Dusty Tales and Old Friends

Reflections on the sixteenth president, the balanced life, the meaning of Green T-shirts.

Blackboard Confessions

Fall term of my freshman year I knew I was at a special place when the calculus professor (Bill Slesnick) knew my name on the first day of class. But the awe and meekness I felt due to that talent were quickly eclipsed. Having filled the Gerry Hall blackboard with limit functions and differentials, Slesnick didn't bother to search out an eraser; instead he just pushed a button and the slate automatically rose, exposing a fresh, unsoiled board beneath. It was clear that here, at Dartmouth, no time would be wasted erasing boards. I worried how I could ever keep up.

By spring term, blackboards three and four deep no longer impressed me. Late one night I sneaked into Gerry Hall and affixed a Playboy centerfold to the second board back. The next morning I patiently waited while Slesnick filled the front board with the permutations of finite mathematics. As he pushed the button. I fully expected him to magically know that it was me who had done the deed,and I dreaded the consequences. As the allness of the centerfold came into view the class burst into raucous laughter but not Slesnick. He didn't miss a beat. Unruffled he continued on, ignoring the smiling face and shapely body as he surrounded it with equations. Soon the board had no more usable space. Slesnick calmly pushed the button and my prank rose out of sight.

ANCHORAGE, ALASKA 75032.1772@COMPUSERVE.COM

In my sophomore year, I took a job as a homework grader for the math department. Professor John Kemeny was down in front of a Math 3 or 4 class, being first or second semester calculus, with about 100 students in the steeply inclined rows of seats.The hall had a set of four or five blackboards which could be raised to reveal those behind. After filling the first board, he heaved it up and continued on the second. When he went to the third board, we saw that someone had been there first and written "EAT IT" in large block letters. There was a modest round of laughter but Kemeny pressed on without a twitch of recognition.

AURORA, COLORADO KPORTER@DIAC.COM

The Wright Reaction

The Dartmouth Trustees are to be congratulated for selecting as 16th president, as the country did in 1860, the candidate from Illinois. By all indications, Jim Wright's election will be far more unifying for his constituency than Lincoln's.

Having been at Dartmouth under both Ernest Martin Hopkins and John Sloan Dickey, and having had the privilege of knowing Jim Wright as a fellow member of the Kimball Union Academy board of trustees earlier this decade, I feel sure that Jim will collegially build on the best of Dartmouth past—including the practicality and integrity of the Hopkins years and the intellectual creativity of the Dickey era to shape an institution of scholarship and wisdom of which we all can continue to be proud.

MANCHESTER, MAINE

I have met Jim Wright and found him to be honest, forthright, and focused on the needs of the College. I do, however, have substantial reservations about his goals. President Wright stated that he sees Dartmouth as a university. Wright was a professor and faculty dean. I fear that his broad view of the College has been influenced by academics and not by Dartmouth's traditions and focus on professors not

teaching assistants teaching undergraduates. Ex-president Freedman trashed, or tried to trash, many of Dartmouth's traditions in an effort to make Dartmouth a university. I hope Jim Wright does not follow on this path of folly. My father was class of '28, my brother's 4, and my sons '94 and '98. I have seen the College change and grow, mostly for the better. As long as we are vigilant and do not succumb to the latest fad in education or political and social correctness, the College will prosper. Good luck to us!

SCOTTSDALE, ARIZONA

Inner Balance

In her Commencement address [September] Doris Kearns Goodwin referred to "a central wisdom" learned from Harvard psychologis Erik Erikson: "The richest and fullest lives attain an inner balance of work, love, and play, in equal order." I believe I learned a greater wisdom from Professor Eugen Rosenstock-Huessey a million years ago, more or less. This social philosopher projected a Cross of Life that included work, love, and play and worship, as well. The latter in my experience is essential for the attainment of "inner balance."

DELMAR, NEW YORK

Net Gains

The codfish article by David Dobbs [September] ought to quiet all the opposition to Dartmouth's research programs. A liberal college cannot live up to its mission without research. While the ancient Greek philosophers had no laboratories or computers, their work in a broader sense invoked research. Research includes every activity the mind is capable of generating. So, let's have more of it and "keep at bay" the recent nay-sayers who fail to understand the full impact of the liberal education they appear to have skimmed through so lightly.

CENTER SANDWICH, NEW HAMPSHIRE

Say What?

I absolutely cannot refrain from writing my first letter to the editor in what, 50 years? after reading the passage from ex-President Freedman's Commencement speech [Sep-tember]: "...the challenge of transcending the ambiguity-entangled counsel of arrogance and modesty, egotism and altruism, emotion and reason, opportunism and loyalty, individualism and conformity..."

Did he actually say that?

NEW YORK, NEW YORK

Hanover Diners

In reference to April's Streamliner article and Joe Mesic's letter in your May issue: in the '50s I worked, as Joe indicated, at the Streamliner but lived in the Hanover Diner. The Streamliner was owned by a gentleman named "Chas." He and his brother were fine, decent, standup guys who loved Dartmouth and everything associated with the College. But the Hanover Diner was the best...cold draft beer and hot homemade soup. We would always celebrate before and after exams. Annie, the waitress, had a sneaker for Joe and always gave him a little extra of her under-the-shoulder essence. Joe, I'm sure, requited this affection. This was "the Pit" at its best.

Incidentally, I was in Savannah recently. Couldn't find the Streamliner. On reflection it's probably better that way.

BROOKVILLE, NEW YORK

The Green Lawn

In your September issue it was noted that President Tucker's awesome powers extended to the decision to buy a lawnmower. Maybe you could enlighten us in a future issue regarding how the Green was maintained prior to 1900. In addition to navigating through the mud did the walkers also have to dodge the sheep dung?

BAKERGROUP@AOL.COM

We can enlighten you right here: the answer is, yes, they did. Cow dung, too. Ed.

Mr. Dartmouth

Editor's note: As our October issue went to press in early September, we received the sad news of the passing of William Scherman '34. Bill, among m.any things, was a class newsletter editor, a sometimes reporter, book reviewer, and, for the past eight years, author of the column "Dr. Wheelock's Journal." Shortly after his death we received the following letters.

I once sat beside Bill Scherman at a luncheon. Within the breathtaking span of several minutes he dismissed the fallacy of a dry martini, identified the Bela Bartok piano piece in the restaurant's background music, analyzed the baseball skills of the Dartmouth quarterback, and recalled a marketing legend of a book called Lincoln's Doctor's Dog.

People called him a Renaissance Man but he was really a Twentieth Century Man, appealingly representative of the century whose varied bulk he spanned. He was a true (and therefore rare) liberal, one who believed his species could improve despite alarming evidence to the contrary. He accepted change, even enjoyed some of it. At its best, change meant construction. No man ever loved the sight of a bulldozer, or wrote about it more movingly, than Bill Scherman. Mostly, though, he loved Dartmouth. He loved his College deeply and sanely and many, many of us loved him back.

ETNA, NEW HAMPSHIRE

The timing of your L'envoi to Dr. Wheelock was spooky. It appeared the day before Bill Scherman's memorial service. The service in The Church of Christ at Dartmouth College was planned by Bill and Gerry Scherman. In between the singing of "The Twilight Song" and "Dartmouth Undying," six people spoke.

The Reverend Carla Bailey: "This was the Citizen Articulate." Charlie Wheelan '88: "I admired Mr. Scherman's bonedry wit. I told him I could get ideas for the magazine he was helping me start only in the shower. He said, 'Then go take a shower.'" Stan Smoyer '34: "'Don't call us the great class of '34,' Bill used to say. 'Forget hyperbole. Call us the good class.' Bill was the glue that held our class together. He wrote the class newsletter every year except one of the 63 years since our graduation." Dan Scherman '83 (son): "Trying to tell my father good-bye, I was at a loss for words. 'Dad,' I said, 'you're a good man.' He shot right back, 'And a good man is hard to find.'" Tim Scherman (son): "My father could make words smile. He was 50 years my senior, and I was jealous of my siblings, who knew so much more of him than I did. I just hope that I can live as generously, as hopefully, as courageously, as my father did." Rowland Scherman (son): "We called him Pop. His classmates called him Mr. Dartmouth... to paraphrase Daniel Webster, He is, Sir, a small college man, and yet there are those who love him."

Yes. And we are two of them.

HANOVER, NEW HAMPSHIRE

Sporty Reporter

Iread your article about Brad Parks ["Face to Watch," May], and wanted to update you on another Dartmouth graduate doing the same job as Brad at the Washington Post. Camille Powell '97 was hired following graduation to cover high school sports in Loudoun and Fauquier counties, which are fast-growing suburbs in Northern Virginia. Brad was the first full-time preps reporter hired, Camille was the second. She followed Brad as editor of the Sports Weekly, and completed an internship at the Boston Globe (as Brad also did). As Camille's assignment editor, I think she's a tremendously gifted writer and reporter. As a former member of the varsity women's soccer team at Dartmouth, she really can relate to the kids as student-athletes.

WASHINGTON, D.C

Green Fans

I ran the last Boston Marathon wearing my Dartmouth "Green" shirt. At several key points, I was exhausted and the pockets of cheering Dartmouth grads made a huge difference for me. I just wanted to say thanks to the Dartmouth family and let all other Dartmouth marathoners know how recognizable that shirt is. Every spectator under the age of ten was thrilled to have a Tshirt they could read and cheer at. And to think there were some of us who thought that "Green" was a nebulous mascot....

BOCA RATON, FLORIDA LURIAS@BMJ.USA.COM

"A Century of Greatness: Dartmouth's Top Ten Athletes" [March] brought back the past with a rush. There I was again in the late '30s and early '40s listening to the wonderful memories told by the distinguished alumni of Manchester, New Hampshire. As great as our sports heritage has been, it will get better and better.

RYE, NEW YORK

If anyone has attended every Dartmouth-Harvard football game since and including his freshman year of 1922, he might be considered a loyal fan of the Big Green. My most vivid memory does not concern any of any of the actual games. Rather, it has to do with our trip to the Harvard Stadium in 1922, when five of us freshmen left Hanover in a Model-T Ford the day before

the kick-off. We arrived in ample time, but only after seven flat tires en route. The Crimson forces prevailed in that encounter. I remember the score: Harvard 12, Dartmouth 3. I remember thinking that losing this game was the end of the worldwhich, of course, it was (almost!).

NORWICH, VERMONT

A couple of recent articles [on Ohio State football players gaining eligibility by passing summer courses in music, golf, and AIDS awareness] in The New York Times were quite revealing. I wonder what happened to basket weaving? No wonder Dartmouth doesn't play Big Ten teams.

EDGARTOWN, MASSACHUSETTS

Donald Sheehan and other scribes in our Hay issue chalked up student stories.