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University Daily Kansan Thursday, Sept. 13, 1962
The Kansan's Tradition
With this issue, the University Daily Kansan begins its 51st year as a daily newspaper. During the past 50 years, certain traditions have characterized the Daily Kansan.
The most important of these is the Daily Kansan's role as a student newspaper; it is not merely a "house organ" as are many college newspapers. The Daily Kansan editors are completely responsible for operating the newspaper, and the paper has a freedom of editorial opinion which many other college newspapers do not have. Faculty members act as advisers, but they are advisers only.
THE EDITORS ARE AWARE OF THE tremendous responsibility we accept because of this freedom. We must accept any credit or blame for our achievements or mistakes. We cannot retreat behind the "just learning" excuse.
THE PAPER HAS WON numerous All-American ratings from the Associated Collegiate Press. This rating is the highest awarded each semester by that organization.
We feel the Daily Kansan's freedom has been at least partly responsible for the paper's position as one of the top student newspapers in the nation. This position has been shown by the awards and recognition won by the Daily Kansan during the past several years.
Two years ago Daily Kansan writing was judged best in the nation's college newspapers by the William Randolph Hearst Foundation, and last year Daily Kansan writing won second place in the same competition.
Last year, the Daily Kansan won a significant award from the National Conference of Christians and Jews for Kansan campaigns during the past
three years against racial discrimination. This is the first time a student publication has received the award, which has been given such publications as Look Magazine, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and the Christian Science Monitor.
The Daily Kansan, in meeting its responsibilities to the students, must work to better the University. This cannot be done solely by acting as a publicity sheet; a university, like any institution, cannot be improved by hiding its faults. Problems must be discussed openly to achieve the best solutions, and students must be made aware of, and must discuss, problems relating to their university — for a university exists primarily for the benefit of students.
We are aware of the philosophy of previous Daily Kansan editors regarding the function and purpose of a student newspaper—a philosophy which in part is responsible for the paper's achievements.
AT THE SAME TIME, a university—to be worthy of the name—must provide the maximum opportunity for free inquiry and discussion of all issues and for the widest possible dissemination of ideas. The Daily Kansan is one channel through which this is done.
THE DAILY KANSAN believes that a student newspaper is just that -a voice for the students. We believe a student newspaper has the responsibility to inform students of news which affects them and to guide and lead public opinion in the University community.
This is the philosophy which has been held by Daily Kansan editors through most of the paper's 50 years as a daily. It is the philosophy of the current editors.
—The Editors
... Letters ...
One of the functions of a university newspaper is to provide a place for student opinion and for discussion of controversial issues.
This has been done through a letters to the editor column, which for many years has been a lively and well-read portion of the editorial page.
THE DAILY KANSAN solicits letters regarding any issue, including its own policies, opinions and coverage. The Kansan's current policy on letters was stated in an editorial in 1960 as follows: "We strive to print every letter we receive that is in good taste and shows due restraint...
"We hesitate to refuse to print
a letter because we believe our readers have as much right to the space in this newspaper as we do. Their opinions are valued highly, and we hesitate to do anything that will cut off this important flow of material.
"HOWEVER, THIS policy does not give license to the printing of attacks on personalities as distinguished from issues..."
The Daily Kansan requires all letters to be signed. Names will be withheld if, in the editors' opinion, the writer has a legitimate reason for wanting his name withheld — but in any case the editors must know the writer's identity.
Although the editors will not cut
LITTLE MAN ON CAMPUS by Dick Bibler
letters without the permission of the writer, all letters should be kept as short as possible. This will help insure that the letter will be printed soon after its receipt and will increase the readership.
"DO YOU EVER HAVE ANYTHING ON YOUR MIND BESIDES GIRLS?"
FOR THOSE WHO WISH to write completely anonymously, the Kansan has a column entitled "Sound and Fury." This column is open to readers who wish to express opinion on important subjects, those opinions being of such import that they stand or fall on the worthiness of their content.
It is emphasized that "Sound and Fury" is not a column for anonymous letters. No material will be printed in the column which could just as well be in a letter. It will be reserved for contributions on basic and important issues. All contributions must observe rules of good taste, and the editors may edit contributions to this column for clarity, style, and space requirements.
The Daily Kansan is your newspaper. Use it to express your opinions.
UNIVERSITY
Daily Hansan
University of Kansas student newspaper
Founded 1889, became biweekly 1904,
and became weekly 1926.
Member Inland Daily Press Association, Associated College Rep. Represented by National Advertising Service, 18 East 50 St. New York 22. N. Y. Mail subscription rates: $3 a semester or $5 a year. Published in Lawrence, Kan., every afternoon during the University year except Saturdays and Sundays. Subscription admission periods. Second class postage paid at Lawrence, Kansas.
Telephone VIking 3-2700
February 71
University of Kansas student newspaper
Extension 711, news room Extension 376, business office
Scott Payne
Bill Kearseh, Deputy
Wigglesworth, and
Bill Mullins, Assistant Managing Editors; Mike Miller,
 assistant; Margaret Catcath, Society Editor;
Margaret Catcath, Society Editor;
NEWS DEPARTMENT
EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT
Clayton Keller and Bill Sheldon Co-Editorial Editors
BUSINESS DEPARTMENT
BUSINESS DEPARTMENT
Charles B. Benson Manager
Dan Meek, Advertising Manager; Doug Farmer, Circulation Manager; Gene Spaulding, National Advertising Manufacrur; Classified Advertising Manager; Jack Cannon, Promotion Manager
Provincial America
How About Your Conestoga Wagon?
By Bill Sheldon
August 9, a chartered jet from Brussels, Belgium, landed at New York City's Idlewild International Airport. The passengers were members of the University of Kansas family-students, faculty members and administrators.The flight was sponsored by the language studies group.
Quizzical looks came over the faces of many people when the public address announcer declared, "University of Kansas chartered Sabena World Airlines jet from Brussels now arriving." The faces in the milling crowd depicted an air of unbelief and dismay. These persons seemed to be asking themselves, "Kansas? Isn't that out west someplace? What are those farmers doing in the East?"
ONE MEMBER OF THE FLIGHT walked through the lobby and struck up a conversation with one of the airport workers. When the man behind the counter was told the traveler was from Kansas City he immediately asked where that was.
This, of course, completely threw the Kansan into a flutter and he went into a rather embarrassing dissertation on the location, size and importance of Kansas City.
While waiting for a friend to disembark, another KU student was approached by a "local" and was asked where he went to college. The reply again brought an unknowing stare and the question, "Where is Kansas?"
Once again an explanation was forthcoming. It was discovered that the Easterner had never heard of the state, had never been further west than Michigan, and had only a vague idea of where the Mississippi River was.
Americans continually lambast Europeans for being sectional in language, tradition, way of life, and scope of knowledge of each other. There is no reason for those in the New World to maintain such a haughty attitude about those in the "Old Country." They possibly are more guilty.
If a person tells a friend at KU that he lives 40 miles directly east of Albany, N. Y., the friend knows little more about the location than before he was told. The direction of thinking is: "If he lives east of New York state, he might be from England."
WESTERNERS THINK people living on the East coast are provincial because they might seem hard to get to know, outwardly snobbish because of their cultural background and historical awareness. Easterners believe anyone who lives on the other side of the Appalachians must be either a farmer or a fur trader. These western "settlers" are looked upon as renegades who are completely in the dark about world affairs and the national economy, and have no idea what a great contribution the Green Mountain boys made to American history.
THE EAST HAS NO CONCEPTION of what, or hardly where, the West is. But what of the knowledge of the East among Westerners? The situation is similar.
The typical Middlewesterner pictures the Eastern seaboard as one continuous metropolitan complex strung from Washington, D. C., to Boston. This mass of concrete and humanity contains mostly slums and warehouses interspersed with enormous edifices which house high pressure salesmen who are making a fabulous living "stealing" from the common man and the farmer.
Contrary to popular belief, there are no Indians rampaging across the far-reaching Western plains, and there are no pilgrims foraging the woods of the rolling hills of the East.
Therefore it is unfortunate, but the present situation will probably be present for many years. At least the situation will not change until citizens of this country take more pride in their nation and become embarrassed because they have no conception of what another sector of the country is like.
No specific route can be outlined to make people more aware of and appreciative of their countrymen. Books, pamphlets and movies only scratch the surface and frequently they reinforce the stereotyped picture. Travel is frequently out of the question for financial reasons.
Easterners are afraid to venture west of the Allegheny Mountains, quaking over the thought of being caught on some vast desert for days without water, being trampled in a stampede of buffalo, or possibly having to spend a night in a tee pee because the local settlement has no empty sleeping bags.
WESTERNERS ARE WARY OF traveling in the East for fear that the big cities will filch all their money, that they will get lost, or that one of those skyscrapers will crumble upon them.
THE KANSAN WHO DOES NOT know the capital of New York state should be as ashamed as the Rhode Islander who cannot conceive sprawling cities the size of Houston or Salt Lake City, or progress such as the new dams in Colorado or the urban renewal program in Topeka.
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The loyalty a person holds for the section of the country in which he lives is good. But this "home, sweet home" attitude should be supplanted by an even greater feeling for one's neighbor in another sector of the country.