Dr. Wheelock's Journal
Divers Notes & Observations
Somewhat upsetting news last month: President Freedman underwent surgery on April 4. The diagnosis was lymphatic cancer, and he has already begun chemotherapy. More reassuring were the statements by his doctors that the prospects for recovery from this type of cancer, at his age, are "very good." He asked News Service Director Alex Huppe' to convey this word for him: "When I came home from die hospital on Friday I was overwhelmed by the outpouring of cards, letters, books, gifts, balloons, a teddy bear, and homemade cookies from so many students, friends, and colleagues...It has been a wonderful feeling."
We understand that the President's earlier-announced plans to take a sixmonth sabbatical beginning January 1, 1995, are for the moment unchanged. The Trustees have tapped Dean of Faculty Jim Wright to serve as acting president for that period.
Otherwise, maybe just because winter left everyone except the skiers with a mega-dose of the blahs, spring has busted out with even more than allover enthusiasm. The Dartmouth Symphony has scheduled Beethoven's Fidelio for this month; the Handel Society will weigh in with Beethoven's Missa Solemnis; and a right good crew from the Glee Club will present HMSPinafore. If you were anywhere in the vicinity, I hope you had a chance to catch Stravinsky's Les Noces rendered by the Pokrovsky Ensemble on four computer-driven pianos April 28. The Hood is showing "Stark Impressions," prints from the era of Weimar Germany which always remind us of the musical Cabaret, and the Harrington Gallery has a small but highly select assortment of works by Manet. The tennis courts are kneedeep in participants, and on especially sunny afternoons, the shorts-clad Green is wall-to-wall with students lunching, tanning, catching up on assignments, courting, or playing frisbee.
Faces of spring have included the engaging high priest of Earth Island Institute, David Brower, at 81 still a master of environmental one-liners and shafts of wit directed at his opponents in our market-economy-dominated "greedlock." Examples: "God may someday decree that man should be thrown away as an experiment that didn't work"; and "When you've reached the edge of the abyss, the only progressive move you can make is backward." Speaking at the Senior Symposium, "Changing Apathy to Activism with Generation X," was Boston University's John Silber, who recounted his struggles when B.U. accepted the challenge to upgrade the educational system of the Boston suburb of Chelsea. Fools are not the only things Dr. Silber does not suffer gladly; on his list are patronage-saturated Boston politicians, intransigent teachers' unions (and incompetent teachers), multiculturalism (he called it a fad), and the "dumbing down" of educational facilities. Physicist Leon Lederman, who shared the 1988 Nobel Prize, will be on campus for a few days after this column goes to press, as will Wilma Mankiller, principal chief of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, who received a Dartmouth honorary degree three years ago. And Michael Eisner, principal chief of the Walt Disney Nation of California will appear at Tuck at the end of May.
The Trustees just made what we have personally considered a no-win decision, namely, rejection or retention of ROTC. In the words of the late chemistry professor Leon B. "Cheerless" Richardson, neither side of the question has "suffered from under emphasis." Merely strong feelings would inevitably turn bitter and resentful no matter what the Trustees did. Upholding the College's nondiscrimination policy would create unhappiness just as much as upholding ROTC. The Trustees voted to take the latter course, keeping the program—again, in our opinion, a courageous move. They noted that, although the government's policy on homosexuals in the military was still discriminatory, impending judicial cases are soon likely to point the Pentagon more directly toward equal participation. We, too, think it is better for Dartmouth to remain an active participant in this most sensitive societal question than to sulk on the sidelines.
With the acceptance envelopes for the class of '98 in the mail, a few more records have been set by Admissions. At next fall's convocation, if you shout, "Hey, Valedictorian!," 33 percent of the heads should turn. What is more, 28.9 percent of the admitted students are from minority groups; SAT scores are a median 1380. And out of this year's 9,524 applicants, also a record, more women than men have been accepted. Two more, 1,076 to 1,074.
On the minus side of the season's sports news: the departure of soccer coach Bobby Clark, to become head coach both of New Zealand's national World Cup and its Olympic teams. The likeable Scot will be replaced by a Dubliner, Fran O'Leary, new to the Ivy League but with a distinguished background in Division III. On the very-much plus side, you will know by the time you read this which NFL team will have signed outstanding Green quarterback Jay Fiedler '94. Gretchen Ulion '94, four-year standout women's ice hockey forward, was named to the U.S. Women's national team. And Betsy Gilmore '94 became the sixth woman in Dartmouth basketball history to be made Ivy Player of the Year.
You have nominated Peter M. Fahey '68, recently retired partner at the banking firm of Goldman, Sachs & Cos. overseer of the Thayer School and three times a Dartmouth parent to Alumni Trustee. Fahey participated in basketball and track as an undergraduate, and one of his offspring is lacrosse co-captain Pete Fahey Jr. '94, who has just launched the rejuvenated team to its best start in a decade. Along with word of this uniquely Native American sport is that Danielle Moore '95, the newly elected president of the Student Assembly, is the first Native American to hold that post; and that the aptly named Occom Inn, taken over by the College, is to become Native American House next fall.
And the discovery by a friend of ours, in a 1929 Delta Upsilon songbook, the University of Virginia's ancient anthem "The Good Old Song" (to the tune of Auld Lang Syne), beginning, "That good old song of Wah-hoo-Wah / We'll sing it o'er and O'er...." To use a common Native American expression, Give us a break.
