Page 6
University Daily Kansan
Friday. Dec. 8, 1961
Living in Templin Enjoyed by Professor
By Richard Currie
The door opens to a smoke-filled room where people are sprawled leisurely on chairs, on two small sofas and on the floor. The professor, whose voice had muttered "Come in" behind the closed door, says "Ah" in a greeting that reveals his Scottish breeding.
A record is blaring "A Nazi resurgence in Germany? Nonsense! We are hell, hell, highly democratic!" A woman and her male friend laugh as the little Scotsman sings the next line "So why all the fuss and the furor, der fuerherr, der Fuehrer, der Fuehrer! Then Leslie Robert Corbet Agnew, professor and chairman of the department of medical history at KU's medical center in Kansas City, goes into his bedroom to make some tea.
TWO OTHER STUDENTS are engrossed in some of the literature which literally envelopes this first floor apartment in Templin Hall. Books are piled on the sofas two feet high. Four book cases overflow with paperbacks and hard-bound books, "The Best of H. L. Mencken," "A History of Medicine," "College Parodies" and "The Lady Chatterly Trial" are some of the titles. A large bag of golf clubs sits in a corner.
The 22 volume "The Dictionary of National Biography" stands on a shelf, safely removed from the bedroom where it had perched precariously over Prof. Agnew's bed. The desk, a long table, is cluttered with papers, magazines and an antler quill pen which Prof. Agnew made from a deer he shot in Scotland.
Prof. Agnew emerges from the bedroom with a cigarette clenched between his teeth and shows you a list of prohibited books in Ireland.
"Somerset Maughan, J. D. Salinger! My God, what can they teach over there," he exclaims pointing to books by these authors banned by the Irish government.
THE TEA, brewed from a tea bag and a liberal sprinkling of Chinese te leaves, is ready. Prof. Agnew pours it from an old aluminum pitcher and passes the students some vanilla wafers. He sits in a chair, his left leg across his right knee and slides slightly down in the chair.
"Ive got mostly general stuff here," he says pointing to the walls lined with books. "A couple of thousand perhaps. The rest of my
Prof. Agnew
books — Dickens, Thackeray and company, are in Scotland."
Glascow, Scotland, to be exact, is where Prof. Agnew makes his headquarters during the summer months while he scours Europe for books to add to the medical center's library.
Though born in England, Prof. Agnew emphatically maintains he is Scottish because of his Scotch parents, who moved to Glasgow when the professor was a toddler. He took his M.B. from the university there in 1946 and his M.D. in 1950 while playing golf for the varsity team.
PROF. AGNEW CAME to the United States and Yale University in 1951 where he was a research fellow in anatomy. Prof. Agnew held research positions at the Universities of Florida and Harvard. In 1957 he earned the Harvard M.A. degree in the history of science and also won the English department's Arnold Prize for an essay on Jeffrey of the Edinburgh Review.
It was at Harvard that Prof. Agnew first lived in close proximity to university personnel as he does at KU in Templin. Here students flock nightly to his cluttered salon to consult his books, roar with glee at his satirical records and absorb his conversation which ranges from athletics, music literature to, inevitably, medical history. At Harvard
Prof. Agnew lived with faculty members as a resident tutor in one of the undergraduate houses.
"I like to be close to the university," he says of his residence in Templin. "The people here are varied. You never know who you will meet. Not so in Kansas City where nearly everyone goes home to suburbia at the end of the day and you have little chance to talk to them. A medical history course and a Western Civilization section also keep him here.
PROF. AGNEW MAKES the trip to Kansas City in a red Chevrolet Corvette. Of a ride in the little car one student has said: "It's a hell of an experience."
There was a knock on the door and a student entered asking to look at the skull Prof. Agnew uses in one of his classes. Prof. Agnew hunted through the debris in his bedroom but finally found the skull in his bathtub. He and the student looked at its teeth, the part in which the student was interested. After 15 minutes of serious talk Prof. Agnew gave him a zoology book and the student left happily.
Prof. Agnew placed the skull next to a bust of Albert Schweitzer who had a stocking cap pulled over his head, a bow tie draped across his neck and a cigarette clenched between his teeth.
"Without them he is rather forbidding." Prof. Agnew says.
ANOTHER STUDENT CAME in seeking advice about a Fulbright application.
Prof. Agnew led him into the bedroom and talked at great length with him. In the interim, two more students entered and played a record of Telemann's Suite in A for flute and strings.
Prof. Agnew came out to hear the last notes and chuckled gaily. One of the students, there are seven in the room now, suggests a game of ping pong. Prof. Agnew grabs a paddle and heads for the basement recreation room. Ten minutes later he slams the ball past his opponent, bouncing it off the floor and winning the game, 21-7.
BACK IN THE APARTMENT,
Prof. Agnew takes out his camera.
He clicks the shutter on one student conducting Wagner's "Rienzi"
overture.
He stops his arm waving and says it is time to eat. "Ah, yes." Prof.
Agnew answers and goes into the bedroom to replace his tennis shoes with a pair of brown shoes. He puts on a gray tweed coat and picks up the latest copy of the London Times. Two other students accompany him and they pile into the Corvette. Prof. Agnew drives the car out of the parking lot and shoots down the highway at 50 miles an hour to Boyd's Cafe for some breakfast.
At the cafe, he orders bacon and eggs and a coke and reads the Times, remarking to his company about some of the items. His order arrives and he eats slowly. A students enters the cafe and hails him. He sits down with the group and tells Prof. Agnew about a novel he is writing.
"Things should be quiet now," he says. "I've got some work to do." It was 2:30 a.m.
His meat finished, Prof. Agnew lights a cigarette, pays for his meal and leaves. The red Corvette sails down Massachusetts St., turns and darts up a side street to let the novelist off. At the Templin parking lot, Prof. Agnew roars in and parks his car.
MATINEE SUNDAY 2:30 EVES. 7:30 Adm. S1.
Adm. $1.00
Page-Creightor
FINA SERVICE
1819 W. 23rd
VI 3-7694
VARSITY
[TREAURE ... Talentium VARSIS 3-1065]
TONITE AND "EVERYTHING'S DUCKY"
SATURDAY! and "SERGEANT WAS A LADY"
Motor Tune-ups
Lubrication $1.00
All Major Brands
of Oil
Candlesticks made of brass, pewter, Wedgwood and silver will be included in the display of 18th, 19th and 20th century pieces.
The display of antique candlesticks is being sponsored by the Art Museum.
A 15th century Italian Madonna and Child will complete the Christmas theme.
Scientists are no damn good.— Enos
A Christmas candlestick collection will be on display in the south lounge of the Kansas Union Dec. 3-Jan. 3.
TWO BONUS HITS
SATURDAY ONLY!
SUNSET
Candlestick Collection To Be in Union
Glenn Ford - Jack Lemmon "Cowboy"
BIGDEAL TRAIN... West on Highway 48
AND
FRI.-SAT.-SUN.
Dean Martin — Ernie Kovacs
"Who Was That Lady"
PLUS
In a Lusty, Action-Filled Western in the Grand Tradition!
STARTS TOMORROW!
COLOR by DE LUXE
CINEMASCOPE
Matince At 2 p.m.
— ENDS TONIGHT —
"SUSAN SLADE"
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