deserved standing and reputation of the College will be dissipated. I had hoped for more from the recent changes.

Lyme, New Hampshire

Freedman's Comments

Having survived for many years the trials and tribulations of depression, war, and other assorted challenges, I feel it appropriate to write my firsthand quite likely my last— letter to the Alumni Magazine. Two comments by President Freedman, and on- going events on the Hanover plain, inspire me.

I never knew until now that Dartmouth had a "deeply traditional mission" of "highly gifted students" taught by "greatly dedicated teachers." When President Hopkins shook my hand and welcomed me to Dartmouth, an occasion I well remember, I do not recall that he said anything as presumptuous as that. But he did mention opportunity and hard work.

Thousands of graduates since those days have made untold contributions to society and this country by taking advantage of opportunites and working their tails off, and they were neither highly gifted nor considered themselves as such. As for dedicated teachers, we've all had some—Lambuth, Bond, Ballard, Wood, Epperson, Fernandez come readily to mind. But all too often on the other end of the scale—then and now— are those ever-present individuals primarily dedicated not to students' education but to tenure and a stress-free lifestyle.

My second surprise from President Freedman was the statement that mathematical parity in the number of male and female students leads to "greater academic distinction." Not only I, but I'm sure many university administrators would like to know the facts that lead to this conclusion. If numbers are the answer, it certainly would simplify the problem of achieving and maintaining quality education.

As for the ongoing events at Dartmouth, I've had problems for years with the hardline and often extreme positions of the conservative far right. But I have equal difficulty with the liberal left, and their intellectual arrogance and absolute intolerance of any views which differ from their own. In maintaining and encouraging such a posture, the administration and faculty of Dartmouth College not only tarnish the reputation of the College, but even worse, make it increasingly irrelevant in the real world.

Clarendon Hills, Illinois

Video Magazine

I was delighted to receive the inaugural issue of Dartmouth Today, the new College videotape magazine.

I welcome this new form of communication as an important addition to our other excellent media, such as the Dartmouth Alumni Magazine, bulletins, news releases, class newsletters, Council flash bulletins, etc. The key to informed alumni is excellent communications. The video magazine certainly goes a long way to help attain this goal.

I particularly enjoyed seeing and hearing President Freedman, watching last fall's Dartmouth Night and viewing the many featurettes. It was an enjoyable first edition and I am sure the video magazine will improve with each succeeding issue. I am pleased with the efforts Dartmouth has made to upgrade its total video capabilities, which will become increasingly important in communicating with the College's many publics.

I used my copy last week to show at a Tuck School alumni cocktail party and have donated it to the Cleveland Alumni Club for additional showings. Naturally, I subscribed for the entire 1987-88 series.

These tapes are excellent for showing at alumni club meetings, as gifts for alumni, or to use in recruiting. The video magazine enables me to bring Dartmouth right into my living room and ... "it doesn't get any better than that."

Cleveland, Ohio

The Winter issue is just out, and in our opinion is even better than the first.—Ed.

I could not help but note your reference to "Dartmouth Today" in the February issue. Two factual components were missing which relate directly to the class of 1958. First of all, you added five years to Bill Hartley's life making him a member of the class of 1953 rather than 1958. Secondly, you should have mentioned that it was the class of 1958 that provided seed money for the concept.

Manchester, New Hampshire

According to Sally Prescott, assistant director ofAlumni Affairs, 1958 was one of four classesthat contributed to the effort.—Ed.

Olympians of Old

Your recent article about Dartmouth Olympians and the subsequent events prompt me to submit some thoughts.

Although the article refers to many Olympians, it fails to mention many others. I would particularly name Colin Stewart '48 who I believe got a fourth place in the Special Slalom and Dave Lawrence '51 who skied to something other than his marriage to Andrea Mead.

On the February page of the Dartmouth Alumni Calender you may see a picture of some earlier Dartmouth skiers. The slopebound little skier to the left of the leapers is identified as J. Flint '32. I worked for Jim Flint for a time at the General Dyestuff Corporation laboratories in New York. He was a great guy and a distinguished dyestuff chemist. He was one of the first to do serious research on ski waxes and you will find his name attached to some of the earliest patents on ski waxes. Perhaps he could have helped some of those cry-babies in Calgary.

In the gas-shortage years of World War II we Dartmouth skiers were not roaming the girdled earth. For a good day's skiing we could take a bus to Woodstock, Vermont. There, on Suicide Six, the site of the first rope tow in the country, established in 1936 by Bunny Bertram '3l, we found a real challenge. Bunny was a legend himself. He stood at the top of that infamous rope tow in all kinds of weather with a cut-off switch in one hand with which he could stop the tow in case one of the inept should become entangled. In his other hand he was always prepared to wield a stop watch to give every would-be champion a chance to win his Silver Six pin by skiing to the bottom in less than one minute. The Gold Six, won by breaking the record, was held by Jack Tobin '34 until, I believe, the hot-shot skiers of the '60s came along.

These reminiscences may seem kind of old fashioned, but all these bits are what make up the Dartmouth skiing tradition. The events of yesterday add a great deal more. Who would have guessed that two Dartmouth women would win the gold and the bronze in the disabled skiing event?

Point Pleasant, New Jersey

Wrong Views

I still think civilization might perish from giving the wrong point of view equal time. And how do you recognize the wrong point of view?

That, my dear students, is what a liberal education is all about.

Forest Hills, New York

Henry Williams

Gifted teachers live on in the lives of their students. Henry Williams was such a teacher, and mine is such a life. In 1958,

during the spring of my freshman year at Dartmouth College, I tried out for a role in a student-written drama about life in the arctic that Henry was directing. After hearing my version of a Norwegian accent filtered through 18 years in the Bronx, Henry turned to me and said: "Why don't you stage-manage!"

I hope he knew what he was doing, because at that moment, he determined the rest of my life. I stage-managed three shows for Henry, culminating in a virtually uncut version of "Hamlet." Henry taught me to stage-manage and to direct. Henry whetted my appetite for theatre history with stories of Mrs. John Drew which led me to a Ph.D. and a teaching career and a lifelong interest in the nineteenth-century theatre. Henry taught me to manage myself and to manage others backstage, and today I'm sitting in a dean's office.

Henry was one of the first human beings who made me feel competent, who made me feel that I could take hold of my life and accomplish something. I was a scared kid, and he put me in charge of a show. Twenty years later, I saw his production of "H.M.S. Pinafore" and was utterly shocked. It looked as if I had directed it. The techniques had become so much a part of me, I had forgotten where I learned them.

Few American families experience delight when their sons or daughters announce that they're going to paint or dance or have anything to do with the theatre. Consequently young Americans interested in the arts go looking for a home. The Dartmouth Players provided that home for me, and Henry, along with Warner Bentley and George Schoenhut and Bill and Phyllis Warfel, were more than teachers. They were spiritual parents.

My real parents met Henry once. At graduation I brought them down to the wonderful house on Balch Hill where he and Becky lived amid their books and pictures and the mementos of their lives. My mother, none too pleased that her son had quit pre-med for Theatre History, fixed Henry with her eagle eye and said: "Tell me, Mr. Williams, will my son ever make a dime out of this?" During the subsequent pause, I wanted to crawl into the wood work until my very gentle father looked around the house, rich with the lives of its occupants, and said, "Well, it doesn't look like the professor's done so bad." Looking back, I think it was one father acknowledging another.

I keep losing my fathers. But I keep becoming them. I look in the mirror and see my own dad. I look at my life and I see Henry. It's scary to think what a chance remark made in 1958 meant to me, but then I look at the riches of a life in the theatre, Henry's and mine, and "it doesn't look like the professor's done so bad."

Other former students who feel as I do might wish to consider a donation to the H. Bradlee Watson and Henry B. Williams Theatre Collection at Dartmouth.

LOYOLA MARYMOUNT UNIVERSITYLos Angeles, California

Specious Hindsight

Those alumni who write in to say that they would have lived their Dartmouth years differently if they'd have had the opportunity to do it over again seem really silly to me.

Am I the only one in the world who sees the speciousness behind the concept of 20- 20 hindsight?

Where do people get the idea that they'd do better on a replay? This is the argument: I know the results of something I did. If I had done something else instead, the result would have been different and I'd be better off!

I ask those dreamers and regretters: How do you know for sure you'd be better off? How do you know what you would have done if you had a chance to do something different (other than the act which now proves to have been a mistake?)—let alone what would be all the ramifications and consequences of a different choice of action?

To those sad ones who sit and moon, "Alas and Alack, turn the calendar back!": let me say that there are more constructive things to do. Regret won't make things right. The past is past, and the past is your life. If you had the opportunity to relive Dartmouth, my guess is that you'd have lived it the same way on the replay. If you had the chance to live life over again knowing what you know now, you'd probably play safe and face predictable consequences by making the same mistakes again.

Eugene, Oregon

Going Native

I'm surprised that Dartmouth has not been more creative about the school symbol. There just may be a way to reinstate an American Indian symbol at Dartmouth. A return to such a symbol should be accompanied by a demonstration from the Dartmouth community that it is truly concerned about and committed to American Indian issues.

The concern and commitment would be demonstrated by: the establishment of more courses about American Indians; fundraising for the purpose of constructing a museum of Indian history and art on campus; and a provision of even greater assistance for Dartmouth students with American Indian heritage in facing their challenging college experiences.

These efforts would be overseen by a committee composed of at least 50 percent American Indians (Dartmouth alumni and students, and other distinguished Indian citizens). The chairperson of the committee would be selected from among these American Indian members.

The committee also would commission an Indian artist to create a Dartmouth College symbol. The symbol would not be a depiction of a human being. Rather, it could be an animal—not necessarily male or aggressive—that had impact on American Indian peoples in New England in the eighteenth century. However, if the symbol, for example, was a timberwolf, the athletic teams would not be called the Dartmouth Timberwolves. Instead, they would be labelled the Dartmouth ???, where ??? would be an actual Indian word from the New England region that means timberwolves. This symbol, described in a Native American language, would be an attention-grabber. It would be classy, and would avoid insensitive caricatures.

Also, if certain historical exhibits such as the Hovey Murals are ever to be included in an official tour of the campus, they should be presented with an explanation of how they represent negative stereotypes that were common in Dartmouth past, as compared to the enhanced sensitivity in Dartmouth present. The committee would develop guidelines and scripts with which stereotyping exhibits such as the murals would be presented.

The committee would have the authority also to institute numerous positive changes throughout campus life. Overall, these actions would demonstrate a true concern about American Indian peoples today, as opposed to a past concern for Indians only as a link to fond undergraduate memories. The actions would project Dartmouth College as a positive leader among the nation's academic institutions.

Eugene, Oregon

Christian Heritage

This year I am diverting half of my Dartmouth Alumni Fund contributions to the Ernest Martin Hopkins Institute in the hope that in the long run it will do more good.

There are numerous reasons but one cause of resentment is the continued covering of the Hovey murals which are hypocritically uncovered when alumni return to celebrate their anniversaries.

Is Dartmouth now ashamed of its Christian heritage?

Portland, Maine