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Opinion
Friday, February 4, 2000
The forgotten chancellor: Just call me Larry
Larry Chalmers deserves recognition for his service to the University
How many of the names on campus buildings mean anything to you? Most buildings are named after important people in University's history, many of them former
That injustice needs to be addressed.
chancellors. In fact, with the exception of interim Chancellor Del Shankel and current Chancellor Robert Hemenway, each of the University's leaders has a building named for him — except E. Laurence Chalmers.
That injustice needs to be addressed. Chalmers came here in 1969 as a young, somewhat idealistic chancellor intent on making sure KU students came first. He immediately tried to do away with much of the formality of the office and implored students to "Just call me Larry." Although he promised to be stern with student anti-war protests, he also said that he sympathized with their situation.
Almost immediately, however, Chalmers came under fire from state lawmakers for refusing to release the names of students who had disrupted an ROTC review the previous spring. He told the legislators that the matter was being handled by the internal University judicial system and that their involvement was unnecessary. In his first month as chancellor, Chalmers made his first enemies in Topeka.
In the spring of 1970, just eight months into his tenure, Chalmers faced the worst violence and civil unrest Lawrence had seen since the Civil War. In early April, several African-American students were arrested at Lawrence High School. With support from the University's Black Student Union, African-American students took over the high school office, demanding a new Black studies department. Their demands failed, and tensions began to simmer around Lawrence, including at the University.
Several nights of violence involving both Lawrence High and KU students ensued, and on April 20, 1970, the Kansas Union was bombed. The next day, Gov. Bob Docking suspended the sale of guns and liquor, declared a 9 p.m. curfew and sent highway patrolmen to Hundreds. Hundreds were arrested during the following days, mostly for curfew violations. In response, students presented
Chalmers with a petition containing thousands of signatures, imploring him to end the curfew, although he had no power to do so.
Instead, Chalmers publicly asked the governor to end the curfew, calling it "inimical to the purposes of a distinguished university." When media around the state reported the statement, headlines all around Kansas screamed,
Seth Hoffman opinion editor opinion@kansan.com
No other chancellor before or since has had such a trial by fire.
"Chancellor protests curfew," cementing Chalmer's reputation as a radical sympathizer.
Just two weeks after the Union burned, President Richard Nixon announced that the United States was invading Cambodia, clearly escalating the Vietnam War. Protest-weary students didn't
hold major demonstrations at the University, but thousands of other students at hundreds of other universities responded with major civil discord. When four Kent State University students were shot and killed by national guardsmen, though, the KU community once again sprang to life.
Whereas African Americans had fronted most of the previous month's unrest, a new more diverse group of students, faculty and drifers joined in the rising chorus of civil discord. The day after the shootings, a large group of protesters gathered at the burned-out Union and marched with four symbolic coffins to the National Guard Armory. That same day, Chalmers, with the support of the University Senate Executive Committee and the campus ROTC commander, decided to cancel the annual ROTC review scheduled for the next day. Although he probably averted more violence and although more than 20 military bases canceled their armed services reviews the following Saturday, Chalmers received a deluge of criticism for "appeasing the longhairs."
Many students viewed the cancellation as a
victory and rallied in front of Strong Hall that night. More than 500 attended, and the crowd grew unruly. Students were urged to march to the Military Science Building, where they began throwing stones through the windows. Chalmers faced a decision: Call in the Lawrence Police Department, the Highway Patrol or possibly even the National Guard, or hope that the rally would end peacefully. The cool-headed Chalmers chose hope, saying later that ordering armed troops would have caused serious violence
For the rest of that night.
Lawrence Chalmers smiles after the open convocation held May 9, 1970. Photo courtesy of the University Archives
For the rest of that Chalmers met with SenEi to decide what to do next.
The group debated for hours, trying to decide whether to shut down the University for the rest of the semester. Many college campuses already had done so, and many born thought it
was the only way to avoid further violence. Chalmers and SenEx decided to hold an all-campus convocation at Memorial Stadium to let students and faculty vote on whether to continue classes. On Friday, May 9, 15,000 people showed up and voted to keep the University open but to give students an option to leave immediately without forfeiting academic credit.
Many other letters, mostly from mothers of students and written on personal stationery, thanked Chalmers for keeping their children safe.
Needless to say, politicians in Topeka were furious at Chalmers. Later that summer, the Board of Regents voted on whether to fire Chalmers. He remained chancellor by a one-vote margin. Another vote was taken later
Today in the University Archives, there are hundreds of letters from parents and alumni that betale Chalmers for appeasing the radical students. One letter stated, "Our child has no vote to close school. We are paying her way, we vote that school continue."
that year, and again, one vote kept him from being dismissed.
Chalmers' heavy involvement with the University's student and faculty governance was also impressive. He let SenEx give counsel on the most important University issues and regularly met with them. By contrast, when I served on SenEx last year, the body was rarely consulted on any matter of importance, and it met with the chancellor only about four times.
Though he was vilified by members of the Legislature and the Regents, Chalmers was extremely popular with students. His "Just call me Larry" approach impressed students and provided them with a high-ranking official they could trust. With an overzealous sheriff and a state attorney general leading drug raids every time someone lit a match, such trust was an impressive coup.
Throughout the next year, Chalmers continually would find himself battling with Topeka lawmakers. Vern Miller, the new attorney general elected on a platform of bat-
fling the "Lawrence
longhair problem" was a thorn in Chalmers' side. As Chalmers put it, Miller used the University as his "personal whipping boy" and vowed to defend students from him at all times.
In 1972, Chalmers' wife was granted an emergency divorce. Knowing that the divorce would be the final straw for the Regents, Chalmers chose to resign rather than fight for his job again. During his brief tenure at the University, many blows were leveled at Chalmers' leadership capabilities, but ambitious politicians who really brought him down.
As a result, there is no Chalmers Hall anywhere on campus. There was no man who could have done more to keep the University together. The University should keep this in mind the next time building is approved. Chalmers was simply a victim of his times; something should be done to right this wrong.
Hoffman is a Lenexa senior in journalism.
Proposed hike in parking meter prices may burn holes in students' pockets
This week the parking board announced a proposal to stop overselling permits for Jayhawker Towers, Gertrude Sellards Pearson-Corbin Halls, and Alumni Place parking lots. The department is finally taking a step in the right direction to lessen parking congestion.
But while the board is giving students some good news, it is also proposing a longer-term meter price increase that hurts students' wallets. The board plans to increase long-term meter prices from 50 cents to $1 per hour in an effort to raise revenue for the new parking garage under construction next to the Kansas Union. This change would affect all long-term meters, including the 500 meters planned for the garage.
While the department claims this would actually benefit students because meters near the Kansas Union and Memorial Stadium will be converted into spaces for yellow and blue permit holders, this is a thinly veiled attempt at justifying yet another increase in parking-related student costs.
Even with the additional yellow and blue spots available near the Union, many students still will be unable to find non-metered parking and will have to settle for a metered spot in the new garage.
Students footing too much of bill for new Union parking garage
For a student who is on campus most of the day, that can mean at least $5 or $6 per day.
The parking department maintains that new revenue must be raised to support the garage. Although students should foot part of the bill, it is disappointing that the department seems to return continually the brunt of the financial burden to them.
It's true that the parking department operates on revenues alone, which it gains from user fees such as fines, meters, permits, parking at events and garage tolls. It doesn't receive state funding or money from tuition. However, it is unfair to force students to dish out so much money so that they can transport themselves to campus every day. Perhaps the University should examine sharing some parking-related costs, such as lighting and maintenance, with the department so that students do not continually feel the squeeze of budget constraints.
ing a new garage, more spaces benefit the parking department because there will be not only new permit and meter revenues, but also more opportunities for fines, which means more income. Even more frustrating is that the parking department now can do almost whatever it wants. The parking department and board only have to answer to Rodger Oroke, director of general services in the chancellor's office. A department like parking, which has such a direct impact on students, should be held more accountable than it is.
The proposed meter hike is not the first increase for students justified by the department as necessary to finance the new garage. In 1997, parking permit prices were raised: Blue permits increased from $85 to $110, red permits increased from $75 to $95, yellow permits increased from $53 to $75 and student housing lot permits increased from $50 to $75.
Now the department is hitting students again with another plan to cough up more money. How long will students be forced to pay? With the lack of accountability, who knows how many more revenue-raising ideas the board will develop that will put a crunch on student pocketbooks?
Despite the financial burden of support
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Feedback Transitional fossils located in museum
Drew Ryun's column is a shopping list of political positions, backed by one-liners. Space permits dealing with only one of his distortions. I pick, "Can anyone tell you where the transitional fossils of the vaunted fossil record are?"
Why not? They have two more gaps to crow about — between A and B and between B and C! Since life forms are classified into species, every new find is an opportunity to point out new "gaps." His call to discuss science, not ideology, is hypocritical at best.
Most of them are in the ground, but you might try the Natural History Museum in Dyche Hall. More important is to know how his creation "science" teachers have dealt with this: When a new form is found between A and C, they don't acknowledge the filling of one of the transitions in the record.
Adrian L. Melot
Professor of physics and astronomy
Kansas Citizens for Science
Theory based on looking at facts
I thought I should take the time to respond to the eloquent but flawed arguments made by Drew Ryun. My argument is twofold, written as a student of science and a concerned citizen.
Ryun states that "there is no hard, empirical evidence for the theory of evolution." Unfortunately Mr. Ryun uses this phrase in a persuasive way, much like the Kansas State Board of Education, without fully comprehending the definition of theory. In a scientific context, Webster's Dictionary lists a theory as a plausible or scientifically acceptable principle offered to explain observed facts. (I stress "facts.") I think the real losers in Mr. Ryun's list should be the children affected by the backlash of the
Finally, I was shocked at the somewhat fascist comments made about the legal argument of whether students should have to pay campus fees for organizations that they don't approve of. According to Ryun's depiction of the situation, he would like to see "which campus groups deserve to survive and which ones don't." Our Constitution was set to defend those that had little or no voice. Who is to say that groups that have vastly different views to your own don't have the right to receive funding. The University environment is one of diversity and exploration, don't let those who wish to find new forms of expression through a student organization lose their freedom of choice.
KSBOE decision. Did you hear a Southern state actually rounded the number pi from 3.14159 to ?? Whether you subscribe to evolution fully or not, some things (like pi and evolution) cannot be disputed.
Corey M. Snyder
Topeka junior
Cafe won't retain Jaybowl traffic
My attendance at Tuesday night's open forum regarding the potential elimination of the Kansas Union's Jaybowl made me realize that the proposal for the cybercafe/computer center that would replace it is based on questionable rationale.
Union Director David Mucci claims that the plans are based on student desires for a lounge, coffeehouse, and computer facilities in the Union on a 24-hour basis and on reported traffic numbers of 170,000 people per year at the existing Academic Computing Center — traffic he hopes to attract to this new facility.
Both of these assumptions are flawed. The new facilities that he proposes are duplications of already under-utilized facilities elsewhere in the Union, such as lounges
and stage areas. There is no evidence that additional spaces of these types would result in increased traffic.
One of the unmentioned issues at stake in this controversy is the lack of traffic in the Union as a whole in the evening hours. Many evenings, the only area with any measurable activity at all is in fact the Jaybowl. The proposal to eliminate it in favor of more facilities of a kind that already exist, most at underused levels, with the expectation that traffic will suddenly increase five fold, is both untenable and unsound.
Groundhog Day
Mucci cites the fact that 170,000 people per year patronize the 24-hour Academic Computing Center and compares this to the 35,000 people per year patronizing the Jaybowl. It is hard to believe that this traffic is going to magically transfer to the proposed cybercafe/computer center. Yet this expected traffic increase — from 35,000 to 170,000 people per year — is the lincpin of Mucci's proposal to eliminate the Jaybowl. These results are far from guaranteed.
Chris Meissner Lawrence graduate student in theater and film
I would like to correct a few items that appeared in the Feb. 2 Kansan. First, when the groundhog sees its shadow, it predicts six weeks of winter not six months. The groundhog is the only species of marmot that lives in the eastern United States and the only species found in the Lawrence area. Lastly, the groundhog is not blind but has very keen eyesight that is critical for detecting potential predators, such as foxes. And Punxsutawney Phil did see his shadow on Groundhog Day, thus predicting six more weeks of winter weather. Phil's prediction is correct about half the time.
Kenneth B. Armitage Professor Emeritus
Broaden your mind: Today's quote
"All my life I have wanted to be where the action is."—Chancellor E. Laurence Chalmers, in his first convocation address