Cornell Alumni News - eCommons@Cornell - Cornell University

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^Alumni
Howard A. Stevenson '19 Editor Emeritus
March 1967
VOLUME 69, NUMBER 8
An independent magazine owned and
published by the Cornell Alumni Association
under the direction of its Publications
Committee: Thomas B. Haire '34, chairman;
Birge W. Kinne '16, Clifford S.
Bailey '18, Howard A. Stevenson '19, and
John E. Slater, Jr. '43. Officers of the
Cornell Alumni Association: Charles J.
Blanford '35, Scarsdale, N.Y., president;
Hunt Bradley '26, Ithaca, N.Y., secretarytreasurer.
Walter K. Nield '27, editor; Charles S.
Williams '44, managing editor; Mrs. Tommie
Bryant, assistant editor.
Editorial and business offices at Alumni
House, 626 Thurston Avenue, Ithaca,
New York 14850.
Issued monthly except August. Subscriptions,
$6 a year in U.S. and possessions;
foreign, $6.75. Subscriptions are renewed
annually unless cancelled. Second-class
postage paid at Ithaca, N.Y., and at additional
mailing offices.
Printed by Connecticut Printers, Inc.,
Hartford, Connecticut. Sixty cents a copy.
All publication rights reserved.
Member, American Alumni Council and
Ivy League Alumni Magazines, 22 Washington
Square, North, New York, New
York 10011; GRamercy 5-2039.
Form 3579 should be sent to Cornell
Alumni News, 626 Thurston Ave., Ithaca,
N.Y. 14850.
Cover
Plus ςa change, plus c'est la meme
chose - Campus landmark, statue of
first Cornell President Andrew D.
White, is shown here with a collar of
snow. Picture, circa 1926, was sent in
by Emmet C. MacCubbin '30.
March 1967
WALT
NIELD
RETIRES
• It is with great regret that the NEWS
announces the retirement of Walter K.
Nield '27 as editor. He had suffered a
severe attack of phlebitis last September
and, while he is now mobile and comfortable,
he is not able to resume full-time
work. Ithaca's winter being what it is, he
has left for Florida, where we hope sun
and sea will prove beneficial.
Walt is a devoted Cornellian. He has
served the university and its alumni well
as president of the Alumni Association,
chairman of the Association's Publications
Committee, member of the University
Council, president of his class, on
countless committees and special assignments,
and, most recently, as editor of the
NEWS.
A man of impeccable taste, he brought
to the NEWS exceptional experience and
talent as a designer, together with a solid
background in alumni affairs and knowledge
of Cornell. In keeping with the 68year
tradition of the NEWS, he reported
objectively to alumni about their university
- from its times of glory to those occasions
when it stubbed its toe. His contributions
to the magazine were many and
his touch will be in evidence for many issues
to come.
Walt has been a gracious associate and
friend. It was our pleasure to work with
him over these past two-and-a-half years.
We wish him well.
We are pleased to announce that starting
March 1st, John Marcham '50 will return
as editor of the CORNELL ALUMNI
NEWS. It had been our good fortune to
have worked with John during a most enjoyable
year before he left to become director
of university relations in Day Hall.
We are happy, indeed, to welcome him
aboard once again.
So much for the news affecting the
NEWS. The big story of the past month, of
course, has been Vaffaire Trojan Horse.
Full details of the incident can be read
in Seth Goldschlager's Undergraduate Report
(see pg. 24), and in THE UNIVERSITY
section as reported by John Marcham (see
pg. 20), so it need not be dealt with in
depth in these columns. In fact, we wish
it did not have to be reported at all - that
it had never happened.
From the decision of The Horse's editors
to print the offending article to the
District Attorney's threat to indict them,
errors in judgment piled up. The result
was a raging controversy in Ithaca and
nationwide coverage in the press. The
charge of obscenity, of course, made for
a juicy news item, and the newspapers
grabbed it as one more piece of evidence
that American youth - and especially college
youth - is headed, jet-propelled,
down the road to Perdition.
It is important to note that the newspaper
accounts we read were distorted or
incomplete on at least two important
points:
1) There was no riot in the commonly
accepted sense of the word. There could
have been one if the District Attorney and
his plainclothesmen had attempted to use
force in arresting those students who were
selling the magazine on the steps of the
Straight. Wisely, he and they desisted.
2) There was no attempt made by
newspaper accounts to explain one of the
basic reasons why a number of faculty
members supported the publication and
distribution of The Horse. This support
was particularly galling to a great many
Ithacans and, presumably, to some
alumni. The point that needed stressing,
but which was instead ignored, is the fact
that if there is any common denominator
in an academic community it is the conviction
that the precious right to publish
and to disseminate published material
must be kept inviolate. Faculty members
are willing to take a strong stand, indeed,
on this issue, even if the published material
is thought to be obscene, in bad
taste, or just plain junk. Even those professors
who thought the article in question
obscene - not merely in bad taste - reacted
unfavorably to the arbitrary use of police
power to seize all copies of The Horse
on campus.
This conviction is clearly expressed by
the temperate, but firm, official statement
on the incident made by the Faculty Council:
"The Faculty Council has reviewed carefully
the series of events that occurred in
connection with the publication and sale on
campus of the student literary magazine, The
Trojan Horse.
"It notes that the faculty and student committees,
the Scheduling Coordination & Ac-